Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s uncle was instrumental in our winning the space race, so it’s unlikely his dense nephew will embrace any moon-landing conspiracies. But his brain does appear to be an unslakable sponge when it comes to nearly every other questionable belief coursing through the meth-strained veins of our decrepit body politic.
RFK Jr. was already notorious for his anti-vaxx advocacy, and now he’s gone so far off the deep end that even shock podcaster Joe Rogan appears taken aback by the gnarly yarns he’s been spinning.
Last Thursday, Kennedy appeared on Rogan’s podcast to demonstrate his deep and profound understanding of all the stuff he’s made up in his head (allegedly!)—and the result was just as absurd as you might imagine. (Full disclosure: RFK Jr. is suing Daily Kos for … reasons.)
RELATED STORY: Robert Kennedy Jr. cavorts with Nazis, and suing Daily Kos won’t make that any less true
Watch:
RFK Jr.: “Well, WiFi radiation does all kinds of bad things, including causing cancer.”
ROGAN: “WiFi radiation causes cancer.”
RFK Jr.: “Yeah, from your cellphone, and cellphone tumors. I’m representing hundreds of people who have cellphone tumors behind the ear. … And we have the science. If anybody lets this in front of a jury, it will be over.”
ROGAN: “What are the numbers?”
RFK Jr.: “There’s a lot of people. They’re glioblastomas. That’s the kind of cancers that they get. But cancer’s not the worst thing. They also, you know, it opens up, WiFi radiation opens up your blood-brain barrier. And so all these toxins in your body can now go into your brain.”
ROGAN: “How does WiFi radiation open up your blood-brain barrier?”
RFK Jr.: “Now you’re going beyond my expertise.”
And … scene.
Yeah, that was quite a claim, huh? And one that conveniently goes beyond RFK Jr.’s expertise! It was so stunning, in fact, it actually appeared to give Rogan pause—and likely prompted his fact checker to momentarily look up from his technicolor, exponentially metamorphosing gargoyle hands.
Oh, wait. That actually did happen. Rogan asked his fact checker to find a supporting article, and here’s what he found!
ROGAN: [Reading]: “’Damage to the blood-brain barrier. Radiofrequency radiation exposure has been shown to affect the permeability of the blood-brain barrier as well as altering the expression of microRNA within the brain, which researchers state could lead to adverse effects such as neurodegenerative disease.’ Whoa! How come I don’t know that?”
Ah, don’t beat yourself up, Joe. It’s hard enough to keep track of all the things that are true, much less all the crap that probably isn’t.
Of course, if Rogan and his fact checker were to dig a little deeper—like, say, another micron into this permanently Chernobyl’d soil—they’d find out that that article comes from the Environmental Health Trust, which has collaborated with Kennedy’s Children’s Health Defense in the past. So this is a bit like Kennedy quoting himself to verify what the Keebler elves told him while they were smoking toad venom together in the wormhole that opens up over Cracker Barrel whenever someone orders the vegan sausage. (To be fair, there’s always a chance that Kennedy is accidentally right about this. But the fact that the first Google result points to an organization with close links to Kennedy himself should give us all reason to be skeptical.)
Of course, the bit about the brain-blood barrier isn’t even the kookiest thing Kennedy has said lately. YouTube recently took down a video in which right-wing darling Jordan Peterson aggressively grilled Kennedy about the current coordinates of the ping-pong balls in his head.
During the interview, Mr Kennedy Jr repeated an infamous conspiracy theory made popular by Alex Jones, claiming that chemicals in the water were “turning the frogs gay.”
Mr Kennedy Jr took the conspiracy theory a step further and claimed that chemicals in the water were also making people transgender.
Mr Peterson complained about the removal, arguing that YouTube had “take upon itself to actively interfere with a presidential election campaign.”
And if you’re actually interested in what RFK Jr. said about better living through chemistry, here it is: “I think a lot of the problems we see in kids, particularly boys, it’s probably underappreciated on that how much of that is coming from chemical exposures, including a lot of the sexual dysphoria that we’re seeing.”
Okay then!
Oh, yeah. Almost forgot. Kennedy is currently running for president. Though for some weird reason I get the feeling he’s actually a MAGA plant.
What do you think? Legitimate presidential candidate or useful fool for MAGA? It’s hard to conclude anything but the latter based on his recent actions. And, of course, if MAGA fools you into doing something, you might as well just give up now. You’ve peaked. I mean, that’s a bit like buying up someone else’s Nigerian prince scam debt for 98 cents on the dollar. It’s hard to come back from that one.
Not that RFK Jujyfruits was actually going anywhere.
Check out Aldous J. Pennyfarthing’s four-volume Trump-trashing compendium, including the finale, Goodbye, Asshat: 101 Farewell Letters to Donald Trump, at this link. Or, if you prefer a test drive, you can download the epilogue to Goodbye, Asshat for the low, low price of FREE.
