# Is it fair to call Cal Thomas stupid and/or disingenuous because of his recent piece on health care? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 3, 2010, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836 "2010-12-03T17:56:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/1 "2010-12-03T17:56:57Z")
First, a link to the article: [Cure or Care](http://townhall.com/columnists/CalThomas/2010/12/02/cure_or_care/page/full/)? Second, I’ll quote the offending statements: > [@](#): > > Think back more than 50 years ago to when the political and medical communities united and led the public toward a cure for polio and the elimination of the need for “iron lungs.” > \ > Finding cures for diseases helps people live healthier lives, and it’s cost efficient. Look at the money saved from no longer having to treat victims of polio, smallpox and tuberculosis. These statements, and the article as a whole, give the impression that Mr. Thomas believes there is a cure for smallpox and polio. But there isn’t. Cite in the spoiler box: [Wikipedia article on smallpox](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smallpox#Treatment) [Wikipedia article on tuberculosis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuberculosis) I put the cites here because the smallpox article contains an extremely disturbing picture of a pox victim some may prefer to avoid. We have vaccines for both those diseases, but no cure; that is, we can greatly lessen the chances of catching them, but we cannot effect a complete recovery in either case. Is it fair to criticize Mr. Thomas for implying otherwise in his article? To me, they bespeak a critical research failure on his part, not to mention sloppy thinking; and even if I were inclined to agree with the rest of his argument, his sloppiness there would cause me to doubt him. But I’m not sure that’s fair? Please not that I try not to ask rhetorical questions; I’d actually like to address the issue of his sloppy thinking, and I am not certain I am being fair in this criticism. Thoughts? ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/2 "2010-12-03T18:05:28Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > First, a link to the article: [Cure or Care](http://townhall.com/columnists/CalThomas/2010/12/02/cure_or_care/page/full/)? > > Second, I’ll quote the offending statements: > > These statements, and the article as a whole, give the impression that Mr. Thomas believes there is a cure for smallpox and polio. But there isn’t. Cite in the spoiler box: > > [Wikipedia article on smallpox](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smallpox#Treatment) > [Wikipedia article on tuberculosis](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuberculosis) > > I put the cites here because the smallpox article contains an extremely disturbing picture of a pox victim some may prefer to avoid. > > We have vaccines for both those diseases, but no cure; that is, we can greatly lessen the chances of catching them, but we cannot effect a complete recovery in either case. > > Is it fair to criticize Mr. Thomas for implying otherwise in his article? To me, they bespeak a critical research failure on his part, not to mention sloppy thinking; and even if I were inclined to agree with the rest of his argument, his sloppiness there would cause me to doubt him. But I’m not sure that’s fair? > > Please not that I try not to ask rhetorical questions; I’d actually like to address the issue of his sloppy thinking, and I am not certain I am being fair in this criticism. Thoughts? > [@](#): > > When a person is infected with poliovirus, there is only one cure – time. If signs and symptoms of polio do occur, treatment for polio is supportive, which means treating the symptoms and possible complications. > > Fortunately, in most cases, the body is able to effectively kill the poliovirus. Approximately 95 to 99 percent of people who are infected with poliovirus never develop polio symptoms, or they develop minor symptoms that cause no long-term problems. Less than 1 percent of people suffer disability (such as paralysis) from a poliovirus infection. In most cases, there are no long-term effects from polio. [Cite.](http://polio.emedtv.com/polio/cure-for-polio.html) I suppose in the narrowest sense of the term, you are correct, but it seems like a nitpick to me. I can’t get your link to load, so I can’t comment on whether or not this is germane to his article. ETA - I accessed the article, and Thomas seems to be arguing in favor of more spending on research and less on treatment of diseases. So I still think it is a nitpick, and not particularly relevant to the merits of the article. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![GoodOmens](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/d26b3c/32.png) [@GoodOmens](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GoodOmens)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/3 "2010-12-03T18:07:24Z")
I suspect it’s not a matter of sloppy thinking as much as imprecise language. He used “cure” in the sense of “something that makes a disease not a problem,” which is a reasonable if nontechnical use. If he was a medical writer I would be concerned, but this is a mass-market editorial produced for a non-medical audience, and I think in that case we can give a little slack. ---
