speaking of that, i hear president biden say america's back. [laughter] back to what? [laughter] back to cash to the ayatollah so he can make missiles that threaten us? back to apologizing what iranians tell our soldiers, sailors to take to their knees at gunpoint? back to president biden killing the pipeline? back to, back to all of a sudden things that put america -- back to supporting a pipeline in europe for european jobs? this is not what we want to go back to anytime at all. and we certainly don't want to go back to letting china have trade deals that kill our jobs right here in america. we can't afford it. [applause] we can't afford it. it's not the right thing, and we don't have to do it. we must be bold, and we must always put america first. [applause] you know, we've spent a lot of time talking about being canceled. i was really happy that this is being aired on television. not canceled, at least for the moment. [laughter] we worked tirelessly with great success to deliver on our values, american values that have made this such a special, unique nation. this country was built on what our founders understood and then the bill of rights that came behind that constitution. they built the nation recognizing that our rights come from our creator and not from any government. [applause] our union becomes more perfect every time we defend our sovereignty and we defend our borders, and i'm proud we were the most pro-life administration in the history of the united states of america. [cheers and applause] it was, it was my job to deny that any taxpayer dollars ever went to perform an abortion any place in the world, and we promoted adoption everywhere and always. and don't forget too, president trump appointed an awful lot of judges that understand the word life and words that have real, real meaning. [applause] i worked with the mexican government, my counterpart, the foreign minister of mexico and the president, to secure our borders. we worked hard too to make sure that drugs and other things didn't traffic across that border, and that meant too protecting your right to have firearms. our second amendment builds strong communities, strong families and insures each of us have the right to defend ourselves precisely as our founders pretended. [applause] liberals tend to care about the poor and then side with with the union bosses against the workers. they pretend to stand for children while kids, while kids in democrat-led inner cities aren't in front of computers like they think they are, they're the struggling figuring out how to stay safe from drug lords and get a good meal. that's not taking care of those people you're charged with protecting. and we need to get every one of our children back in school. and we need to get 'em back in now. [cheers and applause] i was a soldier about 25, 30 years ago and about 100 pounds ago too. [laughter] and when i hear democrats say they want a strong america, i know that they are working to undermine it badly. mark my words, they're going to cut the defense budget that we worked so hard to build. they'll do it to pay for their green new deal. it kind of makes me mad, right? they're going to trade army green for aoc green. [laughter] that is a bad, bad trade. and as i said before, our young men and women, we don't want to put them in harm's way, but when we're weak at home, when we don't stand up for our military, the risk of war increases when deterrence fades. we cannot let that happen. they want to defund the police while they barricade the capitol. this is backwards. and canceling our freedom to assemble peacefully while censoring our communications online is completely antithetical to what our founders understood about america. you know, it reminds me when i headed out to west point, my parents couldn't afford to fly to new york. i grew up in southern california. so they left me at the airport. my mother was happy and all kinds of feelings. she was -- my mother was a cigarette-smoking high school graduate who was the most decent and toughest woman i have ever met. [laughter] [applause] she said, mike, she pulled me a aside, i think she didn't want my dad to hear this. michael, i know you're a grinder. don't ever let them wear you down. wear them down. [applause] i've never forgotten what my mom told me that day. we'll all remember keep grinding, keep championing american values. one more story. smartest officer that i ever came to know, worked closely with his former army -- air force special operations officer. i asked him about someone who was working on our team, and i'd say what do you think of him or what do you think of her, and he'd say, love that guy. you know, he meant that person got stuff done. they were a grinder. they kept banging away. you all know these four years are going to test us. i need each of you to be a pipe fitter. get stuff done. keep grinding. [applause] be a pipe fitter. be a pipe fitter at church. be a pipe hitter at your pta meeting. don't let 'em bring crazy into your classrooms. lead the team to continue to support our military warriors. be a pipe hitter. [applause] be a pipe hitter when they tell you they're closing the mine or the factory because of some green vision. keep it open. president reagan, a real pipe hitter, president reagan once said if we lose freedom here, if we lose freedom here, there is no place to escape. this is the last stand on earth. i saw that. i saw that as your secretary of state as i traveled all around the world. and i am confident that he was right, i am confident that the american star will shine across the heavens so long as we keep a proper understanding of our god-given rights at the center of who we are and we keep up our quest