Adam Creighton, the Washington correspondent for The Australian and contributor to Sky News, discusses Australia's strict lockdowns and the long term policy implications, as well as the political climate in the US and his thoughts on the public opinion of COVID interventions.
Follow Adam on Twitter here and check out his work at The Australian here.
Listen to the Unmasked podcast on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
The book “Unmasked: The Global Failure of COVID Mask Mandates” is available for purchase through Amazon and many other outlets.
Full transcript of the interview is below:
Ian Miller: Hello everyone, welcome to another episode of The Unmasked Podcast. We've got a special guest today. Adam Creighton, who's the Washington correspondent for the Australian and also contributor to Sky News Australia, which is very exciting, Adam, thank you so much for doing this.
Adam Creighton: Thanks very much for having me.
Ian Miller: Yeah, first of all, I wanted to say thank you for your wonderful review of my book. It's it's been really, really great to see all the positive response to it. It helped dramatically help to get the get it into Australia and kind of awareness of it down there, which I hugely appreciate. Yeah so thank you for that.
Adam Creighton: No, I hope lots of people read it. It was excellent.
Ian Miller: I appreciate it. So my first question for you was when when COVID first started you know this was back March 2020. What were your kind of initial thoughts and reactions to it? Were you skeptical of the policies we were putting in? Were you supportive of them and has there been any kind of adjustments or changes in your thinking overtime?
Adam Creighton: You know, certainly at the start I was actually very scared about the whole thing going back to March 2020 because I knew a bit of history. I knew about the Spanish flu. I knew how bad these things could be, and so I was kind of expecting the worst. I mean, I was so scared. I actually shifted my money out of a one of the smaller financial institutions that I was in and put it in a larger bank, but I was just worried about. You know what was gonna happen to the global economy? Uhm, of course, as it turned out, those those fears were, you know, were kind of ill founded at least as fast. As far as the virus went, and I guess because I was so concerned, I was checking everyday the publicly available statistics on worldometer and the various U.S. government websites, and it became pretty clear to me by the end of March at least, that we were massively overreacting to this thing, that there was a climate of hysteria. And I felt as though it was my responsibility as a journalist to point that out, but that was quite a risky move. But as I say, there was a climate of hysteria and it wasn't until the middle of April the 13th or 14th of April that I wrote in my weekly column in the Australian that we were over reacting to an unremarkable virus. And you can imagine how that went over. So because it really was that was kind of peak hysteria and I pointed out things like the number of deaths every year. You know, know, million odd every year that the numbers that the infection fatality ratios were likely very very low. Drawing on some of the work of John Ioannidis, very eminent professor in this field, and he made a lot of sense to me. So I you know, I quoted him. So yeah, so I, so I guess I changed my view pretty quickly and then I you know, I became a champion of that view really up until now and. In terms of how I changed my view at all, well, I mean I'm shocked how long this whole thing has gone on for I would never have, you know, never have thought that almost two years on would be talking about this. I think that's just extraordinary and I was wrong about the vaccines and how quickly that arrived. I guess I was skeptical based on history and based on. The conventional view that these vaccines would take many years to develop, but but as it as it turned out, they arrived much sooner and they appear to have had some effectiveness. Certainly in reducing illness. So I was wrong about that. But really, I haven't changed my view on anything else.
Ian Miller: Yeah, that's a great point. I remember thinking to myself that what's going to happen here. If it takes five years to develop these things, can't we can't keep doing this for five years, can we? But I think a lot of politicians kind of got bailed out by how quickly. They arrived and were able to kind of say, OK well that
Adam Creighton: Yes, exactly that's the shift could justify what they've done by that too. They could say, well, you know the lockdowns make sense because we were just waiting for the vaccines and you know there is some internal logic to that. Even though I still think the lockdowns were very wrong and a grievous assault on human rights which would never have happened. And of course you know barely effective anyway as you know, but right? But even if they were effective, you know, even if they did work, so to speak, I still think there'd be a good case that they're wrong, and I'd probably still argue that case. I mean, the fact is that they haven't worked and it's extremely embarrassing for for proponents of them to try to make a coherent empirical argument that they have.
