Bill Gates comments trumpeted by China's propaganda, media

FPI / April 28, 2020

China is widely-considered now to be responsible for infecting the world with coronavirus. Therefore the communist country is the reason America is on lockdown and tens of millions are out of work.

But billionaire Bill Gates says we should stop picking on China.

Criticizing China for failing to act early to prevent the global pandemic is a "distraction," Gates said during an interview that aired on Sunday’s broadcast of CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS”.

“I don’t think that’s a timely thing because it doesn’t affect how we act today,” Gates said. “You know, China did a lot of things right at the beginning, like any country where a virus first shows up. They can look back and say they missed some things. Some countries did respond very quickly. They get their testing in place and they avoided the incredible economic pain. It’s sad that even the U.S. that you would have expected to do this well did it particularly poorly. But it’s not time to talk about that.”

Gates continued: “This is the time to take the great science we have — the fact we’re in this together, you know, fixed testing, treatments, and get that vaccine and minimize the trillions of dollars and many things you that you can’t even dimensionalize in economic terms that are awful about the situation we’re in. So, that’s a distraction. I think there’s a lot of incorrect and unfair things said, but it’s not even time for that discussion.”

Not surprisingly, Chinese propaganda outlets had a field day with Gates's comments.

China Daily EU bureau chief Chen Weihau tweeted a video of the Microsoft founder praising China's coronavirus response. Chen wrote: "Bill Gates blasts Trump’s blame game on China as a distraction."

China Daily is a state-run English-language propaganda machine.

"When you watch that video, you have to wonder what office Gates was elected to in order to speak as he does," RedState columnist Bonchie noted. "He talks as if he’s the President or a governor of a state, spewing baseless Chinese propaganda about their early testing and supposed fewer health and economic woes with absolute authority. Gates appears to accept their obviously false reports on infections and deaths at face value. Meanwhile, the ChiComs are thanking him for his contribution by sharing his words all over social media."

When asked about the World Health Organization’s culpability in the CNN interview, Gates said “basically no,” pushing back on President Donald Trump’s claim that the organization is “very China-centric.”

“In the retrospective, we’ll see things the WHO could have done better, just like every actor in this whole picture, but the WHO has a strong connection with one country. That country is the United States,” Gates stated. He went on to call the WHO a “phenomenal organization that we’re more dependent on today, to drive things, than we ever have been.”

RedState's Bonchie concluded: "You’d think someone as smart as Gates would realize what he’s doing and not do it, but perhaps this is what he truly believes? Maybe he’s just really this invested in the CCP and corrupt officials like Dr. Tedros at the WHO. If he is, he shouldn’t be anywhere near the levers of power concerning this pandemic. I realize he’s given a lot of money, but money shouldn’t be rewarded with influence if one’s views are this anti-American. Let him go influence China’s machinations or he can run for office if he wants to dictate our responses so badly. We’ll see how that goes for him."

Free Press International