to secure our freedom for our own people and for all of mankind. i'll be with you in the fight. god bless you and may god bless the united states of america. [cheers and applause] >> that was the former secretary of state, mike pompeo, of course, served in the trump administration, speaking before a very welcoming crowd at cpac, certainly hitting some of the highlights that conservatives traditionally care about, the economy, an increase in jobs, successes that he felt he had had with the trump administration during the four years of the trump administration, secure borders, american energy, getting kids back in school. he talked about being pro-life, really kind of hitting some of the things that you would expect him to hit there before that particular crowd, griff. griff: talking about america first, molly, clearly embracing the policies of former president donald trump. but then we also did hear a little bit about grandpa earl and his sort of campaign speech. makes you wonder if she's -- if he's eyeing a political future and what that brings. and i thought what was really fascinating, molly, listening to those remarks was the loudest applause came two times, once about abortion but also the abraham accords. and it really put a lot of distance between himself and his past administration and the incoming biden administration. molly: yeah. and he did, of course, hit the incoming biden administration and biden as well a little bit, talking about the defense budget, where money will be going saying it should stay in defense. also argued that appeasing iran would be a disaster. so a couple ticks there the at the current administration, but really a look ahead and touting many of the accomplishments of the trump administration. so we just had a chance to listen and now we'll take you back to "the journal editorial report." ♪ ♪ paul: hidden in the democratic covid relief bill is a major expansion of the affordable care act with $34 billion going to an increase in obamacare subsidies. my nest guest says the plan is a big giveaway to health insurers that will benefit more men than women. brian blaze served as special assistant to president trump at the white house economic council where he coordinate a nateed the administration's health policy agenda. brian, great to see you. thanks for doing this. let me ask you, so what's -- how will this expansion of subsidies work in the bill, and what does it mean for the average taxpayer? >> yeah, paul. hey, thanks so much for having me on. you know, as you know, obamacare significantly increased premiums for individual market coverage, and this is where people go who don't get health insurance through their employer or through a government program. and it made subsidies available that are financed by taxpayers for this coverage to be more affordable, but it caps them at 400% of the poverty line which is about $106,000 for a family of four. now, obamacare enrollment has been very disappointing, way below projections, and the democrats' solution is to increase these subsidies. and they're doing it in two ways. so people that currently qualify for one, they're going to get a small increase, but they're also lifting the cap at 400% of the poverty line. what this is going to do is lead to a small benefit for lower income families and a massive benefit for upper income families. so let me give you a concrete example. so you have a family of four headed by a 60-year-old. if they make $45,000, this proposal increases their benefit by $1,000. let's say we triple their income and they're at $135,000. they're going to qualify for a subsidy of $18,000 a year to purchase health insurance. double their income further and say $270,000, this proposal's going to give them a subsidy of $6,000. you know, in some parts of the country you're going to have couples that make half a million dollars or more that'll qualify for thousands of dollars in subsidies. paul: all right. now, and the justification for this is that too few people who aren't subsidized have been actually going onto the obamacare exchanges and buying insurance. and is that mainly because those policies are too expensive, or is it because those policies and limitations? why aren't people buying this? it was supposed to be such a good product. >> there was supposed to be 2525 million people on the exchanges right now -- 25 million, and there's about 10 million. and the vast majority receive large subsidies. so, yeah, turns out if you're middle of upper -- or upper income, you're just not buying coverage. so this is a way that the democrats are trying to address that problem. they're not looking at sort of, you know, cutting the underlying cost that obamacare's caused to be exorbitant, their they're just throwing more taxpayer money at it. paul: okay. and that $34 billion figure, i guess that's over two years. so if you expand that, multiply that by five for a ten-year budget window, that's $170 billion or so, and you're talking about -- that's going right into the deficit, is it not? >> it is. and just to be clear, so these subsidies are payments that are made from the u.s. treasury directly to health insurance companies. and people can only access them if they purchase obamacare plans. and, actually, if you extrapolate this over ten years, the cost would be much greater than the five times 34 billion because employers will have incentives to drop coverage. by keeping it limited to two years, employers are unlikely to drop coverage because they don't want to disrupt the coverage that their employees have. but these subsidies are so large are now that employers will reorganize themselves, and they'll stop offering benefits. and i think you could see a 10-year