**Author:** ![Gorsnak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gorsnak/32/7587_2.png) [@Gorsnak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorsnak)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/4 "2010-12-03T18:11:09Z")
Given the prevalence of anti-vax nonsense I think it’s important to be precise about the terminology here. We can’t cure these diseases. We can prevent them. That’s just as good for the most part, but it’s not the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Implicit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Implicit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Implicit)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/5 "2010-12-03T18:14:38Z")
That was all you had issues with in the opinion piece? > [@](#): > > Why can’t we create a united front to find cures for diabetes, Alzheimer’s, cancer and other ailments? Yeah, it’s not like anyone is funding research for any of those. > [@](#): > > …people in Europe and Asia now suffer from the same diseases as Americans. Just now? Before now the other people on earth never suffered the same as Americans? He seems to be promoting the notion that curing disease is cheaper than treating it, problem is he doesn’t understand that there are options like prevention (vaccines as mentioned for polio) and he doesn’t acknowledge that cures don’t grow on trees. If we euthanize people who get sick it’s way cheaper than treating them, but I doubt that’s a solution many would support. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/6 "2010-12-03T18:18:05Z")
> [@Implicit](#): > > That was all you had issues with in the opinion piece? No. As I wrote in the OP, I had multiple problems, the biggest of which was the notion that it’s accetapable to go for long-term solutions even if that means ignoring short-term suffering. Someone whose HMO has denied him coverage for his cancer because it is a pre-existing condition cannot wait ten years for a cure. I brought up cure ≠ vaccine issue because it seems emblematic of the sloppy thinking that permeates the article, but I’m not sure if I’m being fair in that _particular_ assessment. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/7 "2010-12-03T18:22:36Z")
It is fair to call Cal Thomas both stupid and disingenuous in general. When I was living in a small town for several years in the mid-1990s, he was one of the few op-ed columnists published in the local paper, so I read his column because there really wasn’t much else to read. Yes, he is both stupid and a lying sack of shit. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/8 "2010-12-03T18:24:56Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > It is fair to call Cal Thomas both stupid and disingenuous in general. To be clear, I am asking about the particular statement mentioned in the OP – the claim that there are cures for tuberculosis and smallpox. I’m trying to decide whether I am being too nitpicky about _that_ – and, more broadly, how great a misstatement must be to be discrediting of an argument. ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/9 "2010-12-03T18:29:30Z")
In his article Cal states: > [@](#): > > Apparently not to many politicians trapped in an old paradigm that focuses too much on hospitals, doctors and medicines and too little on medical research and preventive care so that people will not need hospitals, doctors or medicines. So he seems to also be in favor of preventative care which would include vaccines. That said he still is an idiot. Its not as if cancer researches haven’t stopped to think, “Hmmm maybe we should try curing this thing.” Scientists are working their collective buts off trying to find cures for the diseases he mentions. The problem is that they are hard to cure. In some cases we have found cures, for example breast cancer is cured in the vast majority of cases. In other cases we can kill 99% of the cancer cells, but the 1% which remain have mutated so they are resistant, and so 6 months later the cancer is back. With our new understanding of the human genome there are many new targeted therapies that can attack the specific genetic pathways of cancer cells and may revolutionize cancer treatment and radically increase the number of curable cancers. His complaints about the FDA are also totally off base. It sounds like he wants the pharmaceutical market filled with the grandsons of laetrile. Before we bring drugs to market its important to know if they work, or if they kill you before the cancer does. ---
**Author:** ![Baracus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/2bfe46/32.png) [@Baracus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baracus)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/10 "2010-12-03T18:49:13Z")
> [@GoodOmens](#): > > I suspect it’s not a matter of sloppy thinking as much as imprecise language. He used “cure” in the sense of “something that makes a disease not a problem,” which is a reasonable if nontechnical use. If he was a medical writer I would be concerned, but this is a mass-market editorial produced for a non-medical audience, and I think in that case we can give a little slack. I agree. If one wanted to do some handwaving, one might argue that while the polio and small pox vaccines did not cure those diseases on an individual basis, they did cure the population of those diseases over time. ---
