The classic illustration of the Yiddish word chutzpah is the youth who murders his parents and then begs the court for mercy because he is an orphan.
But now that chestnut has strong competition, with the Trump administration's director of the National Institutes of Health, Jay Bhattacharya, arguing in Tuesday's Washington Post that scrapping mRNA vaccine development is not calamitous groveling before our anti-science ruler, but "a necessary pivot in how we steward public health innovations in vaccines."
Why? Because despite showing "promise," the mRNA platform "has failed a crucial test: earning public trust."
Give Bhattacharya credit. He said it with a straight face. That must be hard.
Also in Tuesday's Post, former Fox New host and current U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, our old friend, Judge Box o' Wine, Jeanine Pirro, writing about "The Fight to Make D.C. Safe and Beautiful," which seems to involve the lock-'em-up tough guy swagger that represents the entirety of the Trump administration's approach to crime. Or at least toward people of color, and in their mind, to stretch the term, the two are synonymous.
Well, that and calling out the National Guard.
Plus, not to forget — and how quickly we do so — masked policemen plucking people from the street and dispatching them to foreign hellholes without any sort of due process of law.
Newspapers sometimes hand their greatly-muted microphones to public officials. The Sun-Times would let the mayor — or rather, the mayor's press office — go on about something. But two Trump stooges in one day...
It's scary to see this pair of lapdogs being given such prime real estate in what was once a legitimate newspaper, and now clearly is slinking toward being some kind of official government house organ, like Pravda. It would almost be funny if it were not so, you know, terrifying and tragic.
Public trust in MRNA?
ReplyDeleteAt least a billion people worldwide got MRNA vaccines, made by either Pfizer or Moderna & then either never got Covid, like me or of they did get it, it was a very mild case that didn't require hospitalization.
Our national health establishment has been taken over by total crackpots that no longer believe in science, with Brainworm Bobby, the absolute worst of them,. as that utter lunatic wants to require new doubly blind test of the Salk & Sabin polio vaccines, despite the known facts that billions have received those vaccines over the past 60 years & never got polio!
All because a bunch of weirdos & morons on social media have told lie after lie after lie about vaccines, who won't take take them,insanely call themselves "pure bloods", which reminds me of the appalling Southern racists who demanded that blood banks sort blood as to whether it was donated by whites or blacks.
Part of me wishes Lincoln had just left the South secede & we wouldn't have had such stupid people voting & electing such worthless garbage as Reagan, Bush Jr. & of course the worst of all, the current demented, deranged moron, traitor in the White House!
If he had let them go, their economy would've collapsed in 20 years & begged to return, as slavery simply doesn't work as an economic system, let alone that it's totally immoral!
I understand the importance and efficacy of vaccines I have received many in my life and will continue to.
DeleteWhat I don't understand is why if I chose not to get a vaccine anyone else would care it's me that would get the disease not you.
Why the fury?
I understand that it's upsetting when people do something you don't agree with but why the fury?
I'm 70 years old today. I got COVID before the vaccine was available. Not too bad a case. My wife who I live with and sleep next to did not get it. Tested negative several times.
I got the vaccine as soon as it came out. Got COVID again. Not a bad case my wife who didn't get the first shot- she's much younger and had to wait didn't get COVID.
She finally got the jab, and got COVID and so did I.
Had it again this spring. That's 4 times and I'm up to date on the vaccine schedule.
I'm starting to question whether I want to get another coevid vaccine.
When I get the job I end up getting a little sick it's not bad it doesn't last more than a day but I just don't know if it really helps
Geez Steve. You value having an access to vaccines, while categorizing rage at stopping research to lead to future vaccines as inexplicable "fury." I'm not expecting you to understand this, and on another day wouldn't even post your comment. But it reflects a prevalent lambent flutter-your-hands-in-the-air-and-focus-on-the-reaction-rather-than-the-cause indignation that I want to push back against. You're a sated man wondering why people are upset that the farm is burning. While valuing having a choice, yourself, you smile at shitcanning research, which makes the choice, negatively, for everyone else in future years, even people who understand the value of medicine. Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it can't be seen.
DeleteHey Steve, the thing is, by getting well over 90%of the population vaccinated, we then have herd immunity, which prevents the spread of whatever disease that vaccine is supposed to prevent or in the case of Covid, lessen the illness so you don't die, plus then you don't spread it to others. As for your wife not getting, it could be dumb luck, but it also turned out that small number of people for some unknown reason were naturally immune, most likely from getting a slightly similar virus years before. That's how they discovered the smallpox vaccine, people who had cowpox didn't get smallpox.
