the coming crisis of confidence. i'm michael smerconish in philadelphia with a question -- how did a novel back coronavirus get to 11 million people in central china in the dead of winter when most bats were hibernating and turn a market where bats weren't sold into the epi center of an outbreak? when asked that way, the lab leak theory of the origin of covid-19, it sounds quite plausible. a newly released investigative piece in "vanity fair" raises that question and a lot more. this analysis has accelerated a conversation long overdue and it tells the story how a loose network of sleuths of investigator scientific expertise spread around the globe, under took an examination

of a theory of covid origin was that originally discounted by those whose job it was to figure it all out. together they formed a group called drastic to investigate covid-19. one founder was a data scientist who works for a bank in new zealand whose asperger syndrome gives him a professional advantage in finding patterns in data. but while he was building a plausible case for a all about leak, more than two dozen scientists released a statement in a respected medical journal saying this, quote. now to be sure there were crackpots and political hacks hoping to pin the origin on a wuhan lab in the hope of gaining a on china and a boost to president trump. after all trump said early on he had seen classified information indicating that the virus had come from the wuhan institute of

virology. when asked he said i can't tell you that. i'm not allowed to tell you that. the question now fearful of being drawn in a national political debate or cast as nativists did not pursue a theory that was worthy of exploration. eban conducted a months long investigation and interviewed more than 40 people and reviewed hundreds of pages of government documents and found this -- conflicts of interests stemming in part from large government grant supporting controversial virology research hampered the u.s. investigation into covid-19's origin at every step. in one state department meeting, officials seeking to demand transparency from the chinese government say they were explicitly told by colleagues not to explore the wuhan institute of virology's gain of function of research because it would bring unwelcome attention to u.s. government funding of it.

in the summer of 2020 when state department leads had gone cold, they got a tip from a foreign source. key information was likely sitting in the u.s. intelligence community's own files unanalyzed. in november that lead turned up classified information that was absolutely arresting and shocking said a former state department official. three researchers at the wuhan institute of virology all connected with gain of function research on coronavirus had fallen ill in november of 2019 and appeared to have visited the hospital with symptoms similar to covid-19, three government officials told "vanity fair." the reaction inside the state department? holy shit! according to one senior official who recalled the instance. we should probably tell our bosses and the investigation roared back to life. remember the guy with asperger? in january of 2021 fact finding visit to wuhan and a dozen international experts visited and told that the lab's database

of some 22,000 virus samples had been taken offline to prevent a hack during the pandemic. which seemed to make sense, except that the ad hoc group of investigators at drastic figured out that the database was actually taken offline on september 12, 2019, three months before the official start of the pandemic. so here is my takeaway. first, that the lab leak theory is plausible. not assured. but plausible. second, that politics and bureaucratic turf wars hampered the full exploration of the lab leak theory. my ongoing larger concern is the damage this is going to do to public confidence in other institutions at a moment when we can least afford further erosion. if the lab leak theory was erroneously sdodiscounted it wi fuel authority like elections.

sort of thinking that led to the events of january 6th and is already being used to imperil democracy all across the country. suddenly, the phony arizona audit will be harder to discount and science will suffer. look no further to climate change. i can hear the conceptism already. how do we really know it's man-made because they told us the virus came from a bat at a wet market? the criticism of climate science has long been that it was research, money-driven. the vanity fair piece similarly highlights the role of money some american in the wuhan lab and raises questions about the solidarity of gain of function of research community. this, too, must be said -- this will further revelations as they come out, early discounting the lab leak theory, the media will suffer a loss of credibility for its lack of independent investigation. the vanity fair report doesn't come to a conclusion as to whether the covid virus began naturally or in a lab leak, but

it convinced me that politics matter and thwarted the leak investigation. and one ramification of this analysis is bad news for our institutions. it will further distrust in science and even democracy when we can least afford it. let's meet the author. katherine eban is a contributing editor to "vanity fair" educated a at oxford she earned a rhoades clapper and author of this book. this is a serious piece of work for which i congratulate you. my first question. it's february of 2020. 27 scientists sign a statement for the lancet condemning the lab leak and conspiracy theories. what do they now say? >> well, that is a very interesting question because some of them now say, you know, the lab leak hypothesis does require investigation.

