Right-wing media continues apace to count the myriad of ways that America is greater again by the hour. But as the election’s afterglow fades, much of the descending darkness drops down from the Right. Controversies regarding President-elect Donald Trump’s nominees are forcing Republicans to look at each other, asking with eyes askance, “Is this what everyone signed up for?” Some of the nominations almost fold back on themselves as so absurd as to prove that Trump’s just trolling everyone anyway. Except we know better. Indeed, appointing Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be Secretary of Health and Human Services – a man with no medical or scientific training whatsoever, feels more like a cold political calculation turned reckless joke on regular Americans. After all, what else could explain Fox News’s Jessie Watters making such a mockery of himself and the RFK appointment?
Watters is giddy to the point that it’s embarrassing Nevertheless, Watters believes that everything changed in 1990, at least everything with respect to American health and diet. Food was good, drugs worked, and everyone was “hot” according to Watters. Now, given that I was in college at the time, that last bit is rooted in objective evidence as confirmed scientific fact. And yet Watters’s explanation goes much further than wiping away three decades, as Rawstory reports, he explained himself by saying:
“This is going to be so much fun to get skinny. And having everybody be hot again. Because if you look at 1990, this was just a smoking hot country, all right? Then everybody started getting obese and overweight.”
Right. Well, not sure about that. Those sixties seemed pretty hot – not that I was there. By the way, are you a grown-up? What decade is it now? Hey, look at 1979…
“Smoking hot”? One of the advantages of maturation is the dawning awareness that using terms such as “smoking hot” is counterproductive in the extreme. Is anything less attractive than the guys standing in the corner, quietly sniggering among themselves, pointing at all the “smoking hot” people around? Watters was undeterred:
“What happened in 1990? They put ultra-processed food into the food pyramid, they unleashed pharmaceutical drugs into the doctors’ offices, and they moved everyone out of factories into offices to stare at a screen all day, so we all just look like Jabba the Hutt. And so he comes along and says, ‘Let’s just clean up the food, and everybody maybe take a hike’ — how can you be against that? Make America hot again.
It has become cliche for people in my line of work to point out that none of this sounded very “hot” to the Right when Michelle Obama planted a garden at the White House and encouraged kids to exercise and eat right, and yet it is an obligation to make the point because it’s all just so absurd. Robert Kennedy is going to force the nation’s food processors to make food healthy again? And they thought their groceries were expensive under Biden.
Let them laugh. It does seem pretty forced. They deserve their honeymoon. But the Left understands the enormity of what continues to happen and simply refuses to be “owned” this time around. Call it a character flow but our outrage is spent. This time they’re having to battle each other over that question above and what all they signed up for. It seems as though it is the Republican Senate and the Republican blue collar worker in the Midwest who are the ones who might be being “owned” now. They have to vote on the Gaetz nomination, or watch on as a conspiracy theorist lays waste to modernity in medical care and public health.
Joking about things can put off a lot of hard questions. Asking “When was America hottest?” is way more fun than “What the hell is Robert Kennedy doing directing medical research and food processing?” Watters sounds like a kid from the 1990s and not a fully grown American looking at the lay of the land in what might be another sea-change year, 2025 – the year everything changed.
That’s pretty cold. But it’s based on solid evidence and objective truth. It certainly isn’t fun.
God Bless: I can be reached at [email protected] and @JasonMiciak
I cannot imagine the fat, lazy, stupid magats I know getting “hot”, unless they are running a fever. Two loud mouthed magats who go to the gym are on the treadmill at zero incline/1 mph for one hour a few times a week only go there so they can watch fux and dis democrats. They are quite out of shape and probably haven’t ever eaten a vegetable. They would be in a bar but 8:00 am most bars are not open or they would be embarrassed to start drinking that early in public.
All of these politicians and “news” people are kissing the orange ass so they won’t be on the enemies list or so they can land a job in the “administration”. I cannot tell if they are all evil, stupid, ignorant, uneducated, dumb, brain dead, or if we have to create new words. I no longer recognize this country. I hate what we are becoming in LESS THAN TWO WEEKS SINCE THE ELECTION, and that is on top of all that existed prior to the election. I hate the country, the division, the…everything. The people who supposedly voted that tyrant into the residency do not even suspect the pain we will ALL endure. My very sick husband will almost immediately lose his veterans health care. For starters. And we will be caring for my MIL with dementia, my elderly mother, my narcissistic sister, and two households. And we will all lose our social security, Medicare, insurance, and any savings that we all have.
