Robert F. Kennedy Jr., The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma, and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health (Skyhorse Publishing, 2021). ISBN: 978-1510766808. No single work has influenced the American alt-Covid discussion as much as Robert F. Kennedy’s
Kennedy’s book should be a mandatory read in high schools. Kennedy, meanwhile, needs to acknowledge that climate hysteria, like covid, is a tool of control, and he needs to retract his call to censor and imprison climate “deniers” in order to have any credibility.
This is (obviously) an excellent critique of the book, but I have to point out that RFK Jr should be giving credit simply for writing something critical of an individual who basically everyone else in his party was lying prostrate before.
It's RFK's very name under the book title that gives this a credibility almost nobody else could.
One of your criticisms of the book is that it does not really address the Covid vaccine and it’s dangers. Please keep in mind that this book was published in November of 2021. This was before most knew much about the many dangers of the vaccine. Of course, Kennedy, is well acquainted with the dangers of vaccines, but, at the time perhaps not necessarily this vaccine specifically.
As to your belief that hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin were not effective in treating the virus, particularly preemptively, or as an early disease treatment, I could not disagree more. I believe Dr Zelenko saved thousands of people. This also explains the low mortality rate from Covid in Africa, where these antivirals are taken with great regularity. Additionally, it stands to reason that they needed to demonize these antivirals in order to get the EUA. They also needed the EUA for scare tactics, and to make the way for dangerous treatments, like remdesivir and the clot shot.
Fauci may have been merely one participant in the broader discussion with regards to the entire debacle, but, believe me, there is a fiefdom, and Fauci has been at the head of it. I have personally known Tony Fauci for over 20 years. I live in XXXXX, Virginia and have knowledge that others do not. I am not saying that there is not an entire “Cabal” of evil doers. There is. But Fauci should never be let off the hook, or his influence watered down, for he was at the tip of the spear, and wielded tremendous influence and power.
I think Kennedys book is a must read for anyone to begin to understand how an entire world was upended.
By the way, while I admire Bobby Kennedy tremendously, I will never vote for him. I have learned a lot from him since 2012, but he is a Democrat. And I will never vote for anyone who allows their entire political party to be taken hostage by maniacs.
RFK Jr.'s book, read alongside Jennifer Bilek's investigative journalism, suggests that both COVID policies and trans policies are products of the bureaucratic-pharma-industrial complex that grew up around AIDS. The intense censorship and moralization around both; the legislation that makes deployment of very dubious medical treatments not just possible but obligatory; the astroturfing of "progressive" support (accompanied, unfortunately, by a lot of actual support from very dumb progressives); the incredible profiteering at the expense of actual health. They are twin heads of the same hydra.
I appreciate this review. I feel that TRAF is a very difficult slog to read--I only made it thru it once and it definitely suffers from not having an index, so kudos to you for reading it not once but twice and offering some unique insights into a bestseller that was ignored by the MSM, yet I have seen nothing in it disproved either.
I think some things became clear to me thanks to the "Plandemic" as some have termed it: 1) the utter collapse of so-called "evidence-based medicine" in practice (clinical judgment and patient preferences completely suppressed and even actively opposed by expert assertions, mandates and "guidelines"); 2) support for the use of vaccines is a religion or cult--most especially amongst medical practitioners; 3) I pretty much agree with your assessment of the bureaucracies and am also thinking we worry way too much about respiratory viruses--having experienced acute Covid in me, most of my family and my patients--with nearly everyone recovering well and not a single case of long-Covid anywhere to be found--I came to believe every aspect of the Narrative was a lie.
Excellent analysis. We are looking at Kennedy as a possible Presidential candidate here in the United States. I think his candidacy would be good for the Democratic Party- a bit of a return to old fashioned progressivism. This type of progressivism can actually touch libertarianism. It is where Kennedy’s venn diagram does not touch libertarianism that has me concerned and why I would likely not vote for him as President. He seems to believe in big government, but, for him, it must be the right big government. The problem that arises, as you state, is that it would matter little if this overweening government, its institutions and cronies, was pushing Ivermectin or the covid jab. It is still an enemy of peoples rights, the collective wisdom, and freedom of religion...end of story.
I live in Arizona and just learned moments ago that Northern Arizona University (NAU) in Flagstaff is giving an honorary doctorate to Bill Gates at commencement in a couple of weeks. I'm speechless.