so there has been a small u-turn among those scientists early on board. epidemiologist named ralph barack came out signing with 18 scientists calling for a full investigation into the lab leak hypothesis. you know, i think what is important to note here is that the most credible of the doubters raising these questions are not saying it's a lab leak, they don't know. what they are saying is this needs to be investigated and it really hasn't been properly yet. therefore, it cannot be fully discounted. >> how about the state department official who says don't go there, it's going to, quote/unquote, open a can of worms. what do you think he was worried

about? >> so i spoke with him. his name is christopher park of the biological policy staff. what he said he was saying is you can't jump to conclusions that something untoward was going on at the wuhan institute of virology just because they were involved in gain of function research, which is an effort to try to increase the infectiousness of certain path ag pathogens and dozen it seven miles away from the wuhan market but folks on the other side of that have told me and documented in one case in a memo that they felt that they were being told don't dig in those sensitive places because the u.s. government has some exposure here because it has funded some of that research. >> how much of this in retrospect was a visceral

reaction to donald trump? in other words, while trump said a, i better say y, because i don't want to be cast as a nativist with him. >> i think it played a significant role. what people have told me is that that created a kind of antibody response within the government, that they didn't want to be rushing to judgment about something that really wasn't known. i also want to point out that president trump floated the lab leak hypothesis publicly in april 2020, but the biggest revelations about what happened inside the wuhan institute of virology came out months later. the government and state department officials learned about it months later, so, you know, we don't know what president trump knew at the time he said it, but we know that the most consequential intelligence came months after that.

>> what ii printed out your pie home with a large font it was 40 pages long. i point that out so people know it's a real deep dive. interestingly. dr. fauci's name doesn't appear too many times. where is he in all of this? >> first of all, let me just say that my effort in the reporting here was absolutely to stick with what i knew, i could prove and what i could document. so, you know, that is what i stuck to. obviously there is like a huge noise machine about fauci now related to this email dump of his. he is now, you know, raising questions simply about what happened to these wuhan researchers, what were they sick with, you know, can we get any sort of samples of what they were ill with? so i think he has put it out

there that it is inconclusive and we don't know. >> well, let me ask a more direct question. did you see any evidence in your investigation of him downplaying the lab leak hypothesis? >> no, i did not. i did not. >> there are a number of milestones along the way. but from my notes, the three that stuck out, 2012 in a province, six minors taken ill who are collecting bat feces and three of them die. that was taken off september of 2019 before the world knows. is there a benign explanation of that? and then number three is the november 2019 three researchers who you were just making reference to who require some form of hospital treatment. respond, please, to those three items. >> yeah. so let's start with the database. so this is one of the most comprehensive databases of viral

samples that include bat coronavirus strains. the wuhan institute of virology maintained it. it was like an inventory of what they had in their labs. they took it down in september as you point out 2019. the explanation provided publicly by their lead coronavirus researcher shows sjeng lee they were hacked multiple times. but if you look at the time line of when and how she is saying that, she gives the impression that it was taken down after the pandemic when, in fact, it was taken down before. but there is no question about this. the world and the investigators need access to that database and it doesn't appear that china is willing to do that. >> katherine, this is a great, great investigation. old school "vanity fair." i congratulate you for writing it and investing time. thank you so much. >> thanks for having me.

what are your thoughts? tweet me or go to my facebook page and i'll read responses throughout the course of the program. here is the first one. doesn't matter! it doesn't matter! no. it does matter! if you want to prevent it from ever happening again. and, cliff, put that back on the screen! have to say something to this person. cliff! this is exactly the mindset that perhaps caused us to miss this in the first go-round! because it was received as by the scientific community, by the media as well. if trump said it, then we have got to go in the other direction. a broken clock is right twice a day! it should have been taken seriously even if the natural theory is the one that wins out. still to come, some members of congress are putting the concept of the buddy system to good use. you can only join their exclusive caucus if you bring a

member of the opposite party. two of the co-chairs join me to explain why they are different from congress's wiell-known noisemakers. you'll never drink alone again when anheuser booush introduced dog brew. almost a quarter of americans say stress drove them to drink more than they did before the pandemic. which leads me to this week's survey question at smerconish cocaine. will drinking return to pre-pandemic levels? go vote! finding new routes to reach your customers, and new ways for them to reach you... is what business is all about. it's what the united states postal service

