China, virus and uncontrolled rocket entry

I went back to a post I did last year to see what I wrote about what we might do in regards to China once we reach the other side. Cross my fingers, it looks like we might reach the other side this year – OMG, that would be awesome – but we must first see how the summer goes in the South and how we fare in the fall.

So here’s what I wrote last year:

“First, China. We’re already sort of seeing this but there may be more drumbeat on the culpability of China in this pandemic due to its stifling of information from doctors. I would not be surprised that after we get through this horrible time, there would be an assessment on whether China should remain a member of the WTO. Or maybe US businesses will start to pull out of China because businesses cannot depend on China to be open with information in crises such as this. If I remember correctly, I think when China joined the WTO in 2001, it was hoped that its participation in the global economy would introduce changes within the country, bringing in more democratic tendencies as people start to enjoy their wealth, but that hasn’t happened. It’s a real possibility that Americans will call for businesses to pull out of China, especially after so many years of offshoring to China our manufacturing.”

“Black Swan”

Black Swan – Veronique Frizzell

Black Swan

It is still not certain whether the world “punishes” (that’s not the right word but it’s all I can think of at the moment) or ascribes some kind of blame to China for their lack of cooperation in getting to the bottom of where the virus came from, but there is certainly a lot of noises about the possibility of a lab leak leading to the pandemic.

Last year, researchers/scientists/doctors said that based upon the mutant evolution of the virus, the evidence points to an animal, such as a bat, as the initial spark for the pandemic that then jumped to a human rather than a lab accident or bioweapon program as the source.

““If you look at the evolution of the virus in bats and what’s out there now, [the scientific evidence] is very, very strongly leaning toward this could not have been artificially or deliberately manipulated.”

“Everything about the stepwise evolution over time strongly indicates that [this virus] evolved in nature and then jumped species,” he added, telling the magazine that based on the scientific evidence, he did not entertain the lab leak theory.”

National Geographic, May, 2020.

For me, the first tremblor to the animal theory came from Robert Redfield, a virologist who headed the CDC during the Trump administration. I don’t regard him as a Trump lackey; I regard him as someone who was stuck between a rock and a hard place. It’s possible he had to speak softly or face replacement by a Trump lackey who would not tell the American people the truth about the virus. We might not have gotten the truth that the virus was more contagious and deadly than the flu, that we would need to social distance, and that we would need to wear masks. Under a Trump lackey, we might have had way more deaths than the 600K (technically, we’re not there yet but we’re closing in – we’re at 598,910). As of yesterday (March 27, 2021) there has been about 3.5 million deaths recorded around the world that are attributed to Covid, although that figure is most likely grossly underreported.

Anyway, this is what Robert had to say, earlier this year:

““I am of the point of view that I still think the most likely etiology of this pathogen in Wuhan was from a laboratory, you know, escaped,” Redfield told CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta during an interview taped in January, to be aired in full Sunday. “Now, other people don’t believe that, that’s fine. Science will eventually figure it out. It’s not unusual for respiratory pathogens that are being worked on in the laboratory to infect the laboratory worker.””

Robert Redfield

He is knowledgeable enough (he’s a virologist) and independent enough (not a Trump lackey) for me to pay attention to an alternate theory.

The next tremblor came from Anthony Fauci:

“When asked if he was confident that Covid-19 developed naturally: “I am not convinced about that,” he added. “I think we should continue to investigate what went on in China until we continue to find out to the best of our ability what happened.” He continued: “Certainly, the people who investigated it say it likely was the emergence from an animal reservoir that then infected individuals, but it could have been something else, and we need to find that out. So, you know, that’s the reason why I said I’m perfectly in favor of any investigation that looks into the origin of the virus.””

Anthony Fauci

That was a big tremblor.

Then this week came a barrage of news that scientists and doctors are calling for more investigations into China: scientists say that by now we should have identified an animal as the source. The fact that we haven’t, suggests that the lab theory may actually be right.

And finally, the kicker news is that the US intelligence also learned (when, I don’t know, still trying to find that) that back in November 2019, three researchers from the Wuhan lab was seriously sick with Covid-19 like symptoms that they were hospitalized. I don’t know when the US intelligence knew about the three sick researchers; I also don’t know when they knew about the hospitalization. Did intelligence know last year or was this a recent discovery? The timeline of this knowledge is missing. Because if the intelligence knew last year that 3 researchers from the Wuhan lab were sick in November 2019 with Covid-like sypmtoms, why didn’t they tell the American people?

Combine all of these news with the fact that China was uncooperative with the WHO in trying to find out where ground zero is and you start getting very suspicious of China’s motivations. From what I’ve read, China is still not cooperating. Why? Don’t they want to know where the coronavirus came from so that we can prevent this from happening again?

Or do they already know? If they already know, it kind of suggests a lab accident.

The uncooperative nature of the Chinese government suggests that the Chinese government is not a good world citizen and cannot be trusted to safeguard the inhabitants of the world.

A couple of weeks ago, there was an uncontrolled entry of a Chinese rocket into the Earth’s atmosphere. Fortunately, it landed in the water, but if it had landed on a populated land …well, it would have been catastrophic (at least that is my understanding). Again not a good world citizen because the Chinese had been irresponsible to build such a huge rocket that China (or any country) would have been unable to control the rocket’s descent.

These two incidents portray China as a bad world citizen such that I wouldn’t be surprised if other countries around the world demand something. I don’t know what. Maybe not have economic dealings with them since they are untrustworthy.

The drumbeat for accountability seems to be rising.