sure, let's MAHA
but don't be disillusioned that Trump will help
This picture sums up my thoughts on RFK Jr. taking on unhealthy corporate forces inside the Trump administration. While the picture was supposedly a joke (a great marketing opportunity for McDonald's), the caption from the original social media post says it all.
“Make America Healthy Again starts TOMORROW.”
This defines MAHA's future—it starts tomorrow, always tomorrow, and then the next day, and the next day.
But today (and for all the “todays” into the foreseeable future), the rest of Trump's administrative priorities come first, and almost all of them starkly oppose any efforts at cleaning up our public health crisis.
tl;dr. —> RFK Jr. will be fighting his administration at every turn. I cannot see how he gains traction on his priorities when he's up against an administration committed to deregulation and consolidating power at the top.
to the wellness girlies and warrior mamas
You're right that Americans are woefully unhealthy. I wish Democrats had taken something from RFK Jr.'s agenda more seriously and found a way to work with him. Despite his brain worms, Central Park bear escapades, bonkers views on vaccines (yes, he has said crazy things about them despite rolling back some of the more wonky beliefs recently), and other conspiracy theories, there are nuggets of truth that attracted scores of scrunchy moms and wellness fans to his platform.
Many of you are former Democrats (or willing to entertain a liberal platform), and you align with Democratic principles in other ways. I, too, want someone in Washington willing to discuss cleaning up the corporate corruption in our food and healthcare systems (and environmental oversight groups that are inextricably tied to food supply and human health).
Instead of embracing the priorities of this movement that overlapped with the liberal agenda, Democratic leaders focused on Kennedy's faults and shunned him. I haven't read all his books or listened to every one of his speeches and interviews, but I've seen enough to know he is a little bit crazy. Yet I still think ignoring him was probably a mistake. Surely, they could have found a way to work with him, right?
Kennedy's agenda aligns much more closely with typical Democratic policies. Everything he seeks to accomplish requires regulation, using liberal government practices to tame the power of the oligarchs and protect everyday Americans. It's why he tried to be a Democrat and an Independent first; Trump was his last choice!
MAHA and climate action advocates have a lot in common. It's incredibly logical for us to work together, yet somehow, we ended up on opposite sides. I’m pretty sure the lies had something to do with it.
Despite the best intentions, I'm hard-pressed to see how this plays out in favor of public health with Trump at the helm. I'm with you on rooting out corruption and slimy profit motives from the policies and programs that are supposed to keep our children and families safe!
Environmentalists have been trying to pass regulatory measures around public health for decades. We finally saw a dose of success under Biden through the Inflation Reduction Act. The bill's investments in clean energy and other climate action will lead to less pollution, cleaner air, soil, and water, and more freedom to live independently of corporate utilities and foreign manufacturing companies.
Aligning the MAHA agenda with Trump misses or refuses to acknowledge some major hurdles he will pose. Trump cares only about Trump, not a single other soul, so why would he suddenly start caring about the health of our children unless he stands to profit? Regulating big corporate interests and eradicating supposed corruption in government agencies is not profitable for Trump; it will not be on his to-do list.
the most corporate of corporate says in simple terms
In September, Steve Ballmer, former CEO of Microsoft, shared a fascinating perspective with Jon Stewart on The Daily Show about the importance of democratic regulations over capitalist organizations to ensure they work for the people and aren’t exploitative behemoths.
He said that capitalism and democracy are America's two pillars. He continued:
“Capitalism is predictable. You give capitalism a set of rules. People are going to try to compete. They are going to try to make as much money as they can, and that’s what’s going to happen. It’s predictable. …
The fact that capitalism is predictable is actually a great tool for government. Government then needs to train this highly predictable tool to do what society wants it to do. … A role of democracy is to inform where you want to point this highly predictable capitalist motive.
And look, if the world needs more regulations, put them in. ”
Their conversation continued. It was a refreshing discussion between two people with very different and well-informed opinions about how government should work, what it should provide citizens, what’s working and wrong, and how we fix it. Yet they respected each other and tangled with the nuance in ways I wish more Americans could emulate.
we need reasonable regulations and regulators to protect public health
Here’s the big takeaway from this conversation:
Government regulations (and enforcement of those regulations) keep the exploitative motivations of profit-seeking industries like Big Food, Big Ag, Big Pharma, and Big Oil1 (the Big Targets of MAHA) in check. This comes from a guy who knows a thing or two or a lot of things about how big companies make business decisions.
We need government agencies with experts and enforcement power to be the democratic guardrails that keep Big Industries in line (i.e., reduce chemicals and toxins in our food, make healthy options more affordable, and ensure Americans have reasonable access to whatever tools and resources they need to live healthy lives).
Inevitably, as the multi-national corporations grow, so must the regulators overseeing them. Either stop the corporate consolidation or let the regulators be large enough to wield comparative power.
the political powers are not in MAHA’s favor
Trump and Republicans are staunch deregulation proponents. They’ve made clear their intent to dismantle or weaken the agencies and forces needed to execute the MAHA agenda.
The Supreme Court has recently issued several decisions that made sweeping changes to the balance of power to weaken agencies' authority to enforce public health regulations. The headwinds against Kennedy and MAHA are strong and only getting stronger!
Some argue that government agencies are corrupt or must be “cleaned out.” They say we need to turn off the revolving door of people floating from industry, then to the government to regulate their friends and former colleagues, and back to industry, following promises of cushy salaries upon their return.
Those things are true to some degree. Have you met Susie Wiles, former industry lobbyist who is now Trump’s Chief of Staff? How about Chris Wright, the nominee for Secretary of Energy, an industry insider who seems well-positioned to prioritize public health with respect to energy policy (I hope you can sense my sarcasm through the screen). From Wikipedia:
Christopher Allen Wright[1] is an American businessman who is the CEO of Liberty Energy, North America's second largest hydraulic fracturing company. He is the presumptive nominee for United States Secretary of Energy under Donald Trump's second presidency. He is a board member of Oklo Inc., a nuclear technology company, and EMX Royalty, a royalty payment company for mineral rights and mining rights.[2]
In a 2023 LinkedIn post, Wright opined that "there is no climate crisis" and that the term "carbon pollution" is misleading.
Even with industry folks sitting in leadership offices, history tells us those agencies do a better job of protecting our public health than handing that power directly to the corporations that profit from it.
Before the EPA enforced the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts, companies weren't cleaning up their messes out of the goodness of their hearts. They dumped toxins anywhere they'd flow, even if it meant rivers on fire and cancer alleys in their wake. Ballmer’s argument reinforces this concern that, without regulation, capitalism will follow its very predictable model of choosing profit over people at every turn.
I could go on about how a Trump administration will make tackling our public health crisis much more challenging. For now, I made a little chart showing at least some of the forces RFK Jr. and public health advocates might face. I’ll dig into these more deeply in the future.
I’d love to know what you think. Where might Kennedy find allies in this administration? What have you heard about how he plans to execute his agenda, especially in the face of an administration that seems hostile to regulation?
MAHA doesn’t specifically call out Big Oil because Trump essentially told them to leave Big Oil alone. But anyone who thinks we can MAHA while ignoring Big Oil is out of their mind! Big Oil is the source of immense air pollution, fertizilers, PFAS, and more. These are some of the toxins that MAHA considers the poisons to public health.