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Comment by betterunix2 | Hacker News Reader

Censorship is not what causes large numbers of US citizens to refuse this vaccine. If the Republicans in leadership positions took this seriously from the start and did not go around casting doubt on vaccination far more people would get the vaccine. If the previous president had not politicized the response to COVID and had simply told his followers to do what the CDC says we would have many millions more people getting the vaccine (and for the matter, hundreds of thousands of people would still be alive).

Don't let the Republicans off the hook. This should never have been a political issue, but Republican leaders at every level of government made this political and continue to politicize the pandemic.

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The previous president was and is extremely pro-vaccine. People claim there is a large republican cohort of anti-vax politicians, but there is not. There is a large GOP cohort of anti-vax-mandate politicians, but being against a mandate does not mean being anti vax, unless you're changing the meaning.

> If the previous president had not politicized the response to COVID and had simply told his followers to do what the CDC says we would have many millions more people getting the vaccine (and for the matter, hundreds of thousands of people would still be alive).

You are accusing Trump of politicizing COVID while ignoring Andrew Cuomo, who at the beginning of the pandemic, used COVID, and the fact he was not Trump, for his political advantage, and the media gushed and was happy to give him more airtime than Trump, despite the fact it was obvious from the very beginning that New York State's handling was much worse than Trumps.

Trump literally still calls it the "Trump Vaccine". Also I think people forget how much airtime went into "the vaccine isn't the answer" once Trump started talking about warp speed and the second the election was over it was "the vaccine is the only answer".

I think you can blame a lot on Trump and repubs with regards to protocols, level of concern, being actively anti-mask, etc but it takes a very selective memory to act like Trump wasn't 1000% on board with the vaccine.

Examples:

- Past vaccine disasters show why rushing a coronavirus vaccine now would be 'colossally stupid' By Jen Christensen, CNN Updated 11:34 AM EDT, Tue September 01, 2020

- CNN: The timetable for a coronavirus vaccine is 18 months. Experts say that's risky By Robert Kuznia Updated 2:14 PM EDT, Wed April 01, 2020

- Here's where we stand on getting a coronavirus vaccine By Holly Yan, CNN Updated 1:45 PM EDT, Mon June 08, 2020

- With big talk and hurled insults, the gloves come off in the race for the coronavirus vaccine By Elizabeth Cohen, CNN Senior Medical Correspondent Updated 7:00 AM EDT, Wed May 27, 2020

> (CNN)Ethicists and physicians are concerned that, amid a desire to put an end to the Covid-19 pandemic, developers of drugs and vaccines have become overly enthusiastic about the chances their products will work.

Correct. This is one of the few areas where trump seemingly disagrees with his own base. Sites like patriots.win (remnants of thedonald) criticize trump for his vax support.

I am very confused when you say "previous president" and pro-vaccine. Are you not referring to Trump? He was talking anti-vax stuff during the 2016 primary debates. He retweeted conflation of vaccination and autism in 2014.

You are conflating issues. This thread is about the COVID vaccine, which Trump has promoted constantly. Please do not distract from the issue.

Prominent Democrats also cast doubt on vaccine safety. The governor of California essentially stated that he didn't trust the FDA and insisted on doing another safety review before authorizing vaccines for use in the state. This was inexcusable political behavior on both sides.

https://www.gov.ca.gov/2020/10/27/western-states-join-califo...

That was done in response to concerns that Trump was trying to push the FDA to approve the vaccines faster to serve his own political ambitions:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/03/politics/white-house-fda-coro...

https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-business-mark-meadow...

Moreover, Gov. Newsom's statements did not say that the vaccines were unsafe; he simply said that he was establishing an independent panel of scientists to evaluate the same evidence that the FDA evaluated. At no point did he say that people should seek ivermectim or hydroxychloroquin or that people should just rely on natural immunity.

Even if Newsom did the wrong thing here, it is a far cry from the Republicans, who have pushed the narrative that people should feel no specific obligation to get vaccinated because of "freedom." Trump has stood before crowds of vaccine-hesitant supporters and said, "Get the shot if you want to." Republican governors have echoed that sentiment. The results speak for themselves: Democrats have higher vaccination rates and Democrat-leaning areas have lower infection and lower hospitalization rates compared to Republicans.

