It's a problem across society, not unique to the CIA. Here's an intriguing theory: we live in what can be called a "managerial regime" [1]. This system of gove

It's a problem across society, not unique to the CIA. Here's an intriguing theory: we live in what can be called a "managerial regime" [1]. This system of governance relies for its control and credibility not on democratic mandate but rather people's belief in its competence and expertise. Although there may be elections in this system, they have relatively little effect because decisions are actually made outside the realm of elected politicians. Government agencies are a part of this system, as are universities, large parts of the media, many NGOs and so on. These people are effectively the ruling class and have shared class interests. These shared interests supersede their job descriptions: given a choice between being doing their job and being a "class traitor", or lying and remaining loyal, they almost always pick the latter. A major element of shared class interest is the perception that highly trained/qualified people are both competent and honest by default. Anything that challenges this perception is a threat to their power and prestige, and thus must be undermined. This is why "fact checking" (a part of the managerial regime) is invariably so disinterested in real dispute resolution, deciding instead that whatever credentialed people at managerial institutions say is automatically true. If that were not the case, then the journalists pretending to check facts would become class traitors by fuelling claims of credentialed incompetence/dishonesty. The origins of COVID point strongly towards gross credentialed incompetence and dishonesty not only by the scientists actually doing the work, but also the US government for funding it even though it was illegal at the time, and western scientists in general for engaging in a ham-fisted conspiracy to cover up that possibility. If the CIA (or any other powerful body) were to institutionally disagree with the "expert" virologists, after they very quickly decided on the wet market origin theory, then this would not merely be a disagreement with the wet market theory but with the entire western system of credentialing, competence, knowledge and institutional management. It would directly challenge the widely held belief that scientists are inherently honest, which in turn would undermine the continual devolution of power away from politicians and towards the managerial class. In turn that would make the entire CIA class traitors, which would be intolerable, and thus the narrative must be aligned. The same happened of course with other institutions like the New York Times, which fired its veteran reporter digging into the possibility of a lab leak and then replaced him with a woman who immediately announced that the lab leak theory was "racist". [1] https://theupheaval.substack.com/p/the-china-convergence https://theupheaval.substack.com/p/the-china-convergence