Reason Magazine Sucks!

In the Daily Paul Forum, ptpete25 objects to the Koch-funded Reason and Cato, in particular Reason's call for coerced vaccination. But ptpete25 also gets the big picture correct:

They get some things right, but they are total establishment shills on important issues.

Here's ptpete25's full take:

Reason magazine and CATO suck! They get some things right, but they are total establishment shills on important issues.

Are they saying there is no libertarian argument for refusing to have someone stick a needle in your arm and dump heavy metals and "weakened" viruses?

Or are they saying there is no libertarian argument against forcing someone to use a product? Big Pharmacy certainly wants everyone vaccinated.

To all of those saying Reason is correct, then why force people to use just vaccines? Why not Obamacare? Hell let's force feed everyone super healthy organic food so everyone eats right.

Do they make good points in the article, yes certainly. Many good reasons to take on the risks of vaccines. But all they do is make reasons for using vaccines. Their best argument against refusal, "you might get a vaccinated person sick, because they don't work in a small percentage of people."

They're telling us that because someone took a product, and it didn't work, that we have to take the same product, in order to ensure that the product defects aren't noticed.

Reason and Cato will disrupt the message when it really suits the establishment. IMO. This article is establishment garbage. They should be getting a check from big pharma for posting this advertisement.

http://reason.com/archives/2013/12/06/vaccine-free-riders-1

What's particularly bizarre about Reason's argument is that those who believe a vaccine does protect one from a disease, without serious side effects, can, in almost all cases, simply take the vaccine! Why force anyone else to take the vaccine?

Reason goes on to write:

People who refuse vaccination for themselves and their children are free-riding off herd immunity.

Duh, has Reason ever heard of positive externalities? The "stop the free-riders" argument is a argument of the pure central planner. Should we require pretty girls to stop from walking down the street in a mini-skirts because they are dressed such for their boyfriends and not for us or the dirty old man on the street corner? It's a positive externality. We seem to at least get that in the US, versus some Muslim countries. I'm not talking about personal preferences here, religious or otherwise, about vaccines or mini-skirts but government coercion.

Finally, Reason reaches into its bag of arguments for coercion and comes up with this justification for vaccines:

Infants cannot be vaccinated against whooping cough, so their protection against this dangerous disease depends upon the fact that most of the rest of us are immunized against it. Unfortunately, whooping cough incidence rates have been increasing along with the number of people refusing immunization for their kids. The annual number of pertussis cases fell to a low of 1,010 in 1976. Last year, the number of reported cases rose to 48,277, the highest number since 1955. Eighteen infants died of the disease in 2012, and half of the infants who got it were hospitalized. 

But why are we to be forced into buying any scientific view, when it could be wrong? Should Reason, as central planner, have the last word on all science?

I doubt it. Reason doesn't seem to be even up-to-date on whopping cough science.

Nick Paul Taylor writes:

For most of the second half of the 20th century, whooping cough was a disease of the past, one of many previously common infections practically eliminated by vaccines. Since the 1980s the bacteria has fought back, though, and now FDA researchers have a theory why--vaccines might not be stopping transmission.

The hunch is based on FDA research into the spread of whooping cough among baboons, animals that respond to the bacteria in a similar way to humans. Writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the team reports that baboons given the acellular vaccine--which has been used in the U.S. since the 1990s--were more likely to transmit the bacteria than those who received the whole-cell version. The germ persisted for almost twice as long in the throats of baboons given the acellular vaccine.

Whole-cell vaccines were phased out amid safety concerns, but the study suggests that while its acellular replacement stops people feeling ill, it might not stop them transmitting the bacteria. The finding may explain the resurgence of whooping cough. "There were 48,000 cases reported last year despite high rates of vaccination.

Bottom line: Central planning and coercion are evil. Beltarians, such as Reason and Cato second hand dealers in ideas, seem willing to throw over board the non-agression principle, whenever it suits them. Yesterday, it was a call for a basic income, today it is a call for coerced vaccinations.

This dilution of libertarian principle must be objected to every time it is attempted. It is the only way to keep fresh in the minds of new libertarians what liberty really is.