Since the inception of the FDA, when else have state governments independently verified drugs like this? It is clearly a signal that one ought not to trust the FDA. Is it any surprise that large cohorts of the democratic party (namely, their non-white cohorts) do not want to get the drug? I am not surprised.

> "Get the shot if you want to."

That is exactly what any sane person should say. Trump is pro-vaccine. He has unequivocally said he has had it and thinks it's a good idea. He's just anti-mandate. You can be pro-vaccine (as in you believe others should get it), while being against a mandate. This is insanity. The expectation that one must believe that the government ought to require a vaccine in order to not be anti-vax is quite the shift of goal posts.

I think you make a good point here that someone can be pro-vaccine while being against a mandate. I hadn't thought of it that way. I don't really see many Republicans going out of their way recommending vaccines though, either. Trump got his in secret initially.

Sensor Mitch McConnell: "I’m glad to share that a few minutes ago, I received a booster vaccination for COVID-19."

https://www.mcconnell.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2021/9/mcc...

You can find plenty more similar statements by Republicans if you bother to look.

Thanks for sharing this. Looks like Senator John Cornyn and Senator Mitt Romney support the COVID vaccines, too [1]. Good to know.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/14/us/politics/gop-covid-vac...

Have you even bothered watching something like fox news before writing your comments. Literally every story about the covid vax they'll talk about how it's important to speak with your doctor because it's an important tool to fight covid but that it's... Up to you

* Senator, not sensor (damn autocorrect)

Except Trump is constantly on conservative talk radio pushing the vaccine. In fact, sites like Patriots.win are full of Trump supporters who criticize him for pushing the vax. that's like the only thing they don't like about him. Just the other day he was on hannity pushing the vaccine.

no disrespect but i know plenty of liberals who will not get the vaccine. the media turned it into a bi-partisan issue when in all actuality it was a government handling issue in which the rest were used as scapegoats. you remember that they gave themselves raises while the rest of us were told not to go into work. which obviously we are gonna listen if we believe that covid is as dangerous as the scientist were saying, the main issue and the reason why blockchain (primary crypto) technology took last year was because of the censorship issues. people do not want amazon to shut down a website because it disagrees with their narrative, they don’t want facebook, reddit or payment processors shutting things down for those same reasons. so the push towards even more decentralizing is going to happen. but to clear things up, this is decentralized together, not the traditional sense of decentralization.

you cannot censor someone you disagree with and expect them to be okay with it. you make them a slave to your narrative, and if they become slaves, they will push to make you a slave as well by whatever means necessary. see texas abortion bans. it’s what Gandhi said, “an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind” or a more modern version would be “that which we resist, persist”. this is common knowledge, when push comes to shove, the shoved push back. but the problem is, we end up in a loop, where both parties lose more and more of their civil liberties to PWN their perceived enemy. it’s odd that a lot of adults don’t understand this basic concept.

down vote all you want, it doesn’t make it any less true

> no disrespect but i know plenty of liberals who will not get the vaccine.

Respectfully, those people have been anti-vax for a while now (https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/09/what-do-le...) and were part of the group that were unpersuadable.

But leftist anti-vaxers aren't a majority of current COVID-19 anti-vaxers. Those are politically motivated groups.

I’m not sure why you’re being down-voted; elements of the counter-cultural left has been skeptical of science for decades.

The profit-motive is at odds with the nobler pursuit of science and companies like Monsanto, Exxon, Dow Jones are on the wrong side of history. Unfortunately, distrust of “big pharma” mutates into a suspicion of science in general – and the medical sector in particular. There also isn’t a catchy phrase to describe “big holistic/wellness/organic”.

When people (regardless of political persuasion) give up trying to understand the complexities of reality and instead, look for easy answers that appeal to them on an emotional level, they leave themselves vulnerable to all sorts of wacky ideas (many of which can be traced back to good old-fashioned anti-Semitism like George Soros and a shadowy cabal controlling the world).

George Monbiot recently published an article about this issue from a European perspective: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/22/leftwi...