cost of this approaching half a trillion dollars. paul: wow. there's another element in this bill regarding medicaid. it's kind of a lure for states that didn't buy into the expansion of medicaid under obamacare. how would that work? >> they're proposing for two years to increase the federal reimbursement rates by 5% for the traditional population for states that expand. they are the, you know, states that have expanded they're obviously seen costs far greater than projection, and you haven't seen very good health outcomes. so there's a lot of states that have looked at that and decided despite all the federal money, not to extend medicaid programs. this is way to bribe those statements to expand with a two the-year boost in funding. paul: how many states have not expanded under obamacare with the expanded medicaid provision? is it 10, 12 the, something like that? >> it's 12 states right now including big states like texas, florida and georgia. paul: okay. and has that been a wise decision fiscally and, i guess, in health care outcomes for those states? >> i think it has. and aye written quite a bit -- i've written quite a bit about the problems of medicaid expansion. every state that has expanded we've seen enrollments and spending off the charts. we've seen large numbers of people that are not eligible for the medicaid program ebb rolled because -- enrolled because states are spending with federal taxpayer dollars. and there's been a lot of studies that have shown therefore not been health outcomes, evidence of positive health outcomes from medicaid expansion. paul: brian blase, thanks so much. when we come back, former president trump set to make his first major speech since leaving office. what to expect when the former president addresses the cpac crowd tomorrow in florida. ♪ (announcer) this is chet. he loves work but lives for the weekend. and now, he needs a new truck. so he came to truecar and he saw what others paid for the truck he wants. now he can recognize a great price. truecar. buy smarter. buy from home. want to save hundreds on your wireless bill? with xfinity mobile, you can. how about saving hundreds on the new samsung galaxy s21 ultra 5g? you can do that too. all on the most reliable network? sure thing! and with fast, nationwide 5g included - at no extra cost? we've got you covered. so join the carrier rated #1 in customer satisfaction... ...and learn how much you can save at xfinitymobile.com/mysavings. ♪ ♪ paul: donald trump set to take the stage tomorrow at the conservative action political conference in florida. if his first speech since leaving office last month, the former president is expected to deliver sharp criticism of the biden administration while laying out plans for his future and the future of the republican party. trump's speech comes as republicans look to retake control of the house and senate in 2022. we're back with our panel, dan henninger, kim strassel and wall street jowl editorial page writer jason. dan, what do you expect to hear from president trump? >> yeah, who can predict? i mean, this is a donald trump who has been really quite quiet for something going on six weeks or so, and that isn't normal. and he is going to be on a stage in front of a large group of admiring people down there at the cpac conference. and so there is the speech that the will be in his teleprompter for him to read, and there will be whatever is in donald trump's head that he wants to convey as he goes along. no way to predict what that's going to be, paul. i guess what i'm hooking for is whether the -- looking for is whether the speech is going to be about trump himself, about his grievances, whether it'll be backward-looking or whether it'll be about trumpism which is the issue at the center of the republican party debate right now. what was trumpism, what should it be in the future, what are the elements that go into it. and what does donald trump think should go into that, what vision he going to provide for the republicans as they try to unite against the democrats? and that's another issue there, will he take time to attack his opponents in the republican party as he has grown to do, or will he attack joe biden and the democrats? so as i'm i saying basically here, is it going to be a backward-looking talk or a forward-looking talk. my guess, paul, is it will be forward-looking because donald trump wants to continue to be a major player in the politics of the republican party. paul: jason how would you, what would you consider to be a constructive effortas opposed to one that essentially promotes a civil war in the gop? >> well, the party isn't opposition, so it's easy to and constructive for a member of the party to unify around opposition to what the party in power is doing, and i think we will see him do that. what would be less productive, as dan said, relitigating his grievances against mitch mcconnell and georgia officials. i'm a little less sanguine that we will see mostly forward-looking. i think it will be something of a mix. paul: yeah, you know, jason, i've heard from sources that talk to donald trump that he really is set on going after the people he thinks didn't stand by him in impeachment. liz cheney, for example, the gop leadership, and those who have criticized ask him and blamed him for the january 6th attack. so i do expect that kind of attack. this is in the nature of donald trump. do you agree with that? >> absolutely. i mean, you know, i think we have seen especially in his lame duck period that he really can't change, and there's not much that could be done to control him. i mean, he continues with his crusade against the election long after it was clear that it wasn't going anywhere all