# Rand Paul and Chris Christie believe vaccines should be optional **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [February 3, 2015, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654 "2015-02-03T00:36:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![CGav8r](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/34f0e0/32.png) [@CGav8r](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CGav8r)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/81 "2015-02-04T12:53:05Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Wakefield’s study was fully discredited by 2004. Obama couldn’t have thought it had any validity in 2008 - he had nothing to base it on. That’s just wishful thinking to cover up Obama’s stupid quote. Help me out here, Terr; what, exactly, was stupid about Obama’s quote in 2008? ---
**Author:** ![Fuzzy\_wuzzy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a8b319/32.png) [@Fuzzy\_wuzzy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuzzy_wuzzy)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/82 "2015-02-04T12:55:23Z")
> [@DinoR](#): > > Gov Christie doesn’t seem to have a problem with extended mandatory quarantine after exposure to diseases that a person is not immunized against (in that case ebola for which there is not a vaccine.) He seems, in action, to lend some credence to there being possible consequences. That case was silliness extreme instead of rationale governance. I could have seen him trying to stake out a middle ground… he didn’t. > > **Sen. Paul seems to still lend credence to the wootastic BS about disproven side effects. That concerns me. The more libertarian aspect of letting parents be stupid could be separate but in his case doesn’t seem to differentiate.** > > While supporting getting kids vaccinations, I tend towards the more pragmatic on this issue. What system of compliance is really going to modify the behavior of someone who truly believes autism or guaranteed eternal damnation on the list of side effects for their little snowflake. Saying we mandate vaccinations is one thing. Developing actual systems required to effectively monitor and enforce compliance is another. Those systems come with real financial and social costs that need to be compared to the benefits. I don’t see Paul or Christie effectively staking out that middle ground. On what doesn’t have to be a binary issue they made IMO the wrong binary choice. > > I’d be interested in some of the candidates who support mandatory vaccination making proposals for how. How matters. Anything less is simply side stepping the issue and giving political platitudes along the lines of “I support the same good things my opponents do. Vote for me because I said it said it wearing a nicer suit.” As did Hillary Clinton in 2008. Not this in itself justifies anything Paul says on the matter, but im sure those who condemn him will conveniently forget Hillary’s past statements on the issue. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/83 "2015-02-04T14:04:02Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Besides, I have been told, mostly by liberals, that no one should ever be forced to go through an invasive medical procedure. Sticking needles in people is invasive. There is a big difference between a slight poke into the skin that has a proven medical benefit and forcibly sticking the shaming wand into a woman’s vagina with the intent of making it more difficult and humiliating to undergo a legal procedure. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/84 "2015-02-04T14:06:33Z")
> [@Fuzzy\_wuzzy](#): > > As did Hillary Clinton in 2008. Not this in itself justifies anything Paul says on the matter, but im sure those who condemn him will conveniently forget Hillary’s past statements on the issue. Its called “being wrong and changing your mind”. Happened to me, right here in these very boards, had a debate going in GD, and I was on the wrong side of it. Read the arguments, checked the cites, changed my mind. Exposure to facts will do that to you. Well, they do it to _me_, YMMV. Now, about this: > [@](#): > > …Obviously, “Dr.” Paul wanted to dangerously pander… To be ruthlessly fair, the scare quotes are out of line. Rand Paul did, in fact, earn his MD at Duke University. We’re right, we can afford to play fair. Of course, that may not be strictly true, but that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/85 "2015-02-04T14:35:36Z")
> [@Fuzzy\_wuzzy](#): > > As did Hillary Clinton in 2008. Not this in itself justifies anything Paul says on the matter, but im sure those who condemn him will conveniently forget Hillary’s past statements on the issue. But this is 2015. [Opinions change on the reasonable, and irresponsible politicians like Rand Paul double down on the bad advise](http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-31069896). And as noticed the evidence now tell us that there was a very well economically supporting lobbying and/or advertisement done to influence politicians. As I remember how Creationists and Climate change deniers do it, it is not rare to see how money can make a very irresponsible position grow in importance by having a few doctors or scientists breaking bad and with money behind them. > **[Déjà vu All Over Again | Skeptical Inquirer](https://skepticalinquirer.org/exclusive/deja-vu-all-over-again/)** > > How