Donald J. Trump plans to name his former rival, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as chair of a presidential transition team
According to a recent news report:
Donald J. Trump plans to name his former rival, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Tulsi Gabbard, a one-time Democrat, as honorary co-chairs of a presidential transition team that will help him select the policies and personnel of any second Trump administration, according to a campaign senior adviser.
That’s terrifying. I don’t know what being the honorary co-chair of a presidential transition team means, but these people are all on the same team now and they have announced their grand plans. There is no mystery about what they plan to do if their team wins the election. They’ve told us very clearly.
But first, let’s be really clear-eyed about who Mr. Kennedy is. As readers of SBM certainly know, from chemtrails to germ-theory denial to rank anti-vaccine quackery, Mr. Kennedy has been a fire hose of dangerous, deluded nonsense for decades. Here are some of his “greatest hits” as complied by GLADD:
—Made false claims that COVID-19 was “ethnically targeted” to attack certain ethnic groups while sparing Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese people, a conspiracy theory that drew accusations of antisemitism and racism.
—Told Joe Rogan that Wi-Fi causes cancer and “leaky brain.”
—Falsely linked vaccines to various medical conditions, including the scientifically discredited belief that vaccines for children cause autism. Kennedy advertised misleading information about vaccine ingredients and circulated retracted studies linking vaccines to various medical conditions.
—At an anti-vaccine rally in Washington, D.C., compared vaccination records to the persecution of Jews by the Nazis. He said, “Even in Hitler Germany [sic], you could, you could cross the Alps into Switzerland. You could hide in an attic, like Anne Frank did… I visited, in 1962, East Germany with my father and met people who had climbed the wall and escaped, so it was possible. Many died, true, but it was possible.” In fact, Frank and some 6 million other Jews were murdered by Nazis. Frank and her family hid in an attic in the Netherlands, not Germany, before she was caught and was sent to a concentration camp, where she died.
—Falsely told Louisiana lawmakers in 2021 that the coronavirus vaccine was the “deadliest vaccine ever made.”
—His nonprofit organization Children’s Health Defense was removed from Facebook and Instagram for repeatedly violating guidelines by spreading medical misinformation.
—Claimed that chemicals in our water are causing kids to be transgender. He told anti-trans conspiracy theorist Jordan Peterson that kids are “swimming through a soup of toxic chemicals,” including atrazine, a common herbicide, and that, “A lot of the problems we see in kids, and particularly boys, it’s probably underappreciated that how much of that is coming from chemical exposures, including a lot of the sexual dysphoria that we’re seeing.” There is no evidence to indicate that the herbicide causes gender dysphoria in humans. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says, “Most people are not exposed to atrazine on a regular basis.”
—Suggested that poppers, not HIV, causes AIDS and that, “But for [Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Anthony] Fauci, it was really important to call it a virus because that made it an infectious disease, and it allowed him to take control of it.”
—Falsely and repeatedly endorsed the idea that mass shootings have increased because of heightened use of antidepressants.
This is just a small sample of Mr. Kennedy’s dangerous disinformation. Most tragically, his visit to anti-vaccine activists in Samoa in 2019 resulted in a measles outbreak that sickened 5,700 people and killed 83 of them, mostly young children. He has never expressed the slightest bit of remorse for this tragedy and has tried to cover up his role in it. These deaths should should be mentioned every time Mr. Kennedy’s name comes up.
Mr. Kennedy also has a sordid personal life, and while normally this would not be worth mentioning, it reveals fundamental defects in his character. Mr. Kennedy has hurt and taken advantage of people close to him. His own family has disavowed him. He’s not a caring or humble person.
He is a transparent fraud. He rails against the “Democratic elites” despite being a Kennedy. His presidential campaign was entirely designed to help president Trump as explained by the article ‘Whole Thing Is an Epic Fraud’: RFK Jr. Official Admits Goal Is to Elect Trump. Everyone knew this, as explained by the article RFK’s Voters Know They’re Not Electing the Next President. They’re With Him Anyway. After a judge kicked him off the ballot in NY for lying about his residence, he responded by saying “the Democrats are showing contempt for democracy.” Mr. Kennedy is now doing all he can to get Trump elected, and no reasonable person ever thought he had any other goal.
