Orac gives Bill Maher The Treatment. Very entertaining.
I gave up on Maher years ago. I tried really hard to give him the benefit of the doubt, but it wasn’t just the quackery: it was the tepid reluctance to embrace the term “atheist”. It was the frequent flattery-filled appearances of Arianna Huffington, the Rupert Murdoch of the left. It was that Religulous was such a dishonest, devious movie. It’s that every time I did catch an episode, there was S.E. Cupp. It was that his specialty seemed to be gathering a panel of disparate celebrities and pundits, and then setting them loose on each other on topics they were often relatively uninformed about.
He’s what you get if Bill O’Reilly tried to be Jon Stewart. And failed.
I’m a mild Maher fan. I like when he makes fun of creationists, the puritanical BS lingering in the US, and things like that. Yet I’ve always believed that just because one is an atheist that does not make one a skeptic and he is a perfect example of this. Joe Rogan comes to mind as another semi-famous example.
I know I am guilty of this too and for a long time I didn’t believe climate change. That in a way stemmed from my skepticism and climate change seemingly being presented as a political position thanks to Al Gore’s movie and not a scientific position. For instance if it wasn’t a politician and instead was a scientist that produced movies and became the spokesperson for climate change early on I probably would have been more open to it.
After enough research I came around on it because the science speaks for itself. Yet Maher is the type who stridently sticks to his ideology with no change regardless of the information presented to him. He’s also more likely to believe conspiracy theories and is extremely arrogant about it even though it makes him look stupid. His anti-vaxer tendencies are a perfect example of this and why I only watch his show on occasion usually if it makes the news.
Also, he’s a smug arsehole.
Is it bad of me to rather wish that people like Maher get some awful disease that could have been prevented by vaccination?
I’m a mild Maher fan.
Me too. I still watch him, though I did have to resist the urge to throw something at my TV last week during his exchange with Atul Gawande. He’s so good on climate change, and so awful on vaccines….
There are plenty of reasons to like Maher. One of them is that he is a great example why you should never have any heroes and that no matter how often you agreed with somebody in the past the bullshit filter always stays on.
From the article:
Well, obviously he won’t. He doesn’t believe in jabs.
Can someone help me out here? I’m in the UK and I never get a flu jab. It’s generally only made available to people over 65, children, or people with underlying conditions. I am none of these. Now I’m no anti-vaxxer, but saying the flu shot isn’t necessary is hardly Jenny McCarthy. Do people really think an annual flu jab is essential for everyone?
Not that I’m defending the man. Cancer-quackery is not to be forgiven.
I’ve never understood why it seems like no one else can see what an arrogant fauxgressive that guy is. I used to watch Politically Incorrect quite regularly and it was obvious even then. Hell, I remember Mad TV making fun of him for how much inexplicable, open contempt he had for women. He’s no pro-science, he’s pro-Bill Maher Knows Everything.
@madcaphal,
Not sure what UK flu vaccine policy is, but it is children, the elderly, and people with underlying respiratory disorders that are at highest risk, so maybe they’re just being prioritized? I have seen studies that suggest that near-100% vaccination rates of children would prevent more adult cases than the direct vaccination of adults, because the virus mostly spreads from children on up, so maybe that’s what’s going on over there.
Here in the US though, we can’t count on the kids getting reliably vaccinated, so yeah, especially if you’re going to be spending time around other people, it’s a very good idea to get the shot.
I suspect it’s because many people approve his “The rubes who vote for right-wing fuckers are inept morons who should be stripped of their citizenship so that only enlightened cognitively superior übermenschen like ME have a say about politics” but lack the guts to openly admit how illiberal their worldview actually is.
Hi madcaphal, another UKer here. The ‘flu jab is available to anyone who doesn’t have an immune issue that would prevent them taking it. It will only be issued to you free on the NHS if you are an infant, elderly, pregnant or have a respiratory disorder but you can pay to have it at Boots or any supermarket that has a pharmacy. I paid £9 at Tescos to get mine in November, very quick and easy. I will be doing it next year and can thoroughly recommend it, and there is now more than enough stock for everyone.