Article from last year from an Australian perspective: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jun/05/wellne...

I'm curious: what percentage of the population tries to understand the complexities of reality, by your standard?

5% perhaps. Everyone else is busy working.

That sounds about right, maybe a bit optimistic.

>no disrespect but i know plenty of liberals who will not get the vaccine

No disrespect, just statistics [1].

Democrat:Republican ratio among is about 3:5 among the unvaccinated (and about 2:1 among the vaccinated).

>you make them a slave to your narrative, and if they become slaves, they will push to make you a slave as well by whatever means necessary

With all due respect, the example you gave of that is the behavior of the Republican party (abortion bans in Texas). I can provide many more examples from that side, and it seems to be disproportionately popular with people who support that party.

I don't see this happening with non-Republican supporters.

I also have an issue with "you make them a slave to your narrative". The enslaving effect of abortion bans is easily understood; but in which way was Texas "enslaved" by anything Biden's administration did to do that?

It really seems like you're drawing a false equivalence here, because as far as I can see, it's less eye-for-an-eye and more one of the parties going wild with poking eyes out, and getting hurt and offended by the "narrative" of anyone wearing glasses.

[1]https://www.kff.org/coronavirus-covid-19/poll-finding/kff-co...

I think the fact that vaccination is only 3:5 demonstrates that it is remarkably close between parties and people should be more thoughtful about characterization. It is not like it is 100:1 or some extremely skewed distribution.

How about the death rate from covid being 3:1 in red vs. blue counties?[1]

Is 3:1 big enough to say that there, perhaps, is a problem?

[1]https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/27/briefing/covid-red-states...

I'm still not sure why exactly the claimed problem is party affiliation?

Is there a casual link with being republican and dying of covid democrats are immune to?

Should the CDC list party affiliation as a comorbidity and recommend Republicans reregister as democrats for the health benefits.

Of course not, because we know that there is a more direct causal link with not being vaccinated. We know that people in both party are not vaccinated, but more of the unvaccinated are Republicans (50‰ vs d 30% per your link)

Why attribute deaths and vaccination to party affiliation, when we know it crosses party lines?

If we want to really understand the "problem", we should look at traits that are associated with more than 50‰ of the unvaccinated.

> no disrespect but i know plenty of liberals who will not get the vaccine.

Anecdotally, the liberals I know seem much more open to the science behind the COVID vaccine and I don't know any of them who didn't get the shot.

> the reason why blockchain (primary crypto) technology took last year was because of the censorship issues.

Not sure I understand your point here. I think crypto is being adopted for other reasons considering that the most popular cryptos are pseudo-anonymous anyway. Is it because you think crypto can't be shut down? That is a larger discussion and I would say Bitcoin and Ethereum are less likely to be shut down, at least by the US (since in general it seems like they aren't considered to be securities), but I don't think we can expect that of the entire crypto ecosystem.

In general though, I'm not sure what your main point is. Are you saying that both sides of US politicians are at fault here? If so, I don't disagree.

However, I also think the post you were responding to was pointing out that conservative politicians carry some of the blame here and have been pushing these agendas for their own power play, which I'd also agree with.

> Anecdotally, the liberals I know seem much more open to the science behind the COVID vaccine and I don't know any of them who didn't get the shot.

Anecdotally, most people only know others who view things very closely to themselves.

That is why I used the word anecdotally. I was responding to a sentence that was also anecdotal.

I was mainly referring to this:

> Anecdotally, the liberals I know seem much more open to the science behind the COVID vaccine and I don't know any of them who didn't get the shot.

IME, this is because liberals are highly fractured based on race and class. The democratic party is composed of several groups that rarely intermix and often have competing interests. For example, large numbers of white liberals have few black liberal friends. This is not a value judgement, it's a description of how the world is.]

Why would anybody get vaccinated if they have to continue wearing masks? How does that make any sense at all? It ain’t republicans pushing that kind of nonsense.

And what does “take this serious” actually mean? This is a values thing. A lot of people justifiably get upset that the government wants them to put their entire life on hold indefinitely for a virus they aren’t concerned with. Life isn’t meant to survive. It’s meant to be lived. Life is very short and so far a non trivial amount of it has been spent on this. There is way more to life than a myopic fixation on exactly one single illness.

