Topic: WorldNetDaily
As the number of COVID cases increased over the summer, WorldNetDaily not only kept up its usual fake news falsely smearing vaccines, it freaked out over possible mask requirements and other abatement measures. First, though, Joe Kovacs gave space to a right-wing senator's conspiracy theory in an Aug. 13 article:
A U.S. senator is reviving debate over the COVID pandemic, alleging on national television the health catastrophe was "pre-planned by an elite group of people" intended "for our loss of freedom."
The remarks from Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., came during an interview with Maria Bartiromo of the Fox Business Network on Friday.
Bartiromo lamented about information suppression by the federal government as well as Big Tech.
[...]
Johnson explained: "This is all pre-planned by an elite group of people, that is what I am talking about, 'Event 201' occurred in late 2019, prior to the rest of us knowing about the pandemic. Again, this is very concerning in terms of what is happening, what continues to be planned for our loss of freedom."
In fact, "Event 201" was a simulation by governmentl and nonprofit officials to examine possible reactions to a pandemic, and there's no evidence that theorganizers knew that a real pandemic wasc oming -- something Kovacs hid from his readers.
As cases increased, Peter LaBarbera spent an Aug. 21 article fearmongering about possible mask mandates anbd hyping extremists declaring they won't comply with something tyhat didn't yet exist:
With new COVID variants, including BA.2.86 and EG.5, in the news, the same media and activists on the Left who were most fanatical about masks and other heavy-handed COVID policies during the pandemic are now pushing mask mandates again.
Conservatives warned it could be a precursor to a return to oppression in the name of fighting COVID, and vowed collectively not to "comply."
U.S. Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, tweeted out the message: "COVID [does not equal] constitutional authority" above a tweet by Ryan Cunningham that states: "The WHO [World Health Organization], CDC, Biden Admin are fear mongering a new COVID variant BA.2.86 after highly mutated strain reported in Michigan. Sources in DHS and Emergency Management (my field) are already preparing for lockdowns and restrictions. Look at todays headlines. It’s a coordinated government & media campaign."
[...]
But with most Americans enjoying their freedom and thrilled the era of compelled mask-wearing is over – and conservatives already vowing not to comply with renewed COVID restrictions – it appears it would be a lot harder for elites to instill mass COVID paranoia and the tyranny that flows from it than it was in the initial phase of the pandemic under Donald Trump's presidency.
Never mind, of course, that it was LaBarbera that was instilling paranoia.
Bob Unruh followed with an Aug. 24 article pushing the very weird conspiracy theory that a new COVID outbreak is being manufactured to help President Biden's re-election chances:
The undue influences on the 2020 presidential election already have been documented: Mark Zuckerberg's $400 million handout to election officials who often used it to recruit leftist voters. And the FBI's interference when it falsely told media groups to censor accurate reporting about the Biden family's international business schemes because it was Russian disinformation, when it wasn't.
But the rampage of COVID-19 across the country also had an impact. Voting rules were changed, vote-counting procedures changed. voting periods extended until sometimes weeks after election day and more.
Now that the 2024 election is coming into view, it seems that COVID is surging again.
"Mandates are coming back just in time for the 2024 election cycle," conservative Collin Rugg posted online. "What impeccable timing!"
A report at Just the News noted Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk cited new COVID restrictions are "just in time for Democrats to reinforce the importance of mass mail-in ballots."
Unruh offered no evidence that mail-in ballots were in any way a problem in 2020.
LaBarbera returned to serve as stenographer for Donald Trump in an Aug. 31 article:
Former President Donald Trump in a campaign video Wednesday made a defiant reply to "left-wing lunatics" and "COVID tyrants" who are "trying very hard to bring back COVID lockdowns and mandates with their sudden fear-mongering about variants": "We will not comply."
Trump mocked the timing of the resurgent COVID hysteria, saying, "Gee-whiz, you know what else is coming? An election."
"They want to restart the COVID hysteria so they can justify more lockdowns, more censorship, more illegal drop boxes, more mail-in ballots, and trillions of dollars in payoffs to their political allies heading into the 2024 election. Does that sound familiar?" he said in the statement, which is posted on the "Team Trump" X account with the words: "COVID Tyrants want to take away our Freedom. Hear my words – WE WILL NOT COMPLY." (Team Trump is the official X account for the Trump campaign.)
[...]
There is widespread consensus on the Right, and even grudging acknowledgement on the Left, that COVID fears and lockdowns enabled emergency changes in various state election rules that were used to great advantage by Biden and the Democrats in the 2020 election against Trump.
Unruh hyped more fearmongering about almost entirely nonexistent restrictions in a Sept. 6 article:
There's no doubt that COVID-19, in its first form, was a catastrophe, killing some seven million people around the world after having come out, as most experts now believe, of a research lab in Wuhan, China, where bat viruses were being studied by scientists who wanted to know how to make them for lethal.
The death toll in the U.S. alone was about one million.
But subsequent variations all have since proven to be far, far less lethal.
Many people infected with a variant have reported nothing more than sniffles or brief cold-like symptoms.
It was the No. 3 cause of death in the U.S. in 2020 and 2021, fourth in 2022, and so far in 2023, No. 7.
So why are headlines now insisting that mask mandates, those infamous shots and business-killing lockdowns coming back?
And do they have to?
A commentary by John Daniel Davidson, senior editor at The Federalist, charged that the precautions actually nothing to do with anyone's health.
Neither Unruh nor Davidson offered any evidence that COVID vaccines are "infamous" (beyond their right-wing bubble, anyway) or that vaccines are, in Davidson's words, a "Violation of basic civil rights."
