Make Polio Great Again

For a minute there, it looked like Trump appointed RFK Jr., an anti-vaccination kook, to “chair a presidential panel to review vaccine safety and science”. At least, this is what RFK Jr.said after a meeting with Trump on the issue.

This really shouldn’t be a surprise, since Trump did meet with anti-vax activists in August, who reported that he was “extremely educated on our issues.”  Trump has repeatedly suggested in interviews, tweets and during debates that he sees some link between childhood vaccinations and autism, despite the lack of any scientific evidence supporting such a link.

For some reason, this reminds me of the 2006 conference that Iran had  in which “experts” from around the world spoke about the scientific evidence they had that the Holocaust never happened. The expert from the U.S. was David Duke. Nuf sed.

If you’re wondering if any Republicans will voice an “opinion” that maybe immunologists know what they’re doing, forget it. The best you’ll get is “I have an open mind about it – the jury is still out”. Just think back to the 2008 Republican primary debate where the candidates raised their hands to indicate a belief in creationism. It came up after Rick Perry, our next Energy Secretary, told a kid in NH that evolution was just a theory that was out there. Here’s a breakdown of how the candidates answered the evolution “question” at the time.

As long as we’re clearing up some old fake news and ideological science, I think maybe we should try to get to the bottom of the long-running controversy about the alleged “fact” that the earth is round.  Who knows what the truth really is about this?

Anyway, we may be safe for the moment. Trump appears to have walked back the notion that he is appointing RFK Jr. to anything right now.

But here is the interesting thing about all this: I can no longer remember even the last few outrages that have come at a rate of at least one a day for months. Something about nepotism, maybe? Russian hacking? Ethics? Conflicts of interest? Don’t know, don’t care. None of them matter any more. They never happened. Vaccines and autism – that’s what’s important now!