Make America Sick Again

Donald Trump has issued an executive order about weed but it has nothing to do with marijana. On February 18, as The New York Times explains, he issued an executive order

aimed at spurring the domestic production of glyphosate, a widely used weedkiller that has figured in health lawsuits.

The move immediately set off alarms among supporters of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s “Make America Healthy Again” movement, and appeared to put Mr. Kennedy in an awkward position.

Glyphosate is the active ingredient in Roundup, which has been the target of tens of thousands of lawsuits that claim it causes non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. In 2018, as a plaintiff’s lawyer, Mr. Kennedy helped win a landmark $289 million jury verdict against Monsanto, the maker of Roundup, in a case contending the company knew the weedkiller caused cancer....

Mr. Kennedy has taken an aggressive posture on pesticides in the past. “The chemicals pollute our bodies the same way that they pollute the soil,” he said in 2024. In a report issued last year, a commission he chaired to examine the causes of chronic disease singled out glyphosate and another pesticide, atrazine, as potentially harmful to children.

Surely, though, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is a plain-spoken, authentic, and principled guy. The Times continues

But in a statement issued through a spokesman Wednesday night, the health secretary said he supported the president.

“Donald Trump’s executive order puts America first where it matters most — our defense readiness and our food supply,” Mr. Kennedy said in the statement. “We must safeguard America’s national security first, because all of our priorities depend on it.”

Mr. Trump’s order invoked the Defense Production Act, a 1950s-era law typically used in national emergencies to compel companies to produce certain materials or supplies that the president deems necessary for national security. Mr. Trump declared both glyphosate and phosphorus, used to manufacture the weedkiller, “critical to the national defense.”

“Lack of access to glyphosate-based herbicides would critically jeopardize agricultural productivity, adding pressure to the domestic food system,” Mr. Trump argued.

He ordered the agriculture secretary, in consultation with the defense secretary, to “determine the proper nationwide priorities” and gave them authority to compel production of the materials “to ensure a continued and adequate supply” of phosphorous and glyphosate-based herbicides, if necessary...

The Defense Production Act provides a pathway for companies to be shielded from certain liability suits, and Mr. Trump’s order appeared to extend that protection to producers of glyphosate. The Supreme Court is set to hear arguments in weeks in a case that asks whether federal law shields pesticide manufacturers from such lawsuits.

It's simply extraordinary or, in the literal sense of the word, unbelievable that continued over-production (and over-consumption) of soybeans, corn, and wheat- already heavily subsidized by the federal government is criticial to the national defense. However, those crops are intrinsic to maintaining a high rate of disease in the USA. Robert Kennedy, the con artist behind "Make America Healthy Again," knows that but total allegiance to the King is required.

The announcement was made at a rather curious time in that 

Bayer, the German pharmaceutical and biotech giant that acquired Monsanto in 2018, announced on Tuesday that it had reached a tentative agreement that would pay plaintiffs $7.25 billion to settle tens of thousands of lawsuits that claimed Roundup caused cancer.  The company maintains that the weedkiller is safe and an essential tool for farmers.

Last year, several pharmaceuticals each gave one million dollars to subsidize Donald Trump's inauguration. They included Pfizer, Merck, Johnson & Johnson, Gilead, and- you guessed it- Bayer. If in fact, the agreement with Rondup victims is tentative, it can be pulled back or renegotiated. The President has given the company a powerful bargaining chip.

Nonetheless, this may be overthinking Donald's motivation for the executive order.   He  may have something different in mind.

In January of  2016, presidential candidate Donald J. Trump boasted, in only a slight exaggeration, "I could stand in the middle of Fifthe Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn't lose any voters, O.K.?  Ten years and one month later, in the first Cabinet meeting of his second term, the President called the American people "bloated, fat, and disgusting."  Earlier, he had labeled the country itself "evil." A President bent on total power gives "disgusting" citizens of an "evil" country cancer-causing food may make sense to such a twisted individual.

 

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Language

On Wednesday, The Guardian reported

The Trump administration is facing rare bipartisan pushback for firing the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), amid turmoil at the US’ top infectious disease agency that prompted dozens of staff to walk out of its headquarters in protest on Thursday.

The White House has said Susan Monarez, who was confirmed as director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention just a month ago, was fired as she was “not aligned with the president’s agenda” – only for Monarez to refuse to depart. The official’s lawyers have said that, as a Senate-confirmed appointee, only Donald Trump himself can remove her….

Monarez was reportedly fired by Robert F Kennedy Jr, the US health secretary, for refusing to remove agency officials and committing to restricting proven vaccines....

“We are witnessing a full-blown war on science, on public health, and on truth itself,” (Senator Bernie) Sanders said. “In just six months, Secretary Kennedy has dismantled the vaccine review process, narrowed access to life-saving Covid vaccines and filled scientific advisory boards with conspiracy theorists and ideologues.”