If it helps, I haven’t had ‘flu this year!
@laurentweppe, absolutely right. Like Orac said, he’s basically Rush Limbaugh with different social beliefs.
Another flu jabbed UK’er here.
Ive had the jab for the last 5 or 6 years and not had flu in that period, whatever you might of heard about that blokes mate who knew a bloke etc. Well worth it as I ended up in hospital with pneumonia last time I had flu.
I used to feel guilty as I was possibly taking a medication that someone else more needy could use, but there was always a very low take up in the first few years and now there’s plenty to go around.
I pay £10 in a chemist.
madcaphal, this is not directed at you, but you did trigger this response, so that’s why I start by calling your name. Everyone here knows, but some lurkers might not: FLU is not just a strong word for a severe “cold”. Flu is entirely different disease. The word “flu” is attached to mild respiratory disruptions, but actual FLU is much much worse. A FLu vaccine for the healthy adults is important also, not just for the vulnerable (infants, elderly, immuno-compromised, etc). The vaccine is not effective in 100% of the receivers, so they (the not affected) depend on “herd immunity” to protect them from exposure.
TL:DR Get the vaccine, even if you are healthy, to prevent being a “vector”, bearing flu virus to a vulnerable target.
I’m a college teacher, exposed to young people all the time, and I’m expected to get the flu shot.
Like Maher for some of his comedy, and the fact that he seems to be one of the only people on television willing to regularly denounce religion beyond typical Fox News-level scaremongering over Islam. But I’m not a fan when he starts talking about health, diet, or food issues. Though I’m sure he thinks otherwise, you can’t just magically toke, cleanse, or juice your health problems away.
Hell, he’s living in a state with a current outbreak of measles, and he’s still bitching about vaccines as ? Granted, it’s also a state with a licensed pediatrician who is an influential anti-vaxxer, so it’s not just Maher.
Also just in case people were curious. The flu shot this year was not a very effective one, the virus mutated and it was too late to release a new vaccine at the time. Even so it will help with the severity of the flu so it was a good thing if you did get the shot.
For a while I was also a mild fan of Maher. I watched him for a while because he was one of the only people pointing out how fucked the American economy was, and was one of the few people calling for real reform. I stopped watching him a while ago when I got tired and frustrated when he repeatedly dipped into the well of Pro-Israel Islamophobia. I couldn’t stand his racism and bullying after that.
Quite right, twas brillig. I caught a nasty bout of actual ‘flu three weeks after getting my first full-time job at 17. I was off work for a fortnight and then had to work on general admin only for nearly a month, because the ‘flu had weakened my eye muscles so severely that I couldn’t focus on a computer screen. Unfortunately, my manager was one of those dreadful people who claimed to have ‘flu everytime he got a sniffle, so that he could go on and on about how brave he was coming into work when so dangerously sick. Thus it’s something of a bugbear of mine, as I nearly got fired for not coming in despite the fact that I couldn’t walk.
The new thing here is to describe a cold as a “flu-bug”, because it’s not as dramatic and likely to incur mockery as claiming to have the ‘flu when you clearly don’t, but it makes you sound like your cold is a super special snowflake cold and no-one could possibly understand your pain. It drives me up the fucking wall, and unfortunately most of my friends and relatives do it. YOU HAVE A COLD. YOU’RE ALLOWED TO FEEL BAD THAT YOU HAVE A COLD WITHOUT MAKING OUT THAT IT’S EBOLA.
madcaphal: The flu vaccine isn’t should-be-mandatory the way, say, the measles vaccine is. But his approach to the subject is to declare that the vaccine itself is based on bad science–which would apply to all those other vaccines too, by extension. So he’s helping the full-on anti-vaxers.
And yes, if you’re a person who has exposure to the various at-risk groups, especially, you should be getting the shot. (My wife’s company, which does health care, gives all of them free shots, which are mandatory-with-exceptions–including her department, which is in IT, and never actually deals with patients.)