For the same reason that some people might wear seat belts and continue following the rest of the rules of the road.

Go back a year and see who was saying the vaccine was not safe. Explicitly saying you don't trust the vaccine because your political opponent was president when it was created is political plain and simple.

When your political opponent is an unintelligent charlatan who can’t speak two words without spouting a lie, then perhaps some caution would be warranted where public health is concerned.

Last I checked Trump had nothing to do with the vaccine other than helping fund it (Operation Warpseed). If you think Trump could impact the safety then I assume you think the FDA is corrupt which means we shouldn't trust them when they say it is safe now?

Back when that was the debate, Trump was pushing FDA to "accelerate" approval i.e. do it before the studies analysis was done. Now we know how those studies went, but at that point nobody did yet (and they might have revealed e.g. a lack of efficiency), so yes, if FDA did issue an approval back then then they should have been treated as corrupt for breaching their own process in a way that can impact the safety; and that is why the concern was (IMHO reasonably) raised by various Democrat leaders. Heck, Trump was on record asking officials to alter election results, of course he could also try to overrule FDA if he chose to and wasn't loudly opposed.

>Back when that was the debate, Trump was pushing FDA to "accelerate" approval i.e. do it before the studies analysis was done

There are accelerated approvals as part of the FDA process if there is a need. That is how Pfizer is approved now. Pfizer did not complete all the tests and analysis they typically would have had to go through.

>Now we know how those studies went, but at that point nobody did yet (and they might have revealed e.g. a lack of efficiency

Except like I said above we actually don't know since they have not completed all the studies yet.

>so yes, if FDA did issue an approval back then then they should have been treated as corrupt for breaching their own process in a way that can impact the safety

Interesting.

>that is why the concern was (IMHO reasonably) raised by various Democrat leaders.

I didn't see any Democratic leaders complaining when Pfizer was approved with the expedited process. So faster than normal is fine sometimes.

>Heck, Trump was on record asking officials to alter election results,

Trump says stupid stuff that has nothing to do with this. Biden says stupid stuff. Who cares?

>of course he could also try to overrule FDA if he chose to and wasn't loudly opposed.

He didn't though. Biden could do the same with a sugar pill if some company decided it was a cure for covid. Who cares what somebody could do if they don't actually do it.

You are assuming "they" trust the Republican leadership. this Gallup poll says only 12% of Americans trust congress. https://news.gallup.com/poll/352316/americans-confidence-maj... Lots of other interesting tidbits about trust in there...

These people who don't trust masks trust ivermectin. Just... talk with them. Its obvious. There's one political party pushing ivermectin as a solution, and the other one doesn't.

They want "their side" to be correct on this issue. They don't trust masks because masks were chosen by "the other side". They don't trust vaccines (despite being pushed by Operation Warp Speed by Mr. Trump) because someone else became president and started pushing vaccines.

It was historically liberals who hated vaccines, not conservatives. Conservatives were the ones making lynch mobs to forcibly vaccinate people (still an ugly history there but... seriously. The entire political world has flipped upside down).

--------

This isn't about the message. Its 100% about who trusts who, and who trusts what. This is a problem of ethos, not of facts or logos.

My post had nothing to do with any party affiliation. I was simply pointing out the data regarding where trust in our institutions is. Please ratchet the "they"/"other" stuff back a bit. I don't think it is helping us trust each other.

And my post is about the reality of our politics today.

People distrust masks but trust ivermectin. Why? Because certain leaders in certain political thoughts are pushing anti-mask and pro-ivermectin messages.

Its that simple. There's no need to mince words. People trust their leaders. If it helps, its the same reason why some liberals are all "Screw the rich", because they trust Bernie Sanders.

No one likes __Congress__ as an institution, but everyone likes their particular Senator/House rep. If not, those people would be immediately voted out. Its all the _OTHER_ reps that people don't like in Congress. Just as the institution was designed. That's how its supposed to work: you don't like the reps who push for stuff in their state/interests (but not your state and/or interests)... but you like the guy who represents your state/interests.