If there are any NAU alumni, current students, parents, and Arizona residents that find this equally appalling as I do, we need to contact the University President, State Representatives, and the Board of Regents to stop this!
We'll never escape the virus management freaks until the General public comes to reject interventionism in general. The war machine (post WWII in particular) is the foundation of the idea that all can be overcome through mass action - "we beat the nazis and imperial Japan at the same time, we can do anything!"
The forces that brought us the pandemic are quite similar in form as those that brought about the globo war on terror. None of these failures slow them down a bit. Next will be a currency/economic reformation where the same top-down doltery is enforced on us all once again.
Excellent, excellent, excellent. This is why I love you; because you're meticulous and an honest analyst of data and willing to go wherever the facts point.
RFK Jr. has obsessions rather than missions; he's as establishment as they come; he will never go so far as to completely alienate the funding universe that he'll need for his political ambitions.
For a variety of reasons, not the least of which is a captured mainstream media, RFKjr has no chance of becoming president. HOWEVER, his candidacy could accomplish one important goal: forcing a discussion of the Covid politics: the lockdowns, mandates--masking & vax--and other bureaucratic excesses.
Let me add this observation that makes me chuckle about RFKjr's quixotic candidacy:
For 40+ years, the Democrat party has longed for another Kennedy. Now? The party has one--but it's not a Kennedy they want to embrace.
I totally agree with your last paragraph. Even with flu shots and handwashing, we still have flu seasons (except, of course, that time when we all wore masks and the sick people mostly had COVID-19). When "asymptomatic" healthy people are considered to be a health problem, well, that kind of thinking is a problem.
Apr 29, 2023·edited Apr 29, 2023Liked by eugyppius
Excellent review.
To Kennedy's defense, he has gone after several vaccines, to the extent a recent interview explicitly stated they cut his talk about vaccines in general and their links to slew of different adverse outcomes. While he sounds technocratic, saying "if we only followed this policy things would have gone better", if you read some of his others works he has a very real fear of the medical tyranny entering the world.
We've reached a point where now even many medical questions are out of bounds for peons to investigate, and the window of discourse not closes ever tighter to protect democracy. I hope he gets the nomination not because I think he can turn it back, but because the faster these bureaucracies go full mask-off, the faster they lose their legitimacy.
As evidenced by its title, Kennedy’s book was not intended to be a total guide to the Covid story. It was focused on what was known at the time about Anthony Fauci. As you acknowledge, the purpose was to take him off his pedestal. Also recall that it was published in November 2021, which probably means he finished the manuscript in the middle of that year before he went hunting for a publisher etc. So some of the later discoveries would not be in there. At this point, it probably would need an update (by somebody else under the circumstances).
Thanks for such a well-balanced review. I read the book and was mostly impressed by RFK's careful documentation of his stated data and facts, which was rare during those hysterical Covid days. Your characterization of the "bureaucratic neural network" (as I understand your meaning), which seems to have a life of its own, is helpful in explaining what many think is systematic conspiratorial oppression. The bureaucratic reaction is systematic but not really deliberate. In such networks, which hold great political power, many neural nodes can simultaneously respond to outside incentives, resulting in a coordinated system-wide response that, in a weird way, resembles the "unseen hand" of the market. I am getting a new respect (not admiration) for bureaucracy.
Re RFK Jr, i admire him (esp as a Dumocrat) for taking on WuFlu & St. Faux-Xi, but as you point out, E, too little-to-no focus on all of the more tyrannical aspects that were forced on people globally. I know conservative people who defied it all yet are all in for RFK on this 1 issue. But he’s an eco nut & the green tyranny (probably coming soon) is just the other side of the same COVID coin. He may not like the pharm industry but he probably loves the green shit.
It could well be true that Hydroxy & Iver might not be as “magic bullet” as billed; however, the fact that they were not only shrilly & hysterically attacked but actually BANNED in lots of places (including vet supply stores) & a manufacturing plant that made one or the other burned to the ground @ the height of that hysteria leads me to believe they were over the target as real treatments.
And since they would have been prescribed off-label had they been allowed, what harm in that if doctors & patients were willing to give them a try. Also, since they would have been prescribed off-label & not as a definitive treatment (at least not until proven otherwise), that off-label status shouldn’t have precluded EAU quackzines from being rolled out.