the way up until january 6th. and, you know, i'm not sure he can control his behavior. paul: kim, what do you expect to hear, and when you talk -- when you think about donald trump and the gop, does he -- do you think that he is, in fact, still the dominant force in the republican party and he wants to reassert that dominance? >> first of all, what i expect to hear -- i actually think a great deal of donald trump's speech is going to be about the guy who's been in office for the past month, joe biden, his policies, mistakes that he has made, and maybe donald trump finally doing what he should have been doing after the election which was to talk about his legacy and the policies that his party put into place that were so good for the economy and so many americans and make that contrast. and that, by the way, would be a pretty productive way to go. look, donald trump has left his mark on the republican party, and that is why there is discussions about civil war, and, you know, there's a lot of americans out there who felt as though the party hadn't been listening to them for a long time, addressing issues that they cared about. and so it may not be donald trump, but i think donald trump's mark on the party is something that is here and that you already see other republicans embracing as they consider their runs for a presidency in maybe four years. paul: jason, another bit of news regarding the former president this week was that the district attorney in manhattan the, cyrus vance jr., has obtained something like eight years of donald trump's tax returns. he's been after those for a long time, finally at the end of the court fight has them. is there any doubt if -- in your mind that if vance finds any legal problems there, that he will, in fact, go after the former president with criminal charges? >> i think he will. i think, you know, i think the pressure among democrats to do this is very strong, and, you know, mr. vance is an elected official in new york city. i think it's important that those charges, if they do come, be buttoned up and that they don't, you know, that all the is are dotted and the ts are crossed because the president is going to say that it's a witch hunt. and it may be that if we roll out, if a prosecutor rolls out charges that look like, you know, the product of a fishing expedition, that will be politically pretty corrosive, i think. paul: thank you, jason. when we come back, the u.s. launches an air streek in syria against iranian-backed militias even as president biden signals his willingness to return to the nuclear deal with tehran. general jack keane on the new administration's approach to the rogue regime next. ♪ ♪you've got the brawn♪ ♪i've got the brains♪ ♪let's make lots of♪ ♪uh uh uh♪ ♪oohhh there's a lot of opportunities♪ with allstate, drivers who switched saved over $700. saving is easy when you're in good hands. allstate click or call to switch today. wanna build a gaming business that breaks the internet? 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>> yeah, i think it's pretty much the right call, paul. i mean, it was a measured attack. it's against two of the iranian-backed militia groups that have been hitting our troops in iraq over the course of a number of years. and i think most importantly it sends a clear signal that the united states is not going to stand by while others attack our troops. so this is about deterrence, but it's also about force protection. so our troops have got that message that we've got a new president and a new secretary of defense that are taking action in their interests, also sending the message to the iranians, certainly, and also to our other adversaries out there that this new administration is going to respond in kind when something like this happens. paul: okay. is there any doubt at all in your mind that the militias that attacked that base had at least the support of iran if not the active support on that attack? >> no, it's indisputable. we actually -- the attack on erbil, we have the rockets all from iran that were used by the iranian-backed militia. so we have solid evidence that the iranians are backing this thing. and, by the way, i thought it was appropriate to go to syria versus iraq which may seem strange to our audience because the attack came from iraq on our bases in iraq. but why it makes sense is because it's not undermining the government of iraq which has a tenuous relationship with its people, and this is the first administration that has pushed back on the iranians. and that certainly is ad good thing. a good thing. but an attack inside of iraq arouses the people, arouses political opposition as well. and the second thing is an attack in syria against the same group is likely that this would escalate further. in iraq until probably escalate further. so good decision on the location as well. paul: okay. now, let's talk about the biden strategy as you've seen it so far regarding iran nuclear. it seems to me that there's some mixed messages going on. how do you see it? >> yeah. oh, boy, absolutely, paul. you mentioned one of the messages, which was encouraging to see, many officials stated to include secretary of state we want to lengthen and strengthen the iran nuclear deal of 2015. what does that really mean? that means we want to change the deal. paul: right. >> we want to impose greater restrictions, okay? that's a good message. then the same -- last week towards the end of the week, blinken said that the trump sanctions were failed policy that did not work. and then on top of that he invited the iranians to come back into negotiations with him, and if they came into full compliance, he would lift sanctions. well, the reason why the