He tries to spread fear and doubt about institutions and the entire concept of public health. He publishes articles such as Are Public Health Authorities the Authors of Fake Measles News?, The Vaccine Program: Betrayal of Public Trust & Institutional Corruption, Why Won’t the CDC Do Proper Safety Trials on Childhood Vaccines? Follow the Money, and CDC Lies About, and Media Repeats, Risk of Dying from Measles. Mr. Kennedy wants his audience angry, scared, and full of mistrust.
He takes testosterone and likely has neurocysticercosis. He promotes quack COVID cures. He is American Loon #204 and one of the Disinformation Dozen. He does weird things with dead animals. He feels victimized and unappreciated. He is paranoid and aggrieved as explained by the article RFK Jr. Is Even Crazier Than You Might Think. He published a statement titled: RFK Jr.: We Need Disclosure On UFOs. He published an article ‘Our Country Is Under Attack’: RFK Jr. Speaks on CIA and Totalitarianism that began:
In his speech — described by the Ron Paul Institute as “a compelling indictment of the mad push to total control” — Kennedy said the techniques used by government officials during the COVID pandemic to “edge people into subservience” come straight out of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) manuals he researched for his book, “American Values.”
He is grandiose and enamored with himself. He’s cast himself in the role of the brave hero, and is eager to slay his enemies. He brazenly lies about vaccines and his anti-vaccine advocacy. He is utterly shameless. He doesn’t flinch when his lies are revealed on national TV.
Mr. Kennedy is not a good person. He is deeply unwell. He is a dishonest, dangerous crank who made millions by spreading the rankest pseudoscience during the pandemic. The ridiculousness of his exploits with dead bears and whales obscures the grave threat he poses. His buffoonery is a distraction from his danger. As my favorite podcaster said, a clown with a flamethrower still has a flamethrower. Children are already dead as a result of his disinformation. If it weren’t for his famous last name, you’d move far away from him if you heard him ranting in the park. No ethical or serious person, especially a doctor, would praise or legitimize him.
We’re working with Kennedy and we’ll take on corruption at the FDA, the CDC, World Health Organization AND other institutions of ‘Public Health’ that are dominated by corporate power
This is not the first dance between former President Trump and Mr. Kennedy. In 2017 they discussed having Mr. Kennedy chair a “commission on vaccine safety and scientific integrity”. That didn’t happen thankfully. So maybe their current relationship is just bluster too. But it might not be. Trump spread nonsense about vaccines long before he became president, and he reiterated his beliefs during a recent phone call with with Mr. Kennedy. He said:
A vaccination that is like 38 different vaccines and it looks like it’s meant for a horse, not a, you know, 10-pound or 20-pound baby… then you see the baby all of a sudden starting to change radically. I’ve seen it too many times. And then you hear that it doesn’t have an impact, right?
The only time Trump received jeers from his followers was when he suggested they get the COVID vaccine. Having learned to hide his presidency’s greatest success, Trump now earns applause by repeatedly vowing not to give “one penny” to schools with vaccine mandates. He also seems very serious about partnering with Mr. Kennedy this time around. He recently touted their relationship by saying:
We’re working with Kennedy and we’ll take on corruption at the FDA, the CDC, World Health Organization AND other institutions of ‘Public Health’ that are dominated by corporate power and dominated really by China.
There you go. Those are the plans.
Mr. Kennedy sure feels emboldened. Continuing their tradition of publishing nonsense, the Wall Street Journal recently ran his editorial Trump Can Make America Healthy Again, and unsurprisingly, Make America Health Again merch is available for purchase. Dr. David Gorksi discussed this here on Monday. I am sure Mr. Kennedy has big ideas for what he might do and whom he might bring aboard if he’s handed the keys to America’s health castle. According to one news report:
HHS oversees 13 separate agencies, and Kennedy has long argued they are in desperate need of reform. In campaign speeches, news interviews, podcasts and other public forums, he has described wanting to gut the scientific agencies in charge of science and health policy, such as the NIH, FDA and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He told NBC News last year that the agencies have become “sock puppets” for the industries they regulate, and he wants to replace the scientists and government officials with people who align with his views and aren’t burdened by conflicts of interest.
There you go again. Those are the plans.
It’s quite possible that Mr. Kennedy who wants to “gut the scientific agencies in charge of science and health policy” will play a key role in staffing these agencies next year. Undermining confidence in vaccines will likely be his top priority. Anti-vaxxers are ecstatic at the possibilities. This is the moment they’ve been waiting for. Meanwhile, public health is endangered, prominent scientists need bodyguards, vaccine rates are slipping, and measles is spreading, exactly they intended.