Ian Miller: Yeah, absolutely. So I wanted to get your thoughts on the early on in the United States. I mean, you're Australian, but you live here in the US. You're Washington correspondent. So how much do you think the political climate of the US played into the kind of early on the policies of COVID during the first year or so? Kind of specifically, would masks and and kind of these symbols of taking COVID seriously have maintained the same level of level of importance if there had been a different president?
Adam Creighton: Yeah, look, it's a good question and I think the fact that Trump was president polarized the issue more because early on he expressed doubt about the effectiveness of lockdowns and masks. I know that I was actually living in Australia at the very start of it, but certainly the US is followed very closely in Australia. And we say back home, this thing called Trump Derangement syndrome. I assume it's a phrase here as well. But Oh yeah, it's kind of a joke that, you know, uh, lefties, vulnerable to this to this disease. And whenever Trump says something is good, they must say it's bad. And I think that was part of this extraordinary polarization that we have to. Champion these things that Trump. Didn't want and look it was in the UK as well and I know that's that's less of a focus in the US, but the Johnson government was in power too and. And Boris Johnson very early said similar things to Trump that look we should just not. You know, we should not overreact. These think must don't work. You know, lockdowns don't work. We don't want to do that. And of course, as you know, the British Government changed its tune in a few weeks. But but I think there was a similar phenomenon there as well, and so yes, to answer your question, yes, I think the US does play a huge role in how the Western world responds and also how they politically perceive the response as being a left or a right wing issue.
Ian Miller: It's very interesting, and so one question that I I just kind of comes. It came up to me a second ago. We asked a lot of people. I've asked a lot of people I've been asked myself, why do you think the shift happened so much with with Boris Johnson and and Trump and all these governments kind of going back on what they were saying about masks and lockdowns early on. What do you think were the underlying reasons behind it?
Adam Creighton: Yeah look, it's a really good question and we don't really know the answer. I mean, of course it was the Italian Government that was the 1st Western government to follow China down the lockdown path and as. As you will know, every pandemic plan that was written by a western country either explicitly ruled out lockdowns as insane or or did not mention them at all. Something happened in the middle of March 2020, second half of March when all Western governments did this, and I think it was. I think it's just basic political economy that. It's pretty cost less politically to introduce these lockdowns because. If you do it, you can't be blamed for not doing anything, and if everyone else is doing it, you can't be blamed for doing it so. It's just basic political calculus. I mean, of course that's kind of horrifying calculus for the general public, because it means they get subjected to the most awful rules just just for the political benefit of the leaders. But look, I think that's a lot to it. And also, there's of course the modeling that. That was produced by Imperial College. Neil Ferguson, famously predicting extraordinary numbers of death, millions of deaths within six months or so, which never never happened. It was the most ridiculous modeling, but that scared the world. I mean, it freaked the world out and and also it sent the media into paroxysms of hysteria and. And you know, basically scared the daylights out of the Western world. And I think I think if anyone is culpable for for all of the horrible things that have happened on the COVID front, I think you know you have to point to the media which I'm a member of. But the bulk of it was very hysterical and I think it scared people and then governments responded to that fear. Not many politicians in private completely agree with you and me on these issues. I mean, I've spoken to them, but they're incapable of saying saying that in public because, well, they can now more. But certainly a year or two ago they could not, because it could be held down.
Ian Miller: Yeah, Speaking of lockdowns and tough COVID policies, I obviously you you write for an Australian news outlet, you're Australian so I wanted to get your sense of what the public opinion in Australia has been like. Maybe over time with regards to you know what many see is a very draconian COVID policy in Australia. So has there been, has there been, you know, a lot of universal support near universal. Has there been any significant kind of pushback or or response to the policies there?
