Disqus - Latest Comments for roguemedic

Re: The Baloney Protection Act

Rogue Medic — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 22:37:56 -0000

Tylenol with codeine is a problem of someone deciding to be too clever. The codeine is addictive, because it is an opioid. The Tylenol (acetaminophen) is poisonous to the liver, so if you become addicted, you will probably take so much that you destroy your liver. This is not the way reasonable people should try to discourage addiction.

This is the kind of monkey's paw that is expected from a sadist.

Re: Will NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya stand up for scientists censored by the American Diabetes Association?

Rogue Medic — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 21:55:28 -0000

1:22 To ensure transparency and accountability, the ADA will commission a thorough independent review of the events that occurred as well as the policies, procedures, and decision-making process that guided our actions. We want to make sure that such incidents do not reoccur. When the review is complete, we will share what we learned and identify the steps we must take moving forward.

This appears to be the part that matters the most. An independent review of everything, including how they made the decisions they made is important. Sharing their results and how the will change can restore confidence.

A thorough and independent review will take time.

Will President-Elect Jennifer Green, MD be encouraged to withdraw her resignation and participate in this? Will Charles Henderson, CEO handle this? Will someone else handle this?

Re: The Baloney Protection Act

Rogue Medic — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 19:28:11 -0000

The homeopaths claim that the water contains the memory of the chemicals that were in the water, before the homeopaths diluted the chemicals away. They are selling a car with the memory of an engine and claiming that is a better car. Some customers are bragging about their cars that work wonderfully, after they have been towed to the top of hills to show off the power of the memory of the engine - a memory so powerful that it doesn't make any noise.

You can even get one with Utah license plates . . . hardly used.

;-)

Re: The Baloney Protection Act

Rogue Medic — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 19:20:44 -0000

I should have looked at more recent evidence. When I was still blogging regularly, the conclusion was that most drugs were not more effective than IV fluids. I think the first I saw of NK1 antagonists was today, even though they have been around for decades and seem to be effective. The research on other drugs seems to make it clear that most of the anti-emetics are more effective than placebo. Thank you for correcting me on this.

Neurokinin 1 (NK1) antagonists (-pitants) are a novel class of medications that possesses unique antidepressant,[1][2] anxiolytic,[3] and antiemetic properties.

In 2003, the first NK1 receptor antagonist, aprepitant (Emend), received marketing approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).[10][11][12]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NK1_receptor_antagonist

Re: The Baloney Protection Act

Rogue Medic — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 14:05:38 -0000

Samuel Hahnemann, a doctor when being a doctor had nothing to do with evidence for most in the profession, came up with the combination of magical beliefs, named it "homeopathy," and declared homeopathy to be a miracle cure.

1. Homeopathy is not a cure for anything.

2. Treating a medical condition by using something that causes the same condition, because the treatment causes something that could be what you already have, is nonsense.

3. Magically diluting the bad stuff until it is gone does not produce a memory of what to cure in the water (nor in the alcohol for substances that do not dilute in water, but do dilute in alcohol).

4. Magically hitting the water (or alcohol) with a magical object (Succussion - nothing to do with the 25th Amendment, not the Brian Cox TV series "Succession") does not convince the water (or alcohol) to remember what they are supposed to tell the cells of the body to do, because water doesn't remember, alcohol doesn't remember, and cells do not communicate by magical means.

If I have nausea and vomiting, there are a lot of medications that can be prescribed to reduce the nausea and possibly prevent vomiting. The problem is that most of the medications used do not work any better than placebo. Since the FDA-approved medications are often placebos themselves, it is not difficult to show that some sort of homeopathic product (a placebo and often literally a sugar pill with a magic water drop added or a magic alcohol drop added) is as good as a medication that is essentially also a placebo. Why do most anti-nausea/anti-vomiting medications seem to work in the hospital setting? They are given with a large amount of IV fluid, which replaces lost fluid. Fluid is lost due to lack of fluid intake - if you can't keep anything down, you lose fluid. Fluid is also lost by vomiting. A lot that was already swallowed is coming up when you vomit. Replacing the fluid lost is addressing one of the underlying conditions, while other underlying conditions are being addressed. Often anti-emetics (anti-nausea/anti-vomiting drugs) are given after surgery. The term used is PONV (Post-Operative Nausea and Vomiting), which hints at one of the solutions - time. The medications used for anesthesia may cause nausea and vomiting, so giving IV (IntraVenous) fluids until the anesthesia drugs (the drugs probably producing the PONV) are metabolized enough to minimize symptoms, is an effective strategy. Another common use for anti-emetics is in cancer treatment. Cancer treatments often cause nausea and vomiting, so again, it is a matter of replacing fluids until the worst adverse effects of the treatment have passed. The rest of us should be glad we are not having to deal with these problems, but the most effective way to treat nausea and vomiting is IV fluid. If you do not have access to IV fluid, small amounts of flavored (if it helps) liquid that is able to be swallowed, is the next best thing. The placebo drugs may also help, but they appear to be most effective at producing profits for the drug companies.