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believe it or not, a modicum of bipartisanship still exists within the congress but you may have to dig to find it beyond the mainstream headlines. therapy the only caucus they call the noah's ark rule. if you want to join you have to find a buddy from the opposite party to tag along with you and they are committed to finding common ground on many key issues facing the nation and floufs bipartisan bills and issues on covid-19 recovery, health care, immigration and criminal justice reform and they back the january 6th commission which was shot down by senate republicans. the 58 members of the problem solvers caucus practice the values they preach. they sit together in the center at the state of the union address and participate in district swaps and get to know each other's families and build personal relationships to uphold personal attacks and fund-raising against one another and aim to project unity through congress and throughout the

country. in other words, the polar opposite of what we have come to expect out of congress. all of the incentive in the world is geared toward headline generating flame-throwers winning the fund-raising game by throwing red meat to their base. yet the irony is legislative action for many in that camp can sometimes be an after-thought. so it's hard to believe that the problem solvers caucus is part of the same congress as their quiet bipartisan work doesn't yield the same campaign cash or click bait. but they do exist and here to prove it are problem solvers caucus co-chairs and republican congressman brian fitzpatrick of pennsylvania and democratic congressman josh heimer of new jersey. congressman fitzpatrick, can anyone join? what are you signing on to if you agree to be a member of the caucus? >> good morning, michael. good to be with you. so can anyone join? anyone can ask to join but to actually become a member has to be approved by the group, first

by me and josh as co-chairs an then by the group as a whole. they have to have demonstrated some interest in crossing the aisle and have demonstrated some courage in breaking with party leadership. the caucus has to accept them. what are they being asked to do? stand with our country first and not be driven by any political ideology, represent the people back home and of the country and nobody in washington, d.c. and no other elected official. that is what they are being asked to do. when we get the 75% of the caucus agreeing, you have to vote as a bloc together. >> in other words, that is really interesting. congressman, you get together and decide, say, how you look at an issue like whether there should be an investigation into january 6th and if 75% of the group agree, if i'm part of the 25%, nevertheless i've committed to go along with the will of that 75%. >> that is exactly the idea, michael. thanks for having us. when we get together and sit in

a room every week, we debate the issues as you should. we do it with civility in mind which i think is the way we should approach tough challenges and tough issues. we are working tonight. we have got call on infrastructure which we have been working on for a month now. we have disagreements. brian is a proud republican and i'm a proud democrat. as you said, we put country first and look where we can agree instead of focusing on where we disagree which is the problem so much now in washington. >> congressman fitzpatrick, i was born and raised in your congressional district and i consider it to be a place that is a good thing. you would be destined to fail at a primary if this was your modus operandi in a large part of the country. >> you're exactly right, which gets to the institutional challenges we have in congress which leads to the gridlock. gerrymandering is number one. on top of that you have closed primaries which is a case in

many states, certainly. poses a challenge which is why two things we have to address for sure. the more moderates we have in congress the more compromise there will be the less gridlock. but the gerrymandering and close primaries are two huge problems. >> congressman gottheimer a great development to haerm of the problem solvers but sad there needs to be a formal caucus for civility. the more i hear you and brian speak, to me, this is like a throwback to the way things were as late as the 1980s. >> you're exactly right. the ideal world there are no problems and it's just called congress. >> right. >> when we were together at the ends of last year trying to get a 908 billion dollar deal done, we helped lead it in the house and worked with a bipartisan group in the senate and we get together weekly. i know that sounds crazy, right? we are not about tweets and screaming at each other. we are about trying to find a place of common ground and common sense solutions. and, frankly, i hope that one

day we don't have to exist. but for right now, whether it's infrastructure or criminal justice reform or police reform or immigration, some of the caucus issues, it's going to take us working together with each other and talking to one another and listening to one another. i'll tell you it is a breath of fresh air. i wish the whole country could see our conversations. i think we would all feel better about congress. >> congressman fitzpatrick, how, do you know, you are regarded by what i'll describe as the noise makers. i have vision of you in congress they are throwing paper airplanes at you guys. >> yes. it's interesting how we view each other. we view ourselves as representing the overwhelming majority of people in our country that just want government to work the same way their personal relationships do. you never get everything you want. you'd rather get 80% of something. you don't want the enemy to be the good. you know politics better than

