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Conspiracy Theorist Whack Job Will Manage America's Health

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Robert F. Kennedy (right), eating a pile of McDonald's food on Trump's plane in the month leading up to the inauguration. Kennedy dropped out of the presidential race to support Trump in exchange for political favors. However, Kennedy also openly criticized the President for eating junk food, once. Soon thereafter, Trump cornered Kennedy on his private jet, and like a mob boss, glared him into eating food that Kennedy said was poison.



Robert F. Kennedy was confirmed to lead the nation's Health and Human Services today, along party lines. Kennedy is well known for his vaccine skepticism and his belief in the debunked study claiming to link vaccines to autism. This is the context under which Trump unveiled his Make America Healthy Again executive order.

Under the MAHA order, there are several things that, in a vacuum, one can praise. The president ordered that all studies funded in part or in whole by Federal funds should be available to the public. A large complaint about most studies is that they're published in journals and one cannot access them without an expensive subscription. So, this will open a world of science to the public, if Trump follows through with this part of the executive order. Time will tell what the consequences may be, however.

The order also acknowledges the poor health of Americans compared to most other nations, including obesity, cancer, heart disease and diabetes, and calls for the National Institutes of Health to pursue "gold standard studies" on the issue. The order creates a commission to study all inputs to American health and come up with a plan to make Americans more healthy. A key focus of the executive order also revolves around autism spectrum disorders.

Context matters. With a Secretary of Health who has historically preached wild health-related conspiracy theories, there's a shadow looming over all the seemingly good things found in this order. Autism advocates have responded swiftly, fearful that the pursuit of conspiracy theories instead of science could upend any progress currently being made on the matter.

Fair And Reciprocal Trade

President Trump issued a memorandum to various department secretaries declaring his intent to place reciprocal tariffs on countries who charge tariffs on American imports. His first target was India's ethanol, on which that country charges 18% for American ethanol imports, and we charge 0% on India's ethanol imports into the United States. This move was met with praise by a great many organizations in the ethanol industry, but also from the Small Business Association.

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