Homeopathy placebos are just as good as other placebos, but it is unethical to prescribe placebos, because that would violate the ability of the patient to consent to, or to refuse, the intervention, because consent requires honesty.

Honesty prohibits prescribing placebos outside of a research setting. Honesty requires admitting that magic is a lie.

Re: The Authors of the Book “The War on Science” Won Their War. Are They Happy Now?

Rogue Medic — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 12:34:58 -0000

Peterson was right to challenge Canadian govt attempts to enforce pronoun use. Now that we seem to be past peak wokeness, fortunately, the zeal to regulate pronoun use has moderated, but that's one. Also the aforementioned DEI statements, if required for employment. I think they are counterproductive.

No. Jordan Peterson is a master of using logical fallacies to promote bigotry to mediocre white men, but Peterson makes a lot of money promoting anti-science.

I don't know the specifics of any particular government, or private industry program, so I am not going to address any of those specifics. To do so would to be to suggest that if you can find something less than perfect, you can condemn the whole concept, which is the nirvana fallacy.

It is great that you stated that you are not trying to do that:

No, the fundamental values of diversity, equity and inclusion should be shared by all . . .

It is disappointing that you follow that with a bunch of nonsense that seems to contradict that part of what you wrote.

You are comfortable making the DEI statement that, "the fundamental values of diversity, equity and inclusion should be shared by all . . .," but think that it is inappropriate for an employer to require that you state that you actually mean that.

You seem to stating that promoting the kind of bigotry that Jordan Peterson promotes should be something you should be allowed to do at work, because you think Jordan Peterson has some good points. After all, Peterson is not really promoting the things Peterson is promoting. Peterson is merely defending the right of bigots to promote bigotry, because promoting the propaganda of bigots is extremely important to Peterson.

I take it from your lack of response to my question, you think any opposition to DEI policies makes on anti-DEI.

Continue to tell me what I am thinking. I really want to know.

Re: Sabotaging America’s Future: The Catastrophic Cost of Federal Research Cuts

Rogue Medic — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 10:18:43 -0000

Tenure is a means of protecting academic freedom from manipulation by the organization. Protecting academic freedom from manipulation by the organization means that there is confidence that the person is a responsible person,. because the person has demonstrated responsibility for ___ years and no longer needs oversight.

Perhaps some limitations on the amount of freedom are in order, but whatever limitations on academic freedom are imposed, these limits may be required by authoritarian administrations getting involved in academics, as the current administration is.

One of the parts of Project 2025 (The Heritage Foundation's Mandate For Leadership) that is not given enough attention is placing political/religious officers be in all positions of authority, to control every aspect of life in America. This is explicitly Stalinist and embraced by the Republican Party. We have been seeing it in action for almost a year and a half, but most people act as if it is not happening. The fire hose of disinformation can be very distracting.

Re: The COVID Amnesia Project: Erasing Your Free Will to Preserve the Fantasy of the Optional Pandemic

Rogue Medic — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 10:00:05 -0000

While the GBD was not saying don't vaccinate, those hearing the messages were hearing you don't need/can't trust the COVID-19 vaccines.

I would place the emphasis a bit differently in describing the way the Republican Party was the sanewashing of the GBD message.

While the GBD was not saying don't vaccinate, the GBD was telling people not to wear masks and not to keep safe distances, because when people didn't wear masks, or wore them ineffectively, masks did not protect the people not wearing masks.