Kennedy’s book should be a mandatory read in high schools. Kennedy, meanwhile, needs to acknowledge that climate hysteria, like covid, is a tool of control, and he needs to retract his call to censor and imprison climate “deniers” in order to have any credibility.
This is (obviously) an excellent critique of the book, but I have to point out that RFK Jr should be giving credit simply for writing something critical of an individual who basically everyone else in his party was lying prostrate before.
It's RFK's very name under the book title that gives this a credibility almost nobody else could.
One of your criticisms of the book is that it does not really address the Covid vaccine and it’s dangers. Please keep in mind that this book was published in November of 2021. This was before most knew much about the many dangers of the vaccine. Of course, Kennedy, is well acquainted with the dangers of vaccines, but, at the time perhaps not necessarily this vaccine specifically.
As to your belief that hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin were not effective in treating the virus, particularly preemptively, or as an early disease treatment, I could not disagree more. I believe Dr Zelenko saved thousands of people. This also explains the low mortality rate from Covid in Africa, where these antivirals are taken with great regularity. Additionally, it stands to reason that they needed to demonize these antivirals in order to get the EUA. They also needed the EUA for scare tactics, and to make the way for dangerous treatments, like remdesivir and the clot shot.
Fauci may have been merely one participant in the broader discussion with regards to the entire debacle, but, believe me, there is a fiefdom, and Fauci has been at the head of it. I have personally known Tony Fauci for over 20 years. I live in XXXXX, Virginia and have knowledge that others do not. I am not saying that there is not an entire “Cabal” of evil doers. There is. But Fauci should never be let off the hook, or his influence watered down, for he was at the tip of the spear, and wielded tremendous influence and power.
I think Kennedys book is a must read for anyone to begin to understand how an entire world was upended.
By the way, while I admire Bobby Kennedy tremendously, I will never vote for him. I have learned a lot from him since 2012, but he is a Democrat. And I will never vote for anyone who allows their entire political party to be taken hostage by maniacs.
RFK Jr.'s book, read alongside Jennifer Bilek's investigative journalism, suggests that both COVID policies and trans policies are products of the bureaucratic-pharma-industrial complex that grew up around AIDS. The intense censorship and moralization around both; the legislation that makes deployment of very dubious medical treatments not just possible but obligatory; the astroturfing of "progressive" support (accompanied, unfortunately, by a lot of actual support from very dumb progressives); the incredible profiteering at the expense of actual health. They are twin heads of the same hydra.
I appreciate this review. I feel that TRAF is a very difficult slog to read--I only made it thru it once and it definitely suffers from not having an index, so kudos to you for reading it not once but twice and offering some unique insights into a bestseller that was ignored by the MSM, yet I have seen nothing in it disproved either.
I think some things became clear to me thanks to the "Plandemic" as some have termed it: 1) the utter collapse of so-called "evidence-based medicine" in practice (clinical judgment and patient preferences completely suppressed and even actively opposed by expert assertions, mandates and "guidelines"); 2) support for the use of vaccines is a religion or cult--most especially amongst medical practitioners; 3) I pretty much agree with your assessment of the bureaucracies and am also thinking we worry way too much about respiratory viruses--having experienced acute Covid in me, most of my family and my patients--with nearly everyone recovering well and not a single case of long-Covid anywhere to be found--I came to believe every aspect of the Narrative was a lie.
Excellent analysis. We are looking at Kennedy as a possible Presidential candidate here in the United States. I think his candidacy would be good for the Democratic Party- a bit of a return to old fashioned progressivism. This type of progressivism can actually touch libertarianism. It is where Kennedy’s venn diagram does not touch libertarianism that has me concerned and why I would likely not vote for him as President. He seems to believe in big government, but, for him, it must be the right big government. The problem that arises, as you state, is that it would matter little if this overweening government, its institutions and cronies, was pushing Ivermectin or the covid jab. It is still an enemy of peoples rights, the collective wisdom, and freedom of religion...end of story.
I live in Arizona and just learned moments ago that Northern Arizona University (NAU) in Flagstaff is giving an honorary doctorate to Bill Gates at commencement in a couple of weeks. I'm speechless.