I am Professor Jay Bhattacharya and I am a scientific dissident
Despite the grave toll of his anti-vaccine disinformation, both before and during the pandemic, most doctors have chosen silence with regards to Mr. Kennedy. Others however, chose a different path. They have been eager to amplify and legitimize his quackery. They labored to make Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Mercury and Autism Relationship Confirmed in Longitudinal Study, seem normal. They told their audience that he had important insights and strong core values. They said he was someone we should listen to and take seriously.
These doctors shared a common goal with Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Evidence of Harm: Mercury in Vaccines and the Autism Epidemic: A Medical Controversy. They all desperately wanted unvaccinated children to contract dangerous viruses, and they forged a bond and mutual admiration over this. Even though Mr. Kennedy published the article Vaccines Can Spread Diseases Through Shedding, these doctors’ pandemic pronouncements were often completely interchangeable with his. I once made a quiz showing this to be a case, and I should have been clearer that I did so because I was horrified and alarmed that the words of “respectable” doctors were indistinguishable from those of Mr. Kennedy, who published the article New Study: Gardasil HPV Vaccine Contains Chemical Used in Biological Warfare.
Obviously, I have no inside information, but one person who is likely on Mr. Kennedy’s radar were he to gain power is Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, an anti-vaccine, pro-infection doctor who made YouTube videos minimizing COVID while other doctors were busy treating patients with it. Dr. Bhattacharya and Mr. Kennedy, who published New Data Shows DNA From Aborted Fetal Cell Lines in Vaccines, said very similar things about the pediatric COVID vaccine. Mr. Kennedy published the article Top Ten Reasons Not to Let Your Child Get a COVID Shot, while Dr. Bhattacharya authored the article The Ill-Advised Push to Vaccinate the Young. Both articles appeared in June 2021, just before the Delta wave spiked pediatric hospitalizations and killed teens who were eligible for the vaccine.
Dr. Bhattacharya has made no secret of political beliefs. He became a pandemic celebrity through his willingness to partner with a pro-tobacco, child labor advocate who had ties to Neo-Confederate groups. He sued the Biden administration (he lost). He’s testified in Congress at the invitation of Republican Congressmen. He helped Ron DeSantis launch his failed campaign, and he played a similar roll during Mr. Kennedy’s failed campaign. Although Mr, Kennedy published the article ‘Dissolving Illusions’: 225 Years of Lies and Cover-Ups Behind Vaccines, Dr. Bhattacharya spoke at the announcement of his VP candidate, Nicole Shanahan, who is currently promoting a podcast called “COUNCIL of the CANCELED” with the founder of the modern anti-vaccine movement, Andrew Wakefield. These are the people Dr. Bhattacharya celebrates and promotes.
After receiving a glowing introduction from anti-vaccine luminary Del Bigtree, Dr. Bhattacharya lavished praise on Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Vaccines Contain Dangerous Ingredients. Small Doses Can be Unhealthy. Disease is a Product of Genetics and Environment. While speaking at a political rally for Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Read the Fine Print: Vaccine Package Inserts Reveal Hundreds of Medical Conditions Linked to Vaccines, Dr. Bhattacharya portrayed himself as “neutral” public health expert who was a victim this pandemic. Dr. Bhattacharya called himself a “scientific dissident” who had been censored by the “Orwellian Ministry of Truth”. Even though COVID 1.2 million Americans and injured millions more, Dr. Bhattacharya felt the real problem was that he didn’t receive enough attention. He spoke passionately about “Twitter files and court cases” and praised Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Vaccine Rhetoric v. Reality — Keeping Vaccination’s Unflattering Track Record Secret, as a champion for free speech.
Dr. Bhattacharya also mentioned the Great Barrington Declaration in his speech, but neglected to tell the audience that it called for the simultaneous mass infection of 250 million unvaccinated people just two months before vaccines arrived, claiming it would lead to herd immunity in 3-6 months.
The corrupting influence of money
Dr. Vinay Prasad, another anti-vaccine doctor who said it was “reckless” to limit COVID in children, also made no secret of his political leanings. He is an avowed enemy of the “public health establishment”, likening it to Nazism. Even though Mr. Kennedy published the article Natural Measles Immunity — Better Protection and More Long-Term Benefits Than Vaccines, Dr. Prasad spoke glowingly of him on multiple occasions and defended him against allegations that the was a conspiracy theorist. Dr. Prasad said it was wrong to “insult” Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Vaccines and Autism—Is the Science Really Settled?. Instead of criticizing Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Vaccine Injury Touches Families Throughout the U.S., Dr. Prasad also said said we should:
Give credence to what his root concerns are, which is really the concern of the corrupting influence of money. That’s really his root concern.