This is the part of the anti-public health message that the Great Barrington Declaration, Cochrane, and the rest of the anti-science people either promoted as proof that people should not use effective protection against the spread of communicable disease.

Why was so much money spent spreading this message? Once the anti-science people fool the public into believing that public health experts do not know what they are doing, they can use that example to destroy other public organizations that protect the public from anti-science corruption.

The Great Barrington Declaration is notspecifically anti-vaccine. The Great Barrington Declaration isentirely anti-science, anti-public health, and anti-competence.

The Great Barrington Declaration allowed Republican Senators and Republican Representatives to pass legislation that declared meat packers, and other people to be essential workers, so they could not refuse to work under unsafe conditions and protected the companies from being accountable for forcing those workers into working in unsafe conditions, so that record profits could be made exporting meat to China.

People had to be killed to make a profit by exporting meat to China and the Republican Party made sure that happened.

https://www.propublica.org/article/documents-covid-meatpacking-tyson-smithfield-trump

The Great Barrington Declaration was just one part of that anti-science attack on public health.

Meatpacking was already one of the most dangerous jobs in America, before the pandemic. Under the Trump administration's changes to the rules, meatpacking became even more dangerous.

https://www.hrw.org/news/2019/09/04/interview-how-us-making-meatpacking-jobs-even-more-dangerous

Looking for an explicit quid pro quo is a defense used by lawyers to help the guilty, by making impossible demands for proof. centuries of attacks on science and public health by the far right have created a disinformation system that works very well to protect American companies from accountability for harming American citizens.

Was the GBD explicitly anti-vax? The GBD was entirely anti-public health, anti-competence, and anti-science. without the Great Barrington Decalaration, the Republican Party would have spread their anti-vax and anti-science message, but the disinformation was easier to spread with the help of the ~~Great Barrington~~ Anti-Science Declaration.

Re: Will NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya stand up for scientists censored by the American Diabetes Association?

Rogue Medic — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 14:36:20 -0000

President-Elect Jennifer Green, MD, and Scientific Sessions Planning Committee Chair Mark Atkinson, PhD, have both left their positions with ADA, several sources confirmed to MedPage Today.

I am curious about the reasons for these resignations. Without some sort of statement from each of the people, there are many possibilities.

Are the resignations in support of the statement handed out?
Are the resignations due to displeasure at the way the "incident" became an "incident"?
Are the resignations due to the way this was handled by the organization?
Are the resignations in opposition to the statement handed out?
I could go on, but this is an organization that is supposed to be, "Leading the fight against the deadly consequences of diabetes for those affected by it through research funding, community services, education and advocacy."

Diabetes is directly the cause of death of almost 100,000 people in America every year and contributes to the deaths of about 400,000 every year. Diabetes is the 7th leading cause of death in America. This is an organization that can do a lot to help Americans, but politicizing their work can do a lot to kill more Americans.

What does it mean when the President-Elect of the organization resigns? Was the resignation an indication that nothing can be done, even by the president, so becoming president is pointless?

When the Civil War began with the attacks on American forts by the militaries of seceding states, Abraham Lincoln was also only President-Elect, but Lincoln found a way to unite the states that did not secede under a banner of The Union, the United States of America had been attacked by states that chose treason over waiting long enough for Abraham Lincoln to become President Lincoln.

Maybe President-Elect Jennifer Green, MD can negotiate for something that allows the organization to focus on patient care and to reject the political agenda of those trying to divide and conquer anything good about America.

Re: Sabotaging America’s Future: The Catastrophic Cost of Federal Research Cuts

Rogue Medic — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 12:31:41 -0000

That extensive list, which seems to cover almost everything ever written, seems to be just an example of anomaly hunting. We found an anomaly and it is connected, in some way, to AI/LLM writing. We are therefore going to promote this as an indicator, but we are also going to cover ourselves by pointing out that many of these indicators are most often wrong.

There could be a similar list explaining why black people are criminals. There may be on Conservapedia. This is just stereotyping.

If I see a black person and assume that the black person is a criminal, I will occasionally be right. If I see a white person and assume that the white person is a criminal, I will occasionally be right. I will also have been wasting my time on something that is not predictive, mistakenly believing that it is predictive.

