- Mr Paul, a Duke University-trained ophthalmologist, favours vaccination. But he questioned the wisdom of vaccinating infants and worried aloud about "tragic cases of walking, talking normal children who wound up with profound mental disorders after vaccines". Mr Paul earned a lot of flack for this remark, which flouts the medical consensus about the risks of vaccination. He tried to tamp down the controversy on Tuesday by inviting a reporter and photographer to watch him get a booster shot for Hepatitis A. "I think the science is clear that if you compare the risks of taking a vaccine to the ill effects of taking a vaccine, [the benefits of vaccinations are] overwhelming", he said at the photo-op, back-pedalling from his earlier remarks. The question of the risks of vaccination aside, Mr Paul maintains that voluntary vaccination has worked well in the past, and that the sudden efflorescence of formerly subdued communicable diseases ought to be met with greater public awareness of the benefits of vaccination.
This whole saga is straight form bizzarro world. It's a laugh riot to see GOPers defending the right to not vaccinate, when the constituencies who don't vaccinate their kids are almost exclusively far left wing nut jobs. Hillary Clinton can go on the offensive and say the science is settled, and people are nuts for not listening to their doctor, because she doesn't fear pissing off a bunch of hippies who aren't going to affect the election, because they're concentrated in states that wouldn't vote GOP in a presidential race in a million years. Meanwhile Chris Christy has to bend over backward to make sure he doesn't let on that the government can ever mandate anything from anyone ever under any circumstances. So you have him and guys like Paul (a fucking doctor who knows better) saying things like, "Well I vaccinated my kids, but..."
Reporter: mr. Paul, do you beat your children? Paul: of course not Reporter: but you defend a parents constitutional right to do so, correct? Paul: ummmm...., no because children have a constitutional right too Reporter: they have a constitutional right to a healthy life free of crazy? In an ideal world.
It really makes you wonder who they're trying not to piss off. For some reason the media don't like to cover this inconvenient fact. All the attention goes to places like Marin County, CA, where ridiculous numbers of kids aren't vaccinated, then pivots to the GOP presidential contenders without any commentary. WTF?