anyone. the activists are on the fringes and the challenge that josh and our caucus face but believe in it wholeheartedly because we believe that is what our country needs. >> exactly. >> i can think of a particular member of congress who -- she would never make your cut for membership. yet, you know her incendiary behavior generates millions of dollars. i think $3 million in the first quarter of this fund-raising cycle. you two are essentially forgoing that in the name of trying to get things done. >> you're exactly right. there is a whole complex built around the screaming and yelling and extremist on both sides and it's tough to break through, right? people look at us and say you're actually governing? yeah, that is what we are focused on. i'm not interested in the tweets and emails saying give $5 now or the world is falling apart. we want to figure out how to get a infrastructure deal done. i'm driving around my district right now and democrats and

republicans come up to me saying this is what we need. we got to bring the country back together again, right? we are here in the middle, middle left, middle right. we want you to solve our problems and not scheme at each other. i know it's not always the most popular thing on twitter but this is what the country wants and brian and i will keep at is it along with 58 members of this. >> final question for congressman fitzpatrick. i hate to say this but it's true. the media props up what he was just discussing and describing, right? the party bosses today are men with microphones, not individuals in fronts of whom you would have to scream to get an endorsement to run for office. >> correct, michael. anyone in public service, me and josh are in public service. you're in public service as a member of the media. we all have a choice to make. are we going to use this position, this precious time with this great honor we have to try to do something good or are we going to try to cannibalize the voting base? you see it in politics and in

the media. those people are very unbecoming of the honor bestowed upon them. i know you and josh knows and we will look back with pride that we didn't sell out and used this precious time we have to be public servants to do the right thing. >> how refreshing that was. thank you both for being here. >> thanks. let's see what you're saying on my twitter and facebook pages. this is from twitter. well, somebody in minnesota, what a sad commentary that is. i'm heartened by the fact 58 members sitting in the state of the union and not cheap shot. the flame throwers on the left

and right accomplish nothing. you know i was making reference to marjorie taylor. what has she accomplished? like what has passed with her name on it? it used to be you'd get to washington, be a back bencher and bide your time and get position of authority via committee voassignment and get something done. you raise a ton of money and you become the darling of your party. it's twisted! up ahead, without alcohol readily available on tap nearly everywhere you turn, how much is america really drinking? according to an analysis in "the washington post" a few years back, the top ten% of american drinkers downed at least two bottles of wine a night. the next category 15 drinks a week. then it declines from there. that was all before the pandemic. almost a quarter of americans

say the pandemic stress drove them to drink even more. that is why we are asking this question this week at sme smerconish.com. will drinking return to pre-pandemic levels? go vote! what's the #1 retinol brand used most by dermatologists? it's neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair® smooths the look of fine lines in 1-week, deep wrinkles in 4. so you can kiss wrinkles goodbye! neutrogena® the dove beauty bar makes my skin feel amazing and clean. i've encouraged serena my best friend to switch. her skin was always beautiful. i wanted her skin to glow just like mine. it feels moisturized and clean at the same time. my friend stefanie, her skin was dry. i'm like girl you better get you some dove. she hooked me up.

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americans are finally emerging from the darkest case of covid and two-thirds of u.s. adults now say their lives are at least somewhat back to normal. but it remains to be seen if the new normal will include the drinking habits that many of us developed during lockdown. nearly a quarter of americans reported increased drinking the past year to deal with stress, according to the american psychological association. the atlantic senior editor indicate julian says there is nothing moderate the way americans drink today and she joins me now. when i saw your piece come

online, kate, i immediately read it because i knew i had consumed more during the pandemic and i wanted to know where do i fit in? judging by the popularity of your piece, i guess i'm not alone because it was very much circulated. >> i think it's certainly hit a chord among our readers and a lot of other people. speaking for myself, i know the amount of alcohol i drink or the frequency at least has increased over the past year. i think what is really interesting is not july the amount but the way we drink over the pandemic that has changed and that is kind of what is concerning and interesting to me. >> so who among us saw the biggest uptick in their drinking habits? >> so perhaps not surprisingly to anybody who has kids at home, those of us with children in school or rather home from school had the biggest uptick. women saw a disproes the rise.

