America Now Partially Immunized Against RFK, Jr.
HHS nominee experiences miraculous recovery from past polio vaccine skepticism
Dec. 17: Kennedy rolls up his sleeves … Trump backs polio vaccine … Judge rejects bid to overturn Trump conviction … New school-shootings record …
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Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., set to run the Health and Human Services (HHS) Department under RePresident Donald Trump, seemed yesterday to be cured of his hostility to a very, very popular vaccine.
As recently as last year, Kennedy showed serious symptoms of rejecting the science of polio vaccines.
In a 2023 interview, Kennedy suggested that maybe — I’m just asking questions! — the polio vaccine caused more deaths than it averted via an “explosion of soft-tissue cancers in our generation that killed many, many, many more people than polio ever did.”
But since then, Trump has injected his transition with steady doses of shut the fuck up about polio already.
“The polio vaccine is the greatest thing,” Trump said in an interview that aired Sunday. “If somebody [whose name rhymes with ennedy] told me, ‘Get rid of the polio vaccine,’ they’re going to have to work real hard to convince me.”
Yesterday, Trump reiterated, saying, “I’m a big believer in it, and I think everything should be looked at, but I’m a big believer in the polio vaccine.”
Trump, of course, has a conflict of interest in supporting the polio vaccine. He insists that everyone around him bend the knee.
Even before Trump’s remarks yesterday, GOP senators had been giving Kennedy small doses of shut the fuck up, to build up Kennedy’s immunity against the inevitable disappointment of his vaxx-skeptical buddies.
Then, on Friday, Kennedy got a massive shot from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who said, “Anyone seeking the Senate’s consent to serve in the incoming Administration [and whose name rhymes with ennedy] would do well to steer clear of even the appearance of association with such efforts.” Meaning, polio vaccine skepticism.
Kennedy appears to have taken his medicine. Because yesterday he reportedly said, “I’m all for the polio vaccine.” And after meeting with Kennedy yesterday, Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) said that Kennedy “100% supports the polio vaccination.”
It wasn’t immediately clear, however, whether Mullin accepts that 100% = one.
If it’s true that political pressure has inoculated America against the 30-trillion-cell cluster Trump has nominated to run HHS — and Kennedy either accepts the polio vaccination and/or loves soft-tissue cancers — that could effectively immunize America’s kids from the return of a disease that used to kill and paralyze thousands of American kids each year.
Kennedy’s miracle cure means that his nomination is still capable of standing, for now, and possibly even walking out of his Senate meetings this week with enough votes for confirmation. Of course, Kennedy’s anti-science bullshit could still pose a threat to all the other vaccines that keep (a shrinking number of) Americans safe.
But there’s also the possibility that Kennedy could pick up Democratic votes in an effort to propel his promised campaign against Big Food’s ongoing threat to human life.
According to the New York Post1, both Sens. Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Bernie Sanders (I-VT) have made remarks recently suggesting they could get on board if Kennedy is serious about taking a hard look at how fucked up Big Food is. (It’s doubtful, however, that the two would save Kennedy if he doesn’t already have enough Republican votes.)
And some Democratic opponents are still trying to kill the Kennedy nomination before he gets into the government’s bloodstream.
A health advocacy group called Protect Our Care is mounting an anti-Kennedy campaign it hopes will go viral (finally an unforced medical joke). The group announced it’s pressuring a handful of Republican senators to reject Kennedy’s nomination:
Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski
Iowa’s Joni Ernst and Charles Grassley
Idaho’s Mike Crapo
Maine’s Susan Collins
Louisiana’s Bill Cassidy
North Carolina’s Thom Tillis
South Dakota’s Mike Rounds
Texas’s John Cornyn
Utah’s John Curtis, and
West Virginia’s Shelley Moore Capito and Jim Justice.
In addition to tying Kennedy to 80 child deaths in Samoa’s 2019 measles outbreak, the group’s ads make the case that with the Wall Street Journal and others opposing him, a “no” vote is a safe vote. Safe as vaccines!
Trump Announces He Now Has Time for Lawsuits
For years, RePresident Donald Trump has argued that he should be immune from lawsuits and prosecutions because he’s so bad at presidenting that he just can’t defend himself in court and at the same time fuck up the country.
Earlier this year, of course, the Supreme Court agreed that after a quarter-millennium of presidents managing to multitask the way every other working defendant is expected to, Trump presented a unique case meriting special workplace accommodations. So they ruled that he cannot be prosecuted because it would make presidenting just too hard for him.
Well, now Trump appears to have recovered. With the support of the nation’s most obsequious, toadying billionaires, and with millions of federal employees helping him, Trump now appears capable of simultaneously presidenting and engaging in litigation.
At least, when he’s the one suing.
Trump yesterday confirmed that he expects to have enough free time as president that he’s going to launch media lawsuits so frivolous that even ABC could have won them.
Among his targets, the Des Moines Register and the Iowa pollster whose polling said Trump would lose. GUILTY!
Trump was asked, following ABC’s humiliating settlement, whether he would sue more media outlets.
Trump responded, “I think you have to do it because they’re very dishonest. We need a great media. We need a fair media.” He’s already suing Bob Woodward, CBS, and the Pulitzer Prize board.
