First, this, as Bosda put it, is another episode in idiocy in American Punditry. It is amazing how these people get to have a voice in the media when they have absolutely no expertise about anything. I understand the value of entertainment in news, but as Jon Stewart said, it is hurting America. I think a large parts of the problems, divisions, and disagreements we see nowadays are from people getting their opinions shaped by pundits whose only feature is that they are entertaining. If there were some way to open up the airwaves to real experts with real, objectively based ideas that could rival the echo chambers and the punditocracy, then we would all be a lot better off. Again, market forces, nobody every went broke from underestimating the consumer, etc.
Second, I take issue with those who paint with a big brush of anti-Western medicine or anti-medical establishment. It all comes down to accountability. Doctors often recognize the tip of an iceberg with problems – an extra 20 pounds on your belly – and counsel diet and exercise. They continue to do so, and watch it turn into the still reversible Syndrome X. They continue to do so but then have to give meds when it turns into diabetes. The majority of patients just can’t change their lifestyles as easily as taking a pill. The American mentality is all about the lack of accountability and instant gratification, so the pill it is. Doctors recognize that drugs aren’t the best therapy, and that drugs inherently aren’t safe. But the good ones are on top of the game, monitoring the latest science to find the safest and most efficacious. It is really not their fault when the drug previously reported as really effective is now shown, over decades of research, to be nonefficacious (like hormone replacement therapy), or a safe drug now becomes unsafe through scientific dishonesty or gaming the system.
Diet and exercise are incredibly important, and if your doctor does not counsel them (even if you are 100% healthy), you should find a new doctor.
There are many, many problems in our medical system. But if you have a competent doctor, she is acting as a patient advocate against big pharm and big insurance. Doctors are every bit the victims of the systems as anyone else (incessant coding and forms, fighting insurance for prescriptions, fighting for timely payment, etc.).
Oh, and look at this picture and tell me that vaccination isn’t worth it.
This is kind of a touchy subject for me, for precisely the reason edwino linked to that image. We have, in this past century, turned smallpox, measles, and even polio from killers into curiosities in the developed world. Going back to the dark age of infectious disease is not something I wish to contemplate, and the idea of allowing the demagogues and lunatics to drag us back makes me livid with rage.
Of all the things, good, bad, and indifferent, we accomplished in the 20th Century, the strides we made against infectious disease was something everyone could point to as an unalloyed good. It was something that you could take pride in regardless of politics or creed or origin and claim as a victory for humanity. It was something you could hold out as hope for the future, that your children or grandchildren wouldn’t be killed by smallpox, blinded or mentally retarded by the measles, or crippled by polio.
The morons these days have no idea how good they have it.
I disagree about Stern as well. First off, he was clearly in the same power position as Desperate Housewives, being the #1 show and all.
And the “special interest” group that did him in was the FCC. They get more complaints about pretty much everyone else, yet they consistently targeted Stern. Crucified by the FCC tells it all. He received the biggest fine in FCC history for broadcasting the sentence “The big black lesbian is filled with lust.”
Yet when Oprah discusses, in lurid detail, teen sex parties, and Howard fans en masse file complaints with the FCC, does she get fined? Of course not. The FCC isn’t out to get her. Only Howard Stern. Well, they did a number on Janet Jackson, but that was actually a legitimate case of responding to a public outcry.
But then what did they do? They used the Janet Jackson incident to fine Howard for an unremarkable episode three years prior. They have it in for him, and always have. Opie & Anthony are on satellite with nary a peep from anyone. The moment Stern announces he’s going to satellite, all of a sudden the FCC is “looking into” expanding its authority to regulate satellite.
Don’t kid yourself. Howard is a true, modern day media martyr. I can think of no other media figure that has been so blatantly persecuted by the US government since the McCarthy era.
And the FCC was responding to an increasing amount of pressure put on legislators by special interest groups to do something about the “indecency on t.v. and radio.” If there’s one group more afraid of special interest groups than advertisers, then it’s politicians.
Stern voluntarily left. But he did it because he saw the handwriting on the wall. He was either going to have to destroy the essence of his show in order to kowtow to the special interest groups or he had to find a new venue outside of the FCC’s scope. He chose the latter. We’ll see how long it takes the special interest groups to target satellite radio.
As Derleth says, the link between vaccines and autism has been thorougly refuted.
But anyway, that wasn’t what Maher was saying! Most of the people who refused to vaccinate their kids because they were afraid of autism still beleive that measles, mumps and rubella are caused by viruses!
Maher doesn’t just have a misplaced fear about mercury; he’s denouncing the Germ Theory of Disease!
We’re not talking misplaced fears about vaccination, we’re talking about aggressive, pitiful ignorance.
