If he's willing to lie about that, what else is he lying about?
"In the pandemic’s early days, Dr. Fauci tended to cite the same 60 to 70 percent estimate that most experts did. About a month ago, he began saying “70, 75 percent” in television interviews. And last week, in an interview with CNBC News, he said “75, 80, 85 percent” and “75 to 80-plus percent.”"
"In a telephone interview the next day, Dr. Fauci acknowledged that he had slowly but deliberately been moving the goal posts. He is doing so, he said, partly based on new science, and partly on his gut feeling that the country is finally ready to hear what he really thinks."
The problem Dr. Fauci and other scientist have is if they share their opinions and then evidence comes out that makes them change their opinions, they have people who will call them liars and pull quotes out of context. But, this is exactly how science works.
> the average person starts to distrust the "science"
Unfortunately the average person doesn't understand science and that is why they distrust it. I still see people citing papers relating SARS1 is killed by hydroxychlorqine in vitro, ignoring all the papers describing RCTs in vivo dealing with SARS2.
That isn’t to say he should be vigilant when he speaks to be accurate, but sometimes advisement needs to be done before all the data is there.
I’ve had leaders that misrepresented facts in order to obtain compliance, as Fauci has, and leaders that were honest with me. I know which I prefer and I know which is considered ethical.
He’s clearly saying he changed his statement based on the compliance of the population and not medical research. He misrepresented the medical consensus as to what percentage of the population would need to be vaccinated in order to achieve herd immunity.
It's up to you to decide whether that makes him an asshole or not, but I think the fact that he's discussing it with reporters says a lot about his transparency and honesty all by itself.