One of the many “deep dive” researchers I sometimes listen to is a woman named Alison McDowell.
Last year, she did a few of her epic presentations on RFK Jr. and some of his connections to Silicon Valley (among other things). Along with what I view as a huge moral blind spot on the Israel-Palestine topic, those connections were enough for me to trash any possibility of voting for RFK, Jr. (this was before his candidacy was finished).
Like all of these topics, it’s very complicated and requires nuance in our thinking and feeling. On one hand, considering how every time I visit the US (usually every two years or so), I see a populace that is increasingly unhealthy, I believe it IS time for a maverick to shake things up in how y’all do public health. It shows the level of complacency and complicity in most of the media that they can’t even concede this rather obvious point.
I’m reasonably sure when most of those media “elites” gather in their version of a cocktail party, one thing most share is a contempt for what they see as a lazy, overweight American public. Unfortunately, I think too many of them may be somewhat isolated from that world, and, worse, most of the media outlets they work for are corrupted by Big Pharma advertising money. The point is they know that American public health is bad and getting worse, but they have many incentives to keep mum about it.
For all of those reasons, I’m happy a lifelong litigator is heading the HHS. I have been disappointed we haven’t really heard much from RFK Jr. about what he’s up to and this raises my long-earned cynicism.
As does the Casey Means nomination. Reading and hearing some of the critiques, including Dr. Wolf’s article, bring me back to those McDowell videos. While I can appreciate that new tech can be useful in raising our awareness about our health, it’s definitely troubling to see that so much of our personal data seems to be collected by Silicon Valley and they potentially shared with governments.
It's actually a really good question, but a difficult one to answer because so many of her videos are super long and detailed.
I'll share this one from about two years ago, because it signaled some stuff about one of my favorite contemporary philosophers, Charles Eisenstein, who had been signed up as like a political/philsophical/spiritual advisor for RFK Jr's campaign, and Alison saw some red flags that, it seems, are playing out.
I did a search for RFK Jr. on her site, wrenchinthegears.com and there were some others from last year, as well as some stuff from early this year about the tech-bro folks in Trump's orbit. I don't remember if I watched any of those from last year.
Last, she put in a TON of work from like 2015 to 2023 and my sense is that she was burning out on the whole thing, like maybe her hard-fought battle had been for naught.
Having said that, I had kind of a personal falling out with her which wasn't too surprising to me because I'd seen her do this to other people. In my case, I recommended she check out this book a friend had written and Alison's response was rather rude and dismissive, which hurt my friend and made me think she was too narrow-minded in her focus and could do better to not trash the few allies she had.
Still, I don't hear the stuff she presents from just about anyone else, yet a lot of it has come to fruition, so I'll share this video from 2023 and will let you know if she gets back into the game after her break she said she was taking.
Means-watch pt deux. So interesting to hear the Silicon Valley connection. So, between Casey and Elon's DOGE accessing data from Health & Human Services, is this all just a huge data mining free-for-all? ps I initially mis-read Theranos as Thanos without my glasses on, lol - I really hope she's not the second coming of Thanos :/
One of the many “deep dive” researchers I sometimes listen to is a woman named Alison McDowell.
Last year, she did a few of her epic presentations on RFK Jr. and some of his connections to Silicon Valley (among other things). Along with what I view as a huge moral blind spot on the Israel-Palestine topic, those connections were enough for me to trash any possibility of voting for RFK, Jr. (this was before his candidacy was finished).
Like all of these topics, it’s very complicated and requires nuance in our thinking and feeling. On one hand, considering how every time I visit the US (usually every two years or so), I see a populace that is increasingly unhealthy, I believe it IS time for a maverick to shake things up in how y’all do public health. It shows the level of complacency and complicity in most of the media that they can’t even concede this rather obvious point.
I’m reasonably sure when most of those media “elites” gather in their version of a cocktail party, one thing most share is a contempt for what they see as a lazy, overweight American public. Unfortunately, I think too many of them may be somewhat isolated from that world, and, worse, most of the media outlets they work for are corrupted by Big Pharma advertising money. The point is they know that American public health is bad and getting worse, but they have many incentives to keep mum about it.
For all of those reasons, I’m happy a lifelong litigator is heading the HHS. I have been disappointed we haven’t really heard much from RFK Jr. about what he’s up to and this raises my long-earned cynicism.
As does the Casey Means nomination. Reading and hearing some of the critiques, including Dr. Wolf’s article, bring me back to those McDowell videos. While I can appreciate that new tech can be useful in raising our awareness about our health, it’s definitely troubling to see that so much of our personal data seems to be collected by Silicon Valley and they potentially shared with governments.
Wild times, indeed!
Interesting. I'm not familiar with McDowell but will have to look her up once things settle down around here.
She’s a trippy gal. Definitely a rabbit hole type. So yeah, wait until you have some time, lots of it!
Do you have a favorite/especially relevant video of hers you can link to?
It's actually a really good question, but a difficult one to answer because so many of her videos are super long and detailed.
I'll share this one from about two years ago, because it signaled some stuff about one of my favorite contemporary philosophers, Charles Eisenstein, who had been signed up as like a political/philsophical/spiritual advisor for RFK Jr's campaign, and Alison saw some red flags that, it seems, are playing out.
I did a search for RFK Jr. on her site, wrenchinthegears.com and there were some others from last year, as well as some stuff from early this year about the tech-bro folks in Trump's orbit. I don't remember if I watched any of those from last year.
Last, she put in a TON of work from like 2015 to 2023 and my sense is that she was burning out on the whole thing, like maybe her hard-fought battle had been for naught.
Having said that, I had kind of a personal falling out with her which wasn't too surprising to me because I'd seen her do this to other people. In my case, I recommended she check out this book a friend had written and Alison's response was rather rude and dismissive, which hurt my friend and made me think she was too narrow-minded in her focus and could do better to not trash the few allies she had.
Still, I don't hear the stuff she presents from just about anyone else, yet a lot of it has come to fruition, so I'll share this video from 2023 and will let you know if she gets back into the game after her break she said she was taking.
https://wrenchinthegears.com/2023/05/26/camelot-corner-with-operation-snow-white-and-charles-eisenstein-as-troubadour/
Means-watch pt deux. So interesting to hear the Silicon Valley connection. So, between Casey and Elon's DOGE accessing data from Health & Human Services, is this all just a huge data mining free-for-all? ps I initially mis-read Theranos as Thanos without my glasses on, lol - I really hope she's not the second coming of Thanos :/
Yeah, Naomi Wolf's big concern has been the data mining, for both Elon Musk and Casey Means. Very Pluto in Aquarius.