No one is “canceling Christmas” under any circumstances. To the extent that the CDC recommends that people not travel (which is all they have been doing anyway), the people who are most responsible for continued COVID trouble work for Fox News (among other networks). And yet, this morning, the Fox and Friends crew actually joked – though angrily – about whether the Grinch, Dr. Fauci, will be canceling Christmas.

We just passed 700,000 dead from COVID. Of late, the dead are confined to those who have not been vaccinated. Had everyone followed Joe Biden’s advice and been vaccinated by June, we could have had a normal 4th of July, but even more importantly, we would have all but stomped out the disease, not giving it a chance to make a late summer comeback, one that killed another 100,000.

“Another 100,000,” it sounds so flippant. And yet it’s within the number of people that the CDC originally projected might perish from the disease. Who recalls when the “large number,” or the “upper end” of possible lost lives was 240,000? We have now near tripled that figure.

Fox and Friends laugh about it, while Tucker Carlson makes things that much worse each evening, casting as much doubt as he can. Of course, “casting doubt” about the disease involves mocking Dr. Fauci, or at least increasing the anger at Dr. Fauci. The hosts at Fox and Friends are happy to oblige.

He is not “canceling” Christmas. But as we’re finding out from Facebook’s current predicament, the way to increase eyeballs (viewers or readers) is to increase their anger. Fox profits off people’s anger at Fauci, Biden, or anyone else who might harsh their Christmas plans.

It is the ultimate tragic irony that all Dr. Fauci is trying to do is ensure that some people get to enjoy Christmas at all.

crushing my skull in an industrial vise until it pops like a ripe grape pic.twitter.com/GzxcAYsK31

— Bobby Lewis (@revrrlewis) October 4, 2021

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[email protected] and on Twitter @JasonMiciak