Diogenes In Review
Nick and Eric open on the USS Abraham Lincoln, where the crew has passed 250 consecutive days at sea against a normal carrier rotation of 180 days, with two days ashore in Oman and reporting from the Navy Times and Stars and Stripes describing half-cup rice rations, broken plumbing, no hot water, no soap or toothpaste, and thwarted suicide attempts. Nick, a veteran, refuses the “logistics failure” framing outright: “There is a difference between operational management and just cruelty, and what’s going on on the Abraham Lincoln, and probably other vessels too, is cruelty.” Eric puts numbers behind it — service-branch suicide rates from 18 to 31 per 100,000 — and names the political response, including Pete Hegseth calling the reporting fake news while Senators Blumenthal and Gallego and Congressmen Crow and Levin demand an oversight inquiry. They read the Lincoln as the visible edge of something wider, agency by agency, from a gutted State Department to the money pulled out of the Forestry Service and the National Park Service.
The second half is where the episode earns its title. Nick reports that a TikTok video of his was taken down under community guidelines for using the word “eugenics” to describe this week’s executive order breaking the MMR vaccine into single-antigen shots — so the hosts adopt “gene pool management” as the term that survives moderation, and use it for the rest of the show. Eric, the medical voice, walks the practical demolition: no licensed standalone measles, mumps, or rubella vaccine exists in the U.S., Merck discontinued Attenuvax, Mumpsvax, and Meruvax II in 2009 and 2010, the order gives HHS 90 days to produce an availability plan that cannot conjure a supply chain, and the buried foreign-manufacturer clause contradicts both the safety rationale and the administration’s own America First posture. From there they turn to what a counter-plan looks like: Eric’s read that Project 2025 has completed 283 of 532 tracked recommendations without a single act of Congress, that most of the near-term damage runs through rule-making rather than statute, and that a 52-seat Senate is the number that stalls it. Nick’s demand is narrower and harder — have the bills, the nominees, and the Supreme Court list written before you win, and stop calling it courage when a politician simply does the job.
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Nick’s Notes
I’m Nick Paro, and I’m sick of the shit going on. So, I’m using poetry, podcasting, and lives to discuss the intersections of chronic illness and mental wellbeing, masculinity, veteran’s issues, politics, and so much more. I am only able to have these conversations, bring visibility to my communities, and fill the void through your support — this is a publication where engagement is encouraged, creativity is a cornerstone, and transparency is key — please consider becoming a paid subscriber today and grow the community!
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Thank you Jason Gael, Stacey carney, Dar 🇨🇦, Kimmy Win she/her 🏳️🌈🫶🐾, Kami 🏳️🌈🌿, and many others for tuning into my live video with Dr. Eric Lullove! Join me for my next live video in the app.
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