I like Maher for some of his comedy, and the fact that he seems to be one of the only people on television willing to regularly denounce religion beyond typical Fox News-level scaremongering over Islam. But I’m not a fan when he starts talking about health, diet, or food issues. Though I’m sure he thinks otherwise, you can’t just magically toke, cleanse, or juice your health problems away.
Hell, he’s living in a state with a current outbreak of measles, and he’s still bitching about vaccines as ? Granted, it’s also a state with a licensed pediatrician who is an influential anti-vaxxer, so it’s not just Maher.
In our heavily policed media, Maher seems to get away with saying a few things that would otherwise go unsaid in the mainstream.
That’s really unfortunate because there are, of course, scads of intelligent, insightful people who could say those few things Maher gets right without all the medical crackpot or misogynist baggage. But they don’t get to talk (in the mainstream media).
Hopefully, that’s changing. John Oliver’s success is the best news for clear eyed, humanist commentary since Colbert’s speech to the White House Correspondents Dinner.
I never could stand Maher. His smarmy, self-righteous smiles, the way he oozes in his chair, the jokes that insult the intelligence of everyone involved. I honestly can’t understand why anyone would watch him when there is a better alternative at Comedy Central.
madcaphal #7
It’s essential for everyone who wants to avoid the flu. The reason only certain people are requested to get the shot is because for others the flu will be debilitating, but unlikely to be deadly, so the government has no incentive to spend the time and money of the medical staff when it knows that it won’t be held politically accountable for not doing so.
In other words, yes, it’s essential for everyone (unless you have a rare condition) to get a flu shot, but in the eyes of the state it’s not essential to give them out.
Maher is so frustrating: scary smart, a great wordsmith, pretty much willing to say anything, and right on so many issues, but so wrong on some crucial ones, like vaccination.
On a side note: I hope that all this activity from Orac and his alternative identity around FtB means that one of the new bloggers will be Orac’s blog from Science Blogs. I used to read him as part of the trio (Ed, PZ, Orac) over at Scienceblogs – along with ERV until ElevatorGate. I never get back to Science Blogs, so it will be nice to have him located here!
Well, spare us the “it’s only a tiny bit of money!” line, huh? The calculus for me is: I spend 98%* of my time alone in my home, have no contact with immune-compromised people, seniors, or children, and the $10 or whatever it is for us ‘low-risk’ folk is a serious financial burden for me.
But it’s not opposition to the concept or practice of vax, just moths in my wallet.
.
Also, Bill Maher is worse than Limbaugh to me, because people I like would never listen to Rush, but do think Maher is a progressive, and thus that a progressivism opposed to both science and treating women as human is something to emulate.
* I get out for about three hours a week on average, it’s not an exaggeration
And for those who want to avoid being a vector for the flu to infect more vulnerable people, including those whose health precludes vaccinations.
I no longer work in an environment where I’m likely to contact with immuno-compromised patients, but I still get mine as a commitment to increasing vaccination rates among healthcare workers.
I also don’t have to pay anything out of pocket for my yearly flu shot, and they set up a clinic right in my building, so I recognize it’s much easier for me to do than most.
Another reason for those of us who can afford to—in terms of finances, ability, and/or health—to get their shots for the purpose of herd immunity. To help protect those who can’t.
He was occasionally funny and occasionally right. He has gotten less and less funny and now it seems he is less right as well. I remember shortly before I stopped watching him he was arguing that a toxin is a toxin no matter the dose (watch out for water and oxygen!!1!). Maybe his anti-vax belief stems from that bit of nonsense.
CaitieCat @25: I think flu shots are covered by OHIP.
Antivaxxer: Isn’t this year’s flu vaccine relatively ineffective?
Dr.: Yes, because we’re basically guessing about which strains will be—
Antivaxxer: So it’s all just guesswork?