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/11 "2010-12-03T18:57:19Z")
According to [Dictionary.Com](http://Dictionary.Com), cure has these definitions: > [@Dictionary.com](#): > > noun, verb, cured, cur·ing. > –noun > > 1. a means of healing or restoring to health; remedy. > 2. a method or course of remedial treatment, as for disease. > 3. successful remedial treatment; restoration to health. > **4. a means of correcting or relieving anything that is troublesome or detrimental: _to seek a cure for inflation_.** [emphasis mine] > 4. the act or a method of preserving meat, fish, etc., by smoking, salting, or the like. > 5. spiritual or religious charge of the people in a certain district. > 6. the office or district of a curate or parish priest. It appears like Cal Thomas is using “cure” definition number 4 here, which doesn’t neccesarily make him stupid or disingenous. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Excellent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@Mr.Excellent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Excellent)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/12 "2010-12-03T19:00:36Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > It is fair to call Cal Thomas both stupid and disingenuous in general. > > When I was living in a small town for several years in the mid-1990s, he was one of the few op-ed columnists published in the local paper, so I read his column because there really wasn’t much else to read. Yes, he is both stupid and a lying sack of shit. Agreed. I found it particularly charming when he argued about five years ago that we needed to curb illegal immigration because the damned furriners would give us all tuberculosis. ---
**Author:** ![Implicit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Implicit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Implicit)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 7:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/13 "2010-12-03T19:05:19Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > I brought up cure ≠ vaccine issue because it seems emblematic of the sloppy thinking that permeates the article, but I’m not sure if I’m being fair in that _particular_ assessment. I think you are being fair. Preventing disease and curing disease are two different things. Prevention can involve vaccines, mechanical or chemical barriers, behavioural changes, etc. some of which may not have anything to do with medicine at all. ---
**Author:** ![brickbacon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/898d66/32.png) [@brickbacon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brickbacon)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2010, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/14 "2010-12-03T22:25:47Z")
> [@Blalron](#): > > According to [Dictionary.Com](http://Dictionary.Com), cure has these definitions: > > It appears like Cal Thomas is using “cure” definition number 4 here, which doesn’t neccesarily make him stupid or disingenous. Agreed. It’s also worth mentioning wiki says the following about smallpox: > [@](#): > > **Smallpox vaccination within three days of exposure will prevent or significantly lessen the severity of smallpox symptoms in the vast majority of people.** Vaccination four to seven days after exposure likely offers some protection from disease or may modify the severity of disease.[34] Other than vaccination, treatment of smallpox is primarily supportive, such as wound care and infection control, fluid therapy, and possible ventilator assistance. about TB: > [@](#): > > **Treatment for TB uses antibiotics to kill the bacteria. Effective TB treatment is difficult** , due to the unusual structure and chemical composition of the mycobacterial cell wall, which makes many antibiotics ineffective and hinders the entry of drugs.[77][78][79][80] The two antibiotics most commonly used are rifampicin and isoniazid. However, instead of the short course of antibiotics typically used to cure other bacterial infections, TB requires much longer periods of treatment (around 6 to 24 months) to entirely eliminate mycobacteria from the body. Also note the wiki page on “cures” states the following: > [@](#): > > The most common example of a complete cure is a bacterial infection treated with antibiotics.[8] In 1999, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization established a goal to cure 85% of tuberculosis patients in Russia. They reached an 80% success rate, with 75% of the diseased cured, and 5% that had otherwise successfully finished treatment. So the initial statement that we “cannot effect a complete recovery”, is not true AFAICT. Several professionals in the medical community seem to to use the word as the op-ed did, so I think it would be wrong to call him on it. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2010, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/15 "2010-12-04T01:14:29Z")
