IHeartBadCode

Okay since I haven't seen it said here so far. Aspartame is being classified as "a possible carcinogen". The reason for that is observational data. We have observed an increase in obesity related cancers in people who also have daily intake of aspartame. This observation is 1.15 times higher than the background rate (people not having daily aspartame and developing obesity related cancers), so that is what is prompting the classification. There is additional research into if this connection is casual (Synchronicity) and it seems that there is some initial evidence to suggest this is more than just a casual connection.

Remember back to science class. We science by making an observation, posing a hypothesis, testing that out, and then drawing conclusions from it. This move is one of the first steps after the observation part in the political sphere. Science is just making an observation, however, governments are free to move in lock step with those observations or wait till science gets a bit further along in the process. Really depends on the flavor of government we're talking about, but the important part is that whole section of the equation is distinctly NOT SCIENCE.

So that said, where everyone else is chiming in on with aloe vera and what not is the classification the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) is placing aspartame into. This is a political group that moves in step with science research. This group has four levels. 1 - You will get cancer, 2a - Pretty likely you will get cancer, 2b - Maybe you might get cancer, 3 - You will not get cancer. Aspartame is being moved into 2b.

There is still a lot of research left to go about the links between aspartame and cancer. For example, aspartame seems to only cause cancers typically related to obesity, so is it the cause or are obese people just selectively drinking it? This is what I referred to at the start as a casual connection. BUT, there is a whole process before we can technically say "YES". So that process must happen first. But there's going to be people who attempt to say "well yes, obese people get obese cancers, duh" and initial evidence suggests that there is a bit more that we ought not to just hand wave away.

As for what you SHOULD do. You should do what you feel is best. If it puts your mind to ease to nix aspartame from your diet, you should most absolutely do that. But yes Coke Zero has the exact kind and chemical make up of sweetener that Diet Coke has. So if that is the thing you are trying to excise, Coke Zero is not a respite.

I'm pretty sure that I'm replying to you.

Kennedy defended the article insisting no one has shown “one mistake” he made in the article

That's not how fact works. I can make some statement but that statement doesn't pass into "fact" just because no one has yet to provide a list of where I got it wrong. One is required to provide evidence to establish fact.

Here's an excerpt from RFK's paper.

But instead of taking immediate steps to alert the public and rid the vaccine supply of thimerosal

And here's the deal. Thimerosal is a preservative in vaccines. It's used to keep bacteria from growing in vaccines. However, the US goes through so much so quickly in terms of those vaccines that they give you at birth, that we just simply do not need to add a preservative in them. So the claim here is just baseless to begin with. The preservative just simply is not present in childhood vaccines. Where you will likely find it, is in vaccines that need to be shelf stable for long periods of time. Such as things like the flu vaccine. And absolutely NOT the COVID vaccine that needs refrigeration. There's literally no need for a preservative there because we keep it cool.

The component that likely triggers fears is the breakdown of Thimerosal into Ethylmercury C₂H₅Mg⁺ which has been shown to be toxic and indeed Thimerosal does indeed get eventually processed into this compound. However, the body DOES indeed expel ethylmercury in three to seven days. So, NO, it does not stay inside your body. We have thousands of studies that indicate this.

What one might have heard is something called methylmercury, which is very bad for humans but there is no means chemically to convert thimerosal into methylmercury in vivo. We've done studies on that too.

So with that said, does the ethylmercury in vaccines raise a cause for concern? Absolutely not. The amount required to keep a vaccine fresh is orders of magnitude smaller than what you'll likely find in your everyday food, especially fish. You will likely get thousands of times more ethylmercury in a single can of tuna than you will in a single childhood vaccine. So if vaccines prose a problem for a person, literally ALL FOOD on the planet Earth poses a much higher risk by massive values. And this is the thing that RFK's paper completely avoids if you ignore the inaccuracies of the chemical composition of childhood vaccines that he routinely makes.

So:

• One, childhood vaccines DO NOT have the chemical that is routinely cited as the cause for autism.
• Two, the chemical that is routinely cited is found in the vast majority of food being ingested.
• Three, no person has put forward a model that accurately presents a lab repeatable process by which this chemical would cause such a condition.
• Four, evidence suggests that autism is a genetic disorder and is indeed NOT an environmental disease.
• And five, and most importantly, the vast majority of "doctors" hocking the vaccine-autism connection are doing so for finical gains, so literally they're just wanting to use people's ignorance for monetary gain.

RFK is no different in this regards. This paper was a precursor to his book (which I will not link here, but you can easily find it) and he commonly thumps his paper as a commercial for his book. And some might point to pharmaceuticals as just big "ad machines" and the difference is that the claims made in drug ads is peer reviewed. The claims in RFK's book are backed up by: The College of Shit Mr. Kennedy Just Pulled Out His Ass™. I fail to understand how the same people that fear "big pharma" trying to fleece the public is also the same people who gladly get fleeced by people who are distinctly "not doctors". I grant anyone that the way modern medicine is marketed is shitty. That is less a problem with science and more a problem with capitalism, but that is as far as I will open that Pandora's box. So if anyone has beef with medicine, it's likely you have more an issue with something distinctly NOT SCIENCE.