Adam Creighton: Well, at the first point to make is it's been very popular. He's very strict policies, kind of the whole time, really. I mean there's there's been some decline in popularity. I'd say over the past, you know, three to six months, as people just get sick of this, and I think more and more people realize that many of the measures are dubiously effective. But Australia's experience is really in two phases. I mean 2020. We pretty much missed COVID entirely, so there was the first six week lockdown that that are pretty much all Western cities had around the world. And we had those in Sydney, Melbourne, etc. But COVID never took off. There was a blip in the second half of in Victoria. Our second biggest state. Uhm where supposedly security guards slept with someone in quarantine that had COVID and then it escaped and got into the community and about 5:00 or people subsequently died over the next three or four months from COVID in Melbourne. And look, I don't know whether it was a security guard. Certainly that's what the media said, and that's what most people would say was the reason. But I mean, who really knows how the virus evolved there? But certainly that's what prompted the beginning of seven lockdowns in Vic. 7, right? It's kind of remarkable to even say so. They had viciously strict lockdowns, brutal, they even had curfews. I think. 9:00 PM at night you couldn't be outside. Or maybe it was. 10:00 PM I can't remember, but just unbelievable rules that really hadn't been seen. Anywhere else in the world. I don't think I then I'm gonna go in France and Spain had very strict lockdowns too, but there's certainly extremely strict following very few cases and the virus eventually fizzle out there, and then it wasn't until the middle of last year that it really took off pretty much everywhere in Australia, and that's when the rest of the world started taking notice of the, you know, the teargas, the massive protests which were occurring, the police, the helicopters screaming at people on the beach, the quarantine centers. Uh, you know it was. It was pretty extraordinary, and by that time I was living in the US and and I was just shocked by the whole thing. I mean, I was ashamed to actually. I was really ashamed as an Australian and how? Just crazy in hysterical response walls and just how stupid if you ask me. I mean, that's obviously my view, but just embarrassingly stupid when there was a wealth of data out there as you and I know that shows that these measures basically do very little at at best. Well look it was. Yeah, it's and they're still popular. That's that's the depressing thing. And and one of the lessons over the past two years is the extraordinary faith that people have in their governments. Not so much here. Maybe in the US, but certainly in Australia the obedience of people is just remarkable. And I think maybe partly explaining that buy in Australian history of governments have never really. Being seen as the enemy of the people like they have been in the US and other countries so so we don't have that, but nevertheless, just the extraordinary faith in what the government says and that the motives of the government are as pure as the snow. It's just. It's shocked me.
Ian Miller: So that's that was related to kind of my next question for you, and it sounds like you might have answered it, but I was going to ask. Have you been surprised by what the people in Australia have been willing to put up with in terms of this? Strict lockdowns interventions and not being able to travel between states, for example, but it sounds like you might not be surprised because it it might be kind of built into their to the psyche.
Adam Creighton: There is that accurate coming up, we've justified it now. Kind of after the fact by kind of referring to Australia's history as a former penal colony and always having very strict governments, some of our state governments were or except for a few exceptions, prisons. And you know, early on in the early 1800s had very strict rules about alcohol consumption and being outside because at that point they were, you know, largely dealing with prisoners or former prisoners. So that's that's in the psyche, I guess. As I said, there's a there's a general faith in the benevolence of government, because you know, Australia is a wealthy country. You know it's never had any revolutions or civil wars or anything like that. But nevertheless, yeah, look, I. I was surprised by the fact people were OK, for instance, with the Victorian police actually going inside a woman's out invading a woman's house. And arresting her for simply posting on a Facebook site that she was against lockdowns. Now that actually happened actually happened. That was like the second half of 2020. And it was a reminder of me at least, although as I've as I've probably indicated, not many Australians seem to care, but that there are no human rights in Australia whatsoever. I mean absolutely none. I mean, if the government decides just you know the state government decides that there's a so called emergency it can really do anything it wants, including invading peoples houses without warrants and. Arresting them for merely for typing something on a website? I mean, that's that's the extent of the power of Australia state governments. And that's been a real shock to me because our states are just like the US. In a sense, they were independent countries, more or less, with their own governors. And they answered to the British Crown, and they never had constitutions. And when Australia united as a country in the Commonwealth government, the federal government does have a constitution with some limitation on its powers. But the states that make it up do not. And I think that's that's been the real wakeup call for Australians who care about these things is that the state governments can do whatever they want.