iranians are out of compliance is just a simple ploy to do exactly what blinken is saying. i'll come back into full compliance if you lift the sanctions on me. that is tragic because we're walking away from such a better hand that we have five years later. what i mean by that, crippling sanctionings on iran -- sanctions on iran tanked the economy, social and civil unrest directed against the mullahs, not against the united states. and clearly the money from the sanctions was used to kill americans, to encroach on israel and fuel their ambitions in syria, yemen and iraq. paul: right. so it's tragic if we don't take advantage of those sanctions and also take advantage of the fact that we have a broad coalition in the middle east that's an anti-iranian coalition among the arabs and the israelis. that gives this administration considerably more leverage. not to go back to the old deal, but to make a better one. paul: so one of the strategies the administration is pursuing is getting the europeans back to try to put pressure on iran. what do you think about that as a strategy? >> well, i'm pretty frustrated with that, paul. i mean, the administration said during the transition that the first thing they were going to do before dealing with the iranians is listen to our allies in the region, and that's the arabs and the israelis. and, certainly, that's got to be meaningful and substantive in terms of getting that feedback. but the truth is we're listening more to the europeans, and it's the e3, the u.k., france and germany. and they always wanted to stay in this deal despite the fact it was flawed. and likely for their own economic self-interests. i mean, there are some thoughts that if you open up the iranian economy, european thoughts that is, that they will moderate their behavior or that the hard-liners, sanctions make the hard-liners harder. there's not much evidence to support that. this is all about european self-interest and putting their own security and that of their neighbors at risk. paul: all right. thank you, general jack keane. still ahead, republicans push back as house speaker nancy pelosi floats a partisan plan for a commission to investigate the january 6th riot at the capitol. ♪ ♪ ♪ hey now, you're an all-star, get your game on, go play ♪ ♪ hey now, you're a rock star, get the show on, get paid ♪ ♪ and all that glitters is gold ♪ get 5 boneless wings for $1 with any handcrafted burger. only at applebee's. ♪ ♪ the chevy silverado trail boss. with any handcrafted burger. when you have a two-inch lift. when you have goodyear duratrac tires. when you have rancho shocks and an integrated dual exhaust. when you have all that, the last thing you'll need... is a road. the chevy silverado trail boss. ready to off-road, right from the factory. ♪ ♪ paul: putback from republicans over a plan by nancy pelosi to form a commission to investigate the january 6th attack on the u.s. capitol. after the house speaker floated a draft that had seven members appointed by democrats and just four by republicans. senate minority leader mitch mcconnell slamming the proposal as partisan by design. >> an inquiry with the hard-wired partisan slant would never be legitimate in the eyes of the american people. an undertaking that is uneven or unjust would not help our country. paul: we're back with dan henninger, kim strassel and kyle peterson. kyle, i guess, first of all, is a january 6th commission like this a good idea? >> well, i can see the argument for it if the point is to get the facts out. there are a lot of questions that are still open about why the capitol was so poorly protected, what the chain of command there was, when backup was called, the national guard was called in, and how much of this stuff was preplanned. but the question, and i think it's a good question, the senate is split 50-50, and democrats have 51% of house seats, so why should this commission be almost two-thirds democrat? paul: well, on that point, kim, i guess is there enough that you don't know personally that you'd like to know about what happened that day along the lines that kyle said to warrant this kind of a big commission? >> i think, i think that there is. again, mostly on this question of why was the capitol so poorly protected, and what led up to this. because, obviously, we're having a national discussion in which democrats use the word insurrection every day. i think it would be good to have a bipartisan group establish some baseline facts about who was there and what actually happened. now, that's not what nancy pelosi is proposing. she seems very much more focused on getting a commission that she could use as a further cudgel to beat up on republicans and conservatives out there in the country. paul: kim, should donald trump's role in this be part of such an investigation? because i assume that's a exactly what democrats will want to pursue. >> look, i don't think that you can do an evaluation without this without talking, for instance, about the president's speech out there. because that gets to the question of whether or not some of this was preplanned and who was actually at that speech versus who was at the capitol, that kind of a thing. but again, the way that you make sure that you get the facts and that this entire experiment is not moved over and focused as a, quote, witch hunt against the president is you make sure you have a truly bipartisan commission. paul: dan, what do you think is nancy pelosi's calculation here? because if you're looking to essentially have conspiracy theories put to rest, if you're looking to have some kind of consensus about what actually did happen, it has to be credible. and a 7-4 partisan split is just not going to be