The only thing that has been proven that vaccines cause is less dead children. There are too many studies with millions of points of evidence that back this unifying claim up, for alternatives claiming the opposite to even remotely hold a candle to. Simple fact, childhood vaccines save lives and the vast ocean of evidence backing that claim up is overwhelming in comparison to the paltry offering of anecdotal conjecture offered by the opposition.

More importantly this:

This is my view. Other people have different views on this. I think apologizing makes you weak.

This is what cultivates the "never admitting wrong and always attempting to be right" on literally everything. Making people afraid or scared to be "wrong" is absolutely the most incorrect thing possible. We learn best when we self identify our own mistakes.

This whole mentality is literally the number one thing I hear people hate the most on the Internet. Trial and error is a fundamental method of problem solving and if you teach people that being wrong is "weak" then you literally subvert the most basic ability to problem solve.

There could not have been a more wrong bit of advice this person could have given. This is literally the number one thing that makes public discourse even harder to do. My bit of free advice is to literally NOT view apologies as weakness. You will always be an infinitely better person if you just simply DO NOT DO this one thing that Christian Ziegler has indicated.

𝕱𝖎𝖓𝖊! 𝓛𝓮𝓽'𝓼 🅂🄴🄴 𝕥𝕙𝕖𝕞 ѕ¢яαρ 𝔱𝔥𝔦𝔰!

Tell me who's your tree man and how that crisp is so good? You's a superstar apple, why you still in the woods? What in the world is in that BAG, what you got in that BAG? A couple of hives of honey bees, you did a good job of pollinating me, growing me.

There will be a vote. When I remember to do a vote. But only on MAJOR changes and I get to define major!

similarly I understand why Roberts is trying to lower the pressure

Allow me to cite a passage from Kagan on WV v. EPA.

It seems I was wrong. The current Court is textualist only when being so suits it. When that method would frustrate broader goals, special canons like the “major questions doctrine” magically appear as get-out-of-text-free cards.

In short, "weak ass arguments receive rebuttal for being weak ass arguments." The Court is fine to actually start issuing judgement that follows in step with the history of the court. But then you have something like Dobbs and the majority opinion.

The doctrine of stare decisis does not counsel continued acceptance of Roe and Casey. Stare decisis plays an important role and
protects the interests of those who have taken action in reliance on a past decision.

So after indicating that people might plan their lives on court decisions, the majority then begins to explain why "none of that matters" without actually explaining why none of it matters outside of "because unborn babies are important" WITHOUT explaining the "why" of that statement. That's the point of the court to establish the "why" of an argument. It might be plainly obvious to the Justices the why unborn babies are important, it's their job to then hit the letters on the keyboard to spell that out. That's the justice system, you spell it out in insanely ornate detail. That's literally what all lawyers love to do, unload heaps of words onto people. When they do not do that, well then that's how you know they are full of shit.

So no, I dissent here. The Justices must do better and not simply provide weak-ass arguments with nothing but circles for the explanation. The more expansive reading justices are rightly apt to apply heat to bullshit. A weak ass court is only made stronger when it's weak ass arguments and opinions are called out for everyone to read.

That said.

In any case this seems to come back to Congress no longer passing legislation and instead relying on executive powers for all political requirements

That's broad powers. That's how that works. We do not list explicitly every single animal that needs to be on the endangered species list. We do not list in law every single road that will be paved with public works money. We do not itemize in law every single uniform that we will purchase for every member of the military. At some point we just say in law "protect animals that might go extinct", "fix our highways", and "protect our armed forces" and let the Executive dictate how best to achieve those goals. And when the Executive fails on that in a particular way, well they're Congress, they can pass a law that gets more specific.

But even then, when specificity is given, the only thing I hear is "OH NO THIS LAW IS A 1000 PAGES LONG! I CAN NOT READ THIS!" Yeah, who knew complex societies were, IDK, complex?! The Executive powers are JUST THAT, the part of the Government that gets shit done. Congress indicates their broad wishes and the Executive deals out the finer details. How pray tell, is that thinking NOT centrist? How are you left unserved by your supposed current model of governance? Yes, you might be unserved because the political party system is fucked but that is distinctly NOT a function of the balance of power between branches as outlined in our form of government.

Is this really the content that we want for @news ?

There is an up/down vote button for you to express that POV on the post itself. I get what you're attempting to do, but as someone mentioned, this isn't Reddit you have open the ability to create your own @news. Hell, I encourage you to. A nonhomogeneous mix is actually healthier in the long run. And, at least for my part, now you have the answer to why someone down voted you.

Also, no one likes the explicitly @-ing folks who down voted you. Yes, you can see who down votes you but I feel, you should perhaps use the saying of "with great power comes great responsibility." Maybe ask "openly" why you're being down voted. @-ing the folks, and remember this is solely my subjective opinion, that's not cool.

Also, no one owes you an explanation of jack crap. And that applies "in general." Yes, it's better when someone explains their position to you and what not. But no one OWES you an explanation. I think that's what rubs me with the @-ing folks wrong here. None of those people HAVE TO explain themselves, it'd be great if they did, but you are not owed it and that is a very important distinction.

Agencies that built around that openness: “How could our reliance on a private entity have backfired on us like this?”

Also those same agencies: “Does anyone know a free private company we can build upon now?”