This week, someone looking for a telling parable of Trump Regime II, would go right to the national security scandal Atlantic editor Jeff Goldberg broke after being invited to a group chat on Signal, a lightly encrypted messaging app. This chat was called “Houthi PC Small Group” and Goldberg— and anyone else listening, certainly the Russians— knew the precise U.S. battle plans for there attack on Iranian allies in Yemen on March 15.
Goldberg wrote that he “knew two hours before the first bombs exploded that the attack might be coming. The reason I knew this is that Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, had texted me the war plan at 11:44 a.m. The plan included precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing.” Trump’s national security advisor, Mike Waltz invited Goldberg to a group chat that included J.D. Vance, Hegseth Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Tulsi Gabbard, the Director of National Intelligence. Yeah, that’s a good tableau of Trump Regime II. But the NY Times had another one yesterday: Remedy Supported by Kennedy Leaves Some Measles Patients More Ill. In some cases, a lot more ill. Teddy Rosenbluth reported that “Doctors in West Texas are seeing measles patients whose illnesses have been complicated by an alternative therapy endorsed by vaccine skeptics including Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the health secretary. Parents in Gaines County, Texas, the center of a raging measles outbreak, have increasingly turned to supplements and unproven treatments to protect their children, many of whom are unvaccinated, against the virus.”
A little context: Gaines County is nut country— MAGA lunatics all the way. Last year the county gave Trump 91% of its vote. Kamala won 8.4%. She performed worse in just a dozen counties— all rural— of Texas’ 254, Borden, Hansford, Hartley, King, McMullen, Motley, Oldham, Roberts, Sherman, Sterling, Throckmorton and Wheeler, the Texas counties that had been hit hard in the COVID pandemic.
Kennedy has been promoting Vitamin A instead of the vaccine as a near miraculous cure for measles. It isn’t— and in some cases it has made patients much sicker. “Physicians at Covenant Children’s Hospital in Lubbock, Texas, say they’ve now treated a handful of children who were given so much vitamin A that they had signs of liver damage… Vitamin A is not an effective way to prevent measles; however, two doses of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine are about 97 percent effective. At high doses, vitamin A can cause liver damage; dry, peeling skin; hair loss; and, in rare instances, seizures and coma. So far, doctors at West Texas hospitals have said they’ve seen patients with yellowed skin and high levels of liver enzymes in their bloodwork, both signs of a damaged liver… As of Tuesday, the outbreak, which began in January, had spread to more than 320 people in Texas. Forty patients have been hospitalized, and one child has died.
Local doctors and health officials have become increasingly concerned about the growing popularity of unproven remedies for preventing and treating measles, which they fear is causing people to delay critical medical treatment and to reject vaccination, the only proven way to prevent a measles infection.
In Gaines County, alternative medicine has always been popular. Many in the area’s large Mennonite community, where most cases have been clustered, avoid interacting with the medical system and adhere to a long tradition of natural remedies.
Health officials said the recent popularity of vitamin A use for measles could be traced back to a Fox News interview with Kennedy, in which he said he had heard of “almost miraculous and instantaneous recovery” with treatments like cod liver oil, which he said was “the safest application of vitamin A.”
Kennedy has always been a crackpot, but now his quackery isn't just some fringe curiosity— it’s dangerous. And now, as health officials scramble to contain a raging measles outbreak in West Texas, we’re seeing the real-world consequences of his conspiracy-driven nonsense. But let's not forget: this is exactly the kind of person Donald Trump empowers. Not a single Democrat voted to confirm him and one Republican, Mitch McConnell, joined them in their opposition.
Now there’s no doubt that the Texas outbreak, which has sickened over 320 people, hospitalized 40 and killed a child, has been made worse by Kennedy's anti-vax nuttery and promotion of high-dose vitamin A as a supposed measles treatment. If this were just about one lunatic's reckless misinformation, that would be bad enough. But Kennedy is precisely the sort of person Trump likes to be surrounded by— an anti-science crank whose delusions fit neatly into the MAGA movement’s war on expertise. Kennedy’s name belongs right next to Pete Hegseth, who convinced Trump that washing hands is overrated; Tulsi Gabbard, who pushed pro-Russian propaganda while pretending, briefly, to be a progressive; and Michael Flynn, who spent his post-military career promoting QAnon conspiracies. Trump’s national security team— all of ‘em from top to bottom— are a bunch of reckless amateurs, a gift the America’s foes, especially Putin.
Trump’s administration has been a breeding ground for incompetence, pseudo-intellectualism, and outright grift. His presidency has made heroes out of frauds like Scott Atlas, the radiologist-turned-COVID adviser who helped sabotage the national pandemic response. And now, his circle of influence includes RFK Jr., a man so unhinged that even his own family very publicly disowns him. Trump loves other crackpots like Dr. Oz because they reflect his own deep disdain for science, governance and public responsibility. If you’re wondering what the future under Trump holds, just look at Texas— more avoidable outbreaks, more dead children, and more charlatans in positions of influence. The Texas measles disaster isn’t just an indictment of Kennedy— it’s a warning of what’s to come as Trump's grip on power tightens.
Even the most primitive societies had medicine men and women, people who specialized and apprenticed under the wisdom of the previous generation. Rather than developing skills and knowledge that would be directly useful to themselves every day, they developed skills and knowledge that was important to others on a sporadic basis. This specialization of labor is the foundation of civilization. The myth of independence is toxic. Modern society depends on interdependence. That interdependence allows the development of useful expertise which cuts costs, speeds solutions, and results in better outcomes. Don't be your own lawyer, don't be your own teacher, don't be your own plumber, and for God's sake don't be your own doctor.