Ian Miller: Interesting, so you mentioned a minute ago that that there's been a kind of a a big surge of infections and hospitalizations as well over the past few months. Have people there started to question the wisdom of the policy at all you know. Obviously Australians had extraordinary success rolling out the vaccines early on. It was slow, but now it's taking up where it's huge uptake there. It seemed like that was kind of their policy was was wait until the vaccination rates to try to prevent these increases, and unfortunately. Somehow the population still has these huge increases, so has there been any surprise about that there or any questioning of of the wisdom of the policy?
Adam Creighton: Look, not really a great deal of questioning the wisdom of the policy, and I think this is because throughout COVID, the restrictions have been so punishing on so many people that there's a real desire to think that they were the right thing to do, regardless of what the data says. And yes, it is. It is extraordinary look around the world, not just Australia. You look at countries like Israel and other highly vaccinated countries have had huge outbreaks in COVID. And even significant numbers of deaths. I mean Australia had most of its deaths. After like 90% of people vaccinated, I mean, it's that's not what you would have expected from first principles and but those facts really get an airing in the press, certainly not by the government. There's an extraordinary reluctance to criticize vaccines at all. You know, they're kind of considered almost like some sort of religious requirement, and you must kind of venerate them at all times, regardless of what the data says about them. And anyone who, even you know, dares to criticize it is going to be called an anti-vaxxer. So that so that creates a great deal of reluctance in the public space, at least to criticize the vaccines. And so yeah look. I mean, I think people know that there's been a wave of hospitalizations, but they still support these policies. By and large, you know, I guess you could say it's a level sort of national cognitive dissonance, but I don't think Australia is unique in that regard. I think a lot of countries have it to a greater or lesser extent. I mean certainly not parts of the United States where I think. That's it's been wonderful to see such a skepticism here. In some states, at least of these measures. But but yeah, I think cognitive dissonance nationally explains explains that in Australia.
Ian Miller: Yeah, so we gonna mention how the government doesn't necessarily provide all the information is, or at least part of the perspective. But one thing they have done and that I was kind of stunned to see, was at least in the Northern Territory in Australia. They made some very extraordinary statements about locking down unvaccinated people and all of the the language and rhetoric he used seemed seemed really kind of extreme. And so I was wondering, was there any pushback against him for saying that? And maintaining this, you know, lock down for the unvaccinated as a policy and from the outside at least it seems kind of upsetting that that this demonization of others, and we've done. We've done it here too. But this demonization of others has been tolerated or even encouraged.
Adam Creighton: Yes, look, it's a it's a sad insight into. Human nature, I think this kind of pile on to minorities which. In this case manifested itself. In the direction of the cycle unvaccinated, you know whatever that means given they wear out in four months. And so I mean, I don't really know what that means. But but yeah, it's it's depressing and you know, just specifically answer. No, there wasn't much of a pushback. I mean, you know mostly. That leader Michael Gunner, the leader of NT. You know he was just seen as as you know, making the tough decisions, so to speak. You know. And and at the end of the day, Australian politicians are extremely sensitive to public opinion because we have compulsory voting in Australia, everyone has to vote. So what the average person thinks or what the median person thinks. It's very important and they do all their their focus groups and their polling. So pretty much Australia's political leaders just say what they think everyone thinks. So the sad thing is that. Yeah, Michael Gunner said that because he thought that that would be popular in the NT and it was. And if you look at if you look down at Victoria where the premier Dan Andrews I mean he overall presided over the strictest and in my view. Most disastrous regime in Australia throughout you know, throughout the pandemic I mean I, I would say, is the greatest peacetime disaster in Australian history of Victoria. He is now, you know, his popularity is like 60% and his approval rating 60%. And there's going to be an election later this year and he's expected to easily win. So that gives you an idea of how popular these measures. You know has been and. And it's depressing that people cheer for for these sorts of measures. You know, like I say, it isn't insight into human nature and how fragile human rights and and classical liberalism are. I mean, people don't really care much for it. And I think it's been a wake up call that many people on the right of politics who have liked in the past. To imagine that they are the people's champion that they're, you know that they're kind of up against the elites, and they're arguing the case for the ordinary man. Well, the ordinary man for the past two years has cheered for massive restrictions, and the suspension of basic human rights. And and for cracking down on free speech, all of these things are the ordinary man has wanted. And that's quite sad. I mean, for me, it's a very. It's a very sad outcome of this whole thing.
