Ross Douthat

What is the link there?

But are you saying they tried to shut down knowledge and debate about the origins?

Or are you saying that the attempts to crush religion

COVID itself through lockdowns and so on were a kind of expression of guilt.

Like, I have to be able to crush this disease because I myself released it.

So we don't have Anthony Fauci here to argue with you.

But let me try and offer a couple arguments to you for...

what you could imagine people in his position were thinking, right?

So first argument would be

okay, COVID-19 did not have a 5% mortality rate.

It was not particularly dangerous to children, thank God.

It did have a much higher mortality rate, you would agree, than any sort of seasonal flu that we have encountered.

Yes, you'd grant that.

Okay.

And it has profound... The 1918 flu was really bad.

Right, since the 1918 flu.

And it is profoundly risky for older Americans, senior citizens, and so on, right?

It might be that it's just really hard in a big, diverse, fluid society to design a set of policies that sort of separate off old people from the rest of society.

Maybe you can do that to some degree with nursing homes, but most old people...

We have a lot of old people in America.