Hundreds of people turned out to watch a fireside chat with RFK Jr., Dr. Calley Means, and Dr. Phil in Pennsylvania last Thursday. The thread uniting the diverse audience was clear: a deep understanding that saving our country means making America healthy again.
One week ago I drove three hours south from my home in Pennsylvania deep into the heart of farmland country to attend a discussion between Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Dr. Calley Means, moderated by Dr. Phil. The event was a taping for Dr. Phil’s new entertainment and news network, Merit Street Media. I wondered who might attend the event, as it wasn’t specifically a “Trump” gathering, and I thought the content of the discussion was likely to lean more towards health and healing rather than the strictly political. The crowd was made up of enthusiastic middle aged Trump supporters eager to welcome their new ally, RFK Jr., young people who might look more comfortable in a health food store or wandering a farmers market, and suspender-clad men only one religious step outside of the Amish sect. As the speakers took their seats amidst roars of approval and a standing ovation from the crowd, one thing became obvious: the right has enthusiastically embraced their newfound association with a nationwide health improvement push. RFK Jr. ‘s alignment with the Trump campaign was a conservative lightbulb moment, a realization that one of the most urgent and necessary ways in which the United States must improve is in the physical health of the majority of the country. We have some of the worst healthcare in the developed world, pay the most for that mediocre healthcare, and remain some of the most unhealthy people. Our healthcare system is deeply flawed, the pharmaceutical industry is grotesquely corrupt, and people are suffering. On stage, Dr. Means and RFK Jr. declared their intentions to facilitate a top down restructuring of the FDA, NIH, pharma lobbies, and the healthcare system. About our failing healthcare system, RFK Jr. said, “This is existential.” Improving the health of the nation isn’t just a life and death matter for individuals themselves, but for the longevity and success of the country as a whole. The United States thrives if its citizens thrive. The country declines when the health of its people declines. With both RFK Jr. and Dr. Means working on the transition team and influencing health policy within the Trump administration, there is hope for restoring health to our country, and Conservatives are ready to embrace this ambitious task.
A Regressing Population
The Flynn Effect is an observation that the average IQ of a population increases over time. As people are exposed to better education, a more complex and interesting world, and better nutrition, it makes sense that, collectively, IQ goes up in a small but significant degree over the course of decades. RFK Jr. described how, in the past decade, we’ve put the breaks on the Flynn Effect for the first time in human history. “Americans are losing IQ”, he said. During the Covid pandemic, American toddlers had a nauseating 22 point drop in IQ. Male school performance is lagging behind girls for the first time, and boys no longer perform better in subjects in which they used to traditionally outperform girls, like sciences and math. Unfortunately, it’s not because girls are more interested and invested in STEM that they’re outpacing their male counterparts, but simply that the population as a whole is regressing, and men and boys are declining at a more rapid rate than ever. 4 out of every 100 boys have autism, a staggering percentage representation for a disease that only recently seems to have emerged with a vengeance. RFK Jr. highlighted how 40% of teenagers suffer from depression. 1 in 3 children are diabetic or prediabetic. Dr. Means noted that “The biggest building in every city is a pediatric hospital.” In terms of statistics, our country looks distressingly, unfathomably poor. Globally, we are weakening. This issue is “no longer partisan”, Dr. Means remarked. During the Covid-19 pandemic, the CDC dropped the guidelines and thresholds with which childhood development is measured against. Suddenly, milestones for talking, walking, pattern recognition, and general cognitive development dropped to meet the sharp developmental declines seen in children during 2020 and on. Dr. Means and RFK Jr. both expressed disgust that those responsible for detrimental Covid-19 policies were not only never reprimanded or held accountable in any capacity, but often promoted or celebrated within their fields. We are in the midst of a “societal collapsing health crisis”, Dr. Means said. “We’re sicker, more depressed, more infertile….Chronic lifestyle conditions are plaguing America.” Everywhere you look, there is sickness and unhealth. We seem to be unable, but more likely unwilling, to satisfactorily identify the causes of our country-wide illness epidemic. We’re at a societal tipping point, and RFK Jr. seems to be the only politician with enough courage to sound the alarm and demand action. As evidenced by the whoops and shouts of approval from the crowd at the discussion in Pennsylvania on Thursday, RFK Jr. has found compatriots and overwhelming support from the Republican party.
