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I can't believe it's coincidence and accident that this Administration is assaulting medical research simultaneously on multiple fronts: here, with these attack

I can't believe it's coincidence and accident that this Administration is assaulting medical research simultaneously on multiple fronts: here, with these attacks on universities, that seem to primarily target NIH research at America's most prestigious schools; the DOGE attacks, which are preferentially deleting medical workers, multiple entire offices at the FDA and the CDC; and that decision to elevate an HIV/AIDS denier to the office of HHS secretary. I don't know what the intention is behind this systematic assault on medicine. It's incomprehensible.

ajross 2y ago
They view it as an assault on Universities, not "science". The thinking goes (you see this kind of rhetoric right here on HN) that The Radical Left has infested education in the United States and polluted the thinking of a generation of future leaders. "Woke Mind Virus", etc... So to stamp that out, you need to get the kids to stop with the bad thinking. But you can't actually do that as the government because of the whole "shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech" thing. So instead you hit their school instead. Make it so Columbia (in this case) knows that their funding depends on the grace of the government, and that if they want it back they need to start expelling or otherwise controlling the spreaders of the woke virus.
- readthenotes1 2y ago
  I am not sure why you are getting downvoted. This is the rationale given to me by the Trump supporters I know with postgraduate degrees
  - the_third_wave 2y ago
    The downvote button is used by (too) many as the online equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears while loudly saying la la la la la, I can't hear you when confronted with facts they want to but can not rebuke.
  - spankalee 2y ago
    They're being downvoted by Trump supporters who want Columbia to be pressured to limit liberal views on campus.
locopati 2y ago
The intention? A country that is broken and looking to the fascists in charge to keep them safe from the same mess they created. people keep trying to attribute a rationality beyond a selfish power/money grab... they are racist bullies looking to be the boot stomping on humanity's face forever while also looting the place six ways from Sunday along the way (just like Putin and his circle in Russia)
jrflowers 2y ago
[flagged]
- dullcrisp 2y ago
  I don’t understand how that’s relevant. Do you mean to say that ascribing motives to actions is always impossible? Because as I understand it, that phrase means that it’s fallacious to say that the purpose of some system is X if it in fact does not do X. Not that we can never ask why we are doing Z.
  - jrflowers 2y ago
    Intention can be nebulous and difficult to nail down, and can also be lied about. Purpose, as an answer to “Why is this happening?” is easier to reconcile by just looking at outcomes. In the particular instance that this thread is about, the purpose of dismantling a system that saves lives is semantically obvious. For an analogy, if somebody is driving a car and slams on the brakes, the intention and the purpose of slamming on the brakes is obvious: to stop the car.
    - defrost 2y ago
      > the intention and the purpose of slamming on the brakes is obvious: to stop the car. Not always, often it's to slow down or to control or initiate a drift. Hard braking can be done to warn a tail gater to back off, it's also done to sharply reduce speed when headed for a kangaroo or other road hazard .. even though the car can't be stopped in time the aim is to shed speed while staying straight before a probable impact and to increase the time for the animal to move. If someone is racing on tarmac or rallying on dirt they might practice BLAT - Brake Late, Accelerate Turning. When driving heavy or articulated vehicles drivers will brake and downshift on down grades to shed speed and not lose control to mass and gravity. Perhaps purpose is harder for outsiders to deduce.
    - dullcrisp 2y ago
      Okay, but if I ask why did you stop here, the answer I’m looking for isn’t “to stop the car.”
h4ck_th3_pl4n3t 2y ago
Our government is creating its own problems. I see nobody talking on _why_ the egg crisis happened. Some incompetent folks at DOGE killed off the workers responsible for vaccinations against the bird flu. Guess what happened once they were fired: birds got the bird flu. That's the point of right wing governments. Spin it around and point fingers at the fault of others who weren't even involved. As long as you can paint a picture of an enemy, you'll stay in power.
- beau_g 2y ago
  Can you expand on this? Looking this up, most sources I find indicate the bird flu outbreak began in 2022[1], with a new strain particularly affecting egg producing chickens in Sept 2024[2], and affects many countries, not just the US [1]https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/index.html [2]https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/us-egg-prices-see-largest-jump-1980-bird-flu-outbreaks-continue https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/us-egg-prices-see-...
  - cookiengineer 2y ago
    I was a bit sceptical at first, but grandparent's claims seem to be true, at least in regards to the firing/rehiring part. [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjev24184vjo https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjev24184vjo [2] https://apnews.com/article/usda-firings-doge-bird-flu-trump-fdd6495cbe44c96d471ae8c6cf4dd0a8 https://apnews.com/article/usda-firings-doge-bird-flu-trump-... [3] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/19/agriculture-department-fires-bird-flu-vaccine-workers https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/19/agriculture-... [4] https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/doge/usda-accidentally-fired-officials-bird-flu-rehire-rcna192716 https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/doge/usda-accidentally-fire... [5] original source? https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/27/trump-fired-bird-flu-hires-00206334 https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/27/trump-fired-bird-fl...
- nielsole 2y ago
  Is that so? Looking at the table it seems this goes back to before Trump inauguration: https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/data-map-commercial.html https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/data-map-comm... My understanding is that upon a detection the entire flock is killed. A contributing factor why the US is disproportionately affected is the large flock size.
brian-armstrong 2y ago
It's crab mentality. The goal is to ransack the country and make life as bad for the rest of us as it has been for the die hard Trump voters. Our suffering is the point.
- BergAndCo 2y ago
  [dead]
aaron695 2y ago
[dead]
jinushaun 2y ago
Incomprehensible? No, Trump is still bitter about losing his presidency due to Covid and is exacting revenge on science and the medical community.
refurb 2y ago
[flagged]
euroderf 2y ago
Keep'em sick, overworked, and broke. That'll keep protests to an absolute minimum.
- BergAndCo 2y ago
  [dead]
jacknews 2y ago
It's simply a narcissist's revenge

ajross 2y ago

They view it as an assault on Universities, not "science". The thinking goes (you see this kind of rhetoric right here on HN) that The Radical Left has infested education in the United States and polluted the thinking of a generation of future leaders. "Woke Mind Virus", etc... So to stamp that out, you need to get the kids to stop with the bad thinking. But you can't actually do that as the government because of the whole "shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech" thing. So instead you hit their school instead. Make it so Columbia (in this case) knows that their funding depends on the grace of the government, and that if they want it back they need to start expelling or otherwise controlling the spreaders of the woke virus.