If there are any NAU alumni, current students, parents, and Arizona residents that find this equally appalling as I do, we need to contact the University President, State Representatives, and the Board of Regents to stop this!
We'll never escape the virus management freaks until the General public comes to reject interventionism in general. The war machine (post WWII in particular) is the foundation of the idea that all can be overcome through mass action - "we beat the nazis and imperial Japan at the same time, we can do anything!"
The forces that brought us the pandemic are quite similar in form as those that brought about the globo war on terror. None of these failures slow them down a bit. Next will be a currency/economic reformation where the same top-down doltery is enforced on us all once again.
Excellent, excellent, excellent. This is why I love you; because you're meticulous and an honest analyst of data and willing to go wherever the facts point.
RFK Jr. has obsessions rather than missions; he's as establishment as they come; he will never go so far as to completely alienate the funding universe that he'll need for his political ambitions.
For a variety of reasons, not the least of which is a captured mainstream media, RFKjr has no chance of becoming president. HOWEVER, his candidacy could accomplish one important goal: forcing a discussion of the Covid politics: the lockdowns, mandates--masking & vax--and other bureaucratic excesses.
Let me add this observation that makes me chuckle about RFKjr's quixotic candidacy:
For 40+ years, the Democrat party has longed for another Kennedy. Now? The party has one--but it's not a Kennedy they want to embrace.
This is an important counter-balance to Kennedy's book and its discussion to date. So far the people I know are either totally sold or oblivious.
I totally agree with your last paragraph. Even with flu shots and handwashing, we still have flu seasons (except, of course, that time when we all wore masks and the sick people mostly had COVID-19). When "asymptomatic" healthy people are considered to be a health problem, well, that kind of thinking is a problem.
Excellent review.
To Kennedy's defense, he has gone after several vaccines, to the extent a recent interview explicitly stated they cut his talk about vaccines in general and their links to slew of different adverse outcomes. While he sounds technocratic, saying "if we only followed this policy things would have gone better", if you read some of his others works he has a very real fear of the medical tyranny entering the world.
We've reached a point where now even many medical questions are out of bounds for peons to investigate, and the window of discourse not closes ever tighter to protect democracy. I hope he gets the nomination not because I think he can turn it back, but because the faster these bureaucracies go full mask-off, the faster they lose their legitimacy.
As evidenced by its title, Kennedy’s book was not intended to be a total guide to the Covid story. It was focused on what was known at the time about Anthony Fauci. As you acknowledge, the purpose was to take him off his pedestal. Also recall that it was published in November 2021, which probably means he finished the manuscript in the middle of that year before he went hunting for a publisher etc. So some of the later discoveries would not be in there. At this point, it probably would need an update (by somebody else under the circumstances).
Thanks for such a well-balanced review. I read the book and was mostly impressed by RFK's careful documentation of his stated data and facts, which was rare during those hysterical Covid days. Your characterization of the "bureaucratic neural network" (as I understand your meaning), which seems to have a life of its own, is helpful in explaining what many think is systematic conspiratorial oppression. The bureaucratic reaction is systematic but not really deliberate. In such networks, which hold great political power, many neural nodes can simultaneously respond to outside incentives, resulting in a coordinated system-wide response that, in a weird way, resembles the "unseen hand" of the market. I am getting a new respect (not admiration) for bureaucracy.
Re RFK Jr, i admire him (esp as a Dumocrat) for taking on WuFlu & St. Faux-Xi, but as you point out, E, too little-to-no focus on all of the more tyrannical aspects that were forced on people globally. I know conservative people who defied it all yet are all in for RFK on this 1 issue. But he’s an eco nut & the green tyranny (probably coming soon) is just the other side of the same COVID coin. He may not like the pharm industry but he probably loves the green shit.
It could well be true that Hydroxy & Iver might not be as “magic bullet” as billed; however, the fact that they were not only shrilly & hysterically attacked but actually BANNED in lots of places (including vet supply stores) & a manufacturing plant that made one or the other burned to the ground @ the height of that hysteria leads me to believe they were over the target as real treatments.
And since they would have been prescribed off-label had they been allowed, what harm in that if doctors & patients were willing to give them a try. Also, since they would have been prescribed off-label & not as a definitive treatment (at least not until proven otherwise), that off-label status shouldn’t have precluded EAU quackzines from being rolled out.