During Dr. Anthony Fauci’s appearance on Wednesday before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, we witnessed one of the most astonishing things we’ve seen recently in Washington, D.C.—perhaps in decades.
No, it was not the smug and cowardly Fauci pleading the Fifth 111 times. Washington does smug and cowardly the way Ocean City does suntan lotion.
It was not Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., methodically working his way through Fauci’s countless deadly contradictions between his public statements and private musings. Paul’s had Fauci’s number almost since the days of the Rolodex.
It was not Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, dropping coarse language the way Caitlin Clark drops 3-pointers. It certainly wasn’t a string of Democrat senators loving on Fauci almost as much as he loves himself.
It was the brief statement of Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa. Bucking his own party (again), and bucking the theatrics of the day, Fetterman, in his slow, halting way, did something almost unimaginable in politics. He showed contrition.
True, Fetterman, thanks to his stroke, is still sometimes harder to follow than a James Joyce novel. But through his heart and his tone, Fetterman made his meaning clear: I question my own actions and those of Pennsylvania during COVID and failed the public by putting partisanship over the people.
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(It’s worth noting that, thanks to “Admiral” Rachel Levine, Pennsylvania is one of the blue states that shoved elderly COVID patients back into nursing homes to catastrophic effect.)
Two Minutes of Self-Critique
Fetterman only spoke for two minutes, which itself may be a record in Washington. He also put aside his iconic black hoodie and wore a suit, a statement perhaps on how somber the day should have been given the millions of souls lost and tens of millions of lives shattered.
The senator opened by saying he wasn’t there to attack Fauci or defend him. (What? Then what’s the point of all those cameras?)
He noted with a heavy heart that he’d had many family members die of COVID and that he also grieves for those who lost their businesses through the pandemic. “Their lives have never been the same.”
Then he reaches the heart of the matter, with a finger pointed squarely at himself.
“During the pandemic, I was the lieutenant governor, and we were in the middle of all of that maelstrom, trying to find the right balance between protect life and protect the economic of all of that. And I’m not sure if we got it all right, or got it all wrong, but without a doubt I can continue to question myself.”
Like crying in baseball, there’s no second-guessing in politics. But here is Fetterman laying himself bare.
“But one, it’s not so much more about your regrets, but I have one. Early on, there was the theory that the virus could have emerged from the lab. And early on, that became like a ‘right-wing’ kind of theory. And I thought seemed to make sense. Now there was a really advanced lab that was close by. And you have this unknown virus out.
“But that became a very partisan thing. And it seems now it’s more and more an emerging theory that that would have come from the lab.”
He closed with a truth that is both self-evident and utterly absent from today’s partisan politics.
“Now, I hope that the next time our nation’s facing something like this, we do not become, as I might have been, blinded by the partisan idea that maybe the truth might come from a side that’s different than you are.”
Who’s the Real Ogre?
Have you heard any government official, be it an elected leader or public health “expert,” express more contrition, self-reflection, and wisdom over what was done to this nation during COVID than Fetterman in those two minutes?
Fauci, who more than anyone on the planet should be flogging himself for his actions, has shown less concern over the lives lost and damage done than a backyard zapper does for flies. He should be on his knees begging forgiveness. Instead, he’s on his front doorstep accepting flowers and the continued adoration of a complicit media.
He’s the one who should be donning a hoodie and pulling the hood over his face in shame.
A few days before the hearing, Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed compared Fetterman to an ogre.
On Wednesday, Democrats not named Fetterman labeled Fauci a hero.
History—and I believe God—will harshly judge which is the ogre. And in my book, at least when it comes to COVID accountability, Sen. John Fetterman is a hero.
We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal.
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