Re: Sabotaging America’s Future: The Catastrophic Cost of Federal Research Cuts

Rogue Medic — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 10:41:20 -0000

Why do you believe that "M-dash..." is some sort of indicator of AI?

Re: Sabotaging America’s Future: The Catastrophic Cost of Federal Research Cuts

Rogue Medic — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 10:31:44 -0000

In a 2025 Nature survey of 1,600 scientists, 75 percent said they were considering leaving the United States, with Europe and Canada top destinations.

Defunded today. Tomorrow they will be re-educated as part of the continuing Cultural Revolution. Trump is continuing what Newt Gingrich and other anti-science politicians have tried to do for centuries. Get rid of science, because science is effective. Competence is their enemy. Belief and emotion are their weapons.

Ignore reality and hurt someone you don't like, because it feels good. Do not think of them as human (unless it makes you feel more powerful), but as less than human, as something to be used and discarded.

This is the reason they reject DEI. Seeing others as competent people who make things better is unacceptable. This is The Paranoid Style in American Politics, and the Anti-intellectualism in American Life described by historian Richard Hofstadter. Those were written in the 1960s and document a long tradition of these problems that is older than America. These are the arsonists, burning down the house to show their power. Tomorrow, they will burn down another house to demonstrate that they are now more powerful. This is their way of thinking. The logical fallacies offered as justifications are examples of their cognitive dissonance.

Re: Will NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya stand up for scientists censored by the American Diabetes Association?

Rogue Medic — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 09:45:11 -0000

If their arguments were based on logic, rather than emotion, they would/could present logical responses to criticism of their arguments. The best they do is present logical fallacies to support their condemnation of DEI, woke, women, trans, not being white, not being male, and not celebrating being a white male as an excuse to harm anyone in the very fluid group of accepted of "targets."

Violence feels good. Violence feels right. Forget all that pointy-headed thinking stuff and just hit somebody. Then do it again. Let them make a logical argument against that!

For some reason, that seems to be the essence of MAGA. Revenge for their lives not being perfect, because Didn't the Gods make them perfect? They shouldn't have to endure any imperfection. All they have to do is demand perfection louder as any good leader knows.

A healthy dose of cognitive dissonance helps make this winning.

Re: Will NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya stand up for scientists censored by the American Diabetes Association?

Rogue Medic — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 09:37:23 -0000

It is woke, when a non-MAGA person does it.

It is Sacred, when a MAGA person does it.

MAGA is about the emotional appeal of condemning the True Evil (anyone in any group they don't like at the moment) and celebrating their One True Gods, all hundreds of billions of them.

MAGA logic is pure.

Re: Will NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya stand up for scientists censored by the American Diabetes Association?

Rogue Medic — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 20:49:50 -0000

Podcast Jay could easily provide a video hookup, as if it is a podcast and PJ might consider that to be as much association with the little people as necessary, especially if he took a few questions before signing off. PJ could also have planned on flying in, speaking, and flying right out, but never got around to calling and telling the ADA coordinator for the conference that he wouldn't be able to make it. PJ seems like someone, who protects himself by withholding bad news until it cannot be ignored. Everything going according to plan, such as PJ is in the building, is also a possibility, but I tend not to have much confidence in PJ engaging in responsible behavior.

Re: The COVID Amnesia Project: Erasing Your Free Will to Preserve the Fantasy of the Optional Pandemic

Rogue Medic — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 18:57:44 -0000

Does Keith Richards look old because he is in his 80s? because he quit smoking? because he quit heroin? because he dramatically cut down on alcohol? because his genetics minimize the harm these substances do, even if he trips and fractures his skull in New Zealand?

So many possibilities, but while everyone knows Keith Richards, how many people have met him for longer than it takes to get an autograph, yet still he is the closest they know to someone who does all of the things that Keith Richards doesn't do?

Keith Richards looks like he is the evidence that people want to believe in, but he also has access to excellent medical care, as long as he ignores the quacks. Heroin is considered far more dangerous than smoking, but if you get medical grade heroin, and limit yourself to directly observed injections, you essentially eliminate the risk. With smoking, if you eliminate all of the dangers, you no longer have something people will pay for, because tobacco is inherently harmful to the human body, when used as intended, while heroin is not harmful when used as intended. If addiction does develop, but the supply is medical quality, the injections are medical quality, and the carbon dioxide level is monitored so that someone will stimulate the person to breathe, the person can lead an otherwise normal life, even while addicted.

