In 1925, Tennessee passed a law that banned teachers from teaching evolution or denying the Biblical account of mankind’s origin. That year, a high school teacher was arrested and found guilty. It was an appalling assault on science, but remained on the books, for two more generations, until 1967 when another teacher was dismissed for teaching Darwin’s theory of evolution to a high school science class. He fought and was able to get the law rescinded, citing his First Amendment right to free speech.
This summer, Tennessee was back at it. Its Republican state lawmakers pressured their public health department to fire its top vaccine official and banned outreach to children for all vaccines, not just COVID. Its Governor refused to be photographed getting his vaccine and three million doses were returned to the federal stockpile, despite the fact that cases had tripled in a month and only 38 percent of the state was fully vaccinated. “We’re sort of grinding to a halt. The people who want it have gotten it,” said a spokesperson.
Tennessee, like most other Deep South states, has low vaccination rates and climbing infections. Even the state’s beloved country-and-western superstar, Dolly Parton, couldn’t move the dial. She got her first Moderna dose at Vanderbilt University, where she’s donated millions, and wrote, then performed, pro-vax lyrics set to the melody of one of her hits “Jolene” to try to convince people to get shots.
Vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine
I’m begging of you, please don’t hesitate
Vaccine, vaccine, vaccine, vaccine
’Cause once you’re dead, then that’s a bit too late
These Republicans kill their own. A study showed that in counties where only 30 percent or fewer residents had been vaccinated, there were 5.6 new COVID cases per 100,000 people, and where more than 60 percent of residents had been vaccinated, there were only 2.1 new cases per 100,000.
Republican Senator Mitt Romney bluntly stated that the politicization of vaccination by members of his party was “an outrage” and “moronic”. And Alabama Governor, Republican Kay Ivey, finally publicly broke with her Southern anti-vax peers and said: “Folks [are] supposed to have common sense. It’s time to start blaming the unvaccinated folks, not the regular folks. It’s the unvaccinated folks that are letting us down.”
America’s poorly-financed education system has also let the country down, churning out a huge population of uneducated people, thanks to insufficient funds and knuckle-headed curricula. Not coincidentally, and not surprisingly, there is a link between education and vaccination rates. A University of Southern California survey in February 2021 showed that 76 percent of U.S. adults with at least a bachelor’s degree had been vaccinated or planned to get vaccinated, compared to just over half of adults, or 53 percent, with less education.
America’s failure to provide equal and decent educational opportunities — and lack of knowledge about science — may be mostly to blame, but so is its amoral politics.
Consider that Republicans took credit for Trump’s “warp speed” program, which accelerated the creation of vaccines, but after the election totally reversed gears, because of Biden’s successful vaccine rollout, and began attacking the vaccine itself. The about-face was easy, given that an off-the-shelf platform had been honed and perfected in 2015 by its loopy Tea Party contingent with its rabid anti-science and anti-vax “health freedom” movement.
By 2020, their cause took over the party then morphed into pressure and open defiance against masks, lockdowns, and social distancing, and open defiance. And it’s worked: vaccinations have slowed and now a third or possibly fourth wave rolls across mostly Republican America. For example, 40 percent of all the nation’s recent cases are in states with lower vaccination rates -- Florida, Texas, and Missouri.
Montana has banned health authorities from quarantining sick people or those exposed to COVID – thus reversing a public health measure initiated in the 14th century to halt the plague. North Dakota has banned state health authorities from requiring a face covering for any reason, including for tuberculosis or other highly infectious airborne diseases.
The rationales behind these laws range from concern that public health measures “infringe on the rights of private parties” to sheer lunacy. In June, Ohio’s House of Representatives featured a Cleveland doctor who claimed that Covid vaccines leave people “magnetized” and could “interface” with 5G cellular towers. She received applause from Republican lawmakers who labeled her presentation as “enlightening” testimony.
Alabama Representative Mo Brooks claims masks carry “cancer and other health risks”. QAnon loonie-tune, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, compared volunteers who are going door to door to encourage people to get vaccinated as Nazi-era “brown shirts”. North Carolina Representative Madison Cawthorn took that idiocy to a whole other level: “Think about what those mechanisms could be used for. They could then go door-to-door to take your guns. They could go door-to-door to take your Bibles.”
All this is amplified by Facebook, Twitter, and Fox TV. A recent survey revealed that now one in five Americans believe that the government is using the vaccine to plant "microchip" tracking devices into people.
Some Republican lawmakers have even proposed laws to make it illegal to “discriminate” against people who aren’t vaccinated by preventing healthcare institutions, schools, or employers from requiring vaccinations. Fox TV Presidential wanna-be, Tucker Carlson, told his audience of two million to control people wearing masks which, he believes, are signs of “political obedience”, not health care measures. He believes making children wear masks is “child abuse” and parents should be reported.
President Biden correctly blamed social media companies for allowing disinformation about the novel coronavirus and vaccines to spread on their platforms. “Look, the only pandemic we have is among the unvaccinated. And they’re killing people,” he said.
America’s covidiocy is also being exploited and exported by the Russians. They are disseminating America’s anti-science social media posts, slogans, and disinformation to destabilize other democracies, as well as America’s, by derailing their anti-COVID programs. The result is increasing refusal of vaccines around the world, from Mississippi to Brazil, South Africa, France, India, Tanzania, and the Philippines.
It’s sad that the pandemic exposes that in large swaths of the United States nothing much has changed since 1925 when Tennessee politicians declared war against science and reason in the classroom. Consider that some American states have had to resort to offering free baseball tickets, a $1-million weekly lottery, cheap beer, or free transportation to get people to take a vaccine that anyone with a cortex should know will prevent a deadly disease.
Clearly, America’s biggest health risk is not the pandemic or cancer or heart disease. It’s superstition, ignorance, religious beliefs, and elected representatives with the collective IQ of my neck size. The United States should make vaccinations mandatory, as Germany is considering, and as China, South Korea, and others require.
Spare me the argument that lockdowns, vaccinations, and social distancing are unconstitutional because they remove liberty. So do stop signs, speeding tickets, and laws against fraud and murder. Freedom is the right to swing your arm, but not hit anybody else with it. And maskless morons threaten everybody else as well as businesses, the economy, society, and the nation-state.
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Just as an aside, on a recent trip to Fort Lauderdale. Two pcr tests in Canada $160 CAD each, in FLL $100 USD upon return another self test ( free). The Canadian pcr's can be actioned at a local hospital with provincial insurance. Walmart in conjunction with Quest Diagnostics normally $100 but free with a (any) US address. Plus the face mask get around trick, is to drink from an empty Starbucks coffee cup which requires the non use of a mask ! Altogether much to much of a hassle to contemplate any more travel for a while!