Ian Miller: It absolutely is. It's a lot of great insights there. I think that you hit the nail on the head and it's very upsetting to see. And I think we've learned a lot. We've all learned a lot about this over the last couple of years. Maybe kind of changed some preconceived notions about who people actually are and how they think. So I wanted to get your thoughts on on what the end game is. For a lot of these policies in Australia, I mean you know a lot of the United States has has gone back to normal, at least temporarily. Are they going to kind of permanently reorganize their society around COVID policy, or will things really go back to you know, 2019 normal there?
Adam Creighton: Well look, I think 2019 is going to be some way off. And when I say that. Probably at least a year. And it's been heartening. Looking at the success of U.S. states that have dumped all of their mandates. I think that's that's an inspiration and an example to Australians that we don't have to have all these restrictions. And also probably even more so because the UK resonates more in Australian culture than the US of obvious historical reasons. And the fact that the UK has pretty much dumped every single regulation as far as I know, I mean the whole lot, vaccine passports, all of it. I think that is very kind of that's inspiring, or that's. That offers me some hope that that Australian states will do the same but but right now you know there there are still vaccine mandates effectively in Australia. I mean, I like how the various government websites they typically say at the top that are vaccination is optional in Australia and you don't have to get a vaccine. But then they say except if you work in these following industries which is about 40% of the population. So it's not really. It's not really optional at all. So look the end game, I hope. Is that people get sick of it and look just on the current war between Russia and Ukraine, which is obviously a shocking tragedy. But I think it's making people realize that. Look, you know, here's a group of people in Ukraine suffering enormous hardship. You know, real hardship, and you know why on Earth are we still worried about this ridiculous in virus with a, you know, with the fatality rate of nought point nought or whatever it is percent. Uhm, you know. So I so I think maybe the fact the news has shifted so much to another issue are people will forget about COVID and won't pay as much attention to the you know the various COVID dashboards and counters and all that sort of rubbish that we've been subjected to for two years, right?
Ian Miller: It puts it all in perspective a bit
Adam Creighton: Exactly. That's what I was trying to say. Yeah, yeah, it absolutely does. At least hopefully does.
Ian Miller: Speaking of of kind of ridiculous perspective, lack of perspective, what was your sense of what people there thought about the Novak Djokovic situation? I mean, the news cycle moves so quickly. I think people have already forgotten that it even happened, but. He was, he was literally kicked out of the country after it seemed like he followed all the rules. So were people there supportive of it? Or did they see it for being kind of a political stunt? What? What was the response there?
Adam Creighton: Well look, I think I think more more informed observers realized it was a political stunt that worked in the government's favor. But you know, by and large it was extremely popular to kick him out. I mean, I think there were polls showing 70 or 80% support for kicking him out, which is which by any poll is a lot. That's a huge majority. Or when any political question is asked, as you know. And it was. The interesting thing for me is most people realize the rules were ridiculous because COVID was rife in Australia at the time. So, so the argument that we couldn't let him in, in case he had COVID was just obviously stupid, so people tended to say that, well, look, they're our rules, and they might be stupid, but he's gotta follow the rules like everyone else. Uh, yeah, I don't know others who said well he did follow the rules, but it was a disagreement between the Victorian government and the federal government in Canberra. The Victorian government, somewhat ironically, said that he could come and then after he arrived, the federal government realized that there's actually some box or something that he didn't take properly from their point of view, and so then they. They kicked him out using this arbitrary kind of immigration power that that that the minister has in emergencies to basically kick out whoever he wants. I mean, it's a it's a completely arbitrary power, and it goes back to a point I made earlier about the power of Australian governments. I mean, there is no human rights bill or act in Australia, so a lot of these laws that have been on the books for decades. In many cases they have little tiny clauses that no one ever paid any attention to. You know, kind of part 25, part 4, BCD etc. Which say that in an emergency you know the Minister can do whatever he wants, you know, and I think we've seen a lot of those powers used. In Australia, and that was one of them. Yeah, I hope that that's a lesson we all learn to that if we need to kind of curtail these emergency powers because it it really can get out of hand incredibly quickly with politicians.
