CLAY: We have got some breaking news. Not really a surprise. It was inevitable. But we have our first Omicron case here in the United States. It has been identified in California and it’s a breakthrough case, Buck. The person who has got the new variant that was the first identified in South Africa has been doubly vaccinated. They are not in any sort of substantial health related issue, but they have now tested positive.

We have identified the first case of what will certainly be many in the United States of this latest variant. Dr. Fauci is discussing this latest covid variant with all of the media, and your early read on this, Buck, is probably gonna be somewhat similar to mine, which is the variant gives the Biden administration and Dr. Fauci and his stooges more opportunities to implement more restrictions, more vaccine mandates, more restrictions of all of our freedoms. That’s my biggest takeaway, because we don’t really know that this new variant promotes or provides any more danger than covid already had in the first place.

BUCK: How could anybody understand — even at a very basic level — the Fauciite regime in this country and what it has done? This is essentially a health regime, right, health policy, first as the most important thing in America. How can anyone see this and not think that Dr. Fauci and the response that we’ve had is not an enormous failure?

They’ve said things repeatedly over and over again that are not true. Here we are being told… I actually have the official CDC tweet right in front of me. Look, I know they keep saying, “Oh, it changes. Oh, it changes. We sit here and say in advance of the data changing, ‘It’s going to change, and here’s how, and here’s why,'” right? So the CDC says they’ve got the first confirmed case of Omicron, obviously said that in California.

Everyone five years and older should get vaccinated against covid. Boosters are recommended for everyone 18 years and older. That’s the CDC that just put that out a few minutes ago. So we have a huge vaccine push underway right now. And they’re telling everybody to get boostered. And, remember, they’re telling us to do this at a time when we’ve already seen the previous vaccination did not have the durability of protection that they said it would when it comes to infection and spread.

It is good… We have to keep saying this otherwise Media Matters will clip this. “He says vaccines…!” You know, this is what they do. It is still good for protection against hospitalization and death, which is obviously very important. But if you’re 25, you’re not concerned about hospitalization and death from covid. You should not be — certainly not — if you’re 5 or 10.

CLAY: Yes.

BUCK: So why is getting all the kids vaccinated a reasonable thing to do under these circumstances, given that the actual risk of death from covid is something like one in 500,000 or whatever the actual figure is? The latest figures may be 140 kids, give or take, have died from covid in the entire United States. So we’re just repeating this all over again, and the part of this that I think everyone needs to keep in mind is, Clay, how are we not going to be in this same position next year? How is this not the way it is every year?

CLAY: Some details — a bit more — for those of you who are intrigued by this. The individual who has tested positive for Omicron was a traveler who returned from South Africa on November 22nd, tested positive on November 29th. So this person has tested positive from South Africa, but as we have been discussing on the show, already this new variant was widespread, potentially, in many different European countries, certainly several of them.

It may not have even originated in South Africa. That might have just been the first place to actually detect it. So I think it’s somewhat ironic and also quite predictable that the person who has tested positive for this new variant was already double vaccinated, Buck, and so to the point that we were making earlier.

I think it’s important to acknowledge that so far there does appear to be significant protection from death or hospitalization for people who are vaccinated. But in terms of actually spreading this virus, there’s a lot of studies out there now that are showing that the vaccine doesn’t seem to restrict any more the spread of the virus than for people who are unvaccinated.

BUCK: And let’s just be very clear about what is being said right now. Fauci is still up there doing his Fauci routine in the White House West Wing as we’re speaking to you and we’re seeing — I can see — the transcript in real time, the closed-captioning so I can get a sense of what he’s talking about as we’re discussing this.

First of all, I thought it was fascinating. There was a question, Clay, that was asked. “Well, if it turns out that Omicron is less…?” As you’ve pointed out, sometimes viruses mutate away from — thank heavens, right, or else what happened with the Spanish influenza… It went through a couple of cycles where actually it got worse in the second wave and then the third wave was pretty bad.

The second wave was really bad, but then it evolved into something else and it essentially went away, right? So it does happen that viruses can become less lethal, and they tend to do that. So if Omicron is effectively — and I’m not saying this is the case, but the early indicators are, what if it’s more akin to a bad cold, right? I don’t know this, but the early indicators are people have symptoms or no symptoms for a day or two so far.

If it were substantially… This is a question that was posed in the West Wing what I’m trying to get to here. If that is the case that it is less dangerous, well, then, why should we take all these restrictive measures to try to stop a less dangerous version of the virus from spreading pretty freely which may then…? Again I’m essentially paraphrasing what a journalist asked in the West Wing a moment ago.

Wouldn’t that be better than Delta which we know can still be very dangerous? Fauci basically said that’s crazy. He’s like, “That’s so dangerous! Nobody who knows epidemiology, whatever, supports that.” I know doctors who are epidemiologist who I think would actually say that that’s an interesting theory.