this was drinking at home and often by yourself and, secondly, relatedly it was drinking to deal with, as you said, you know, negative feelings, anxiety, stress, you know, even a bit of depression. the problem those two things maybe even as much as the quantity of alcohol are really concerning as far as setting people up for problems down the rolled. alcohol itself isn't necessarily the problem but the way we have been drinking it is really concerning. >> millennials have been regarded as the driest of the generation groups. does that remain true? >> no. this is a really interesting fact and it sort of defies a lot of expectations. back in the early 2000s it was noticed wildly in public health circles that teenagers were not drinking as much as teenagers used to and everybody thought this is great news because we know that, in general, people drink less as teenagers and sets them up for a sort of drinking

course for adulthood but, in fact, something different has happened. the age at which drinking peaks has gotten a bit later. it used to be 18, 19, 20, now it's maybe 22. but the amount people are drinking by the time they hit their late 20s and 30s is as much as everybody else. that is really troubling. it's not just, again, the quantityof drinking across the nation but the drinking going on at the extremes. >> beyond the cirrhosis which is, obviously, a problem is this all necessarily a bad thing? >> no. i think really keeping in mind here is alcohol has an, in addition to the health harms we hear so much about, some important social and psychological benefits and those don't get a lot of play but the research suggests that having, you know, a moderate or light

drippi drinking habit is correlated with like having more friends. a fascinating study out of britain that they found that people who had a pub they went to were better off in a whole bunch of regards. they were more trusting and they were more socially connected and they were more happy and a great sense of well-being. when they dug into the data that this kind of ritual going and getting a little bit disin disinhabited meant they had more friends. >> you get to weigh in live on my survey question you have inspired. do you think we will go back to pre-pandemic meaning less drinking or are these habits here to stay? >> i can argue it both days. depends on which day of the week

you ask me. look. i think we have an opportunity for a reset and think we are deliberate when and where we drink. i'm going to lay off the liquor. wine is probably a healthier choice for me and lay off the beer and i'm not drinking by myself and not say let's pour a glass at the end of the day of wine because the kids are driving me crazy or work is driving me crazy or the pandemic keeps going on on. i think a real risk people will if they don't stop and think what it's doing for them and not doing for them that we could have some problems. >> well done. the piece was great. thank you for being here to discuss it. >> thank you so much for having me. so now as paul harvey would say, now you know the rest of the story! now you know why i'm asking this question today! smerconish.com. i imagine when you first saw it, what is up with that? will drinking return to pre-pandemic levels?

vote now. at this particular time we are going to need free rehab in addition to free vaccines. aaron, thank you for that commented. yeah, i think that all of the data that she had in the piece made sense to me and comported with my own experience which has probably been a bit to excess the last year in comparison to other years of my life. still to come, what happens with you go from being president to a private citizen overnight? a new book tells that story and shows the sides of president george h.w. bush that many didn't get to see before and during and after his presidency. it is written by his former chief of staff and she joins me next.

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from prom dresses 27 vita to workoutserals, and new adventures you hope the more you give the less they'll miss. but even if your teen was vaccinated against meningitis in the past they may be missing vaccination for meningitis b. although uncommon, up to 1 in 5 survivors of meningitis will have long term consequences. now as you're thinking about all the vaccines your teen might need make sure you ask your doctor if your teen is missing meningitis b vaccination. here we go. ♪ ♪ [john legend's i can see clearly now]

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nenever formally hired and she was chief of staff for george h.w. bush, much has been written about him not the least of which his own memoir of shorts, all of the best my life in letters and other writings." the man i knew is a funny, poignant, revealing read written by someone who for a quarter century was at the side of an american president. it presents george and barbara bush in a way the rest of us never had an opportunity to know them. this is jean becker. jean, i love your book. walk me through this. they are upset because of the election outcome in '92 and they split their time between walker's point, kennebunkport and houston. he buys her a blue mercury sable. the next thing you know they are at sam's club.

