https://amgreatness.com/2025/09/07/the-issue-is-never-the-issue-senate-hearing-turns-into-proxy-war/
The issue is never the issue.
The appearance of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Secretary of Health and Human Services, before the Pfizer Tribunal at the Dirksen Senate Office Building on Thursday reminded me of the truth of that famous saying of Saul Alinsky.
The issue is never the issue. What is always the issue, according to that community organizer nonpareil, is power.
Ostensibly, Secretary Kennedy came to answer questions about COVID (remember that scam?) and the performance of people at—or, rather, recently at—the Centers for Disease Control. He recently fired the new, freshly confirmed director, Susan Monarez, for being “untrustworthy,” and some 1000 staffers walked out in solidarity or—what’s that other word beginning with an “s”?—Oh, right: in a snit.
One by one, the senators, mostly Democrats but also a few Republicans, screamed and gesticulated at Kennedy, accused him of being a “charlatan” and worse, and demanded that he resign or be fired.
One friendly questioner asked whether Kennedy thought that the response to COVID had been “politicized.” Indeed, it had, Kennedy said. Moreover, the government and the media lied to the public about many aspects of the disease, beginning with its origin. (No bats were involved in this entertainment.)
The public was also aggressively lied to about the danger of the virus—overwhelmingly, the only vulnerable parts of the population were the elderly, the obese, and the diabetic. We were lied to about the efficacy of “social distancing”—it was a made-up nostrum—and cloth masks. They are worse than useless. I still see damaged souls driving around in cars or walking outside by themselves wearing a mask. You might as well, as some wag proposed, wear a seat belt while walking around as a sort of safety blanket.
But the largest load of lies concerned the various COVID vaccines. Kennedy’s views about the efficacy and safety of vaccines are often caricatured. You may or may not always agree with him, but his views are nuanced, well-informed, and subtle. Several senators seemed surprised that Kennedy could agree with the proposition that President Trump deserves the Nobel Prize for overseeing Operation Warp Speed, which produced a spate of COVID vaccines in a matter of a few months, while also remaining highly critical of the safety and effectiveness of the vaccines.