Though Dr. Prasad, who monetized much of his COVID output, has made a grand public display of concern about falling vaccination rates, the fact that Mr. Kennedy published the article Vaccines Do Not Deserve The Credit For Reducing Contagious Diseases wasn’t a deal-breaker for him. While Dr. Prasad said that doctors who suggested the pediatric COVID vaccine were “idiots”, he was full of praise for Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Vaccine Boom, Population Bust: Study Queries Link Between HPV Vaccine and Soaring Infertility. In reality, the HPV vaccine prevents multiple different types of cancers and it does not cause infertility. Yet, Mr. Kennedy’s crusade against a vaccine that prevents cancer was a non-issue for Dr. Prasad, an oncologist. In fact, not only was Dr. Prasad willing to overlook the fact that Mr. Kennedy published the article Unvaccinated Children Have Much Lower Rates of Chronic Illness, he was willing to overlook Mr. Kennedy’s actual body count. Samoa is far away, 2019 was a long time ago, and 83 people killed by an entirely preventable virus, most of them children, isn’t really a big deal, I guess.
Beyond being unperturbed by the toll of Mr. Kennedy’s anti-vaccine disinformation, Dr. Prasad has adopted many of his techniques. Like Mr. Kennedy, Dr. Prasad frets mightily about rare, mild vaccine side-effects, even mere abnormal lab values, while extolling the virtues of viruses and casually brushing aside literal death from them. That’s how the Kennedy-Samoa connection can be overlooked.
Ho hum, just 19 dead kids in a single month
RFK will flatten most public health experts in a debate
Stop and think about the message this all sends, especially at a time when the ideas of Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Mercury Toxicity: Highly Toxic, Cumulative and Still in Vaccines, are spreading along with measles, predictably. Prestigious doctors from prestigious universities with large media footprints cozied up to and legitimized the biggest stars of the anti-vaccine movement during a pandemic. They told their audience to trust Mr. Kennedy, who in turn provided material like this to their audience, Vaccine Mandates for Everyone, Everywhere—A Globally Coordinated Agenda. And thus, their audience is now purely anti-vaccine.
These doctors told millions of Americans that Mr. Kennedy, who published the article CDC’s Latest Tuskegee Experiment African American Autism and Vaccines, is more reliable than Dr. Peter Hotez, a besieged vaccine-expert who developed a patent-free COVID vaccine and wrote a book about his daughter’s autism that debunked pernicious anti-vaccine myths. They said that Mr. Kennedy, who published the article CDC Scientist Still Maintains Agency Forced Researchers To Lie About Safety Of Mercury Based Vaccines, was correct about his “root concerns”. Even though Mr. Kennedy published the article Don’t Fall for the CDC’s Outlandish Lies About Thimerosal, they said absurdly said his root concerns were about “the corrupting influence of money.” The fact that Mr. Kennedy published the article Worse than Nothing—How Ineffective Vaccines Enhance Disease was besides the point.
In fact, Dr. Prasad said that Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Read the Fine Print: Vaccine Package Inserts Reveal Hundreds of Medical Conditions Linked to Vaccines, would “flatten” “obliterate” and “destroy” a vaccine-advocate in a purely imaginary debate. While it’s absurd to believe that a verbal wrestling match between cranks and scholars on Joe Rogan’s podcast would reveal scientific truths, Dr. Prasad told his audience that Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Evidence of Harm: Mercury in Vaccines and the Autism Epidemic: A Medical Controversy, is vastly more trustworthy than the local pediatrician, the “establishment figure”, recommending vital vaccines. Dr. Prasad does this all with profane language and juvenile, demeaning insults to signal to his followers that he’s edgy and controversial.
To make matters worse, these prestigious doctors from prestigious universities doctors pitched themselves to the public as paragons of EBM. While other doctors were sloppy, they were rigorous. While other doctors abandoned science and evidence during the pandemic, they held firm. They feel it was abomination that not every aspect of the COVID vaccine was studied via a massive RCT for every demographic group and for every variant. They have scorn and contempt for anyone who disagrees with their methodolatry.
