For all the insanity, idiocy, and violence spewing from the God Emperor of the Republican Party, the craziest is the plan to bring back 19th Century life expectancy. I've never been able to understand the anti-vax delusion. It has existed since Jenner first discovered vaccination for smallpox, which, in case you didn't know it, ultimately resulted in the extermination of smallpox from the earth. In the 1950s, polio terrorized the nation and the world and Jonas Salk, who developed the first effective polio vaccine, became one of the greatest heroes of the age.
If you're much younger than me, you don't know what it was like to grow up with many of your classmates crippled by polio. People who were partially paralyzed were everywhere. My aunt had polio and couldn't raise her arms over her head. FDR, as you must know, couldn't walk because of polio. My Ph.D. mentor, Irving Kenneth Zola, walked with great difficulty using braces and canes, and often had ot use a wheelchair. They were, at least, lucky enough to be able to breathe.
Rubella, also known as German measles, caused devastating birth defects. We had institutions full of people with profound intellectual disabilities because of Rubella. Most people got through mumps and measles, but some ended up sterile, or brain damaged, or dead. Diphtheria and tetanus killed people as well. The very suggestion that the lunatic Robert Kennedy Jr. would be allowed within 1,000 light years of making public health policy is horrifying. But that's a promise that half of the voters are telling pollsters they want to see kept. We are descending into madness.
8 comments:
"Democracy, anarchy, tyranny." That is what my best teacher ever, Dorothy Coveney, used to make us repeat as a class -- out loud -- in 10th grade European studies, so we would get it through our heads that that is the inevitable progression in democratic countries. She helped me and others develop critical thinking skills. She was the only teacher I had throughout public school (over the course of 12 years) who helped me in that way.
We will know after Tuesday if Miss Coveney is correct in this case. After much reading, thinking and searching, I am confident Kamala Harris will be our next president. But she is going to have a hell of a lot on her hands if the right-wing crazies and Fucks Propaganda Network are allowed to keep spewing.
We need to teach critical, thinking skills, and people need to be held accountable for their actions. I know exactly whom to start with.
PS: For starters, we need to teach much of the country's supposed grown-ups that TV is not reality. We also need to regulate social media, and it wouldn't be the worst idea to ban its use for minors.
Don - I can't figure out how folks who think like this manage to successfully buy a house or hold down a responsible job. Has their corpus callosum been damaged, and the only decisions they make in the hemisphere disconnected from their rational facilities are the political ones?
Chucky: Sitting here at my desk on election night, working even in my state of dread, I wonder the same thing. I've met people just like this: nice, personable, polite, and apoplectic around their right-wing views. People who improve their houses with addition, make music, have families ... I admit it seems insane. You may be onto something here. But I really do think the Rupert Murdoch has successfully invaded their ... corpora callosa. My brother-in-law just visited here from Syracuse, NY, and related to me how his parents (mom lived into her 90s, dad just died at 100) became politically radicalized by shock-jocks (Limbaugh, etc.) and Fox. I think this is a huge part of what has happened. But it still begs the question: Why did so many of us -- though, apparently, not enough -- successfully detect and eschew the bullshit that has flooded the airwaves? Is there a genetic component, of is it primarily a result of people living out in the boondocks? No doubt many "boondockers" voted blue. Perhaps it is genetic ... *SIGH* I am having such anxiety tonight. I know I'm far from alone. See:
https://cdn.prod.dailykos.com/images/1359937/story_image/TMW2024-10-28colorXL.jpg?1729878001
Chucky -- Also: people don't need critical thinking skills to buy a house or hold a job. They get help for that. Who says they necessarily do these things well? In addition: I think a lot of people just can't get themselves to vote for a woman, or for a brown person. Obama won, but there was major backlash in the form of Shitler. And here we still are! We just can't/won't confront our racist past. Too many people are hunkered down in the Fox/DeSantis/Shitler alternate reality, apparently. Nothing ever seems to be done to combat the hate speech and lies. I fear I will no longer be able to live in this country. God, I don't want to have to move.
My best guess is that these folks don't take politics seriously. It's like they're trying a different strategy in a chess game; if it doesn't work, don't use it in your next game. They're so used to seeing the system muddle through poor decisions that they assume they'll always have another shot at getting it right. That doesn't appear to be Trump's intention. It feels to me like he's playing a game of Russian Roulette with us with live rounds in 3 of the chambers.
And his finger is on the trigger. ...
It is terrifying. Insanity and fascism coming to the USA in broad daylight. So much ignorance, confusion, trauma and bullying. We've been bullying and killing innocent people here and abroad for 405 years. I guess it largely IS and always has been the identity of the United States. Now a psychopath is at the helm.
PS: That last comment came from me, Don.
Post a Comment