Trump’s announcement of his new ability to multitask litigation and country-fucking came at an opportune time because…
Judge Keeps Trump Conviction on Life Support
Judge Juan Merchan yesterday rejected a bid to throw out Donald Trump’s conviction for fudging his business records to thwart campaign-finance laws.
Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records so voters wouldn’t find out he paid Stormy Daniels $130,000 to keep quiet about sleeping with him, which most people who sleep with Trump are willing to do for free.
Merchan rejected Trump’s argument that the collection of evidence infringed on his president-ness.
Trump has yet to be sentenced and it’s unclear how the case can or will proceed. Prosecutors have suggested pausing the proceedings until Trump leaves office in 2048, agreeing on a sentence with no jail time, or simply closing the case with him convicted but not sentenced and with no appeal.
Trump’s lawyers are still fighting to have the verdict erased from the space-time continuum.
Judges Gone Wild
Remember Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) cut that deal letting Donald Trump fill four circuit court vacancies next year in return for Republicans not stalling the confirmation of 13 lower-court judges? And how Democrats got pissed at Schumer for apparently throwing Republicans four judgeships?
And remember how two of those four vacancies disappeared when the judges took back their retirements because Republicans hadn’t called “No take backs”?
Well, a third of the four vacancies just got unvacanted. Politico reports the slot disappeared from the list of pending vacancies over the weekend. And Judge James Wynn wrote to Pres. Joe Biden, saying that he was unretiring in order to spend less time with his kids:
“I write to advise that, after careful consideration [of Donald fucking Trump], I have decided to continue in regular active service as a [non-insane] United States Circuit Judge for the Fourth Circuit. … I apologize for any inconvenience I may have caused [except to anti-abortion, pro-corporate litigants].”
Republicans, of course, are ripshit, because they would never let politics influence their oversight of the judiciary except for that time they refused to fill a Supreme Court seat until Trump took office and sent a religious zealot there.
Unlike Democrats, however, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) appears poised to do something about it. He has hinted at forcing recusals and even investigating judges for alleged politicization, which is barred by ethical codes unless it’s Republican.
In a probably related story, American trust in the judicial system has hit a record low, new polling finds.
Ironically, both parties seem to agree that America’s judicial system sucks. Is that because it sentences a disproportionate number of non-white people to disproportionately long sentences? Or because private prisons have warped the system toward incarceration? No, ya big silly. It’s because politics!
Biden supporters don’t seem to like how Trump has skated on most, possibly all, of his criminal charges. And supporters of Trump were told by Trump that the courts are all rigged.
Democratic Generational Battle Heats Up
House Democrats today will vote for their new committee leadership.
The House Democratic Steering Committee yesterday voted against recommending Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) as ranking member of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee. Instead, the committee gave its blessing to Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-VA), who has both old age and cancer.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) reportedly lobbied the committee to back Connolly. But the final say today goes to the full Democratic caucus, where Ocasio-Cortez reportedly claims majority support.
Rep. Jared Huffman (D-CA) appears to have a clear path to be ranking member of the Natural Resources Committee. Rep. Angie Craig (D-MN) will be the top Democrat on agriculture — imagine that, a non-coastal Democrat taking point on agriculture!
And while this may sound all very dry and boring, it’s in the aggregate where it gets interesting. This is, in one fell swoop, a new generation of Democrats replacing the old. Politico calls it “a huge amount of turnover.”
As of next month, a new generation of arguably more forceful Democratic leaders will be the voice and face of the party as the nation grapples with the consequences of what it fucking did at the polls last month.
Three Quickies
Yesterday’s school shooting in Madison, WI, was the 83rd this year. That makes 2024 a record year for school shootings in the U.S., beating the previous record set in 2023 and easily topping the records in most other countries, which typically average around 1 or 0.
Hey there, Newsfuckers! Didja know we’ve got another Government Shutdown Looming™? The deadline to approve a new funding package is Friday at midnight and, reportedly, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) doesn’t have a deal. There’s a stopgap bill that would extend funding just till March but even that’s at an impasse over disaster aid and money for farmers and other poor people. Anyway, the point is, this is all someone else’s problem as of Jan. 20.
Ukrainian-American Rep. Victoria Spartz (R-IN) is kinda boycotting her own party. She says she’s still a Republican but won’t caucus with them, sit on committees, or attend party meetings. It’s not clear why the fuck she’s doing this, but Republicans don’t seem inclined to miss her all that much. It’s also not clear whether this could leave Republicans one vote shy when it comes to electing the speaker next year.
TCB
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Go get ‘em, kids!
Sorry, couldn’t find this anywhere else.
Great thanks for the post, always the TFN is the best news source! One must be highly suspicious of the anti-vax movement.
In my Hungarian-adjacent state of Florida our state's surgeon general, Joseph Ladapo, sends out emails to healthcare professionals that have the trappings of a professional missive with footnotes etc to promote his anti-covid vaccine perspective (someone needs to let him know that Trump was responsible for it). It looks normal on the surface but it ignores the dominant studies and cherry-picks obscure articles from second rate literature and is poorly reasoned.
One always wonders about his motivation and personal insight in his actions--does he know he is a bullshit artist? His messaging always pretends to reason to his conclusion but the reality is that his nonsense conclusion has no support in conventional medical literature or thought.
Fucking well done! The Kennedy article had me cracking up. I’m slowly building up my immunity to all the bullshit news by just laughing at it sometimes. Thanks!