Dr.: Well, the science isn’t guesswork. But we can’t create a vaccine against all possible strains, so we need to, basically, guess which—
Antivaxxer: It’s all guesswork!
Dr.: The science is very—
Antivaxxer: Guessing!
Chiming in on the flu:
First off, Herd Immunity is a thing. Some of the most vulnerable people can’t take the flu shot, or it is less effective in them. They depend on the rest of their community to not be carriers/vectors. I get the shot every year, both because I am now an immunocompromised person and have asthma.
BUT ALSO I get it because back in my 20s and 30s, I had the flu twice. The FLU-flu, not a pernicious cold or mild virus. And although I was a healthy adult in the prime of my youth, HOLY CRAP do I understand how that disease kills people. It nearly killed me. I ran 105°F temperature. I lay in bed with the heat set to very warm, seven blankets and two cats, and shivered so hard and so long that I honestly thought I would break my teeth with the chattering, and at times literally could not uncurl my body to get up and go to the bathroom. (I crawled.)
When I wasn’t semi-delirious in bed, I was sitting on the toilet with a bowl on my lap, evacuating my alimentary canal simultaneously from both ends.
Believe me when I say, you reach a point with the flu where you wish you would die.
I never want to go through that again. NEVER.
Adding: The flu itself lasted 4 days. (FOUR DAYS OF SHEER HELL.) I was weak as the cliche kitten for another three days, and another week or more before I felt back to my old self.
I reiterate: I was a strong, healthy adult. I can’t imagine what it would do to a child, older person, or someone not healthy to begin with.
I think part of the US-UK difference on the flu vaccine is because of official government recommendations.
From the US CDC: “All persons aged 6 months and older are recommended for annual vaccination, with rare exception.”
From the UK NHS: “The injected flu vaccine is offered free of charge on the NHS to people who are at risk to ensure that they are protected against catching flu and developing serious complications. You are eligible to receive a free flu jab if you: are 65 years of age or over; are pregnant; have certain medical conditions (see below); are living in a long-stay residential care home or other long-stay care facility; receive a carer’s allowance, or you are the main carer for an elderly or disabled person whose welfare may be at risk if you fall ill; are a healthcare worker with direct patient contact or a social care worker (see below)”
So the British government is saying that the flu vaccine isn’t necessary for children and healthy adults, while the American government is.
madcaphal: here in the US, people in “high-risk” categories, and people who live with them, are generally advised to get flu shots. I suspect that has to do with limited supplies of shots.
As for why Maher is anti-vax, I suspect it’s because of his anti-big-corporate bias — which is understandable, but still a grave mistake he should have corrected long ago.
Religulous was such a long time ago, can someone remind me what was wrong with it?
I mostly remember a lot of edits to make interviewees look stumped by Maher’s questions when I’m sure they really weren’t.
Siggy,
I seem to remember him either talking over or down to everyone, and disregarding what people were actually saying. That and a lack of female interviewees. I recall him being especially rude to a gay Muslim fellow.
I do not watch Maher, what really put me off most was his smartass comedian being so dominant, often showing as a superior attitude and insulting. It is just boring after a while. The setup for his show also seems to favor a shallow less thoughtful discussion which he handles as an opportunity to display his great wit.
that he comes off as an anti-intellectual with some of his ideas makes it that much easier to just not care what he has to say.
uncle frogy
Mr. Rawnaeris had to go on medication this year that now puts him in the “immunocompromised” category. So we both got flu shots for the first time this year. While we were back at home over Xmas, our year and a half old niece got the (real) flu. Considering that we both escaped unscathed I’m inclined to attribute that to herd immunity of the family, as SIL is a nurse and made everyone else get the vaccine. If she hadn’t, it could have been very bad for Mr. Rawnaeris.
I won’t watch Bill Maher. His demeanor (which several others have appropriately described as smug) has always been a big turn off for me, but I can get past that. But then there’s the sexism and racism. And then there was a bit he put on his show* that had no purpose except to shame male rape victims and minimize their experiences as being ‘every real man’s dream.’ I have nothing but contempt for blatant rape apologists like him.
