Alex Berenson | |
---|---|
Born | Alex Norman Berenson January 6, 1973 New York, U.S. |
Education | Yale University (BA) |
Genre | Nonfiction, spy fiction |
Subject | Politics |
Notable awards | Edgar Award (2007) [1] |
Spouse | Dr. Jacqueline Anne Basha (m. 2009) [2] |
Website | |
Official website |
Alex Norman Berenson [2] (born January 6, 1973) is an American writer who was a reporter for The New York Times , and has authored several thriller novels as well a book on corporate financial filings. His 2019 book Tell Your Children: The Truth About Marijuana, Mental Illness and Violence sparked controversy, earning denunciations from many in the scientific and medical communities. [3] [4] [5] [6] [7]
During the coronavirus pandemic, Berenson appeared frequently in American right-wing media, spreading claims about COVID-19 and its vaccines. [8] He spent much of the pandemic arguing that its seriousness was overblown; once COVID-19 vaccines were rolled out, he made claims about the lack of safety and effectiveness of vaccines. [9] [10] [11] [12] [13]
Berenson was born in New York, and grew up in Englewood, New Jersey. [14] After attending the Horace Mann School, he graduated from Yale University in 1994 with bachelor's degrees in history and economics. [15]
Berenson joined The Denver Post in June 1994 as a business reporter. In August 1996, he left the Post to join TheStreet, a financial news website founded by Jim Cramer. In December 1999, Berenson joined The New York Times as a business investigative reporter.
In the fall of 2003 and the summer of 2004, Berenson covered the occupation of Iraq for the Times. He then covered the pharmaceutical and health care industries, specializing in issues concerning dangerous drugs. [16] Beginning in December 2008, Berenson reported on the Bernard Madoff $50 billion Ponzi scheme scandal.
In 2010, Berenson left the Times to become a full-time novelist. He lives in Garrison, New York, [17] with his wife Jacqueline, a forensic psychiatrist. [5] : 1 [18]
He has written 12 spy novels, all featuring the same protagonist, CIA agent John Wells. His first novel, The Faithful Spy , was released in April 2006 and won an Edgar Award for best debut by an American novelist. [19] The Faithful Spy was ranked #1 on The New York Times Bestseller List for paperbacks. [20]
In 2008, Berenson released his second thriller, The Ghost War. His third novel, The Silent Man, followed in 2009. His fourth, The Midnight House, was released in 2010 and debuted at #9 on The New York Times bestseller list. [21] The fifth, The Secret Soldier, was released in 2011 and debuted at #6 on the bestseller list. [22] The sixth, The Shadow Patrol, was released in 2012, and debuted at #8. [23] [24] In July 2012, The Shadow Patrol was named a finalist for the Ian Fleming Steel Dagger Award, given by Britain's Crime Writers' Association. [25] [26]
In 2019, Berenson authored the book Tell Your Children: The Truth About Marijuana, Mental Illness and Violence, which argues that marijuana use contributes to psychotic disorders and violent crime. The book "received positive coverage from The New Yorker and Mother Jones for what some called its troubling truths" [27] but was denounced as alarmist and inaccurate in the scientific and medical communities because of his claims that cannabis causes psychosis and violence; many scientists state that he is drawing inappropriate conclusions from the research, primarily by inferring causation from correlation, [3] : 1 [6] : 1 [28] : 1 [4] : 1 [8] : 1 as well as cherry picking [5] : 1 data that fits his narrative, and falling victim to selection bias via his use of anecdotes [5] : 1 to back up his assertions. [28] : 1 [4] : 1 [6] : 1 [29] : 1 [7]
Early in the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, Berenson vocally argued that people and the media were overestimating the risk of the new virus, that it posed little risk to young Americans, and that it was being used as a cover for government overreach. [8] [30] Many public health experts have rejected his claims. [8] [30] : 1
In May 2020, Fox News announced that Berenson would host a TV show called COVID Contrarian on its online streaming platform Fox Nation. However, by July 2020, amid surges in coronavirus cases across parts of the United States, Fox News appeared to have backtracked and removed the announcement of his show from its website. [31]
In 2021, Berenson tweeted that COVID-19 vaccinations had led to 50 times more adverse effects than flu vaccine. PolitiFact rated the claim "mostly false". [12] The Atlantic called him "The pandemic's wrongest man", owing to his claims of the vaccine's ineffectiveness. [10]