I am going to get a few guns next week. Me. Spoke with a Democratic neighbor the other day and saw their gun collection. Impressive, if you like guns. I do not! I just hate this country and the people who caused all this. This hatred we feel toward each other didn’t exist before tyrant came onto the political scene and the press saw a way to get wealthier and have so much more exposure for their shows. And the millionaires and billionaires got their tax breaks and are so greedy and want more, more, more. But the stock market that was booming is starting to put the brakes on with these disastrous appointment announcements. And ANYONE who believes congress/the senate, democrat or republikkklan will EVER stand up to the tyrant with the enemies list…well, ain’t gonna happen.
I was listening to a podcast where they were saying that the justices at the state level take their jobs seriously and will enforce the rule of law. I think the threat of the enemies list is too great. Or the so called Supreme Court overturns them or tyrant just throws them off the bench or even locks them up! Then they will fall into line.
The illnesses are coming. We will be thin all right. Starvation and illness will do that to a person. I’m stocking up on extra supplies/food every week until I no longer can afford do so. My head hurts and my heart hurts even more. The thought of the illnesses going through the schools, cities, etc. We’ll be right back to another pandemic. And all the borders of the world will be closed TO US, if they have any sense, and I hope they do!
The fact that none of the appointees can get a security clearance means nothing. Tyrant just gave Jared access to top secret, national security information last go around Easy as that.
Yeah, we won’t be able to afford to live, but we’ll be beautiful, slim, and healthy. I’m 114 lbs. how much can I lose? Not much, that’s for sure. But I’ll be armed and dangerous. I may never get to vote ever again, unless it’s like the elections in Russia, but well, I’ll have a few guns and a subscription to the new Onion lol. THAT is funny! Such karma for Alex!
Say I’m being pessimistic or anything you want. I actually DO see it getting worse every day. What I imagined was the very worse it could be yesterday, is twice as bad today. Don’t criticize until you can actually say, with actual certainty, and PROVE that it won’t be that bad. But every day brings another brick on my head. People are begging for President Biden to do something, Anything, since he has the SC blessing. No, he is a kind, man who Does follow the rule of law. And the SC only meant immunity for tyrant.
We will be passing through DC in January and I remember the women’s march. The “pussy” hats all the women knitted and wore. Is there is going to be any peaceful, no weapons allowed, send off to celebrate President Biden, VP Harris, and democracy before the tyrant tears it all down? If so, I’ll be there. I want a safe, sane, peaceful gathering. I just want to remember a normal life one brief moment before the end of it all arrives later in the month. And to send our love to a great man who served us very well during his long and distinguished career and brought this country back from the brink tyrant set us on.
Thank you. I’m sorry for being so verbose. It comes pouring out and I cannot stop it.
I know magats are gathering names so I’ll probably just lurk from now on. They want carnage and “blood in the streets”. But thank you all. You all are great
Carol: Thanks for writing this heartfelt and very sad but true summary of our new “here & now”. Most days this past week it’s all I can do to get out of bed. I’m definitely experiencing some PTSD, similar but worse than last time. Looking back, it took me well over a year to really begin to feel anything – well into 2018 or more. I toggle between deep, soul crushing sadness and white hot rage at the stupidity of it all. No guns yet for me but…
Hmm. I have to wonder but who was the President in 1990?
Oh. That’s right. George H W Bush. A Republican.
And who was the Secretary of Health and Human Services at the time?
Oh. Louis Sullivan. Another Republican (and one of that rare breed, a BLACK Republican).
Funny thing, though. The Food Pyramid was designed by the Department of Agriculture so the Secretary of Health and Human Services doesn’t actually have any direct involvement. The American version was introduced in 1992 (there were versions created in other countries before then but what the US used before 1992–which would include 1990–was the “Basic Four”).
So, who was the Secretary of Agriculture when the US’s FIRST Food Pyramid was developed? Well, that would be Ed Madigan, yet another Republican. And, surprisingly, one who had little to no actual history of agricultural or nutrition expertise. He’d spent nearly a quarter of a century in politics (first as an Illinois state legislator, then as a member of the US House representing Illinois; as far as I can glean from the man’s Wiki page, his only “private sector experience was as a student, then operating his own taxi service and leaving his job as Secretary of Agriculture to work for Philip Morris–in which he was able to help the company navigate government regulatory matters).