If we really want to cut deaths from opioid overdoses, we probably can cut them to almost to zero without even decreasing use of heroin, but only improving the quality of the supply. We should try to end addiction, but we should understand that the addiction is not the problem.

If we want to cut much larger number of deaths from tobacco, we have to stop the use of tobacco. Safe use of tobacco is a myth.

Alcohol is somewhere in the middle. Alcohol is more dangerous than heroin, but less dangerous than tobacco. Alcohol's problems mostly come from addiction, but since repeated alcohol use causes a lot of damage to the liver (and the heart) and a healthy liver is important to a healthy life, alcohol addiction is very deadly.

The arguments that alcohol and tobacco are not deadly come from people who do not understand medicine or science. There is plenty of evidence. The idea that a glass of wine a day is good for you is due to study designs that did not adequately control for variables. Many of the people who do not drink at all have quit alcohol, because of alcohol addiction, having already caused significant damage to their livers and hearts, which caused them to die younger than people who only occasionally drank alcohol.

Re: The Authors of the Book “The War on Science” Won Their War. Are They Happy Now?

Rogue Medic — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 18:08:43 -0000

It would be nice if people had some more agreement on what are the right terms for different aspects of being human. The problem seems to be that whenever a community settles on this is our preferred term to identify with, the far right starts using that in ways that are intended to be demeaning, so the far right can claim to be the victims. All I did was use their preferred terminology (ignoring everything else that went into the incident) and they flew off the handle.

What is needed is some sort of shibboleth for good faith, but any time somebody comes up with something, the far right weaponizes it to try to divide and conquer.

Unfortunately, we apes are not rational, so we tend to fall for it over and over.

Re: Will NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya stand up for scientists censored by the American Diabetes Association?

Rogue Medic — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 17:53:09 -0000

Was Podcast Jay actually there? I am not going to try to track down the location of someone in the government in this hyperparanoid (too much?) administration, but it was "last minute cancellation," so maybe PJ was there and maybe this was just the justification for not going, or maybe it would have been a virtual presentation, or . . . So many possibilities.

It will be interesting to read whatever behind the scenes reporting comes out of this.
Unless Tommy lee Jones used a Neuralyzer on them. Official government podcasters can have some impressive tech. The Neuralyzer-in-Chief is denying he ever said, No new wars.

Long Live the Memory Holes!

Memory Holes? What are Memory Holes?

😱

Re: Will NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya stand up for scientists censored by the American Diabetes Association?

Rogue Medic — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 16:20:31 -0000

See, their tract was saying right there that their opinion was not aligned with ~~ADA~~ MAGA/MAHA, so ~~ADA~~ MAGA/MAHA was in their right to have them thrown through the airlock.

Project 2025 The Heritage Foundation's Mandate For Leadership already described how this is what people were voting for.

I am exaggerating, but speaking of communism, I would not be surprised if the US were to deploy this year their own political commissars.

Project 2025 The Heritage Foundation's Mandate For Leadership already described how this is what people were voting for.

There is a reason I keep referring to the Republican Party's behavior as Stalinist. Republican politicians hate the word communism and act as if anything not Republican is communism, but the Republican Party in power is imitating politics under Stalin. Political officers will tell you what you did wrong and how you should be punished, but if you slip them some money, or some favors, you might be spared . . . this time.

The most essential jobs are for those who keep the memory holes working.

Re: The Authors of the Book “The War on Science” Won Their War. Are They Happy Now?

Rogue Medic — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 11:45:29 -0000

What are these "certain DEI policies" that you oppose?

Re: Will NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya stand up for scientists censored by the American Diabetes Association?

Rogue Medic — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 11:39:06 -0000

For those wanting to skip to that part of your article, it looks like the new part adds 4 paragraphs and begins 6 paragraphs from the end with:

Unfortunately, the ADA didn’t do any of that—quite the opposite, in fact. Yesterday, the ADA issued a statement demonstrating that its leadership has learned nothing from the backlash:

I know you don't like punctuation and other corrections, but for those scrolling up, the paragraph right after this is part of the statement by the ADA, but it is not formatted as a quote. I sent the notification to sbmproofreading@gmail.com, but I realize it may take a little bit and the formatting can be confusing - at least it was for me.