Ian Miller: Absolutely, yeah, so moving back to the US, we've seen recently a lot of these jurisdictions and in counties, cities, states lifting mask, mandates, other kind of COVID policies seemingly out of nowhere all at once. And there's been a lot of conversation on the Internet about, you know, there's a polling data showing it's unpopular. Memos going out so you're in Washington and and from what you've heard, do you think political concerns are the main reason for all these dramatic changes?
Adam Creighton: Yeah, well, look. I think you know, I think political concerns were the reason for them being introduced in the 1st place. I mean, I was talking to someone reasonably senior at the DC government. Actually about four, maybe four or five months ago, and even they said, and I was surprised that they said it. Actually, that that mask mandates were purely performative. I mean like that wasn't the official view, he was just an employee, but nevertheless a fairly and senior employee. And so I thought, oh, that's really interesting that someone sent you in the DC government thinks that this whole thing is performative, but look to answer more specifically. It was a great coincidence, wasn't it? That they all ended by the state of the Union speech on Tuesday? It did happen very, very quickly. My sense is there was there was a lot of you know that that there was political polling involved in this decision because. I mean, if you look at the DC, for instance, they introduced a mandate for vaccines honestly five weeks ago or so and they went to the great trouble of rolling it out, you know, and there is significant at administrative effort. I mean, someone who's once worked in government. I know these things, you know, take a lot of effort to roll out these new policies and then it was gone. Just five weeks later, which which could not have been the intention when it was introduced. So therefore I do think that the polls have changed quite dramatically across the US, and you're seeing all these governors. And mayors and so forth. Dump these policies quite regardless of the fact that there's still 1500 people dying a day in the United States, which is, you know, almost near the peak, right? I mean, it's you know it's high. It's a high level and that could be used to justify keeping the restrictions in place, but it's not. So I think people are moving on, you know, the great test, of course is gonna be if there's a 7th wave between now and November. That's going to be very, very interesting to watch.
Ian Miller: Yeah, and that's something I wanted to ask you about as well. You know, do you think that in areas like DC, California, New York, I mean, obviously somewhere like Florida, they’re done, but, uh, in in DC and all these other areas, will we see a return to to the vaccine passports in the widespread mask mandates? If there's a new variant, or like you say it's 7th wave in the next couple of months,
Adam Creighton: Yeah, look, I mean, I just. It's hard to know. I mean, I don't think you'll ever see lockdowns in that sort of thing again, you might see mass come back, but even then. A lot of people are just so sick of it, I don't. It will depend on the polling, of course, because the midterms are approaching, and that's a particularly important time to be popular. So if people are over it, then I don't think they will come back in and then what's gonna be interesting is trying to see the justification on the democratic side of politics as to why they're not back in. Of course they're gonna have to say, oh, it's different science or whatever, but the cold hard reality is that it will be pure politics. And if that happens, if that occurs I mean it will be. Well, it'll be good for our side of the argument if you like. I mean not that that's you know, much of a savior of a society, but it will show you. It will illustrate very clearly that this whole thing, all the restrictions were really political, were really about politics, not about so-called science at all. But look, we don't know yet. You know, maybe they will come back in. Who knows? I mean, I certainly hope they don't. But yeah, we just have to wait and see. And it's a it's a crystal ball on that one. I don't know.
Ian Miller: Yeah, so so much of this is so performative. You kind of mentioned that a minute ago where you see the policy is you get on an airplane, you put a mask on, you land in Florida literally never wear a mask for a week that you're there on vacation. People that live in New York and New Jersey and DC. But then you put the mask back on for that. That two hour flight.