readthenotes1 2y ago
I am not sure why you are getting downvoted. This is the rationale given to me by the Trump supporters I know with postgraduate degrees
- the_third_wave 2y ago
  The downvote button is used by (too) many as the online equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears while loudly saying la la la la la, I can't hear you when confronted with facts they want to but can not rebuke.
- spankalee 2y ago
  They're being downvoted by Trump supporters who want Columbia to be pressured to limit liberal views on campus.

locopati 2y ago

The intention? A country that is broken and looking to the fascists in charge to keep them safe from the same mess they created. people keep trying to attribute a rationality beyond a selfish power/money grab... they are racist bullies looking to be the boot stomping on humanity's face forever while also looting the place six ways from Sunday along the way (just like Putin and his circle in Russia)

jrflowers 2y ago

[flagged]

dullcrisp 2y ago
I don’t understand how that’s relevant. Do you mean to say that ascribing motives to actions is always impossible? Because as I understand it, that phrase means that it’s fallacious to say that the purpose of some system is X if it in fact does not do X. Not that we can never ask why we are doing Z.
- jrflowers 2y ago
  Intention can be nebulous and difficult to nail down, and can also be lied about. Purpose, as an answer to “Why is this happening?” is easier to reconcile by just looking at outcomes. In the particular instance that this thread is about, the purpose of dismantling a system that saves lives is semantically obvious. For an analogy, if somebody is driving a car and slams on the brakes, the intention and the purpose of slamming on the brakes is obvious: to stop the car.
  - defrost 2y ago
    > the intention and the purpose of slamming on the brakes is obvious: to stop the car. Not always, often it's to slow down or to control or initiate a drift. Hard braking can be done to warn a tail gater to back off, it's also done to sharply reduce speed when headed for a kangaroo or other road hazard .. even though the car can't be stopped in time the aim is to shed speed while staying straight before a probable impact and to increase the time for the animal to move. If someone is racing on tarmac or rallying on dirt they might practice BLAT - Brake Late, Accelerate Turning. When driving heavy or articulated vehicles drivers will brake and downshift on down grades to shed speed and not lose control to mass and gravity. Perhaps purpose is harder for outsiders to deduce.
  - dullcrisp 2y ago
    Okay, but if I ask why did you stop here, the answer I’m looking for isn’t “to stop the car.”

h4ck_th3_pl4n3t 2y ago

Our government is creating its own problems. I see nobody talking on _why_ the egg crisis happened. Some incompetent folks at DOGE killed off the workers responsible for vaccinations against the bird flu. Guess what happened once they were fired: birds got the bird flu. That's the point of right wing governments. Spin it around and point fingers at the fault of others who weren't even involved. As long as you can paint a picture of an enemy, you'll stay in power.

beau_g 2y ago
Can you expand on this? Looking this up, most sources I find indicate the bird flu outbreak began in 2022[1], with a new strain particularly affecting egg producing chickens in Sept 2024[2], and affects many countries, not just the US [1]https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/index.html [2]https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/us-egg-prices-see-largest-jump-1980-bird-flu-outbreaks-continue https://www.thinkglobalhealth.org/article/us-egg-prices-see-...
- cookiengineer 2y ago
  I was a bit sceptical at first, but grandparent's claims seem to be true, at least in regards to the firing/rehiring part. [1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjev24184vjo https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjev24184vjo [2] https://apnews.com/article/usda-firings-doge-bird-flu-trump-fdd6495cbe44c96d471ae8c6cf4dd0a8 https://apnews.com/article/usda-firings-doge-bird-flu-trump-... [3] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/19/agriculture-department-fires-bird-flu-vaccine-workers https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/feb/19/agriculture-... [4] https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/doge/usda-accidentally-fired-officials-bird-flu-rehire-rcna192716 https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/doge/usda-accidentally-fire... [5] original source? https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/27/trump-fired-bird-flu-hires-00206334 https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/27/trump-fired-bird-fl...
nielsole 2y ago
Is that so? Looking at the table it seems this goes back to before Trump inauguration: https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/data-map-commercial.html https://www.cdc.gov/bird-flu/situation-summary/data-map-comm... My understanding is that upon a detection the entire flock is killed. A contributing factor why the US is disproportionately affected is the large flock size.

brian-armstrong 2y ago

It's crab mentality. The goal is to ransack the country and make life as bad for the rest of us as it has been for the die hard Trump voters. Our suffering is the point.

BergAndCo 2y ago
[dead]

aaron695 2y ago

[dead]

jinushaun 2y ago

Incomprehensible? No, Trump is still bitter about losing his presidency due to Covid and is exacting revenge on science and the medical community.

refurb 2y ago

[flagged]

euroderf 2y ago

Keep'em sick, overworked, and broke. That'll keep protests to an absolute minimum.

BergAndCo 2y ago
[dead]

jacknews 2y ago

It's simply a narcissist's revenge