did the ID movement publish in a peer reviewed biology journal? A story from climate science sheds light on the question. > [@](#): > > This is how it begins: Proponents of a fringe or non-mainstream scientific viewpoint seek added credibility. They’re sick of being taunted for having few (if any) peer reviewed publications in their favor. Fed up, they decide to do something about it. > > These “skeptics” find what they consider to be a weak point in the mainstream theory and critique it. Not by conducting original research; they simply review previous work. Then they find a little-known, not particularly influential journal where an editor sympathetic to their viewpoint hangs his hat. > > They get their paper through the peer review process and into print. They publicize the hell out of it. Activists get excited by the study, which has considerable political implications. > > Before long, mainstream scientists catch on to what’s happening. They shake their heads. Some slam the article and the journal that published it, questioning the review process and the editor’s ideological leanings. In published critiques, they tear the paper to scientific shreds. > > Embarrassed, the journal’s publisher backs away from the work. But it’s too late for that. The press has gotten involved, and though the work in question has been discredited in the world of science, partisans who favor its conclusions for ideological reasons will champion it for years to come. > > The scientific waters are muddied. The damage is done. > > This basic story-line describes not one, but two high profile incidents in the past two years. One concerns climate science, the other evolutionary biology. Both are highly politicized fields, and in each case, the incentive to get something into print is considerable for those who want to carry on their political and scientific fight against the accepted, mainstream view. The big difference here is that in this case a very well renown journal was affected and that actually adds to the effectiveness of the deception that Wakefield and others did and anti-vaxxers continue to do. ---
**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:** [February 4, 2015, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/86 "2015-02-04T15:28:22Z")
OK, **Terr** , answer me this: If Rand Paul did not wish to imply that vaccines cause autism, why did he say what he said? His statement has no purpose other than to lead the listener to that conclusion. He could have been much more honest about the matter by saying nothing at all. Why didn’t he? ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/87 "2015-02-04T15:33:08Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > OK, **Terr** , answer me this: If Rand Paul did not wish to imply that vaccines cause autism, why did he say what he said? His statement has no purpose other than to lead the listener to that conclusion. Maybe he wanted to explain why some people are led to not vaccinate - as wrong as they are. It’s funny - after years of Obama’s weaseling, people are really not used to a politician saying something and actually meaning what he said and not something else. ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/88 "2015-02-04T15:50:36Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Maybe he wanted to explain why some people are led to not vaccinate - as wrong as they are. This is the full quote, right? [QUOTE=Rand Paul] I’ll give you a good example, the Hepatitis B vaccine is now given to newborns. We sometimes give five and six vaccines all at one time. I chose to have my delayed. I don’t want my government telling me that I have to give my new newborn the Hepatitis B vaccine, which is transmitted by sexually transmitted disease and/or blood transfusions… so I had mine staggered over several months. I’ve heard of many tragic cases of walking, talking normal children who wound up with profound mental disorders after vaccines. I’m not arguing vaccines are a bad idea, I think they’re a good thing, but I think the parent should have some input. The state doesn’t own your children. Parents own the children and it is an issue of freedom. [/QUOTE] Frankly, I’m not sure what he’s saying. There’s absolutely no evidence I’m aware of that concurrent vaccinations cause any known medical problems. I’m also of the understanding that they’re done that way not for any great medical reason, but simply for the convenience of the parents. I was told this myself as a new parent, and then we had to make the choice – get all the shots at once, which is presumably a safe and convenient way to do it, or spread out the shots, which there’s no medical reason to do. This was pretty annoying; simply giving the parents the choice implies that one way can possibly be better than the other, and since spreading out the shots is much less convenient, parents might think, like Rand Paul apparently does, that it’s somehow _healthier_. But he doesn’t come out and say that. He essentially says, “I did this medically unnecessary thing, spreading out my childrens’ vaccinations, for reasons I’m not going to clarify, and that should be my choice.” What are his reasons? Does he distrust the science? is he trying to help his doctor pay for a new boat? Does he know something that the various researchers and medical organizations don’t know? Already, he’s giving the impression that parents know best, when, in the case of vaccines, they almost certainly don’t. Then he goes on to say that some parents have observed their kids develop problems post vaccination. What reason could he possibly have to bring this up in this context? Is this another example of parents knowing best? I just don’t get it. He’s clearly pro-vaccine, so why not just come out and say “Vaccines are great but parents should have a right to make the wrong decision” without all these subtle hints that maybe parents know more than their doctors? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/89 "2015-02-04T15:55:04Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Maybe he wanted to explain why some people are led to not vaccinate - as wrong as they are. Rand Paul had a chance to clarify and instead doubled down on letting parents be irresponsible. > [@Terr](#): > > It’s funny - after years of Obama’s weaseling, people are really not used to a politician saying something and actually meaning what he said and not something else. We know that groups with money can shape opinions of many politicians, but the leaders one should be more confident should be the ones that do accept the latest evidence, not the ones that double down on defending irresponsibility now. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/90 "2015-02-04T15:59:17Z")
> [@steronz](#): > > But he doesn’t come out and say that. He essentially says, “I did this medically unnecessary thing, spreading out my childrens’ vaccinations, for reasons I’m not going to clarify, and that should be my choice.” What are his reasons? Peace of mind. I staggered my second kid’s vaccinations. There is an old Russian joke about someone who comes to a friend’s house and sees a horseshoe nailed above the door (a token of luck in Russian folklore). So he asks the friend - “Why did you do that? Surely you don’t believe that nonsense?”. And the friend replies “Of course I don’t! But I heard that it also helps those who don’t believe in it.” > [@](#): > > Then he goes on to say that some parents have observed their kids develop problems post vaccination. What reason could he possibly have to bring this up in this context? Is this another example of parents knowing best? Again, goes to peace of mind. My kid was diagnosed with autism around 2004. Right around that time the Wakefield thing was going strong. As bad as autism is, it is even worse when you’re thinking “I could have prevented it”. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/91 "2015-02-04T16:03:13Z")
Defending the continuation of past mistakes like that (and of the ones that are supposed to be leaders) today is not progress at all. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/92 "2015-02-04T16:15:00Z")
Just about all parents do that, **Terr**. Something bad happens to your kid, first thing you think is “What did I do wrong?”. Pile facts up to the ceiling, says you had nothing to do with it, you’re still gonna think it. No blame. ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/93 "2015-02-04T16:17:05Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Peace of mind. I staggered my second kid’s vaccinations. > > There is an old Russian joke about someone who comes to a friend’s house and sees a horseshoe nailed above the door (a token of luck in Russian folklore). So he asks the friend - “Why did you do that? Surely you don’t believe that nonsense?”. And the friend replies “Of course I don’t! But I heard that it also helps those who don’t believe in it.” I like that joke btw, I’d never heard of it. Still, I don’t think that doing pointless things for “peace of mind” should be encouraged. I just had this argument with my mother-in-law about plastic food storage containers. I told her there’s no evidence that routine use of plastics are related to any maladies, but she still insisted that she felt better not using them. “Peace of mind,” I’m sure she’d say. No harm no foul, you may say, but I don’t think we should let any pointless superstitions go unchecked. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/94 "2015-02-04T16:58:44Z")
[Elias Isquith:](http://www.salon.com/2015/02/04/americas_vaccination_nightmare_what_christie_pauls_nonsense_is_really_about/) > [@](#): > > So Christie and Paul had a bad day. What makes their bad day important, however, isn’t so much what it tells us about them as individuals, but rather what it says about the voters they’re courting so assiduously. While many lefties are likely to assume that the anti-vaccination movement is simply another manifestation of conservative ambivalence about science, the truth is that the vaccination truther impulse appears to be cross-ideological. Run into an anti-vaxxer, as they’re called, and you’re just as likely to find yourself face-to-face with an archetypal San Francisco liberal as an archetypal Dallas Tea Partyer. President Obama recently urged parents to vaccinate their children, so it may eventually end up as a partisan issue. But as of now, the anti-vaxxers’ prominence speaks to something deeper in American society. > > What that “something deeper” is, I can’t definitively say. But I think we recently got a glimpse of it from a third source, who did us all a favor by expressing a common sentiment with an uncommon