Adam Creighton: You know it's become like a virtue signaling someone called it a MAGA mask for sorry, MAGA hat for liberals. Yeah, I mean it's yeah, it's it's a bit like that and you know what's just just on the mask to dwell. I mean, what's extraordinary is even the doyens of public health like Leana Wen have said that their performative cloth masks are performative, but overwhelmingly, that's what people still wear. It just it's extraordinary, like why, anyway? Yeah I go on. Yeah, it's now. I've appreciate that it's it is crazy when he when he really sit down and think about it.
Ian Miller: I wanted to get your thoughts obviously right for a major media outlet in the Australian. That's that's significant paper and so have you felt any pressure writing for them to cover COVID in a particular way? Or have you been able to kind of say what you think or write about what you want?
Adam Creighton: Well, actually no, and this is a good opportunity for me to to kind of give a shout out to my employer a News Corp, which has been extremely supportive of. We actually throughout the whole thing. They've never said to write about this or or don't write about that. You know so. So no, I haven't. I mean, I, I haven't I come under pressure from from any editors on COVID. The only pressure is is probably from other journalists. Not not not just at News Corp, but throughout the Australian media industry. They've been very pro restriction, and so there's been a lot of vicious. You know vicious attacks on me. You know mainly from from outspoken members of the general public, but also from other journalists, which I found very, very depressing because I never liked to attack other journalists, even if I vehemently disagree with them. Personally I mean. Because, you know, there's a. There's a. There's a shrinking bunch of us. It's a hard job and you know I don't think that we should be attacking each other personally, but. So the pressure has come from, you know, from other journalists to conform and. And what's worried me is how so many journalists are? You know, basically became cheerleaders for the government through through this. And I I thought that that was very unusual given what the role of the fourth estate should be, and certainly not to to cheer on extraordinary restrictions on human rights, right? So that's so, yeah, so so the pressure has come from the groupthink, not from my employer, which has been very supportive.
Ian Miller: Yeah, that's that's great to hear, and I've I've literally have made that exact point many times about that. Journalism is as I understood it was supposed to be kind of speaking truth to power and and questioning authority. And it seems like a lot of people have not held up to that standard in the last couple years. So you wrote a piece back in December, basically saying that you caught COVID and it was no big deal. And if you're on Twitter, many of us have seen you know these these 20 plus long tweet threads from from Twitter doctors or. You know people with a blue check mark describing how they you know their their experience with COVID, and if they coughed 2 more times today than they before, or something equally absurd. So so why did they talk about COVID like that? Do you think is it? Is it just for the the likes and the retweets and the attention?
Adam Creighton: In the column I just kind of, you know, made a lot of it and just stressed the fact that. This is the experience for 99% of people at least who have COVID and. And you know, I was attacked by including by lots of other journalists for that column. You know, quite viciously. And you know, I, I really don't understand why. I guess it was the blue checks look. I think I think amongst the blue checks. You know who are largely journalists and there's. A disproportionate number of authoritarians and virtue, signallers and moralizers, and intellectuals. And you know, if you read Hayek, or any of those other serious thinkers, you know, that's what that's what. He argues, that those sorts of people. The authoritarians are hugely overrepresented in the intellectual class. And I think that's that's what you've seen. In the COVID experience, and I think it explains largely why so many journalists have barracked for more government control and have screamed and abused people who don't line up with what the mob want or think. And you know, it's it's extremely sad.
Ian Miller: So another column you recently wrote was about the state of the Union, which just happened here a few days ago, and so I had a few questions about it. First of all, and we kind of touched on this, but how convenient was the timing that all the masks in Congress were removed right before his speech? And also, what did you think of it and what did he get wrong? What was kind of what we're hoping to to express in that column? And more importantly, how well are the Iranian people holding up against Vladimir Putin?
