i’m still not sure how that mitigates the current administration’s appalling failure at basic governance…
It doesn’t. But it’s about the optics, not reality
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This conversation is grossly irresponsible for all the reasons mentioned above. But we’re also missing a bigger point, which is that if the virus was released from a lab,
S O W H A T ?
It won’t make the current pandemic go away, or be easier to treat. It won’t justify war with China or burning down Chinese takeout places. It won’t mean the exact same situation couldn’t still arise naturally. It won’t affect what governments should do, or how their actions to date should be judged.
So, sure, you can “just ask” about Chinese bio labs, Chinese 5G infrastructure, Chinese people having sex with bats, etc. But folx will draw some pretty shrewd conclusions about why you’re just-asking those particular questions right now, as it’s clearly not for public health reasons.
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“It’s definitely a real possibility being bandied about at the high levels of the administration,”
That would be the administration full of conspiracy theorists, kooks and sociopaths. Sounds legit.
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Knowing how this whole thing started is “So What”? My approach to the world must be incredibly different than yours because that statement seems bizzare to me. Not saying my approach is better than yours, just that it is almost an alien spicies in comparison to “So What”.
Its interesting that the official Chinese story of blaming the seafood market ends up causing western intelligence agencies to suspect the seafood market is not to blame.
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This right here.
My first thought was “Trump and Boris huh? Okay but what about, say, the third highest level of the administration? Those folk seem to know what they’re doing at least some of the time.”
*Then how come I, along with most of the rest of the world outside the US and UK, *
That’s unfair. IIRC most of the British population knew that Blair was lying just as much as the US was.
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Also skeptical of any line of questioning coming from “high levels” of our administration. Even if it was a lab, there is a long history of lab accidents around these viruses ( https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2019/3/20/18260669/deadly-pathogens-escape-lab-smallpox-bird-flu ). I mean we literally do “gain of function” research where we boost it’s abilities to spread ( https://www.vox.com/2019/2/17/18225938/biologists-are-trying-to-make-bird-flu-easier-to-spread-can-we-not )
I don’t know if I’ve ever seen it articulated, but yes! When did the fun conspiracy theorists get replaced by gun hoarders and someone’s drunk uncle at Thanksgiving? I blame Facebook.
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I’ll remind you that the approval rating for the Iraq war was 54% for, 38% against. Yes, there were a million people protesting in London, but these were a minority at the time. Unfortunately Murdoch, Dacre and co did quite the number on the UK public at the time.
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I can tell you exactly when: it was September 12th 2001.
The Dick Cheney line about WMDs comes to mind on this – If there is even a one percent chance we should proceed as though its a certainty.
The GOP has a long, ugly history with facts and science. If Chinese lab is the answer Donny and the jets want, its the answer that they’ll find. I just pray American journalism has learned something in the past 17 years (although I’m yet to see anymore evidence for that then I’ve seen for a Chinese lab releasing SARS-CoV2).
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I misread that as “trial buffoon”. Seems more appropriate with this admin actually 
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At this point, I do not trust anything coming from Trump the Unfit’s “intelligence” agency - or Boris Johnson’s.
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The comments thread could have just stopped here. The blame game is their favorite distraction right now. The endless con-job continues.
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I sort of suspect we still have that–there’s just nobody in charge of governance that is heeding factual information anymore. At best they’re probably cherry-picking nuggets of intel that might “play well” with Trump’s base. It’s probably an infuriating time to be part of the FBI and CIA.
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That is interesting. The person’s claimed expertise of China is living in China for 10 years and speaking Mandarin.
All of his research is from online articles and forums.
That is not enough for me.
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