Mike the Mad Biologist

A couple of lessons from Republican Senator Bill Cassidy’s primary loss in Louisiana, which should have been self-evident by now. The first lesson is unless you are completely loyal, Trump will turn on you. Second, once you break with Trump, within the Republican Party, you are almost always politically dead, especially if your break was an attempt to moderate. You become tagged as a RINO (Republican in name only), and you cannot come back from that.

Anyway, Cassidy put himself in the worst of both camps by voting for Kennedy, but opposing Trump in other ways–and to Cassidy’s credit, he did vote to impeach Trump (Cassidy must be really pissed at McConnell right now for not pushing harder on impeachment).

The final lesson is for Democrats: there are no Republican moderates left. You cannot compromise with the Republican Party as currently constituted–it is a fascist, white Christian supremacist party that is, as fascist formations are, utterly loyal to their leader, Trump, regardless of what some of its elected officials tell you in private or secretly believe.

If you have not heard yet, Marty Makary, former commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, resigned from the FDA (it was clear he was going to be fired). Makary has said all sorts ridiculous things about COVID, and he was involved in changing how vaccine reviews were conducted, so this is no great loss to the Republic. Unfortunately, the reason for his firing is, well, not good (boldface mine):

Makary’s insiders said the former Johns Hopkins University cancer surgeon resigned after Trump forced his hand on authorizing fruit-flavored e-cigarettes. Makary had reportedly been resisting the sign-offs out of concern that the kid-friendly flavors could again entice youth use and addiction—something public health officials and experts have for years worked to combat. But Makary’s stance was in conflict with Trump’s “save vaping” campaign promise—and with the tobacco industry’s interests.

Earlier this month, The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump had called Makary over a weekend to scold him for not moving fast enough to authorize flavored vapes, particularly menthol, mango, and blueberry flavors from the Los Angeles manufacturer Glas. The FDA authorized those flavored products days later and issued a new policy that would make it easier to market flavored vapes.

Officials in the Trump administration also noted that Makary had angered anti-abortion activists, who accused him of slow-walking a safety review of mifepristone, a pill used for abortion and miscarriage treatment.

The upshot of this is the next FDA commissioner likely will be worse: more pliant to Trump et alia, and also more willing to push the Republican Party’s traditional theocratic agenda.

None of this needed to happen.