DeleteI appreciate you humoring me today but the question I have is if I don't get the vaccine . That doesn't cause you to get covid or any other illness that they have vaccines for I'm the one that gets it.
DeleteIm the one who gets it why the fury? About this specific thing
I tend to doubt you got covid because you got the shots. My wife and I both got the shots. My wife got covid sometime last year. It was fairly mild. I was in Waukegan last month at the court house. I really felt ill. The police station is across the street. I was just sitting in my car. Some officers came along and asked if I was ok. They called an ambulance and was taken to the hospital where I learned I had covid. I did feel better the next day. I am not sure what they gave me. But I was in the hospital all weekend and got released on Monday. I wouldn't force anyone to get the vaccine. Up to you to put yourself at risk. But kind of selfish to put others at risk unless you were not planning on going out anywhere.
DeleteGood points, Clark, but the problem is those nutjobs don't just live only in the South anymore.
ReplyDeleteBut if we had let them go in 1861, then they couldn't emigrated here, unless they were sane ant-slavery people. Never forget that thousands who had left Germany before the Civil War fought for the Union, because of their experiences in those fractured screwed up principalities that later combine to create Germany
DeleteI’m really with you, Clark St, on Lincoln allowing the South to secede. Out abilities to creating the conditions for all people in the US to thrive have been so compromised by our appeasement of the “Southern” attitudes and values who still insist the Civil War was about states’ rigbts! Talk about denial and delusion. I often wonder what might have happened post-civil war if John Wilkes Booth hadn’t appeared on the scene. Talk about someone who changed the course of history for America, he’s right up there with Trump and all the Project 2025 creators.
DeleteI would disagree with letting them secede. The slaves would not have been better off. Even though Lincoln emancipated him most blacks had no where to go. I imagine a lot came here. I don't even know how the ones that did come north where able to survive. I am sure they had no money. No place to live, no money, no education. I wonder how they ever survived. On the kindness of strangers. I don't know that people in the north were any less racist than in the south. After all Daily basically segregated the black community by building the express way.
DeleteYet another instant of why my European friends are asking me to explain what is going on here. They are now all fearful about considering a visit to this side of the ocean
ReplyDeleteWith good reason!
DeleteThey have good reasons to be fearful. They could very easily be snatched off an American street, chucked into a detention camp, and never see their homeland again. Some have been detained upon entering the country and subjected to all sorts of indignities. And they weren't lawbreakers or illegals. Just your ordinary Norwegian or Italian tourist.
DeleteTruth is, officials in European and Asian countries are now trying to discourage their citizens from visiting the Untied Snakes, because things have gotten so bad here, in a remarkably short period of time. Is this how Germany was, in 1938?
Right now, I would tell someone from another county: "Screw up your courage, take your chances, and come to America, before it is gone. You might never again get the opportunity to do so in your lifetime, because there won't be an intact America left to visit."" And they would probably reply: "Thanks, but no thanks...I'll just stay home and watch you disintegrate."
Anonymous: your European friends might look to their own political systems , many of which seem to be finding "Strong Man" rule more attractive with each election. As has been said many times in this forum: Trump is not the problem; he's a symptom of the problem.
Deletetate
My brother and his wife(an ethnic Russian) have lived overseas in various countries for the last 40 years. She is not a citizen but he is. They visited here this summer as the often do. And had some problems with our friendly customs folk. Nothing bad, just irritating. Her children and grandchildren are all US citizens either by birth or naturalized. While discussthis I suggested to them that they tell their friends in China and elsewhere to stay home. Don’t trust Americans in any situation. Not business deals, not treaties, not security agreements. Nothing. In our current climate we no longer can be relied onfor anything with the Emperor and his toadies being unable to keep one thought in their heads for one minute that doesn’t involve hate or how to cheat someone out of the most important thing ever. Money. I have said elsewhere that in the climate today I am ashamed to be American and still stand by that. Not all of our history but certainly some is and has been magnificent. But very little now. And once again rather than post my name to avoid more death threats( the inbox is full) I will stay unlisted. In person I would but I would but in the inter web, no.
DeleteFollow on to my last point: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/aug/13/new-zealand-woman-six-year-old-son-ice-detention-us-ntwnfb
ReplyDeleteIt's the same as with the constant investigations of the 2020 elections. Did they have the slightest scrap of evidence of malfeasance? No, but a lot of people were VERY CONCERNED because the people using that concern as an excuse for those nothingburger investigations had spent months on the TV telling them to be concerned.
ReplyDeleteYou post today reaffirms my fears in the state of information in modern world.
ReplyDeleteThe right pulls no punches while they lie.
Full stop. That's it. nothing but lies and propaganda to force their beliefs and agendas on the planet.