Perhaps I'm being too brutalistic or simple. But its really how I see things.

> People distrust masks but trust ivermectin.

source? It may also be useful to disambiguate anti-vaxers from anti-vax-mandate-ers. I think they have fundamentally different arguments.

>but everyone likes their particular Senator/House rep.

everyone?

> That's how its supposed to work:

I doubt that the founders intended to build a system only 12% of people supported but maybe...

> I doubt that the founders intended to build a system only 12% of people supported but maybe...

The founders absolutely intended for Congress to be the "we like our guy but dislike every other guy" situation. 100%. In fact, that's 100% evident in the design of the electoral college.

We were _supposed_ to hate other guys so much that Congress would end up choosing the President each time through debate. What was _NOT_ intended was for political parties to creep up and unify the voices of people across state lines (ie: giving actual power to the Electoral College. Woops).

The founders got a lot of things wrong about how people would act. But they got the part right about Congress. What we see today is exactly what the founders intended. (This doesn't mean that the founders are necessarily correct about this issue, but anyone who has studied the Federalist papers / other early writings knows this to be how Congress was designed).

Yeah, people glorify the founders and all that. But they were just people, and they made mistakes. (Have you met anyone yet who believes that the founders were divinely inspired by God? Because I have. There's lots of opinions about how this country was founded) Regardless, its important to understand their intents and the design of this country as part of our debates.

Congress, for better or for worse, is acting just as intended. The reason why Congress can't do anything right now is because we have deep disagreements across this country about what we should do.

------------

> everyone?

Every House/Senator has over 50% of support within their district, by definition. Every. Period. If not, their opponent gets elected next time.

There's some legitimate questions about redistricting and such (Gerrymandering wasn't foreseen by the founders). But Senators are immune to Gerrymandering by nature of how they work. But the reason why we have so many Senators for some areas is because of compromises before the Civil War about slave states vs non-slave states (whenever a "slave state" was founded, a non-slave state would split into two states to satisfy the status quo). There's all sorts of messes that we've inherited from short-sighted decisions 200 years ago (after the founders, but before the civil war).

In any case: the specific complain that I asserted earlier: that we like "our guy" but dislike others, is exactly how the system was designed to work. Only when large groups of people agree on a matter should a new law be written.

> source? It may also be useful to disambiguate anti-vaxers from anti-vax-mandate-ers. I think they have fundamentally different arguments.

I dunno? My parents? My sister's father in law? My coworkers? The lady on the Airplane I talked to? Just talk to people. Its pretty common. Look for watchers of Fox News or One American News networks, and the like. Surely you have someone in your social circle?

IVM is a miracle drug being used by people overseas that CDC isn't allowing. Don't-cha-know? Its the same line being used everywhere, because these people are watching / listening the same arguments from leaders they trust.

I think the smarter leaders are trying to morph the discussion towards drugs that do work (ie: Monoclonal Antibodies), and I'm willing to have a debate on that issue. (Monoclonal antibodies do work, but cost $2000+ per dose. Compared to a $20 vaccine or a $1 mask, its a steep price to pay).

IVM is so stupid I'm not going to debate it seriously.

> These people who don't trust masks trust ivermectin. Just... talk with them.

I've talked with them. Some of them believe as you say. Others don't. I think you're doing a lot of pigeonholing; the reality outside defies the neat discrete classification favored in internet conversations.

Ivermectin is a perfect story for our divided times. Republicans believe Ivermectin is very effective by a 22R-6D margin and very + possibly effective by a 56R-19D margin. Conversely, Democrats believe Ivermectin is dangerous by a 64D-18R margin. May I kindly suggest we lay off partisan news?

https://today.yougov.com/topics/politics/articles-reports/20...

No, the Gallup poll says 12% Americans say they trust Congress. People say they do not trust politicians, but the fact is that when politicians speak people listen. Politicians know this and that is why they always give soundbite-oriented remarks and lines of questioning in their various hearings and "debates."

>People say they do not trust politicians, but the fact is that when politicians speak people listen. Politicians know this and that is why they always give soundbite-oriented remarks and lines of questioning in their various hearings and "debates."

