Fauci’s new position isn’t just that low-risk people should get to choose, however, as his statement might imply. Fauci would subsequently imply that even high-risk people should be given a choice.

“Make [the vaccine] available to everyone, but certainly recommend it to high-risk people,” Fauci told Karl.

It’s a stunning reversal. Fauci is now using words such as “choice” and “recommend” in relation to vaccines — even for high-risk people. Talking points about the efficacy of mandates have vanished ( including mask mandates). …

All of this, as well as a series of legal defeats of various vaccine mandates, helps explain why Fauci is suddenly a proponent of allowing people to choose whether to get vaccinated. But the single biggest reason for Fauci’s reversal is almost certainly this: The politics of vaccination have changed.

[It has belatedly dawned on Fauci and the Fauciites that mandates and authoritarian enforcement are counterproductive. But this is hardly the first time Fauci has changed positions, for political convenience or otherwise. The better question here may be why anyone’s bothering to ask him about policy any longer. — Ed]