*This clip is on youtube if anyone wants to search for it and see for themselves. I realize I’m not providing a very relevant link, but I really do not want to go looking for it and watch it again. Apologies.
FWIW. I last had the flu in 1984. For five days I went through headache, N & V, diarrhea. I was even bleeding (slightly) from my nose and/or sinuses, lungs too, as well as almost inability to breathe. With every joint, muscle and bone in my body aching horribly. I did not leave the bedroom/bathroom for this period of time, let alone go downstairs. The old lady (my wife at the time), had it as well, but was feeling better sooner as she was not a tobacco abuser, as I was at the time.
I’ve received my flu shot every year since then because I won’t make it through another episode like that!!
*Being* a smug asshole is fun. Watching a smug asshole you agree lock-step with is fun because you get to watch those people that you just know are stupid get insulted. Until you realize there is more to debate than simply assuming you are right about everything because you are and assuming you are smarter than everyone else because you’re right (you agree with yourself) and everyone else is wrong (they don’t agree with you).
So if Bill Maher in the Limbaugh of the left, who is the Al Franken of the right?
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I think an argument can be made that that the flu vaccine is the most ineffective vaccine as the flu virus mutates quickly, and because so many others get the flu vaccine the herd defense is likely to protect you, you are likely to be safe not getting one, and as a flu won’t kill you (if you aren’t an infant or elderly) or do any permanent harm, not getting a flu shot is at worst a gamble. (A stupid gamble as the flu is *very* unpleasant and a flu shot is a minor inconvenience.)
*BUT* considering how vocal and wrong and dangerous and growing in numbers the anti-vaxxers are, it’s gotten to point that not getting a flu shot is down-right *immoral*.
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And the “24-hour flu” and “stomach flu” and “chest-flu” misnomers *seriously* mislead people’s idea about how nasty the flu is. I had it in 1986 and things were flying out of both ends of my body at the same time with vision headaches so severe that turning my eyeballs from the start of a line of text to the end of the line of text felt like skewers through the temple. I quit vomitting after three days and could drink water and four days later I could stand up and eat soft food but it was ten days before I stopped having constant aches and it was two months before I stopped having skewer to the brain headaches every few hours.
Even then I didn’t always bother with flu shots as I figured the flu I had was just the “super-flu” and the “stomach flu” (which itself is nasty) was the typical flu. I was wrong. Very very wrong.
Its fascinating how easily Maher rejects the rock solid evidence for vaccination, especially since he accepts the much less empirically proven evidence for global warming. He is clever and witty, but he lacks the skeptical tools of self-correction in the light of evidence. The latter non-evidence based worldview he shares with many religious people.
The current recommendation is All persons aged 6 months and older are recommended for annual vaccination, with rare exception.
In 2001, the CDC-recommended groups were high-risk children and high-risk adults. The CDC’s recommendations have gradually included more and more healthy people by age group until 2010-2011 flu season when people between the ages of 19 and 49 years were added, making the CDC’s flu shot recommendation universal (with some exceptions, e.g., if you have an allergy to eggs, if you’ve ever had Guillain-Barré Syndrome).
I always saw him as a one step forward, two steps back sort of guy. When he’s on point, it’s a bullseye. When he isn’t he’s an embarrassment.
The interview I saw with him and Jason Box, I had the impression Maher “accepted” but without understanding. It seemed like it was all tribal.
Bullshit. The evidence for both is such that you really have to believe in a massive conspiracy or a deceptive deity/alien intelligence to deny them. As far as anthropogenic climate change is concerned, you have to deny basic physics as well as the instrumental record and paleoclimatic evidence, just as with vaccination you have to deny basic immunology as well as the epidemiological evidence.
Well, to begin with it was done in a very similar style as Expelled. It also reminded me a lot of Thunderfoul’s videos in that he aimed largely at soft targets, never really gave them much chance to defend themselves (at least not in the actual video), and tended to proclaim a lot of importance without providing evidence.