credible. >> well, that makes sense to me, paul, but i don't think it makes sense to nancy pelosi at all, i'm sorry to say. the speaker has been relentlessly, i would say, hopelessly partisan the past four years. she has become obsessional about affiliating and joining donald trump to the republican party. that is what she lives for. and she somehow has it in her head that if she can put together a commission that associates trump with these right-wing militias like the ohskeepers, proud boys and q aknown, that it will thousand -- qanon, it will send a message to voters that they can't associate with republicans in the midterm elections. it is political, mitch mccome is right about that. you are right that it would not be credible, but a lot of what she has done the past four years isn't credible, and this is the course that nancy pelosi has set herself on, and there is no reason why republicans should participate in an exercise like this. though i will say that i do think we could use an objective examination into what happened that day. we're not going to get that if pelosi is leading it. paul: kyle, the precedent that i like that they could follow is the rob silverman report which looked into the faulty intelligence before the iraq war. former democratic senator and a republican-appointed judge led that. they followed the facts, they didn't follow a predetermined theory, and they came out with some very credding conclusion. credible conclusions. is that something? i mean, what do you think? >> yeah. and i think that's true, and the 9/11 commission is another precedent, that's the one pelosi keeps raising. that was evenly split, and it was a unanimous report which gave it the credibility that you would want in something like this. i mean, the alternate, the alternative precedent is the commission after the financial crisis which was not evenly split, and the result was you had all the democrats issued one report, and all the republicans dissented and said the majority's report didn't get the story right, and people shrugged and there's -- what's the point of doing a commission and putting out a report if you're not going to have a bipartisan agreement on the story? paul: all right. still ahead, as the pandemic-weary american public looks for answers, the biden administration is facing criticism over what some say is mixed messages on covid. so with cases dropping and more vaccines coming online, we'll talk to dr. marty makary about a timeline for a return to normal. >> the question i ask, i'm asked most often is when will things get back to normal? 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>> that's going to depend on the geography, paul. parts of the country will be there in april, parts in may, but the general sentiment that natural immunity was underestimated is now being affirmed by a lot of studies that show there's a lot more t-cell immoonty than antibodies out there. and if you look at the rates of vaccinations, we're on track for herd immunity in late april or may. north dakota, they've hit herd immunity, a week without any deaths, so it's going to depend on the geography and the vaccine rollout. paul: and your definition of herald immunity is a combination of vaccination and previous infection at about 70% of the country? because dr. fauci said it's more than that. >> yeah, so dr. fauci and some of the other old guard medical establishment have dismissed natural immunity, so that's how they arrive at their calculations for when we hit it. but the reality is that herd immunity is not an all or nothing thing. you start seeing significant slowing when a lot of people have had prior infection. the vaccination rate right now is going up by about 4% per week, and it's not linear. we're seeing mass vaccinations scheduled for anybody who wants it as early as end of march in connecticut, and i think you're going to see certain parts of the country hit herd immunity in april. paul: okay. what are the implications of that when you're talking about social distancing, masking, going out in public? are we going to be really wearing masks until 2022? >> no. and we need to live our lives. the question about once you're vaccinated can you be with loved ones, can you go out to dinner, can you do activities, the answer is a definitive yes. we need to address one of the great epidemics of lonely that affects health outcomes. so right now we need to talk about how to restart our lives and not do what we've done most of the pandemic, and that is a reactionary approach of, oh, this is where we are? let's scramble to figure out what to do. this is the a good time for us to plan getting back to normal. paul: and does that include -- when you say getting back to normal, does that include attending mass events like concerts or sporting events, that sort of thing? >> yes, it does. we're going to see a lot of mass public gatherings starting later this summer -- sorry, later this spring. and it's understandable if the day we go below 5,000 cases a day and less than 50 deaths in the country if people are not ready to put the switch back on, it's been a rough year, it may take a while for consumer confidence to pick up again. paul: how worried are you about these merging strains of the virus, mutations compromising the effectiveness of the vaccines? i guess so far not too much, but it's going to continue to mutate. >> yeah. you know, there's -- this is something we follow carefully, but the message has got to be clear. our tools are 100% effective against the new variants. and if you look at the countries where the new variants are common, the u.k. and south africa, they have had reductions in daily cases greater than we've seen in the united states. we've