Break out the cigars. Merck quietly admitted defeat this morning as it pulled out of misguided lobbying efforts to foist its agenda on girls as young as nine for all the reasons that I laid out a few weeks back.
Yeah, might not want to seem like there is a conflict of interest being the sole producer of a mandated drug. Might not want to answer quite yet for all the dizziness reported by the guinea pigs so far. Might want to get out of bed with "Dykes Women in Government". Might not want to get the Texas Governor shot by some pissed off Papa who doesn't want anyone touching his baby girl.
Common sense wins the day. But Merck will live to fight again. And we will be ready.
Folks, I am so done with American society for things I will not discuss in this forum, you cannot possibly imagine. We have drifted so far from the Republic our Founders envisioned. I refuse to channel the Founders, and I despise when people arrogantly attempt impossible assumptions taken up for their lost voices. But when will America sober up?
I am heartened by this victory over the toxic blend of Big Government and Big Business. And for all the technology I curse--television, Crackberries, video games--the Internet is the one thing in which we may find salvation for our bedraggled Union. It is no small thing to beat a Giant like Merck at a game it practically invented.
A sling shot may not be the tool of choice in 2007, but we are indeed An Army of Davids.
I saw this on the news and immediately thought about your post a few weeks back. Definitely good to see them back down. But we must be vigilant, the big bad pharm lobbyists will be back in full swing eventually.
[JANE SAYS: You bet they will. The Marine Wife in me calls this "regrouping".]
Posted by: Chuck | February 21, 2007 at 05:59 AM
thank God (wait am i allowed to say God?) that algore invented the internet!
Posted by: rhino-itall | February 21, 2007 at 08:05 AM
I too am happy that Merck has given up. My opposition to making this vaccination was primarily on libertarian grounds. I am not impressed by the argument that the vaccine will turn our little girls into sluts. I am, however, skeptical of big government and big corporations.
[JANE SAYS: I concur, Gary. The Religious Right goes off on the stupidest argument on the planet when they could have won it on purely logical Libertarian grounds. Typical.]
Posted by: gary | February 21, 2007 at 08:54 AM
The Religious Right is quite often one of the biggest thorns in the side of Conservatism.
Posted by: Stealthkix | February 21, 2007 at 12:46 PM
"the vaccine will turn our little girls into sluts." Seriously? That was one of the arguments?
I didn't have much of an opinion on HPV vaccine because I'm lazy and haven't bothered looking up how far spread a threat this virus is.
It is it good to reduce Cervical cancer rates. Yes. Do we need to take into account the risk vs the benefit, hell yes.
[JANE SAYS: And WHO among us is going to let their little girl be the first STATE MANDATED lab rat?]
Posted by: Sniper One | February 21, 2007 at 01:30 PM
I'm horrified they even thought of lobbying for this. How about just teaching your girls to avoid sex until marriage or (horrors!) getting married young if they find the right guy?
I'm officially with the libs on this one - Big Pharma needs to be reigned in. There are many cheaper, more common sense ways of treating things that are getting supressed because of these corporate cretins. It's moving medical science backwards, because all doctors do now is write prescriptions for pills, most of which don't work or are harmful. I know first hand.
[JANE SAYS: It is amazing--for all their love of IRREFUTABLE SCIENTIFIC FACTS---ABSTINANCE WORKS 110% of the times its applied, vaccine efficacy issues aside...this is NOT POLIO----and the Left STILL won't admit THAT FACT.]
Posted by: PRCalDude | February 21, 2007 at 03:41 PM
"Folks, I am so done with American society for things I will not discuss in this forum, you cannot possibly imagine. We have drifted so far from the Republic our Founders envisioned. " -Jane
And that is why, even as a paralyzed disabled vet, I am seriously considering the life of an ex-patriat.
Don't get me wrong, because I love this country, or more correctly, what this country once was and is supposed to be. I just can't take any more gun bans, forced meds, cotowing to the defeatists and terrorists, disgracful politicians, and a multitude of other things that I see every day.
Sickening and maddening at the same time.
~V5
[JANE SAYS: I am going on the "internal ex-pat plan" when HH retires. UNfortunately his retirement pay and "rights" as a Vet (as you well know) come from Uncle Sugar, so to that miserable extent, we will still be on the grid. Until then I will do my part to bail this Titanic. But just a few years from now, when I have my forty acres and a mule, this place can go straight to hell. And I feel certain that it will.]
Posted by: V5 | February 21, 2007 at 07:26 PM
If this were the 1700s, we would have had a revolution by now. Unfortunately, the idea of "rights derived from God" has no traction any more. We therefore submit to the arbitrary will of our 'leaders.' Francis Schaeffer points this out in "How Should We Then Live."
Unfortunately, the problems in our society are more a failing of the Christians in this country to be "salt and light" than anything else. This all started way back in the 1930s, when the higher critics in the mainline US denominations started deconstructing the Bible. Once you take away inerrancy, you take away the reason to be Christian and to believe the Bible, or to even hold to "made in the image of God". Man is just another dumb animal, so there's no reason to give him rights.
[JANE SAYS: Brilliant, sucinct and SPOT ON. I keep waiting for the Revolution. It will never happen. This country is slumping toward mediocrity. As I have said, we have gone from One Nation Under God to American Idol. I am dropping out very soon. As soon as HH retires, we are dropping out. A country girl can survive.]
Posted by: PRCalDude | February 22, 2007 at 08:58 AM
You have less chance of cervical cancer if you um, limit your sexual partners. But we must not inflict our puritan values on others, Jane, not even if it means that they will be doomed to die in agony as their
girly bits rot from the inside out!
No sirree. I'm sorry, I got a little over excited just then. I can't promise it won't happen again, but I am sorry.
[JANE SAYS: Well JANE'S girley buts are JANE'S business. NOBODY ELSE'S...least of all BIG BUSINESS. If one is being a "good Liberal" one knows this. If you're are a disingenuous ass, you deny it.]
Posted by: Miss Carnivorous | February 22, 2007 at 03:15 PM