Nick Gotts @46: I was reading that comment as global warming being detected at the 99% level or so, whereas vaccines are statistically much clearer than that. But you’re probably right it was a dog whistle.
futurechemist:
No, what you quoted the Brits actually saying is that it’s free. All of those conditions are detailing in which cases it’s paid with taxes which fund the NHS. Indeed, simply being free doesn’t mean it’s necessary that you must take it by law. They are not making a statement about when it’s “necessary” or not. You simply pay out of pocket if you don’t fit their description, and they can recommend that sort of thing as “necessary” (or at least prudent) as a matter of policy, separate from the policy outlining when it is “free” (taxpayer-funded) and when it is not.
Donnie: “I never get back to Science Blogs, so it will be nice to have him located here!”
You can read Orac at his other not so secret blog: ScienceBasedMedicine.org
consciousness razor @48
Actually it’s one and the same. The part of the NHS website I quoted is titled “People who should have a flu jab”. So it is the British government making a recommendation that healthy people under 65 are not recommended to get the flu vaccine. They could choose to get it anyway of course, but the NHS says it’s not officially recommended. And that lack of an official recommendation probably means less people will have the vaccine in practice.
I’ve noticed it for a few other vaccines too that the CDC seems more vaccine-focused than the NHS. The CDC recommends chickenpox and hepatitis B vaccines for everyone, while the NHS recommends it only for healthcare workers and other vulnerable people.
I, like PZ, am in a group of people who – despite being non-elderly adult and not having a suppressed immune system – are expected to get annual flu jabs. In my case, I’m a nurse.
The hospital I’m at doesn’t make them truly mandatory (as this would open them up to a lawsuit) for all staff that have contact with patients, they simply mandate that if you don’t submit paperwork indicating that you’ve gotten the jab by a set date, you are required to wear a mask during flu season at all times when on hospital grounds or off-grounds in an official job capacity.
Futurechemist, the CDC’s logic for recommending the chickenpox vaccine is based on the logic that while chickenpox is (usually) a minor illness that resolves without complications for children. The problem is shingles – which is debilitating, very painful, and can be fatal. The CDC’s logic is that by eliminating chickenpox, shingles will (eventually) cease to be a problem. Of course, this also serves to prevent the (relatively rare, but still quite real) cases of children who are left with serious scarring or blindness, or who die of chickenpox, as well as protecting pregnant women (pregnant women who are exposed to chickenpox can develop pneumonia) and the immunocompromised.
I like watching Maher. If he’s stupid about vaccines, oh well. He’s right about a lot of other stuff. Like religion, gun control, and global warming. And a host of other things that are wrong with the US.
He has people like S.E. Cupp and David Fromm and other right wing nutters on the show because he tries to balance his panels (unlike Faux news). Sure the republicans talk nonsense, but he’s got them out there to demonstrate their idiocy for themselves. And he calls them on their bullshit when they talk bullshit. He’s probably about as perfect or imperfect as the rest of us, but raises serious political issues and from my point of view, mostly takes the side of sanity.
And for those who dislike his political incorrectness, he’s a fucking comedian for FSM’s sake. He’s an equal opportunity trasher. He pokes fun at everything and anything. In my opinion, what some of you see as him being smug is him taking the piss out of a societal smugness.
The guy’s not perfect, but I’d rather watch him than some american icon, like, say, Bill Cosby. Maher, at least, is funny. Cosby was funny when I was ten years old.
I’ve been reading this blog for years and the hard core pharyngulites have become as purity conscious at the tea party. Get a grip.
Yeah, gee whiz, you ‘hard core pharyngulites’, can’t you just take a joke? You have insulted congenital cynic, a long time reader, with your disdain for ‘political incorrectness’. You have no senses of humor, obviously.
Since you are telling us to get a grip, you are one who needs to get a grip. Look in the mirror prior to such pronouncements. Then don’t make them. It won’t make you so politically correct by your definition of politically correct.