However, these demands for highest standards of evidence were only applied to unwanted measures to limit COVID’s harms. Indeed Mr. Kennedy, who published the article MMR Vaccine’s Poison Pill: Mumps After Puberty, Reduced Testosterone and Sperm Counts, got a free pass. Because these doctors shared Mr. Kennedy’s larger goal of infecting unvaccinated children with SARS-CoV-2, they didn’t hold him to any standards at all. Although Mr. Kennedy published the article Mercury, Vaccines and the CDC’s Worst Nightmare, their attitude towards him was “sure, Kennedy is wrong about a few things, but he’s basically OK and trustworthy.”
The term for this is sanewashing, which is defined as:
Attempting to downplay a person or idea’s radicality to make it more palatable to the general public.
That’s a trendy new term, but it fits perfectly here. These doctors portrayed Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Japan Leads the Way: No Vaccine Mandates and No MMR Vaccine = Healthier Children, as a fundamentally rational man with rational concerns about real problems. They also portrayed him as a hero.
Though these doctors absurdly claimed the COVID vaccine would ruin confidence in routine vaccines, their positive relationship with Mr. Kennedy, who published the article It’s Been 10 Years Since a Whistleblower Exposed the CDC’s Cover-up of the Link Between Vaccines and Autism. The Agency Has Done Nothing, shows they were perfectly willing to lend the legitimacy of their universities to throw all vaccines under the bus. Falling vaccine rates are the obvious consequence of prominent doctors normalizing Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Kids, Vaccines and Autism: Will a New Legal Strategy End the Decades-long Battle for Truth and Justice?.
That’s how badly they wanted them infected.
Media, Health Officials Should ‘Just Tell the Truth’ About COVID Shots for Kids, Physician Says
The affection was mutual. Mr. Kennedy reciprocated by bolstering pro-infection doctors. They shared a similar disdain towards limiting dangerous viruses. Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Measles Vaccine Narrative Is Collapsing, has also published multiple articles by and about Dr. Prasad, for example. Mr. Kennedy is a big fan. One typical article was titled, Media, Health Officials Should ‘Just Tell the Truth’ About COVID Shots for Kids, Physician Says. It’s tagline read:
Vinay Prasad, M.D., MPH, in a video released this week called out what he said were the “lies and exaggerations” about COVID-19 vaccines and kids being spread by media and public health officials.
This sort of article, where a brave, maverick, truth-telling, “pro-vaccine” doctor destroys the “official narrative”, has long been a staple of anti-vaccine propaganda. Check out the articles How a Pro-Vaccine Doctor Reopened Debate About Link to Autism and How a Respected Pediatrician Lost His Medical License — Because He Supported Informed Consent to see what I mean. Another example is the article Government Spending Millions on ‘Cognitive Vaccines’ to ‘Protect’ Public From ‘Fringe’ Viewpoints which said:
Dr. Jay Bhattacharya, Eric Weinstein, Ph.D., Nicole Shanahan and Mike Benz, on Wednesday discussed how government-funded “cognitive vaccines” and corporate interests are stifling dissent and undermining public trust in science, media and democracy.
You won’t find any such articles about me on Mr. Kennedy’s website or anywhere else.
Mr. Kennedy, who published the article ‘Laughable’: Experts Rip CDC Report Claiming Childhood Vaccines Saved 1.1 Million Lives, also recently amplified the voice of pro-infection radiologist Dr. Scott Atlas who said:
What we as a society did to children… I could just burst into tears right now. It’s so awful. We broke the social contract we have as people by harming our children as a society and injecting, for instance, experimental drugs into children that have side effects, many of which are uncertain for a disease that those children, healthy children, did not have a significant risk from, to use them as shields? I mean, this is almost unspeakable.
As a reminder, no one proposed vaccinating children as shields and the pediatric COVID vaccine is not an “experimental drug.” It was studied in 6 RCTs, and everyone was clear its purpose was to directly protect children, even healthy ones, from a potentially dangerous virus. It’s done that. While Dr. Atlas made a performance of nearly “bursting into tears” over something that only happened in his imagination, in the real-world, Dr. Atlas proposed using unvaccinated children as shields with this potentially dangerous virus. He thought it was “fantastic” when they were infected with it because he thought it would lead to herd immunity. Around 2,000 are now dead, and 234,000 were hospitalized. Some have long COVID.This would have been much worse had we listened to pro-infection doctors at the start of the pandemic.