The left provides facts and hides them behind a paywall. Then they asks their readers to come to a conclusion. Most who have gotten that far had most likely already understood the lies and malfeasance of the right. A preaching to the choir moment.
The mainstream and "center" is where democracy goes to die. Bad takes. Equal opportunities for lies and truth. Fighting a war with a water gun. Kissing the ground that fascist and jackbooted thugs march across.
The Chicago Tribune, Washington Post, New York Times, LA Times, CNN, CBS, NBC, ABC, FOX, nearly every major "centrist" publication does it. And that's the problem. People can say and do what ever they want, and it doesn't matter. No one is held accountable and the rich keep making money.
Now is the moment we all need to begin to start making sacrifices. some small, some large, but sacrifices must be made. I've called for the boycott of republican funding machines before, but it is time to actually do it. The only way things will change in this country is if the rich begin to financially hurt.
RFK Jr. (a drug addict, nepo baby, flunkee, and welfare queen) makes millions of dollars from Anti Vax companies. His teeth are falling out because he doesn't use fluoride, he was vaccinated as a child but says you shouldn't be. He was able to afford controversial and trial medical treatments to restore his voice and kill a worm in his brain because he refused to take care of himself and couldn't find doctors to treat him, but he doesn't want you to have that ability or opportunities.
Elon Musk is the same. A drug user, nepo baby, welfare queen, supported by government contracts trying to inflict his views and opinions on you to better his life.
If their funding goes away, so do their voices and opinions. It is OUR responsibilities as members of society to sacrifice so that the next generation may live better than we did. Stop funding these ghouls. if you don't you are the problem.
The NY Times has been a disgrace since Howell Raines hated Al Gore & actively worked to destroy his candidacy. Apparently he wasn't far enough left for Raines, so for some sick reason, he had the Times bury anything bad about Junior Bush. The story of Bush's drunk driving arrests & conviction were buried on Page 26 of the Times. Never forget, if you read the Times, & then watch the nightly network news show, a couple of their stories are flat out stolen from the Times. But they don't care about anything the Times puts on Page 26, because that means it's not very important. Only the front page really matters when they steal an article for a story!
DeleteFor me, the right Yiddish word describing these lying bastards and the media who help them is not chutzpah, it is mamzers. Not meant in the literal sense, I have no prejudice for the birth circumstances of anyone, but it was the word used by my folks to describe heinous people like these who fawn over power brokers st the expense of the honest.
ReplyDeleteMy mother spoke only Yiddish until she started school at the age of five.
DeleteHer word for Felonious would have been "shtunk"...literally a stinker.
Someone who smells so awful that you can't stand to be near them.
In his case, it's literally as well as figuratively. Two words: adult diapers.
Trump is running the table. Things will get worse before they get better. A lot of what he's doing isn't surprising but it is shocking.
ReplyDeleteI can't get over how many powerful, wealthy folks kneel and kiss ass. US Senators, multi-billionaires. What's the purpose of being unbelievably rich if you can't use your "Fuck You" money?
to say nothing of how many universities have bent a knee to him $ wise
DeleteOn the day that the Jeanine Piro OpEd was published, WaPo notified me that my subscription renewal was coming up. Needless to say, I’ve opted out.
ReplyDeleteI just re-upped. Another year, another forty bucks (they still have promotions). Why, I don't know. Hardly ever read their Trump nooze. And they banned me from commenting several years ago. Apparently, I'm now doing life without parole in the WaPo Jail. They wouldn't respond to my inquiries, but they are sure as hell happy to take my subscription money. Why am I being such a chump?
DeleteThe Washington Post banned you? Whatever for?
DeleteSo many terrific comments today! thanks to all. I am terrified that the next CO VI D vaccine won't be available. Or the latest flu vaccine. We are old-in our 80s I remember well what life was like before the polio vaccine. Or how lucky we were to avoid Co Vid. We are also concerned about what is happening with Trump and his dangerous amount of power and crazy people running government agencies. I hope we can recover from his dangerous moves, but I see 8 years of Vance, with Trump running the show. Thanks again for the comments.
ReplyDeleteYou see him living until 2033? He would be 87.
DeleteI wouldn't lay a bet on that. He's not healthy enough.
And even if he's still breathing,his head will be mush.
Won't be running any shows. Just to the toilet.
People do. My dad's 93, is overweight, never exercises. His head's already mush.
DeleteBeginning at the age of 72, I spent 2021 to 2023 participating several Covid vaccine studies, I received multiple doses of the live vaccine, never contracted the virus.
ReplyDeleteI have continued to be vaccinated whenever an updated version of vaccine was made available. I have yet to contract the virus.
Lots of knuckleheads who are victims of their own research.