He’s not right about anything. He’s on the side that is right about many issues but he himself isn’t right about anything. He takes easy pot shots and attacks strawmen but he debates and analyzes nothing.
….*sigh*….. Any-one want to pitch in on a self-reflecting irony detector for some of our more “hard core” members?
Here’s an old Politically Incorrect episode about women and feminism. Maher is in rare form. I think my favorite bit is his insistence that every woman in the room would cower behind the nearest man if a gunman burst into the studio.
Or our tone trolls?
@Siggy
IIRC, in Religulous, Maher made a lot of highly dubious claims regarding some similarities of some ancient religions with other ancient religions. Get your information from a more reliable source, like Dr Richard Carrier.
probably the biggest thing anyone can do to prevent the spread of the flu is to not go to work while sick.* the flu shot is great and all, but having pride over never taking a sick day is idiotic.
* obviously, while this ought to apply to everyone, lots of people don’t get paid sick leave and are often effectively forced to go into work sick. this should change.
I’m betting that the CDC’s current flu vaccine recommendations are a direct result of the 2009 epidemic. Novel flus have a nasty tendency to be more fatal to people with strong healthy immune systems than people with less healthy, but still functional immune systems. Basically, the inverse of the curve for seasonal flus. This pattern was first observed with the 1918 flu, but it’s since shown up in other pandemics, including the relatively mild one of 2009. For the Science Blogs veterans, this was discussed on Effect Measure before the Reveres closed up shop there.
The reason for this is that healthy immune systems apparently overreact to novel flus, and that overreaction is lethal. The key phrase for a Google search is “cytokine storm.”
Anyway, I think the CDC is operating on the theory that a poorly matched vaccine is better than no vaccine where potentially new strains are concerned.
you know, if “Big Pharma” was really driving flu vaccine production, and all they had was a pure profit motive…
why not lie about the effectiveness?
why not just say: “sure, it’s 89% effective”
nobody would catch the error until the statistics were out the following year, and they could just claim some error.
this is why the “Big Pharma” conspiracy bullshit is just that, bullshit. if there was a real conspiracy, they wouldn’t be telling you the vaccine was expected to only be half as effective this year.
…or MAYBE… it’s all a cover, so that the big pharma conspiracy won;’t be suspected!!11!!1111!!!
He has people like S.E. Cupp and David Fromm and other right wing nutters on the show because he tries to balance his panels (unlike Faux news). Sure the republicans talk nonsense, but he’s got them out there to demonstrate their idiocy for themselves.
And that makes his shows a good deal less informative than they could be, since they give the loony right yet another platform to at least dumb down the debate and degrade our ability to present a clear and useful message. Every minute spent giving “equal time” to loonies and liars is one minute less for a clear explanation of the policy or events in question. The loony right already have virtually unlimited air-time to shove their demented worldview in everyone’s faces — why give them up to half of what little air-time we have as well?
From my experience watching Maher, when he has righties on the show, 99% of the time he and the other guests rip them to shreds. When people see that, they learn something. They learn that there really are some people who know more than these fools and are willing to speak up. In every other entertainment and news (really, the same thing) program, the righties get to spout unopposed (exceptions to Stewart and Colbert). This has real educational value.
In the end, Maher is just as politically correct as those he decries. It’s just about different things. He has his own bubble that he lives in (just as he decries against the right) which cannot be penetrated by reality. He has a position that he “knows” is right and he will do or say anything to keep it in order to maintain his vision of himself lest he be seen as a traitor to his cause. That is the essence of “political correctness”: The taking of a position for its value to the rest of the group rather than for its own sake.
I’m not sure he’s anti-vax, he’s certainly anti flu vaccine and he’s got some decent arguments against it. Not enough that people should skip it. Certainly high risk people should get it, the very old and the very young and those with already compromised immune systems for sure. I’m not sure 100% of people need it though.
What does the flu shot cost, versus the cost to you and your employer for being infectious for a week and missing work? Or infecting others if you go back to work too quickly? There is a lot you are missing.