In other words, Dr. Atlas fits in perfectly with Mr. Kennedy. I would be mortified if Mr. Kennedy shared my message in a positive way. These doctors never protested his attention, however. Like Mr. Kennedy, Dr. Atlas now brazenly distorts his pandemic record, claiming he never said what he said and that all he ever cared about was education.
Of course, former President Trump is familiar with these doctors as well. He worked with them and publicly praised their calamitous “plan” for herd immunity through mass infection. I am sure he won’t object to Mr. Kennedy appointing them to powerful positions in his administration. The connections between them are very deep.
Maybe this isn’t a drill
While it would be vital to remember the role pro-infection doctors played in our disastrous pandemic response no matter what, it’s especially important at this moment to resist pandemic revisionism and call-out those who actively encourage amnesia and apathy about it. These doctors’ repeated factual errors, farcical forecasts and glowing homages to “natural immunity” didn’t convince them quietly slink away into obscurity as normal people might do. Quite the opposite. While other doctors continue to treat sick patients, they continue to hit the lecture circuit, hiding their pro-virus philosophy, bemoaning their “cancellation”, and overtly blending medicine with business interests and right-wing politics, as discussed here by Dr. Allison Neitzel and here by Walker Bragman.
It’s possible Mr. Kennedy will staff the CDC, FDA, and NIH with pro-infection doctors. Yet, this doesn’t seem to worry most people. The most common response has been silence. Since Mr. Kennedy is so absurd himself, the idea of him really getting power at these institutions is also treated as absurd, as if there’s a 0% chance of it actually happening because someone else will step in to save the day.
Hopefully!
However, hope is not a plan and while prestigious doctors from prestigious universities feel emboldened to speak out on behalf of Mr. Kennedy, I can’t recall any professional organization that’s been brave enough to speak out against him. Similarly, medical school deans say nothing when their professors validate Mr. Kennedy, who promotes movies such as Vaxxed III: Authorized to Kill. These “leaders” are so afraid of being called “censors” that they censor themselves and treat anti-vaccine misinformation as a reasonable topic for “discussion and debate“, even as their universities become inexorably linked with disinformation and quackery under their watch.
Of course defending medicine against the normalization of Mr. Kennedy, who published the article Weeding Out Vaccine Toxins: MMR, Glyphosate, and the Health of a Generation, is not silencing anyone. It’s just calling out dangerous nonsense for what it is.
Some editorial writers have recognized the threat, but how many blunt news stories been written about the potential implications of handing enormous power to an anti-vaccine crank? Mr. Kennedy published articles such as Measles Vaccination and Autism: The Inexcusable Suppression of a Long-Documented Link, What Polio Vaccine Injury Looks Like, Decades Later, and 25 Reasons to Avoid the Gardasil Vaccine. Will the CDC be publishing this material in 2025? Will its website remove all evidence that measles, polio, and HPV can be dangerous and the vaccines against them effective? Will there be mass purges of scientists at these institutions? Will CDC employees who try to stop a virus be labeled an “extremist”? Will people silence themselves to avoid being fired under this punitive new regime? Will any journalist ask Mr. Kennedy these questions?
Some of us have been sounding alarm bells about Mr. Kennedy and his dangerous movement for years. We’ve noticed with horror as his one-fringe anti-vaccine ideology has become sanitized and normalized by a group of small, but influential doctors with stellar credentials and academic appointments. I write about them not just to resist their pandemic revisionism, but also to sound alarm bells about institutional decay and its implications for the future. It would have been bizarre and inappropriate for a doctor to have embraced Mr. Kennedy in 2019, and it should remain that way today. That’s literally all I am saying.
I also want people to notice how our standards have changed. At least Andrew Wakefield got struck off for his anti-vaccine data fraud. In contrast, Dr. Joseph Ladapo, who called the COVID vaccines “the Antichrist of all products” on Steven Bannon’s podcast, might be rewarded for his anti-vaccine data fraud with an appointment as the next CDC director.
What was once intolerable, is now tolerated, and we may be at the beginning of these doctors’ story. While they want their words to be erased and forgotten, I do not want them censored and silenced. I’ve worked to keep an accurate record of what they said and to amplify their voices as loudly as possible. I’m certainly not the only one doing this, but isn’t it time for other, more prominent people and institutions to say something? It’s possible that Mr. Kennedy will soon elevate several We Want Them Infected doctors to positions of great authority. For this reason, we must remember what they said, the policies they pushed, and the suffering that resulted. We should all should be clear-eyed about the potential consequences of them gaining power.
Maybe this isn’t a drill.