Even during a holiday week, the current administration appears chaotic and inconsistent.
Did President Joe Biden express contrition during his whirlwind Tuesday press conference? He admitted he should have ordered 500 million tests two months ago, forgetting that he pledged to deliver 300 million tests back in September.
Biden then went to ABC News to clean up the mess with a formal interview. Perhaps it was not as disastrous as his post-Afghanistan debacle on the same network, but it also was not overly reassuring.
When asked by David Muir about “these long lines, people waiting for hours outside in the cold, just to get tested, to be reassured before they spend time with their family,” Biden replied, “I don’t think it’s a failure. I think it’s — you could argue that we should have known a year ago, six months ago, two months ago, a month ago.”
The Biden Administration Rejected an October Proposal for “Free Rapid Tests for the Holidays”https://t.co/b6hJvreV43
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) December 24, 2021
That statement is another sign that Biden does not remember what he promised earlier. Back in his big September announcement of a vaccine mandate for employers, the president told Americans we’d find COVID-19 tests to be abundant and free.
“We’ll also expand free testing at 10,000 pharmacies around the country,” he explained. “And we’re committing $2 billion to purchase nearly 300 million rapid tests for distribution to community health centers, food banks, schools, so that every American, no matter their income, can access free and convenient tests. This is important to everyone, particularly for a parent with a child not old enough to be vaccinated. You’ll be able to test them at home and test those around them.”
But fewer than 2 million national test results were reported most days this week, totaling about the same number as in September when the Delta variant was spreading, and a smaller amount than one year ago.
If you look at news today, reports show people can’t find tests on the shelves, and open appointments for free tests–from California to Cleveland to Houston–are hard to obtain.
As for Biden’s guarantee this week that 500 million new COVID-19 tests will start arriving in January, even the New York Times expressed doubts about that timeline.
Earlier this week, David Harsanyi concurred, noting in part:
“The government keeps getting in the way. We now have vaccines. We now know a lot more about therapeutics and treatments. We’ve now had experiences with multiple variants. And we knew that testing, no panacea, was going to be important. And the FDA, unlike virtually everything else Biden concerns himself with these days, is actually under the purview of the president. So why doesn’t Biden deserve the blame he so eagerly heaped on his predecessor?”
Related: White House Continues Cruel and Dehumanizing Messaging on COVID
Omicron spread more rapidly than we thought, but not only isn’t it killing people, but it’s already peaked where it began.
Before Christmas arrives, let me add that ever since the government started taking aggressive action against COVID in March 2020, Americans have been told that if we could just get over a hump — recall “two weeks to stop the spread”— draconian madness would be over. But every time we conquer a hump, another one appears on the horizon.
“Their control of us has never been about a desire to control us, but a desire to cover up their lack of control of a microbe. Science is their god and their god has failed them.” https://t.co/xLZS0k14wr
— Erick Erickson (@EWErickson) December 23, 2021
At some point, the misinformation and fearmongering must cease.
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