Our Views: GOP in Legislature is courting disaster with anti-vaxx extremism – The Advocate

No good deed goes unpunished, and that’s especially true of the creation of a modern miracle: vaccine protection against COVID-19. And the extremist Inquisition against science — not to mention, common sense — is in full cry at the State Capitol. 

We believe the legislative hysteria about the state’s more-or-less successful response to the coronavirus pandemic is not only extreme in a policy sense, but politically unwise.

The policy part? The Legislature appears to be in a long-term political frenzy against the emergency declarations that were so painful economically and socially, but ultimately helped to curb the spread of the deadly disease.

Lawmakers in the Republican caucus, by and large, have chafed against the tough decisions made by Gov. John Bel Edwards — as well as mayors like LaToya Cantrell of New Orleans — to curb the spread of the disease that killed more than 17,000 Louisianans.

But as is true at the national level, Louisiana law gives wide discretion to the executive in an emergency. Agree or disagree with the decisions of leaders over the past two years — and from President Donald Trump on down, every leader worried about the economic and social impact of the orders — the situation was handled.

We believe that there should be a thoughtful review of what happened and whether today’s laws are appropriate in light of the coronavirus experience, still not entirely over.

But GOP lawmakers are holding a grudge. And once again this year there are bills to allow the Legislature — even one chamber, not both House and Senate — to cancel executive orders in an emergency.

The key decision-making body outside sessions is the Joint Legislative Committee on the Budget, which is composed of senators and House members. That smaller group cannot act unless a majority of members from both houses agree to a proposal.

Because the House GOP has some of the most ardent anti-vaxxers, the principle of joint legislative consideration is being jettisoned. It’s the definition of legislative extremism.

The governor has vetoed previous versions of the legislation, and he should again. He has also won in court most often when challenged on details of the laws.

There are also new legislative efforts to prevent vaccination of schoolchildren, as required for highly contagious diseases — which, somehow, the medical mandarins of the Legislature seem to believe is not true of coronavirus. To hear their complaints, the vaccine is the problem and threat, not the solution.

That can only be interpreted as anti-science.

Given the growing alliance of Republican officials and trial lawyers, maybe it’s not surprising that there is also a proposed constitutional amendment to provide vaccine refusers “health autonomy.” Writing that vague language into the Louisiana Constitution would launch a thousand lawsuits.

The persistence of these anti-health initiatives ought to alarm the rank-and-file Republicans who are by and large happy to be vaccinated and boosted. They were satisfied with Trump’s “Operation Warp Speed” development of safe and effective vaccines.

We see the GOP leadership as making the classic political mistake of toadying to the clamor of the small faction of anti-vaxx extremists. That this is nonsense doesn’t have to wait on the verdict of history; the crazy notions that the vaccines would cause a generation to be infertile, or result in other medical catastrophes, are already shown to be just that, nuts.

Members ought to reflect on whether the party should devolve into a sect of the noisy and discontented, over one of America’s great achievements, coronavirus vaccines.