Adam Creighton: That was. That was very funny. I must say the fact that Biden instead of Ukrainian and he said it quite clearly too like it wasn't like it was a you know it could have been one or the other. It it was definitely Iranian and but look I mean that was that was just a reflection of the bumbling and fumbling nature of the delivery. And you know, people say that that doesn't matter, but look I think it does. I mean he's the leader of the free world. He's been a politician for a senior politician for more than 40 years and he must have rehearsed that multiple times. And, uh. And he still you know it. It it you know he he gave it. Very poorly, I would argue and but but of course it's not just that it's the content too. I mean, it was, you know, it was a real opportunity. I thought for the Democrats to, you know, shift their political direction. And let's face it, their political direction has delivered him the lowest approval rating. Almost of any president in history. So clearly the political direction is not a success. You know whether you think it's right or wrong. It's not a success and I was just shocked by the fact that it was all the same talking points from last year. You know about build back. Better about infrastructure. There were no new announcements in the speech to, you know, to kind of take the media by surprise. The only new announcement was in the foreign policy part, which was which was actually quite a small part of the speech. I was surprised about that too where he banned Russian flights in and out of the US, but that's that's a tokenistic negligible policy. There was really nothing new on the foreign policy front or the domestic front and on COVID, which of course is what we're talking about here. I was particularly surprised because here was an opportunity to just say, look, let's say. We've we've beaten it. We've done it. It's over, you know. And and all our wonderful measures have worked. I mean, that's what I would have done. I would have said look, the measures have worked. We've done it. Rah rah, let's move on. But no, we talked about new variants. I mean, I couldn't believe it. He talked about new variants. He talked about masking. In fact, masking got more mention than China, which I thought was extraordinary and and testing. I thought, Oh my God, do people want to hear about that? I mean, I certainly don't. But as we discussed earlier, the polls suggest a lot of Americans don't want to hear that either. So I I thought that was very weird, so look. I mean, I gave it a five out of 10 at best. Uhm, I don't think it's gonna help him in a way I thought it might have helped him in the polls.
Ian Miller: Yeah. And Speaking of that, and it was kind of my last question I had for you. You know the conversation is definitely shifted over time in the United States, but a lot of other countries are still very much still in the throes of of mandates and and vaccine, passports and international travels is not the same as it was. You can't just hop on a plane and land in Paris without jumping through hoops and filling out paperwork and all this other stuff. So where do we think we go from here is that is that going to become a permanent feature now is that the new taking your shoes off at the airport? Or is that gonna
Adam Creighton: Hopefully not. In Paris I. I'm kind of itching to get over to Europe actually, and I I kind of have I keep putting it off because of just all of the administrative drama with going the testing on this side. The testing on that side, you know I'd be forced to get a booster, which I don't really want to get. I mean, I'll probably be compelled to because it'll be the rule. But you know, I've had COVID, so I figure I don't need the booster, at least for quite awhile. But I understand the French Government I think requires it. So yeah, so that's that's kind of. I've been on my mind but just just in general with all the lockdowns and interventions look, I mean again, you know we kind of discussed this earlier I. I hope people just get sick of it and kind of move on to the next issue, which may or may not be this tragedy in Ukraine which is dominating the media right now. I mean, I think I think one of the funny things is that a lot of the public health cheer squad. A public health cheer squad are feeling very lonely or ignored right now because the media is moved on to something else and so I hope that we do. Just move on and they don't come back. I mean lockdowns in particular I think, have been such a disaster that I expect the next two or three years there'll be more and more academic research coming out showing just what a disaster they were, and so I don't suspect that they'll be coming back. But As for vaccines in masks and that sort of thing because they're. So called relatively low cost restrictions. Supposedly, I think they're more likely to come back than the lockdowns so but look, you know, we've just had two years, which has been an extraordinary learning experience about ourselves, about our friends and colleagues and about governments. And you know it'll take years and years to to kind of assess what was good and bad out of it. And you know, frankly, from my point of view, most of it was bad, but there's certainly lots of assessing to do.
Ian MIller: Yeah, well I that was great. Thank you so much for all your answers. Thank you so much for your time. Yeah please everybody go follow Adam on Twitter. It's Adam under score, Creighton and and check out his work at the Australian. It's it's fantastic and he's always posting new interesting stories. So please go read those. And yeah thank you again for doing this.
Adam Creighton: No worries in and I hope the book is a bestseller.
Ian Miller: Appreciate it.
Episode 14: Adam Creighton, Washington Correspondent for The Australian