Editors at Issues and Insights consider President-elect Joe Biden‘s changing message about the pace of moving forward with COVID-19 vaccines.

Joe Biden has started attacking the Trump administration for not getting the COVID vaccines distributed fast enough. It’s the exact opposite of what Biden was saying before the election.

“As I long feared and warned, the effort to distribute and administer the vaccine is not progressing as it should,” Biden said last week.

As he “long feared and warned”? Who is he kidding?

Before the election, the only fear Biden expressed was that Trump was making wildly unrealistic claims about how quickly a vaccine could be developed, and that Trump was putting pressure on regulators to rush approval. “I trust scientists,” Biden said in September, “But I don’t trust Donald Trump, and at this moment, the American people can’t either.” He added that “The idea that there’s going to be a vaccine and everything’s gonna be fine tomorrow – it’s just not rational.”

Biden also said that even if a vaccine did miraculously emerge by Election Day, it wouldn’t be available to most Americans until “well into 2021.”

Meanwhile, the only warning Biden issued was that the country faced “a dark winter ahead.”

So what actually happened? Two vaccines were developed by Election Day, and both were quickly approved by federal regulators on an emergency basis.

Even the New York Times credited the Trump administration for the speed of these developments. …

… et instead of crediting Trump for achieving what Biden and his cadre of scientists said was impossible, Biden is now attacking Trump for supposedly taking too long to get the vaccines out to the public.

Last week, Biden complained that at the current rate “it’s going to take years, not months,” to vaccinate the public. …

… Biden launched his presidential campaign promising “no malarky.” But when it comes to the COVID vaccine, that is all he’s delivered.