A Party-Wide Awakening
It used to be fringe and alarmist to believe that we’re all astonishingly ill, and that it’s our food, pharmaceuticals, and lifestyles that made us this way. Thanks to RFK Jr.’s massively successful grass-roots Independent campaign this year, not only have a greater number of people been exposed to the truth of our broken food and drug system, but they’re supporting the fight to improve it. The MAGA rallying cry has been joined with the MAHA declaration, and a new era of conservatism is being born in front of our eyes. “The old left”, as RFK called it, used to be the party fighting for the health interests of the people, and creating checks and balances on influences over food and drug manufacturing. Now it’s conservatives, arm in arm with RFK Jr., taking up the mantle to repair what corruption and cronyism has completely destroyed. According to Dr. Means, “Pharma is the largest funder of policies” in government, and our “institutions of trust”, like the FDA and NIH, have been bought and sold for profit and power, and not for health or healing. According to one study noted by Dr. Means, the NIH was found to have over 8,000 “significant” conflicts of interest since 2012, an internal industry of corruption totaling more than $188 million dollars. In one disturbing example of unfavorable test results being simply brushed away and the taxpayer dollars that funded them sent disappearing into thin air, Dr. Means cited a 10 million dollar study on the effects of puberty blockers on American children. The NIH found that puberty blockers given to gender dysphoric children had no positive effect on their mental health, and they subsequently refused to publish the study. “These agencies are corrupt to their core,” said RFK Jr. Dr. Means astutely noted that we can feel in our gut that “our institutions aren’t quite right”. This seems to be the nerve struck by RFK Jr. for conservative voters. We’ve long known that our high-level health institutions like the FDA, NIH, and CDC appear to work against the populations in which they are charged to protect and improve, and now suspicions are confirmed. RFK Jr. turned on the lights in what was once a dark room and illuminated all the shadows that we could feel but didn’t see. Our health systems are broken, and republican voters are ready and eager to begin the long road to fixing them.
A Vote For Action
RFK Jr. remains on the ballot in many states, but he expressed the importance of using would-be independent votes to vote for Trump and thereby bring RFK Jr. into office within that administration. If we believe in the goals and objectives of the MAHA movement, a vote for Trump ensures it’s advancement. Should Trump win the election, both Dr. Calley Means and RFK Jr. will work on the transition team and influence health policy within the White House. They stressed the need for top down dismantling of the FDA and NIH, with intentions of making personnel changes at these corrupt agencies and creating regulatory checks on how science is conducted and influenced. RFK Jr. noted the importance of creating changes through regulation and executive order rather than attempting to remove corruption by sending bills through congress. Changes must happen now, and without the capacity to be further corrupted. About their objectives, he said, “We’re not taking choice away from anybody…you’re an American”. But he believes that people have an immediate right to real, factual, uncorrupted studies about the foods they eat and the drugs they take, and how it’s affecting their health and lifespan. He believes Americans have a right to the truth about the causes of their poor health. RFK Jr.’s goals for his place in the Trump administration are lofty. “We’re going to find out what’s causing Autism in a couple of months,” he declared confidently. Dr. Means, referencing backlash from Trump’s recent viral McDonalds visit, dismissed the question of whether it was “healthy” or not for Trump to visit McDonalds, but rather asked why the United States allows McDonalds to serve “poison” to us and our children when other countries do not. These are the kinds of ambitions front of mind for the men ready to step into action if Trump becomes president for the second time: causation identification of our country’s most puzzling new disease and the massacre of the substances filling our country’s most popular fast food restaurant. To make America healthy again means dismantling many of the institutions and ideas that we’ve become habituated to accept over the decades. The health and future of our country depends on a few people being willing to put it all on the line for change. RFK Jr. endorsed Donald Trump as the right man for the job. Moderator Dr. Phil said we’re “fighting a huge institutional legacy”, but RFK Jr. had no qualms about Trump’s capacity to change those institutions if brought to office. He said what we all feel about Trump, why the nation is ready to bring him to office for a second time. About Trump, RFK Jr. stated simply, “He’s fearless”.
Jordan Musser 