On January 25, 2022, Berenson appeared on the Fox News show Tucker Carlson Tonight declaring that existing mRNA vaccines are "dangerous and ineffective" against COVID-19, and further demanding that they be withdrawn from the market immediately. [32] The Washington Post 's Philip Bump denounced Carlson for "inviting Berenson on, despite his proven track record of misinformation and cherry-picking" and observed that "Berenson's claims went unchallenged." [33]
On August 28, 2021, Twitter permanently suspended Berenson for repeated violations of its policy on COVID-19 misinformation, but after Berenson filed suit in December 2021 demanding reinstatement, Twitter reinstated Berenson's account in early summer 2022, in a "mutually acceptable resolution". [34] [35] This reinstatement was referred to as "significant" by The Atlantic, given that most social-media-banned people fail to win their court cases. [35]
Berenson did not regain Twitter access because of a First-Amendment free speech claim, which was rejected by the judge. [35] Eric Goldman, a law professor at Santa Clara University School of Law, theorizes that Twitter settled because of documentation of promises made to Berenson by a high-level Twitter employee concerning the nature of his tweets. [35] Goldman stated that Internet company executives have always been advised by their attorneys not to make promises to or even to speak to anyone about their individual accounts "for reasons that should now be obvious". [35]
John Wells series
No. | Title | Publisher | Date | Genre | ISBN |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | The Faithful Spy | Random House | April 25, 2006 | Spy fiction | 978-0-345-47899-3 |
2 | The Ghost War | Putnam | February 12, 2008 | Spy fiction | 978-0-399-15453-9 |
3 | The Silent Man | Putnam | February 10, 2009 | Spy fiction | 978-0-399-15538-3 |
4 | The Midnight House | Putnam | February 10, 2010 | Spy fiction | 978-0-399-15620-5 |
5 | The Secret Soldier | Putnam | February 8, 2011 | Spy fiction | 978-0-399-15708-0 |
6 | The Shadow Patrol | Putnam | February 21, 2012 | Spy fiction | 978-0-399-15829-2 |
7 | The Night Ranger | Putnam | February 12, 2013 | Spy fiction | 978-0-399-15972-5 |
8 | The Counterfeit Agent | Putnam | February 11, 2014 | Spy fiction | 978-0-399-15973-2 |
9 | Twelve Days | Putnam | February 10, 2015 | Spy fiction | 978-0-399-15974-9 |
10 | The Wolves | Putnam | February 9, 2016 | Spy fiction | 978-0-399-17614-2 |
11 | The Prisoner | Putnam | January 31, 2017 | Spy fiction | 978-0-399-17615-9 |
12 | The Deceivers | Putnam | February 6, 2018 | Spy fiction | 978-0-698-40753-4 |
The Power Couple February 9, 2021 Mystery, Thriller Simon & Schuster
Alex Michael Azar II is an American attorney, businessman, lobbyist, and former pharmaceutical executive who served as the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services from 2018 to 2021. Azar was nominated to his post by President Donald Trump on November 13, 2017, and confirmed by the United States Senate on January 24, 2018. He was also chairman of the White House Coronavirus Task Force from its inception in January 2020 to February 2020, when he was replaced by Vice President Mike Pence.
Theodore Edward Rokita is an American lawyer and politician serving as the 44th and current Attorney General of Indiana. He served as a member of the United States House of Representatives from Indiana's 4th congressional district from 2011 to 2019. A member of the Republican Party, he served two terms as Secretary of State of Indiana from 2002 to 2010. When Rokita was elected to office in 2002 at age 32, he became the youngest secretary of state in the United States at the time.
China National Pharmaceutical Group Corporation (CNPGC), commonly referred to as Sinopharm, is a Chinese state-owned enterprise. The corporation was the indirect major shareholder of publicly traded companies Sinopharm Group, China Traditional Chinese Medicine, Shanghai Shyndec Pharmaceutical, and Beijing Tiantan Biological Products.
Eric Liang Feigl-Ding is an American public health scientist who is currently an epidemiologist and Chief of COVID Task Force at the New England Complex Systems Institute. He was formerly a faculty member and researcher at Harvard Medical School and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. He is also the Chief Health Economist for Microclinic International, and co-founder of the World Health Network. His research and advocacy have primarily focused on obesity, nutrition, cancer prevention, and biosecurity.
Ellison Litton Barber is an American journalist and correspondent for NBC News based in Manhattan. She contributes to NBC News, MSNBC and NBC News Now. Barber was reporting outside of the United States Capitol as a mob attacked and overtook the Capitol building. She remained live on NBC News throughout the evening.
Rick Wiles is a far-right American conspiracy theorist, pundit, religious extremist and senior pastor at the non-denominational Flowing Streams Church. He is the founder of TruNews, a website promoting racist, homophobic, and antisemitic conspiracy theories.
