Vox, which is in many ways the liberal answer to the Babylon Bee except its writers don’t know they’re doing parody, has offered yet another doomsday COVID missive with the Omicron … er, ominous title, “Why omicron could bring the deadliest phase in the pandemic yet.”

Its author intones: “The worst-case scenario with the new variant could be 20 percent more US Covid-19 deaths than last winter.” This begs the question as to how a variant could be simultaneously more deadly and less severe, but we’ll circle back to that approximately three weeks after the Apocalypse.

The lapdog media has since the beginning of COVID — no, not the beginning when Nancy Pelosi toured San Francisco’s Chinatown and said everything is hunky-dory, that other beginning — preached that the Grim Reaper is nigh, #OrangeManBad is trying to kill us all by talking up treatments, and only the 100% guaranteed safe and effective (except when they’re not) vaccines will save us.

Now, as Bonchie noted here earlier, the Biden Administration is getting ready to throw in the towel on COVID and relegate it to the category of the flu; i.e., always here, constantly morphing, can’t stop it, treat it the best we can; we’ll work on a shot for the latest variants. And how will the media respond? Brace yourself for a change coming so fast it’ll give you media-induced whiplash, as COVID coverage magically transforms to the same level as flu coverage. Namely, space-filler in-between puppy adoption and new public playground dedication stories.

It takes no prophetic gift to foresee the moment Biden and company quietly pass along the word that no, we’re not going to eliminate COVID, so you’d full well better learn to live with it, there will be an immediate torrent of articles and talking heads preaching the party line. “Treatment” will replace “vaccine” as the daily buzzword.

A new wonder drug called Ivermectin will be discovered, and no, you’ve never heard its name before, so shut up already. Elderberry farms will become the latest hot investment ticket as its natural powers to lower the risk of contracting COVID in the first place are suddenly discovered. Monoclonal antibody treatments such as Evushield will be made available to all. Face masks? Well, they’re nice and all, but not really necessary. Vaccines? Oh, silly us, we may have overreached a bit in calling them that. We meant to say “shots.”

In the media’s effort to make the COVID story disappear faster than Darrell Brooks, you may well see a nasty dichotomy between the more traditional left-leaning press (CNN, New York Times, etc.) and outfits such as Vox catering to The Squad’s, um, squad. The traditionalists are far more interested in the Democrats’ maintenance and protection of power, thus will eagerly go along with the narrative of burying what has been their own narrative since early 2020. The progpimples genuinely believe their fever-derived delusions, and as long as AOC Inc. maintains any kind of COVID hysteria, they will willingly go along.

And what of St. Fauci? Two ways this can go. He swiftly changes his tune based on “the latest science” and maintains his hollow … excuse me, hallowed status. Or, he remains COVID’s Chicken Little, at which point traditional media will turn on him — never mind how they’ve anointed and protected him before – then leave him at Snoopy’s mercy.

Back in the day, the father of Christian rock Larry Norman recorded a quirky little song about Christmas entitled “The Day That a Child Appeared.” It’s appropriate to bring it up now, for Christmas this year will forever be remembered as “The Day That COVID Disappeared.”