As explained by Trump chronicler Michael Wolff, Mr. Kennedy was nominated for Health and Human Services secretary so that Donald Trump, responsible in his first term for Operation Warp Speed, could shore up the anti-Covid vaccine portion of his base. He is as much a public health menace as Senator Sanders maintains and the upheaval at the CDC ratches up the danger. Things turned silly, generously speaking:

The Trump administration shows no sign of backing down, however. In a press briefing on Thursday, Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, criticized one of the departing CDC officials for using the term “pregnant people” in his resignation letter.

“I understand there were a few other individuals who resigned after the firing of Ms Monarez,” she said. “One of those individuals wrote in his departure statement that he identifies pregnant women as pregnant people, so that’s not someone we want in this administration anyway.”

The official, Demetre Daskalakis, resigned from his position as director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases at the CDC on Wednesday, accusing the administration of using the agency to “generate policies and materials that do not reflect scientific reality and are designed to hurt rather than to improve the public’s health”.

Daskalakis responded to Leavitt’s remarks in an interview on CNN. “I find it outrageous that this administration is trying to erase transgender people,” he said.

“I very specifically used the term pregnant people, and very specifically added my pronouns at the end of my resignation letter to make the point that I am defying this terrible strategy at trying to erase people and not allowing them to express their identities.

“So I accept the note from the press secretary and I counter that with: I don’t care.”

This is just such a stupid argument. Speaking of which...

Call me crazy, but if you tell me men can get pregnant, you have ZERO credibility with me on anything to do with health.

Why would I listen to a word you say if you fail basic biology?

Once again, I find myself being screamed at for taking the top side of a 97-3 issue 🤷‍♂️ pic.twitter.com/xnJgJrJiyK

— Scott Jennings (@ScottJenningsKY) August 29, 2025

Jennings began by complaining "I just have to say, he did use the term 'pregnant people.'" In the interests of parsimony, I will, uncharacteristically, keep it short: "pregnant people" is a silly term.

The phrase is "pregnant women" or, in some instances, "women who are pregnant." And that goes aside from the issue of whether it is currently, or will be in the future, possible for men to get pregnant.

Demetre Daskalakis, the CDC official with the great surname, should have made his remarks without invoking "pregnant people," which served only to give Karoline Leavitt an opportunity to twist the issue and stir up more hatred and divisiveness.  It was a shout out to the anti-LGBTQIA portion of the GOP basis, valuable because it's an issue which Trump, he of the whatever is in the Epstein files, does not want to deal with.

If Jennings had merely called for clear and unambiguous language shorn of political correctness, he would have been sensible. However, as someone wishing and hoping that the Big Guy in Washington will give him a blessing for a Senate run to replace the retiring Mitch McConnell, the Kentuckian couldn't leave it at that once Leavitt idiotically commented that because Daskalakis "identifies pregnant women as pregnant people, so that's not someone we want in this administration, anyway."

Host Abby Philip is somewhat disingenuous but in relevant part correct when she rhetorically asks Jennings

Are you serious- that of all the things we're talking about here- immunization, vaccines, autism, research on communicable diseases, on cancer. Are you- are the most concerned about someone's use of the word "people?" That's the most important issue?

Actually, Jennings was concerned about the phrase "pregnant people," rather than the word "people," and he has a right to be. Still, Philip came very close to the heart of the problem fundamental to Jennings' objection. All these matters- immunization, vaccines, autism, communicable diseases, cancer, and research on these and others- are far more important than language.

Or at least in this case. Jennings responds to Philip "because you were just complaining about the politicization of science and I can't think of- I can't think of politicization of science more than that."

Yes, he can. Daskalakis would have been politicizing science if the issue had been transgenderism. However, in his bold and thorough (nine paragraphs, 115 lines) emailed resignation letter, Daskalakis addressed that issue only once, citing "the recklessness of the administration in their effort to erase transgender populations." His only reference to "pregnant people" came in a different context.

Which is to say: the LGBTQIA issue was peripheral to his resignation and "pregnant people" nearly irrelevant. Yet, it was central to Jennings and Leavitt. Long gone are the days when conservative Republicans railed against "political correctness"; a good thing, too, because that's exactly what those two are leaning upon when they get bent out of shape with the use of a term,  "pregnant people," largely incidental to the topic. Science wasn't being politicized; language was being politicized, and even I don't consider that a crime.

There also was a time when the right believed in merit, or at least claimed to do so. Yet, here was the press secretary for a Republican president maintaining that the spoken word, a reference to "pregnant people," disqualified someone for a job; and a GOP strategist arguing that someone who uses the wrong language is proof he is ignorant on other, unrelated subjects.