Assuming the data is in showing that it’s substantially less dangerous, ’cause then you would have natural immunity from something that’s much less dangerous than the Delta variant, and you’d want to outcompete the Delta variant. It’s just interesting. I bring it up, Clay, ’cause he dismisses it outright, and they’re telling us to get the shot when the reason for getting the shot is a variant that they are also telling us may — and I’m quoting — “evade some of the vaccine immunity.”

CLAY: It’s very well said. It’s a great question. And it’s something that we talked about on this show. I think it’s important to acknowledge because a lot of people out there, every time they hear “variant” or they hear “mutation,” the expectation is it makes things worse. Oftentimes actually that can not be true. It can make a virus much less dangerous with the mutations and the variations.

BUCK: “Mutation” sounds scary, right? If your doctor comes in with the clipboard and says, “We’ve found a mutation,” you’re freaked out, understandably.

CLAY: Yes, 100% — and, by the way, the other thing that we’ve been saying on this show that is going to be proven true (although it has not been officially proven true yet) is Dr. Fauci was just asked if two shots is still considered “fully vaccinated.” He says yes, but that could change. Let me tell you, it’s going to change.

BUCK: It will, 100%, and what will be fascinating — and I almost want to bookmark this, Clay, this part of the discussion because this will go in that big bin of “Clay and Buck were right,” right? I actually… I thought if I remember correctly — and we could always go back to the transcript — you were very concerned in July when Delta first was coming out and I was like, “Well, wait. Let’s see.” It turned out Delta/vaccine failure together —

CLAY: Was a bad deal.

BUCK: — created a huge surge in cases that we suffered through and then it was, “How is this happening?” It was, “Well, is the vaccine losing efficacy? Is it something else? Is it a mutation? What’s causing this?” Right now, I think we can look forward and pretty reasonably understand. This goes in the “Clay and Buck are right” bin, assuming that we’re right on this one.

The same way that there is now a culture of disdain from the top of the U.S. government for the unvaccinated, that will be transposed onto the unboostered. Just wait ’til January, folks. All of a sudden it will be, “Why aren’t you getting the booster? What’s wrong with you! Why don’t you care about people? Why do you want grandparents to die?” et cetera, et cetera, the whole thing all over again.

Right now they say, “We would never do that! The booster is a choice.” Let’s see where we are in, you know, middle of January when it comes to boosters because this is just their mentality, man. It’s never enough. You never mask up enough. You never get enough shots. Have we stopped the virus with all the things we’ve already done right now? Look at the numbers.

CLAY: No, we failed in every aspect, and that’s why you’re talking about the summer as Delta started to rise up, you looked at the data in England, you looked at the data in Israel, and you said, “This is ominous,” right? That’s the conversation that we were having. Right now, as we’ve been doing the show, Vermont — which is one of the most vaccinated states in the entire country — just hit an all-time high for covid hospitalizations.

Hospitalizations in Vermont have reached a new high, with 99% of seniors fully vaccinated and ~65% having had a booster shot, but the important thing to remember is that this is all the fault of college football fans in the South pic.twitter.com/dumAuL85kO

— IM (@ianmSC) December 1, 2021

And the reason why I want to bring up a state like Vermont — we got a lot of listeners in Vermont; we appreciate you guys — is because they’re doing everything that the Biden White House has told us we have to do to protect ourselves, and they’re still setting an all-time high right now as we speak for hospitalizations and covid infections.

BUCK: Can I also ask this — and I mean this — if we have an epidemiologist out there maybe, you can call in. Please don’t call in and say you’re an epidemiologist when you’re actually a holistic practitioner of something. I want to know, how much more infectious are we even really? They’ve already told us that Delta can essentially be spread in aerosolized form through casual contact.

I remember, ’cause I was making fun of how stupid the test-and-trace program was in June of 2020 in New York City. By the way, another in the Buck-was-right column ’cause it was absurd, right? But they were saying you had to be in close contact with someone for six to 12 minutes to get infected. Close contact, confined space, six to 12 minutes. That was pre-Delta. Then Delta comes along. “Oh, my gosh! Casual contact, aerosolized.” How much more transmissible could Omicron be? By the way, I ask that question. I don’t know.

CLAY: Great question.

BUCK: But it starts to sound like, is it like a heat-seeking virus missile like it’s gonna go through air vents and find people? You start to wonder how much more transmissible than Delta could it even really be, adnd then you also get into Fauci saying… I couldn’t believe this. I’m a J&J recipient here, Clay.

Two months after the shot, I’m supposed to get boostered? You gotta be kidding me. That’s what he says. Now, they’ll say you’re eligible. Okay. Well, if I’m somebody that’s really scared and wants to avoid it — which I’m not and I’m not getting boostered — what the heck is that, a 60-day vaccine? You’re kidding me.

