Last year, when Glenn Beck learned that outbreaks of diseases like whooping cough and measles were on the rise due to an increasing number of parents who are refusing to have their children vaccinated, he reacted by literally standing up and applauding those parents.
Now that the issue of vaccinations has worked its way into the 2016 presidential campaign, Beck returned to the topic today on his radio show, declaring that opposing vaccinations is an issue on which activists on the Right and on the Left ought to be able to find common ground and work together.
"I'm interested in moving to common sense. I'm interested in moving in the direction of freedom," Beck said. "And so when it comes to these measles vaccinations, we have a lot in common with the left ... and we have to reach out to allies." While asserting that nobody wants children to get measles, Beck asserted that "there's something happening" with the measles vaccine and the rise of children being diagnosed with forms of autism that should make people cautious about getting their children vaccinated.
"God gave me a brain. God gave me personal choice and responsibility for those choices," he said. "I'm going to say no to those vaccines because I've done my homework."
Beck then went on to declare that people who oppose vaccines are now being persecuted, just as Galileo was persecuted by the Catholic Church.
"Here's another group of people that are now being rounded-up and pointed at and called morons and idiots and crackpots and crazies," he said. "Just totally discredited ... Where is anybody saying 'my gosh, we're living in the days of Galileo'? The church has become the state and if you don't practice their religion exactly the way they tell you to practice it, you're done."
"God gave me a brain. God gave me personal choice and responsibility for those choices," he said. "I'm going to say no to those vaccines because I've done my homework."
I'm sort of delightfully surprised and also horrified that this has become a partisan issue. Delightfully surprised because I thinking it is likely to backfire spectacularly, hopefully with minimal loss of life.
I was thinking the same thing, this seems like a huge miscalculation to me. I hope I'm right.
I'm sort of delightfully surprised and also horrified that this has become a partisan issue. Delightfully surprised because I thinking it is likely to backfire spectacularly, hopefully with minimal loss of life.
I was thinking the same thing, this seems like a huge miscalculation to me. I hope I'm right.
YES!! In the face of a huge measles outbreak? That was already determined to be caused by unvaccinated people??!!! WTF people, you need to work on your timing.
Oh, goodness, yes. A FB friend of my H was complaining about his children being treated as social outcasts because of the "thoughtful and educated" decision he and his wife made. I'm so glad I'm not friends with him on Facebook. The sense of persecution and victimization is outrageous.
Post by Skyesthelimit1212 on Feb 3, 2015 16:56:48 GMT -5
This is Jenny McCarthy's fault. I what to find her and punch her in the ovaries, then I want to find Donny, make-out with him for a while, and then punch him in the testis for marrying a giant boobed airhead.
I'm sort of delightfully surprised and also horrified that this has become a partisan issue. Delightfully surprised because I thinking it is likely to backfire spectacularly, hopefully with minimal loss of life.
I like to read the comments on the Corner blog hosted by the National Review. The blog itself hasn't been too hard on Christie, Paul, etc, but the commenters there are extraordinarily pro-vax. So I don't think this is going to become a left/right issue. The Republican party is just not libertarian enough. There are a lot of people on the right that want sweeping executive power in the name of public safety (i.e.people also support militarization of the police, War on Drugs, Christie's extreme hard line on ebola, etc). Mandatory vaccines fit with that. Beck and Rand Paul have always been way more libertarian.
Also, I have picked up from that comment section (so not a scientific sample but hey, anecdotes) that a lot of people there believe that the only unvaccinated people out there are insane liberals and foreigners (mostly those entering illegally). So ultimately, I suspect the GOP will start sidestepping the issue, and argue that Americans won't have to be forced to get vaccinations if they didn't have to worry about ebola nurses and Manny Measles sneaking in to the country, and that Obama's executive order is really the problem here.
Post by cattledogkisses on Feb 3, 2015 18:31:45 GMT -5
I really want to hope that all this anti-science, anti-education nonsense that the GOP is spewing will finally be the nail in their coffin, but then again, look at the morons that we the people have elected in the last few years. My faith in my fellow country men/women is not high right now.
Um, no. See, Galileo was a scientist and researcher. Anti v axxers dis-count both of these concepts unless they come from blogs or self-published books.