Is the ADA being political by preventing people from passing out information, when the people are not acting in any official ADA capacity? Is the censorship political or would allowing people to express their professional opinions at a professional conference be the political action?

Re: Will NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya stand up for scientists censored by the American Diabetes Association?

Rogue Medic — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 09:07:51 -0000

“All attendees will conduct themselves in a professional and respectful manner, free from any form of discrimination, harassment, or intimidation, ..."

It's not discrimination when we do it to protect the image we want to present. It's not harassment when we do it to protect the image we want to present. It's not intimidation when we do it to protect the image we want to present. It is not a bad thing, when we use the police to prevent people who disagree with our speech from mentioning that they disagree by any kind of speech.

A safe space must be provided for political officers of the administration to speak without the appearance of any disagreement. Even the hint of criticism caused Podcast Jay to run away and hide, while sending someone else to be sacrificed to the violent mob. How did the unfortunate human sacrifice manage to survive the violence that clearly terrified Podcast Jay.

"War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength." Speech is violence.

Freedom comes with responsibility, while freeDUMB rejects responsibility in favor of performative destruction. Cutting funding to researchers who follow the scientific method and increasing the funding to researchers who reject the scientific method in favor of other methods of knowing, that appeal to the political officers in charge of the Brave New Science.

The dog whistles of DEI, immigrants, women, trans, woke, . . . dependably motivate the cult members to destroy anything that can be destroyed.

We do not appear to be rational enough to understand responsibility, integrity, honesty, or much of anything else. Incompetence and corruption are being exalted by this cult that would be amusing in a work of fiction, but is truly deadly.

"The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command."

😔

Re: The COVID Amnesia Project: Erasing Your Free Will to Preserve the Fantasy of the Optional Pandemic

Rogue Medic — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 20:32:00 -0000

Knowing someone who lived a long life in spite of repeated self-destructive behaviors is something that is often noted about the person, but it is definitely not common that people have long healthy lives in spite of smoking 2 packs of cigarettes a day or drinking a quart of whiskey a day.

Even if you have one of these rare genetic mutations, there are plenty of other aspects of the harmful behaviors that will cause problems.

Some people just look like they are 90 years old, because they drink or smoke or both, even though they are nowhere near 90.

Re: Planets Around Black Holes

Rogue Medic — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 20:06:10 -0000

We seem to be on the path of let's go to the stars, . . .

but first we should destroy ourselves, because it seems like so much fun!

😔

Re: Reason’s Next “Flame of Freedom” Winner Should be Someone Who Stood Up to Their Past “Flame of Freedom” Winner, Dr. Jay Bhattacharya

Rogue Medic — Sun, 07 Jun 2026 16:45:19 -0000

The Reason Foundation - an ironically named organization behind the magazine. The Reason Foundation is financed by the multi-billionaire Koch brothers, Charles Koch and the late David Koch. These two also created the Cato Institute, the Mercatus Center, and Citizens for a Sound Economy. Why mention David, if he is dead?

David was the Libertarian Party's vice-presidential candidate in 1980,[12] running on a platform of abolishing Social Security, the FBI, the CIA, and public schools.[33][34]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koch_network

I mention David Koch, and not just Charles Koch, because David was the less reactionary of these two leaders of far right reactionary politics. Being less reactionary does not mean that David did not lead where the Republican Party was going. It just means that David Koch had to show where the Republican Party was being dragged by the Koch brothers. All of these policies are being supported/enacted by the currently serving Republican Senators, Republican Representatives, Republican President, and Republican SCOTUS.

There are occasional acts of rebellion by one, or two, even three, Republican politicians, when the media accurately report what the Republican Party is doing to the American government and to American citizens, but it is usually too little and too late, because we are irrational apes demonstrating death by cognitive dissonance.

If the media accurately reported on what the Reason Foundation, the Republican Party, and the rest of the far right propaganda organizations are doing to America, would enough people care? Would we just scroll to the next thing, because the leopards are not eating my face this time?