If people are only listening to sound bites, they aren't really listening. I think most people are staring to realize that politicians are self serving. The reality distortion field is finally starting to wear off.

When shit hits the fan, like COVID, people listen though, they listen very carefully. The current crop of politicians have forgotten how to be leaders though and go through their same ole sound-byte-and-finger-point-for-reelection trope they've grown accustomed to getting them reelected. I think it will cause a few waves in the next few elections, especially as COVID draws out over the next few years.

> You are assuming "they" trust the Republican leadership. this Gallup poll says only 12% of Americans trust congress.

Congress ≠ the Republican leadership ≠ at least one member of the Republican leadership, or GOP members aligned therewith, enough to overcome dis- or non-trust of the rest.

“Congress” as an institution usually polls really badly when compared to individual politicians in their own districts, because Congress consists of 535 members, 532 of which the person answering the poll had no say in electing and represent people with different interests living elsewhere, and (usually) approximately half of which represent the least preferred of the two major parties, who usually have the power to at least block legislation (thanks to either split between the partisan majority of the House and Senate or, failing that, the Senate filibuster.)

Trust of either party leadership, and particularly voter’s own members of Congress, tends to be much higher than that of Congress as a whole.

This is exactly what I'm tracking for the 2022 election - is the public able to separate anti-mask/vaxx choice from anti-vaxxing within their minds? Or will the right be tied to anti-vaxxing by proxy?

I'm leaning toward the latter. Most people I talk to think the right is actively pushing anti-vaxxing efforts despite top federal Congressional leadership explicitly encouraging vaccine procurement (and their former POTUS "inventing" the vaccine!).

I don't think it is possible to make the distinction. It is too late unfortunately. I'm vaccinated and I'm ok with people making (what i view as) bad decisions. The fundamental issue here is a question about the role of government: let people hurt themselves or have a nanny state. I don't think anyone would listen though and I'll get lumped in with the antivaxxers regardless of the nuances of my opinion.

The right's story has generally been that people should get the vaccine if they want to because "freedom." Trump literally said this in front of crowds of his vaccine-hesitant supporters. Prominent Republicans like Rand Paul are going around casting doubt on the credibility of Dr. Fauci and the CDC/NIH, and Republicans have done nothing to address the tidal wave of conspiracy theories making rounds among their constituents.

Get back to me when Trump gets on stage at some rally and says, "Anyone who thinks the vaccine makes them magnetic is a moron." Republicans are free to call it a Trump vaccine if they are saying, "Real Patriots do what their country needs, and getting the Trump Vaccine is what we need Real Patriots to do." If that is what it would take to convince people to get the shot I have no objection. Unfortunately I am not seeing that happen; instead what I see are non-committal statements, shouts of "freedom!" and Republican governors preventing local leaders from imposing mask or vaccine mandates in their states.

Trump's own recommendations to his supporters to get vaccinated were not well-received:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/aug/22/donald-trump...

...which makes the politics behind it all the more unusual.

Unpopular opinion: I'd not let either side off the hook. Politics caused multiple screw ups in the pandemic response. Still is.

Partisan politics aren't a good idea when forming public health policies. Nor is fear. Especially the fear being used for political gain.

The most enlightening aspect of the whole COVID debacle was just how bad politicians are with science. Democrats criticised vaccines just for political reasons. Republicans did also.

As for censorship, that never leads anywhere good. If the public discourse cannot openly mock bad content because it has already been "disappeared" then we are not better off.

I'm just hoping this pandemic doesn't cause a meltdown into outright authoritarianism. We've already seen what nazism and communism did and I'd rather not have society try either of them again.

I don’t even know how to respond to this. The nicest thing I can say is that your comment is both entirely ahistorical and highly indicative of why Republicans don’t trust the CDC.

Yeah, it’s pretty silly to look at how pretty much every opinion regarding COVID-19 follows party lines so closely and conclude that negative opinions about vaccines are caused by public health experts failing to maintain public trust. This defense reminds me of a similar one we’ve seen recently: “this group is only bigoted because they’ve been called bigots by the media for so long.”

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