Let the Man Cook

RFK Jr isn't being blackmailed by Big Pharma...

What’s going on with RFK Jr.? Has he been threatened? Is he being blackmailed? Did he take Big Pharma’s 30 pieces of silver?

These are questions long-time supporters of RFK Jr. have been asking this week after their man came out and said 14 words they never thought they’d hear him say.

No, not those 14 words.

These 14 words: “The most effective way to prevent the spread of measles is the MMR vaccine.” That’s what Kennedy, Secretary of the Department for Health and Human Services, posted on Twitter.

And just like that, the heavens opened, the dam burst—pick your metaphor.

“What’s the point of writing an entire book about dangers of long term side effects of untested vaccines if you aren’t going to mention it once in power?” one Kennedy follower wrote in response to the post.

“You really make a great poster boy for Big Pharma. So much for ‘MAHA.’ GROSS,” wrote another.

Del Bigtree, who was Kennedy’s communications chief and now heads a vaccine-advocacy group, blasted his former boss. “Your post got cut off. The MMR is also one of the most effective ways to cause autism.”

Even Kennedy’s very own health nonprofit, Children’s Health Defense, which he founded and served as chairman of, distanced itself from him.

“What he says does not speak for Children’s Health Defense in any way at this point,” said the organization’s CEO Mary Holland.

I could carry on listing the angry responses. There are thousands of them. The mood in the various Twitter health groupchats I’m in was no less furious. I generally avoided commenting, preferring to let cooler heads prevail, but it took some time for people I know care deeply about the success of the MAHA agenda to calm down. These are people who want Kennedy to succeed, because they want America to succeed. They want their children and all American children to grow up in a nation where they’re not poisoned from cradle to grave and where sustaining them in ill health is not a multi-multi-billion-dollar industry. I’m with them.

I can understand the anger. Kennedy’s statement is in marked variance to years of comments and detailed work on the dangers of vaccines and the MMR vaccine in particular. It’s a complete 180, a U-turn—again, pick your metaphor.

What makes it all the more worse is, of course, the fact there could hardly be a more qualified man to Make America Healthy Again. Kennedy gets it in a way no other candidate for the job could. He’s lived it for pretty much his entire adult life, fighting against corrupt entrenched interests to expose the truth about America’s unprecedented health crisis, however ugly the truth may be. The man doesn’t just see this as a job. He sees himself as being on a mission from God. That’s exactly what he said on the campaign trail: “For 19 years, I asked God to put me in a position where I could end the chronic disease epidemic and bring health back to our children. And in August, God sent me Donald Trump.”

So what gives?

I don’t think Kennedy is being blackmailed; that’s a dumb suggestion. Like pretty much every male member of the Kennedy family, RFK Jr.’s a pussy-hound, and we’ve all heard the crazy stories about dead bears and dead whales and brain worms and roasted dogs in Guatemala and how heroin improved his grades at Harvard. I don’t think there’s anything else lurking in the man’s closet that could surprise us at this point, frankly. We know Kennedy’s led a colourful life, and he’s not embarrassed to admit it. Good for him.

To me, the MMR comments look much more like a sop to his critics, and a pretty weak one at that. Kennedy’s comments come in the face of a large measles outbreak in Texas that may be linked to migrants. In the initial stages of the outbreak, Kennedy didn’t promote vaccination. Instead, he said vitamin A was an effective treatment. It’s only now, months into the outbreak, as new cases keep emerging, that he’s been forced to make a statement in favour of the MMR vaccine.

It’s worth noting that his critics don’t believe he’s changed his mind on vaccination. One, a scholar at Johns Hopkins, told The Wall Street Journal he’s just “ticking a box.” He is. He hasn’t changed his mind. He doesn’t want the measles outbreak—which is still small and geographically confined—to overshadow everything else he’s doing.

At this stage, I think the man’s earned a little slack. If he were a Big Pharma or Big Ag candidate, of course things would be different. But he’s not and we know that. This is just the reality of exercising power, as anybody who’s ever had access to power, or even tried to do anything involving other people, will know. Sometimes you have to compromise, even if only temporarily, to achieve some greater goal.

Look beyond this storm in a teacup, this mountain being constructed from a you-know-what, and you’ll see much stronger indicators that the MAHA agenda is still on track.