Fond thoughts of this tradition were revived this week by a New York Times investigation by Kenneth P. Vogel and Christina Jewett about efforts by Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullen, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert Kennedy, Jr., and possibly President Donald Trump to clear a regulatory path for a dietary supplement called kratom that “interacts with the brain’s opioid receptors” and “has been linked to liver toxicity, seizures, and thousands of deaths.” (Trump’s role in this mess is hard to pin down because the public statement he made on the subject was, characteristically, incoherent.)
But the Times story got me thinking: When did patent medicines—which today go by the more polite name dietary supplement—become the exclusive province of the Republican Party?
Asked by Groucho Marx, in a 1951 appearance on “You Bet Your Life,” what Hadacol was good for, LeBlanc replied: “It was good for $5.5 million for me last year.” A few months later the Federal Trade Commission came calling. It concluded that LeBlanc was engaged in “false, misleading, and deceptive” business practices by marketing Hadacol as “an effective treatment and cure for scores of ailments and diseases.” LeBlanc’s answer was to run for governor of Louisiana. He lost.
Demonizing the medical establishment as crooked probably helped encourage Republicans to fill the void left by Dudley LeBlanc after he died in 1971. Capitol Hill’s last gasp of Democratic quackery was a 1976 bill sponsored by Wisconsin Senator William Proxmire prohibiting the FDA from “establishing standards limiting potency of vitamins and minerals in food supplements or regulating them as drugs based solely on potency.” After that, the cause was taken up by Republican Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah.
Steven Pray, a professor of pharmacy at the University of Oklahaoma, complained in The Journal of Child Neurology that “Patients who purchase dietary supplements take the place of the laboratory rats used in legitimate safety research…. The United States is little better than a third-world country in regard to access to unknown products.”
That’s no secret to the Republican former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell. A decade ago, McDonnell got busted for accepting gifts and money while in office in exchange for smoothing the regulatory path for a dietary supplement called Antabloc. His conviction was later overturned by the reactionary Supreme Court in one of a series of decisions decriminalizing political bribery. Bill O’Reilly, Doctor Phil, and Mike Huckabee can’t say enough good things about something called Relaxium. I doubt they’ve done so for free.
If you have shied away from profiting from the immense promise of stem cells to treat disease because of moral concern over extracting stem cells from fetal tissue, pay close attention. You can now invest with a clear conscience. An Israeli entrepreneur, Zami Aberman, has discovered “an oilfield in the placenta.”
If the GOP is going to bring back patent medicines, then I demand we be entertained by the medicine shows that used to go along with them. It was on a bus for Hadacol Caravan, legend has it, that Hank Williams plucked the first notes of “Jambalaya.” That beats the hell out of a UFC Freedom 250 Match.
Hence then, the article about when did scammy patent medicines become a republican thing was published today ( ) and is available on The New Republic ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( When Did Scammy Patent Medicines Become A Republican Thing? )
Also on site :