On the other hand, Karoline Leavitt seems to be back conspicuously displaying a cross, so she is on God's side and right about everything and I'll deny I ever criticized her. 

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Unholy Alliance

If the following tweet from a former US Representative from Illinois weren't so vague, we'd have an idea if his point is justified or even legitimate. Presumably, he's referring to this, a motion whose merit is more nuanced than it seems.

Hey Democrats, don’t censor RFK Jr. Don’t censor anyone. Let him speak. He’s a conspiracist. Defeat his speech with your speech.

— Joe Walsh (@WalshFreedom) July 20, 2023

This tweeter confronts Walsh because of Kennedy having been on a Joe Rogan podcast and profiled in The Washington Post and The New York Times. However, none of them qualifies as a "Democrat" and Walsh therefore presumably is more concerned about someone like Florida Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

 

DWS: You compared COVID public health policies to barbaric tactics of Nazi Germany saying the Jewish people of Nazi Germany had more freedom than Americans..

RFK Jr: What you are saying is a lie pic.twitter.com/g4lviOCLJO

— Acyn (@Acyn) July 20, 2023

Kennedy's remark comparing Anne Frank to SARSCov-2 vaccination was insensitive, offensive, and misleading. It also was made a few months ago and about a policy- vaccination- less relevant now. Not so, this:

Biden admin extends U.S. habit of interfering in other countries’ domestic politics. Now it’s threatening Israel with the ending of the special relationship between our two nations. As President, my support of Israel will be unconditional. #Kennedy24https://t.co/63spdhkwwY

— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) July 19, 2023

"Unconditional?" So if Israel were to invade Ukraine or, more realistically, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were to order bombing of Iran completely without cause, the USA would back Tel Aviv? Really?

The pseudo-Democrat running for President implies that Biden's remarks to a New York Times columnist were confrontational or a radical departure from American policy toward Israel. This is highly misleading (an RFK specialty) because, as the article in The Times of Israel to which he links explains

US President Joe Biden said that Israel’s leaders need to slow down their divisive overhaul of the judiciary and instead strive to achieve a broad consensus with opposition parties on the issue, reportedly warning that the “special relationship” between the two countries could sustain irreparable damage.

Biden made the comments to New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, whom he sat down with in the White House Tuesday after meeting earlier in the day with President Isaac Herzog, who is visiting Washington.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud and its allied far-right and ultra-Orthodox parties have been barreling ahead with their overhaul plan, which has been met with months of mass protests from critics who say it will radically weaken the court’s power to act as a check and balance against the Knesset, and dangerously erode Israel’s democratic foundations.

In addition to protesters blocking roads and disrupting public transportation, pushback against the overhaul has seen groups of military reservists threaten to stop volunteering for special key duties — including piloting fighter jets — if the legislation process continues. Likewise, business leaders and medical staff have called strikes to protest the overhaul.

Military reservists, business leaders, and medical staff are appalled by Israel's Trump, the authoritarian Netanyahu, but Kennedy believes Washington must support Tel Aviv no matter what.  The Times of Israel continues

Speaking to Friedman, Biden expressed public support for the protest movement

“This is obviously an area about which Israelis have strong views, including in an enduring protest movement that is demonstrating the vibrancy of Israel’s democracy, which must remain the core of our bilateral relationship,” he said.

“Finding consensus on controversial areas of policy means taking the time you need,” said Biden. “For significant changes, that’s essential. So my recommendation to Israeli leaders is not to rush. I believe the best outcome is to continue to seek the broadest possible consensus here.”

President Biden is not calling for support of the BDS movement, withdrawal of aid to Israel, or regime change, however little the current Likud government is interested in a just and lasting arrangement with Arab Palestinians. Biden merely is asking Tel Aviv to slow down and seek broad consensus so that the special arrangement between it and the USA can continue. He is asking for the bare minimum, for Israel to resist the most extreme elements in its governing coalition.

It no longer is sensible for partisanship to "stop at the water's edge" and if Democrats had been more critical of President George W. Bush's forays into Iraq and Afghanistan, the USA might have been spared a couple of disasters. Still, if there were a place and time for both parties to agree on a broad approach to a foreign policy matter, it would be to apply skepticism toward the Netanyahu government. 

Republicans have rejected this approach in favor of one enthusiastically supporting Benjamin Netanyahu, probably because he is not only uncompromising and unyielding to Palestinian Arabs and Iran but appears to rival in corruption the GOP's favorite living ex-President.   Now, the same presidential candidate who a few months ago suggested that vaccination against a coronavirus was as stifling to individual freedom as was the Third Reich criticizes President Biden for not showing blind allegiance to the right-wing government in Israel. That mirrors the GOP perspective which, considering the effort of Robert F. Kennedy to wound Joe Biden politically, makes sense in a dangerous and perverse way.

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