Fox News鈥� COVID blind spot
The death of Colin Powell meant the loss of another American hero.
He was beloved and respected on all sides of America’s ever-widening political divide.
Minutes after his death was announced, tributes filled the 24-hour news stations.
Some of those tributes were tearful. All were sincere.
I was heartened to see some of Powell’s contemporaries liken his contributions to American history to those of Uniontown’s George C. Marshall.
Both men had served our country admirably during wartime, and as senior statesmen during peacetime.
Powell, though, had the added burden of having to try to bootstrap through a military, which, at times, hadn’t always been hospitable to Black soldiers.
He survived, then thrived in a way that led him to become a history-making first as U.S. Secretary of State.
All of his accomplishments were in full view as speaker after speaker gave their testimonials.
But at Fox News, they did what they always seem to do. They used the occasion to make a stale point.
Morning show host Will Cain lauded Powell, then he theorized (and for no good reason) that there would be, “Conversations about him (Powell) being fully vaccinated.”
It’s true that Powell was fully vaccinated.
But Cain failed to mention Powell was 84 years old, a cancer survivor and suffering from Parkinson’s disease.
He simply had a compromised immune system.
That may have been understandable for Cain to overlook those facts since he was reporting on Powell’s death within an hour of it being made public.
But 12 hours later, Cain continued to question Powell’s cause of death.
“Does this tell us anything about the effectiveness of the vaccine?” he asked as if it hadn’t been already answered a thousand times.
“For that matter,” Cain continued, “what does it mean that Powell was fully vaccinated?”
If Cain wanted to know the answers to his barrage of rhetorical questions, he should have visited the CDC website.
Instead, he preferred to cloud the air with questions that would lead his fellow conservatives to believe that there are no easily obtainable answers for what defines “fully vaccinated.”
Cain continued.
“How long does the vaccine last?”
Then, “Did he get a booster?”
That revealed a lot about Cain’s motives. It had been reported earlier in the day that Powell had been scheduled to get his booster shot before it was discovered that he contracted COVID.
Cain wasn’t being curious about the efficacy of the vaccines.
He was implying that vaccines aren’t working. He’s leaving it up to Fox News viewers to draw conclusions based on his lack of research.
Another Fox News anchor, John Roberts, used Twitter to make an even stronger point.
“The fact that Colin Powell died from a breakthrough COVID infection raises new concerns about how effective vaccines are long-term,” wrote Roberts.
Roberts later deleted that tweet because, of course, it lacked the proper context.
The worst Chicken Little-like Fox News host is Tucker Carlson.
He’s been dangerously sounding alarms against masks and vaccines for months.
So, after Powell’s death, it was another occasion for Carlson to rev up his infernal “Question Machine.”
“So, what does that tell you exactly?” Then he concluded, “It tells you that you’ve been lied to. Vaccines may be highly useful for some people. But across the population, they do not solve COVID.”
Oh, they don’t?
Tucker, Tucker! You’ve left out the essential part about the 84-year-old Colin Powell having a weakened immune system.
Later in the same hour, Mr. Carlson returned to the subject of Powell’s death. He did seem like he was going to clarify his initial assessments.
“Vaccinating the vulnerable is so people with other underlying health problems won’t die of COVID. Unfortunately, that didn’t work in the case of General Powell, and it didn’t work for many thousands of other Americans, and that’s the point we’re making in the first place,” he smugly concludes.
That was a point NOT well taken.
Vaccinations aren’t just for the vulnerable. They’re for everybody. Even Fox News watchers.
Even Tucker Carlson’s watchers.
Even Tucker Carlson.
Edward A. Owens is a multi-Emmy Award winner, former reporter, and anchor for Entertainment Tonight, and 40-year TV news and newspaper veteran. E-mail him at freedoms@bellatlantic.net.