Fauci, yes.
Bright, yes.
The rest can get the boot.
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One thing is sure. Birx knows a lot more about epidemiology and public health than Scott Atlas does.
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She should definitely stay on the task force. Who else is going to get covfefe for Nunez-Smith?
Hi! To find out what I can do, say @discobot display help.
Discobot, you are my eternal foil.
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There’s nothing in her past, or her current handling of the situation that suggests she should be retained.
The only question is whether the Biden team is able to find someone else who can help with the transition work, but considering how little the panel achieved under Trump, there may not be much to transition anyways.
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Oh, god yes. Drag Atlas out at 12:01pm on Jan 20 before he kills anyone else. Drop him, Barr, and DeVos over an ISIS stronghold.
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Keep her on, but demote her.
Surely some frogs need the pimples on their asses counted, right? That’s about the level of her “expertise.”
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disco bot is a liar. It asks me to say “display help”. Now I could yell at my laptop but there’s never a response from this Russian bot. TPM ought to can it. Discobot is in my pantheon of hated nonliving entities. Cortana in Windows 10 and Bixby on my Verizon infected phone are the others.
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If I recall correctly, Birx has either been at the root of, or a participant in, several decisions that impeded data collection during the pandemic.
That alone should make a hard ‘no’ on Birx an easy call.
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While that is a general concern of mine, whether to keep Birx around does not tell us anything about that. Keeping Birx around would not be pandering to moderates or the right, because they wouldn’t think twice of it. The discussion to keep Birx around is based largely on whether as the functional head of the current COVID task force, would getting rid of her hurt the COVID response or not. Even a day’s delay is 1500 Americans lost who would otherwise be alive, and tens of thousands more infected and sick.
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I have no more doubt about your point of view.
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She did more harm than good, and her responsibility was to do no harm. Buh bye.
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“Brix out on the sidewalk”
ISWYDT
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ETTD
DTMFA
In this country, it is good to kill an admiral from time to time, in order to encourage the others.
Voltaire, Candide.
Get rid of her. If you really think she knows something useful (which I doubt), maintain a back-channel.
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Dump her!
Why do you hate ISIS?
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On further thought, it’s possible this isn’t even a decision the Biden team has to make. It’s pro-forma for political appointees to offer their resignation to an incoming administration, but she may want to bail out anyway. She can write her book defending herself and climb in bed with Big Pharma as a lobbyist.
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I don’t think ambition was part of the equation. I think she was cowed by Trump and decided to play it both ways for the greater good, but she miscalculated and forgot how to properly do her job.
I’m willing to give an older woman some leeway, because they were raised in a different era, not encouraged to think for themselves, told to kowtow to men, etc.
That being said, being a leader requires that you not be easily cowed by your boss. There is no room in a Biden administration for Birx in any type of leadership role. If she has knowledge that might help with the pandemic, that’s different, but I don’t see what that might be. So I think she should be politely thanked and sent on her way. She will need to deal with her shortcomings during this period on her own. (I’m assuming she has a conscience.)
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