had about a 77% reduction in daily cases, they've had an 82 and 90% reduction in cases respectively. so the variants are something we watch carefully, but at a certain point the virus sort of mutates itself out of existence. so it's not like the variants are always going to be worse. it goes both ways, and coronavirus will be with us for a long time as a seasonal virus, but right now the vaccines appear to be 100% effective against death, 100 percent effective against hospitalization once you're 35 days out from that first dose. paul: well, moderna, i saw, is already investigating a potential booster shot vaccine that could deal with whatever the virus throws at us. is that going to be our future perhaps? americans are familiar with that with other diseases. are we going to have to have booster shots in the future, maybe on an annual basis? >> i don't think it'll be annual because this virus is more stable compared to, say, the influenza virus. but, yes, and you're right, pfizer announced tear new phase one trial that they started culling people from the original trial giving them a third dose six months later to see if it gives better coverage against variants, and also moderna developed a vaccine -- relatively uncovered this week -- they developed a new vaccine designed for variants, and that is a new mrna vaccine, and they actually shipped it to the nih. they developed it in about 30 days, faster than the first vaccine they developed in 42 days, so it does show our ability to respond quickly to new variants. paul: all right, dr. ma carry. thank you. we sure appreciate that optimistic assessment. we have to take one more break. when we come back, hits and misses of the week. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ when the chapstick goes on. it's on. get yours on at chapstick.com alright, i brought in ensure max protein... ...to give you the protein you need with less of the sugar you don't (grunting noise) i'll take that. yeeeeeah! 30 grams of protein and 1 gram of sugar drink, play, and win big in the powered by protein challenge! what do you look for when you trade? i want free access to research. yep, td ameritrade's got that. free access to every platform. mhm, yeah, that too. i don't want any trade minimums. yeah, i totally agree, they don't have any of those. i want to know what i'm paying upfront. yes, absolutely. do you just say yes to everything? hm. well i say no to kale. mm. yeah, they say if you blanch it it's better, but that seems like a lot of work. now offering zero commissions on online trades. we charge you less so you have more to invest. ♪♪ ♪ muckpaul: time now for our hitsd misses of the week. kim, first to you. >> paul, a big miss for the u.s. supreme court for failing to take up and settle one of the biggest questions out of the 2020 election. the case here was whether or not the pennsylvania legislature has the authority to write election law as has always been the case or whether or not pennsylvania's supreme court gets to just willy-nilly change it and extend the deadline by three days as happened in november. this happened across the country. it was a chance for the court to say, give some guidance on this. it seemed to think it was too big of a hot potato. prediction, the cases that come along next will be even worse. paul: all right, jason. >> paul, i'll give a hit to demonstrators in burma who, i think, have impressed the world and shown up in force against the military coup that took over the country at the beginning of this month. most americans may not think that much about burma if, but it's right there on the border with china in a region that's increasingly important to american strategy, so rolling back the coup and limiting china's influence will not be easy tasks, but i think the demonstrators deserve credit for their bravery. paul: all righty. kyle. >> i will give a muss to neera tanden whose nomination hit a wall this week when senators balked at voting for a nominee who savage ld them on twitter. her committee vote was called off, and it's not hard to see why. i think she called senator susan collins as papa netically bad -- pathetically bad face, and senator joe manchin worried about the toxic relationship between the congress and the budget office. so another public figure learns that insults on the internet actually make people mad in real life. paul: dan. >> a hit to dr. francis collins, director of the national institutes of health, for publicly praising the trump administration's operation warp speed and its director. joe biden continues to shamelessly ridicule the trump administration's covid effort as a complete failure. dr. collins made clear that operation warp speed cleared a path of testing at least six vaccines inside eleven months, producing the extraordinary benefits the whole nation is realizing right now. >> so grateful to be here, and if you would -- eric: well, it's day three of cpac in florida where the crowd of largely pro-trump conservatives -- let's listen to fox news' and fox nation's pete hegseth who has now taken the stage. >> -- all morning long. i'll tell you, it's been a lot of fun to watch all these speakers, especially the young folks, the charlie kirks and your james o'keefes and your don jr. how about dan bongino? [applause] the doers, the doers of the conservative movement that have stood up and said we're not going to let the left come over, control and destroy our country. which is what we know they want to do. and we stand on the shoulders of conservative giants at a convention like this, don't we? i mean, william f. buckley, ronald reagan, newspaper gingrich, rush -- newt if gingrich,

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