Of course, Watters doesn’t care about any of this–they’re “facts” after all and his job is to spread propaganda, not report facts.
As for the rest of his nonsense, he might want to consider it’s been the GOP that helped contribute to the whole “ultra-processed foods” matter (remember when Reagan wanted to treat ketchup as a “vegetable” for school nutrition programs?) and Big Pharma has spent far more helping to get GOPers elected (I’d be curious to know just how much that industry contributed to Trump and the GOP chowderheads this past year) because the GOP’s SOP is “end regulations” (which included the idea of letting pharmaceutical company representatives go door-to-door selling various drugs to physicians like a bunch of Girl Scouts selling cookies).
And, at any rate, what would Watters REALLY know about 1990? The man was born in 1978 meaning he was TWELVE in 1990–not exactly an age when one knows that much about “hotness.”
Oh, another thought: Has Watters looked at ANY of Trump’s many rallies and looked at the physical state of Trump’s supporters? I wouldn’t really think many of them could be considered “hot” and I’ll damn well bet that they’d kill anyone–even Trump–who stood between them and their daily diet of Twinkies, Ho-Hos, corn chips and sodas and beer.
Watters might also consider that Trump himself seems very fond of the oh-so-unhealthy offerings from McDonalds. According to a report from Business Insider (the reporter actually ate the foods he lists in the report), Trump’s dinner generally consists of 2 Filet-o-Fish sandwiches and 2 Big Macs plus a chocolate milk shake and a Diet Coke. Now, the fish sandwiches have 380 calories each and the Big Macs have 590 calories each so, just the sandwiches provide a whopping 1940 calories and the chocolate shake will be anywhere from 520 to 800 calories, depending on the size (the small is 520!) so, at a minimum, Trump’s dinner is 2460 calories. The article notes that Trump may skip breakfast and even lunch but he indulges in munching on salty snacks like Doritos chips through the day. But, considering the standard dietary guideline is based on a 2000 calorie a day diet, Trump easily blasts through that. Of course, if he were TRULY active and weighed what he claims to weigh and were as tall as he again claims to be, he could probably deal with that diet with little problem (even at his advanced age) but as he looks to be at least 50 pounds heavier than his claim and is several inches shorter than his claim, he’s already into the “obese” end of the BMI scale and his diet don’t do him any favors.
And something tells me that he’ll withdraw Kennedy’s nomination if Kennedy makes ANY suggestion to the Agriculture Secretary to change the Food Pyramid (now actually, “MyPlate”) and suggest any changes to the way that the fast-food industry prepares its unhealthy fare. I mean, beyond the changes the companies make on their own which lead to consumer outrage over changes in taste and quantities. Like when McDonalds–IIRC–decided to change the oil it used in cooking its fries as well as the way the fries themselves were made (apparently, the process involved using some sort of animal-based fat to coat the fries which led to lawsuits from vegans who’d been assured the fries were vegan-friendly) while the majority of consumers noted the fries tasted incredibly different.
It occurred to me yesterday, a quote: he who controls the food, controls the people. Do they want us hungry and underfed? Given the evil in this group, maybe, because we’d be easier to manipulate. Also, if no migrants, who now works those fields? Grandma’s and grandpas? I admit my imagination runs wild but look at hitlers “workers “. Calories a day around 600.
See me loudly NOT disagreeing. 😉
yes, fries used to involve beef tallow.
“Jesse Watters Says RFK Will Take Us Back to 1990”
No vaccines, no medicare, no food standards regulation, the return of mumps, measles, rubella, diphtheria, and polio, and more serious influenzas and covids.
It won’t be 1990, it’ll be 1690, 1790. and 1890.
Back when life expectancy was 30 – 50 years instead of nearer 80.
Oh look, they’ll be able to bring back social services for the over 60s, because there’ll be so few of them, it’ll hardly cost anything.
I though it was 1940 instead of 1990 but either way, the America population is screwed. My autocorrect wouldn’t let me put in the word I wanted to use. I have easily a good 30 years left to me and I’m a senior. So I’ve seen so many improvements, and now I will get to watch our country go backwards. I will be working into my 80’s IF I can find another job as I can’t pull Social Security until I’m at least 70. Any amount before that is un-livable (I *really* hate autocorrect).
So what all this blather is about is that I *completely* agree with you and I am scared.
Like I said when I was first introduced to Politizoom, human evolution that’s all it is, human evolution.
thanks for info.