CLAY: There’s an interesting study that I was reading. It wasn’t a study. It was just kind of a synopsis of how this Omicron had spread. They found two different guys who ended up getting the virus that never came in contact with each other, quarantining in a hotel on opposite sides of the hallway. So to answer your question on how transmissible could this be, if those guys are representative of that overall transmissibility?

In other words, you’re quarantining in your room’ he’s quarantining in his room. These are two doctors on opposite sides of the hallway. They both ended up testing positive. They never came in contact with each other. They only opened their door to be given food. So it was airborne moving somehow through the ventilation system from one hotel room to another.

BUCK: Clay, they didn’t mask up between bites. That’s what you are leaving out of this equation.

CLAY: That’s what happened. That’s a great point.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

FAUCI: The answer is yes, because you know that the new — the new regulation, if you want to call it that, is that anybody and everybody who’s coming into the country needs to get a test within 24 hours of getting on the plane to come here.

REPORTER: But what about people who don’t take a plane and just do border crossers coming in in huge numbers?

FAUCI: That’s a different issue. For example, when you talk… We still have Title 42 in regard to the protections at the border. So there are protections at the border that you don’t have the capability, as you know, as somebody getting on a plane getting checked looking at a passport. We don’t have that there, but we can get some degree of mitigation.

REPORTER: Is there something to do to test these people somewhere else?

FAUCI: No, there is… There is testing at the border under certain circumstances, as you know.

BUCK: Welcome back to the Clay and Buck show. Notice Fauci doing the tap dance there. We’ve gotta have everybody tested before they come into the U.S. or after they enter the U.S., depending. Except for the southern border! All of a sudden, it turns into blah, blah, et cetera, et cetera, under some circumstances, Title 42.

Clay, I know Border Patrol agents — I’m in contact with people down at the border — and guess what? They’re not testing everybody at the border for covid. They’re certainly not vaccinating everybody at the border who wants to come into the country right now. So that’s one part of it. Yet again, you have Fauci showing everybody what he’s really about, what he’s really about, who he’s really about.

And he also declined to comment on New York’s decision — which I mentioned earlier in the show today — to postpone elective surgeries. The quote was, “I really don’t want to comment on situations in individual states because there are so many factors from state to state that are different,” end quote. Anyone who doesn’t see this guy as a political hack is willfully blind.

CLAY: Well, it’s ironic that he would try to use that line because he has ripped states like Florida and Texas —

BUCK: Yep.

CLAY: — which have made decisions that are uniquely grounded in what’s going on inside of their state. And also, Buck, I just want to make it clear for everybody out there to understand how much of a hypocrite Fauci is on the border in particular when it comes to testing. What’s going on right now under these new rules, is if you and your family go down to Mexico?

You go to Cabo, you go to Cozumel, you go to Cancun. Maybe you go on a cruise. In order to come back into the country from Mexico, for instance, you have to prove that you don’t have covid. You are an American citizen; you are having to test. If you sneak across the border illegally and enter into this country, there is no requirement whatsoever that you be tested.

Similarly, if you are working at a place with over a hundred employees, Joe Biden is saying, “You have to be vaccinated! We are mandating it.” But if you are one of these illegal immigrants coming into the country, there’s no requirement whatsoever for you to be vaccinated. There’s no mandate in place for you.

So we’re talking about American citizens being put through expectations, protocols, hurdles that we’re not even requiring illegal immigrants to follow through. It seems backward. If you were going to be honest in your policies, wouldn’t you want noncitizens to have more stringent requirements than citizens?

BUCK: Yeah, of course — and also, we all know that they don’t know and they admit they don’t know what the reality of Omicron is in terms of transmissibility and lethality.

CLAY: Amen.

BUCK: So how is it reasonable to block hospital surgeries, elective surgeries right now? It’s absolutely not reasonable. It’s a panic move but Fauci, folks, if nothing else he’s a bureaucrat and a coward. He always has been.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

REPORTER: You have a vaccine mandate.

FAUCI: Right.

REPORTER: At what point does the booster become part of the mandate?

FAUCI: Y’know, I can’t answer that right now. But I know that for the time being, the official definition of fully vaccinated is two.

REPORTER: But do you see that changing?

FAUCI: It — it — it — it —

REPORTER: We keep having these variants. We’re concerned about them.

FAUCI: It could change. It could change.

REPORTER: You’re concerned?

FAUCI: It could change, yes.

BUCK: I think it almost certainly will change. Welcome back to Clay and Buck show.

CLAY: How much money would you put on that, Buck —

BUCK: Oh, man.

CLAY: — if you had to put dollars on the fact that it will change to “fully vaccinated” including being required to have a booster to be fully vaccinated?

BUCK: I’d throw out some cash. I’d throw down… I’d throw down a new electric scooter over that one, my friend.

CLAY: (laughing)

BUCK: I’d throw down some cash on that one.