>> well, michael, first of all, thanks for having me on. i love the sam's club story, mainly it shows how you go from being the president and first lady one day and the next day, you're walking around sam's club pulling a cart. they love sam's club and they bought everything in bulk. i'm convinced there's still a big jar of cheetos sitting around in texas. they bought everything in bulk and they loved cheetos. they were enjoying immersing themselves back into life as normal citizens. >> and that includes him seeing a tv commercial. bush 41 for princess cruises and booking it for the two of them. >> he books a cruise just a month after they have left the white house. i call it the love boat cruise.

he surprised her with the cruise. she thought they were going to florida to visit jeb and his wife. and he then springs on her they are going on the love boat. i think if she had known, she maybe would have stopped this. it maybe was not the best idea. can you imagine being on a princess cruise in february of 1993 and you're walking around the boat in your swimsuit and in your cover-up and here comes george and barbara bush who had just left the white house? the funniest thing that happened on the boat is president bush admitted to his friend george he worked out one day in the gym and took a shower in the gym and comes out of the shower, stark naked, and there is a man waiting to take his photo. yes, mr. president, you're not in the white house any more! >> he was a very forgiving man. you say it's possible that he went to his grave only disliking

three people -- saddam hussein, ross perrot, and dan rather. >> i think that's right. he became best friends with bill clinton. mrs. bush called them the odd couple. president bush did not hold grudges and he also had a unique ability to see the best in everybody. i'm not sure he ever forgave ross perot for running against him in 1992. saddam hussein, that is sort of obvious. he and dan rather did not get along very well. we will leave that story for another time. >> it sounds like a cliche what you wrote about him. "41 never quit living life to the fullest." when i step back and look at what you told, it is undeniable. he never stopped living life to the fullest. >> he didn't. i'm quickly going to read one

short paragraph just to show how he really did not want to give in to aging. this is actually i wrote this in an email to my two sisters on in november 2007. president bush had not been diagnosed with parkinson's yet but we knew something was going on with him. he was getting more and more frail and unstable. i wrote this to my sisters. today, he is going hunting. the first trip of the season. he is so he unstable on his feet and slightly said he is afraid of getting shocked. he said if you wobble out there you might fall in the path of another hunter. he was dead serious, yet no intention of not going on. he said it as a matter of factually to me. i my get shot today, jean. okay, these texans are weird. but it was so president bush. he wanted to go hunting! so what if he might fall down

and get shot? that just might happen. one of the things i learned from him from watching him grow old and i put this in the book, watching him deal with his new reality taught me another important life lesson. grow old gracefully and don't wine and don't wallow in self-pity. i learned so much from that man. we certainly all can learn -- i'm sorry, go ahead. >> there is a lot to be learned about the way to lead one's life from your book. by the way, i've got a quick time-out, but over your right shoulder, i think i know who painted that. >> i love this painting. it touches my heart every day. the 43rd president of the united states painted that a portrait of his father and gave it as a gift to me after his dad died. i'm very proud of it and it makes me smile! >> what a blessing! congrats. the book is excellent! thank you. >> thank you, michael. still to come, more of your

best and worst tweets of the facebook comment. the final results of the survey question is coming up. nearly a quarter of americans reported increase in drinking over the pandemic. i'm asking will drinking return to the pre-pandemic levels? always go for 100. bring out the bold™ you never leave the house without your luvs or your big dad energy. because...when you see a leaky situation you have luvs ready for that pro-level leak protection. luvs. parent like a pro. finding new routes to reach your customers, and new ways for them to reach you... is what business is all about. it's what the united states postal service has always been about. so as your business changes, we're changing with it.

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time to see how you responded to the survey question this week at smerconish.com. with nearly one in four americans saying the pandemic stress drove them to drink more than usual, i've asked will drinking return to pre-pandemic levels. here are the results.

what do we got? 69% say, wow, of 11,019 who voted, let's call it 70-30 say, yes, now that the pandemic is winding down we'll go back to the way we were. i don't know, time will tell. social media we don't have much time. what came in this week i can respond to quickly? i'm too hung over to vote. one more if we've got time for it. put it up there. for me any increase in drinking has been due to boredom rather than stress, more hours at home watching tv or surfing the internet. two bottles of wine per night, yeah that sounded crazy. see you next week. welcome to allstate. ♪ ♪

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a federal judge striking down california's decades old ban on assault weapons comparing an ar-15 assault rifle to a swiss army knife. >> we are worried that some people will get hurt. >> it's critical that people understand how far reaching this risk really is.