lack of grace. Monday was a bad day not only for would-be presidents, but for an Arizona cardiologist and anti-vaxxer, Jack Wolfson, who earned his 15 minutes of infamy during an interview with CNN. Asked by a CNN reporter whether he would struggle to live with himself if he found out that a child with an immunodeficiency had died after catching a virus from one of his non-vaccinated kids, Wolfson, with a chilling lack of affect, responded with a firm no. “I could live with myself easily,” Wolfson said. “It’s an unfortunate thing that people die, but people die. And I’m not going to put my child at risk to save another child … It’s not my responsibility to be protecting [someone else’s] child.” > > To be clear, the borderline sociopathy manifested in Wolfson’s answer is hardly widespread — that’s part of the reason his interview got so much attention. But the basic premise of the worldview Wolfson shared — which holds that American society isn’t a single community so much as a massive collection of individual families, and that these millions of families owe nothing to one another beyond the bare minimum, expressed in the pseudo-legal language of “responsibility” — is far from unique. The most famous articulation of the idea probably comes from the U.K.’s Margaret Thatcher, who once declared there was “no such thing as society.” But it’s been one of the key tenets of Americans’ self-perception for a while now, and has become ever more rigid and prominent as of late. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/95 "2015-02-04T17:01:28Z")
Oh geez. there was nothing anti-vaxxer about Christie’s and Paul’s statements. They stand exactly where the President stands. there is no political divide on this issue among the political class. ---
**Author:** ![Knorf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/58956e/32.png) [@Knorf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knorf)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/96 "2015-02-04T17:06:32Z")
That is untrue. Read Rand Paul’s quote again: “I’ve heard of many tragic cases of walking, talking normal children who wound up with profound mental disorders after vaccines.” Rand Paul is explicitly linking vaccines and mental disorders. It’s pure weaseling to say he isn’t. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/97 "2015-02-04T17:09:01Z")
I’ll concede that. I could parse his statement to claim that this isn’t what he was trying to say, but I think he knew what he was doing there. But I still wouldn’t classify him as an anti-vaxxer, since like the President, he believes that vaccines should not be mandatory. And he supports vaccinating and got his own kids vaccinated. He can be fairly accused of pandering to the anti-vaxxers, but again, it doesn’t seem like that makes him much different from the President on that issue either. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/98 "2015-02-04T17:12:23Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > [Elias Isquith:](http://www.salon.com/2015/02/04/americas_vaccination_nightmare_what_christie_pauls_nonsense_is_really_about/) Holy crap, my irony meter went off the scale, and this is an industrial grade SDMB approved and tested irony meter. So, this guy is saying, in effect, that he’s unwilling to ‘risk’ getting his kid vaccinated (a very low probability risk) and would feel nothing if/when his kid got a disease (that would threaten his own kid of course as well, and is a much higher probability risk) if that caused the death of a kid who contracted this disease from his kid but who, due to immune deficiency or other issues couldn’t be vaccinated?? :smack: What a fucking asshole…and a stupid, cold blooded and big mouthed asshole to boot. I hope he loses a bunch of his patients at this point…I know that I wouldn’t use a doctor that stupid and ignorant. Good grief. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/99 "2015-02-04T17:13:39Z")
As much as I’d like Obama to strongly announce support for mandatory-by-law vaccinations, I can imagine little that would be more likely to make about 10-20% of people react by ceasing vaccinations for their children. ‘Obama says I have to stick a needle in my kids?!?!? No thank you, Mr. Muslim Kenyan!’ ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [February 4, 2015, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654/100 "2015-02-04T17:14:09Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > I’ll concede that. I could parse his statement to claim that this isn’t what he was trying to say, but I think he knew what he was doing there. But I still wouldn’t classify him as an anti-vaxxer, since like the President, he believes that vaccines should not be mandatory. And he supports vaccinating and got his own kids vaccinated. > > He can be fairly accused of pandering to the anti-vaxxers, but again, it doesn’t seem like that makes him much different from the President on that issue either. He’s over exaggerating the risk. I don’t see a counter statement by him (feel free to provide if I missed it) urging parents to vaccinate despite the miniscule risk, which means he’s isn’t like the President at all (who HAS made just such statements, repeatedly). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rand-paul-and-chris-christie-believe-vaccines-should-be-optional/711654.md?page=6)