Skald is eminently fair. I think the level of sloppy thinking shown in the confusion of cure and prevention indicates that Thomas is unqualified to have an opinion here. Cure versus prevention is not the big problem. If we had a cure for some disease that could be cheaply applied before the disease harmed the person having it, we’d have something almost as good as prevention. This may not always be possible, since the disease might cause damage silently first. Now for the stupidity. He seems to be implying that health care reform won’t cure anyone. However, we must have both prevention and the means of getting the prevention to people. If the reform means that more people get vaccines, it is indeed helping in prevention and thus making cures not necessary. Most insurance programs I know of today pay 100% for prevention, so it is not like his “insight” that prevention is better than treatment is anything new. Second is his childish hope that throwing money at something will fix it - something I’ve always thought liberals were accused of. Jenner was not part of a major research program when he discovered the smallpox vaccine. There was more on polio, but nothing nearly as big as the war on Cancer. In any case, you get diminishing returns. Not every doctor who is excellent at treating patients would be excellent at doing research. He gives no evidence that increasing research funding levels by a significant amount would do much good - or that there are well qualified researchers to get the money. I’m sure there are plenty of idiots whose grant proposals always get rejected who’d take it. In any case, the fame that would go to someone who could develop either a cure or vaccine for Alzheimer’s - and the money any drug maker would get from it - are more than enough to drive all the research that makes sense. I believe that I read in a review of the new book on cancer that a problem with the War on Cancer was that knowledge of genetics was not yet advanced enough to really understand how cancer cells worked. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case here also. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2010, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/16 "2010-12-04T04:59:00Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > It is fair to call Cal Thomas both stupid and disingenuous in general. This. Thomas seems to ignore inconvenient facts, or spin them so much that they’re impossible to recognize. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2010, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/17 "2010-12-04T12:15:32Z")
> [@Lynn\_Bodoni](#): > > This. Thomas seems to ignore inconvenient facts, or spin them so much that they’re impossible to recognize. I’m sure all the problems we have with health care can somehow be blamed on the Clinton administration. At least that’s how I remember the few times I read Cal Thomas back in the 90s. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2010, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/18 "2010-12-04T14:11:46Z")
Skald, I think the your specific point is a nitpick, whether or not the rest of Thomas’s argument is flawed. He clearly means it the way Blalron suggests–i.e., attacking a disease to find a means of effectively rendering it “gone,” something that no longer needs to be treated, a bygone tragedy that (for the most part) no longer requires hospital wards and lives lost or catastrophically altered. He is describing solutions that eliminate the need to treat diseases. Call it something other than a “cure,” but that’s his point–“Why are we fixated on treating illnesses, when we could be eliminating the need to treat them at all? Wouldn’t that be better?” Now, this may be faulty logic for any number of other reasons. But if I saw someone on a TV show’s panel, for example, disputing this column’s thesis by attacking the “cure” word, I would probably roll my eyes and wonder if the “attacker” really had a point. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2010, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/19 "2010-12-04T18:59:15Z")
The bigger problem, I think, is in drawing a distinction between “cure” and “treatment”. Cancer, for instance, can be cured sometimes: You can start with a patient with cancer, and turn them into a person without cancer. The way this is done is by treatment which is particularly successful. Now, that treatment won’t always lead to a cure, but even in the cases where it doesn’t, it usually increases longevity and/or quality of life. And it’s usually a very long, drawn-out process. Then, too, a “cure” as a concept doesn’t even make sense with regards to many medical conditions. Will we ever have a cure, or vaccination, or whatever, for broken bones? Of course not. But if your kid falls out of a tree and breaks his leg, you’re still going to need to go the hospital. ---
**Author:** ![Rand\_Rover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/db5fbb/32.png) [@Rand\_Rover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rand_Rover)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2010, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836/20 "2010-12-05T02:31:29Z")
I see what you’re saying Skald, but I side with those saying that the nit you are picking is small potatoes indeed (to mix metaphors). I think he meant “cure” in the sense of “we made it so it’s not a big problem for our society anymore,” which is true enough. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-fair-to-call-cal-thomas-stupid-and-or-disingenuous-because-of-his-recent-piece-on-health-care/562836.md?page=2)