Tell Your Children: The Truth About Marijuana, Mental Illness and Violence is a 2019 book by Alex Berenson. In it, Berenson makes claims that cannabis use directly causes psychosis and violence, claims denounced as alarmist and inaccurate by many in the scientific and medical communities. The scientists state that Berenson is drawing inappropriate conclusions from the research he cites, primarily by inferring causation from correlation, as well as cherry picking data that fits his narrative, and falling victim to selection bias via his use of anecdotes to back up his assertions.
The Stop Mandatory Vaccination website and associated Facebook group are some of the major hubs of the American anti-vaccination movement. It was established by anti-vaccination activist Larry Cook in 2015.
The first confirmed case of the COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S. state of Connecticut was confirmed on March 8, although there had previously been multiple people suspected of having COVID-19, all of which eventually tested negative. As of January 19, 2022, there were 599,028 confirmed cases, 68,202 suspected cases, and 9,683 COVID-associated deaths in the state.
Media coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic has varied by country, time period and media outlet. News media has simultaneously kept viewers informed about current events related to the pandemic, and contributed to misinformation or fake news.
The COVID-19 pandemic has affected innumerable scientific and technical institutions globally, resulting in lower productivity in a number of fields and programs. However, the impact of the pandemic has also led to the opening of several new research funding lines for government agencies around the world.
The COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on the cannabis industry. Investor's Business Daily said the industry was affected as "customers stock up on prescriptions and recreational customers load up on something to make the lockdown a little more mellow or a little less boring".
Helen Branswell is a Canadian infectious diseases and global health reporter at Stat News. Branswell spent fifteen years as a medical reporter at The Canadian Press, where she led coverage of the Ebola, Zika, SARS and swine flu pandemics. She joined Stat News at its founding 2015, leading the website's coverage of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
The Donald Trump administration communicated in various ways during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, including via social media, interviews, and press conferences with the White House Coronavirus Task Force. Opinion polling conducted in mid-April 2020 indicated that less than half of Americans trusted health information provided by Trump and that they were more inclined to trust local government officials, state government officials, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Anthony Fauci.
America's Frontline Doctors (AFLDS) is an American right-wing political organization. Affiliated with Tea Party Patriots co-founder Jenny Beth Martin and publicly led by Simone Gold, the group is opposed to measures intended to control the COVID-19 pandemic, such as business closures, stay-at-home orders, and vaccination. The group promotes falsehoods about the COVID-19 pandemic and COVID-19 vaccines.
The COVID-19 pandemic that started in 2020 has significantly impacted liturgical celebrations of the Catholic Church worldwide. The Pontifical Foundation Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) stated that the pandemic has become not "just a medical, social and economic problem, but also a pastoral problem", which led ACN to start encouraging a special program for the actions of priests and religious against the virus spread.
During the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic, many people began to spread false or un-confirmed data and information. This included politicians and other government officials from administrations in several countries. Misinformation about the virus includes its origin, how it spreads, and methods of preventing and curing the disease. Some downplayed the threat of the pandemic, and made false statements about preventative measures, death rates and testing within their own countries. Some have also spread COVID-19 vaccine misinformation. Changing policies also created confusion and contributed to the spread of misinformation. For example, the World Health Organization (WHO) originally discouraged use of face masks by the general public in early 2020, advising "If you are healthy, you only need to wear a mask if you are taking care of a person with suspected 2019-nCoV infection," although the WHO later changed their advice to encourage public wearing of face masks.
Planet Lockdown is a film containing misinformation about COVID-19 that was banned on YouTube and Facebook.
The Trusted News Initiative (TNI) is an international alliance of news media, social media and technology corporations which claim to be working to identify and combat purported disinformation about national elections, the COVID-19 pandemic and COVID-19 vaccines. TNI was founded by Jessica Cecil, a leadership figure at the BBC who also serves as the initiative's director.
Berenson's victory was not based on his argument that his ban was a violation of the First Amendment; the judge rejected this claim. Instead, his success seems to have hinged on promises made to him by a high-level Twitter employee. "The points you're raising should not be an issue at all," the company's then–vice president of global communications assured Berenson at one point, according to the complaint. The lawsuit says the same executive later told Berenson that his name had "never come up in the discussions" about Twitter's COVID-19 misinformation policies. Goldman believes that the court's decision to allow a claim based on that correspondence prompted Twitter to settle. Internet-service executives have always been instructed by lawyers not to talk with people about their individual accounts and not to make any promises about what might happen, Goldman said, "for reasons that should now be obvious".