From Vaccines to Social Security: The Quiet War on Seniors
RFK Jr.’s moves aren’t random. They fit a larger pattern of making old age more dangerous...and cheaper for the government.
From Vaccines to Social Security: The Quiet War on Seniors
RFK Jr.’s moves aren’t random. They fit a larger pattern of making old age more dangerous…and cheaper for the government.
The Jack Hopkins Now Newsletter #464: Friday, August 1st, 2025. 9:15 am CST.
They’re Playing Russian Roulette with Your Life
Scott Bessent let the mask slip first.
At a friendly Breitbart gathering, Trump’s Treasury Secretary bragged that the shiny new “Trump baby accounts” were, in his words, “a backdoor to privatizing Social Security.”
He said the quiet part out loud…and the White House panicked.
Now, Robert F. Kennedy Jr…Trump’s Health Secretary…is taking his turn in this slow‑motion demolition.
He fired every single member of the CDC’s vaccine advisory panel.
He forced out the FDA’s top vaccine regulator.
And he replaced them with vaccine skeptics and ideological allies.
Is this just a deep misunderstanding of medical science?
Or is it part of a larger, calculated plan to make old age more dangerous—and cheaper for the government?
Let’s follow the trail.
The Purge: ACIP…Peter Marks…and the Hollowing Out of Expertise
If you’ve never heard of ACIP…that’s by design.
The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices is the group that quietly does the work of keeping the U.S. alive.
They evaluate vaccines.
They advise the CDC on when and how to use them.
They’re the firewall against mass illness.
Until RFK Jr. walked in.
He fired all 17 members of the panel.
Then, he forced out Peter Marks…the FDA’s top vaccine regulator…a man whose signature was required to approve lifesaving vaccines.
He didn’t replace them with new generations of data‑driven scientists.
He replaced them with figures like Dr. Robert Malone and Martin Kulldorff…people celebrated in anti‑vaccine echo chambers.
In other words: science is out…ideology is in.
Chaos Has Consequences
When you fire your top vaccine experts…you don’t just create a headlines problem.
You create a disease problem.
Right now…measles is making a comeback.
Pockets of whooping cough are spreading.
And the next influenza wave doesn’t care about your politics.
Who dies first in that environment?
The elderly.
The already fragile.
The people living off Social Security checks…whose deaths conveniently shrink the federal payout burden.
Are you starting to see the pattern?
The Scott Bessent Connection: Follow the Incentives
When Bessent said the Trump accounts were a backdoor to privatizing Social Security…he let the entire strategy slip.
Here’s the quiet architecture:
Normalize risk: Shift retirement from guaranteed benefits to market‑based accounts.
Erode trust in government: Make public institutions look incompetent or dangerous.
Quietly reduce obligations: If fewer retirees live to claim checks…the system gets “solvent” without any public vote.
RFK Jr.’s purge of health experts and embrace of anti‑vaccine policy fits this model perfectly:
It increases mortality risk among the old and vulnerable.
It drives fear and mistrust of public health…so citizens rely on private solutions.
And it lowers lifetime entitlement payouts…quietly easing the fiscal pressure that Bessent and his allies publicly lament.
Is it written in a memo? Probably not.
Is it functionally indistinguishable from a coordinated plan to shrink the senior population? Absolutely.
History Shows Us the Playbook
We’ve seen this dance before:
2005: George W. Bush tried to privatize Social Security. The public revolted.
2017‑2020: Trump floated Social Security cuts but backed off before reelection.
2025: The strategy has evolved. It’s not “cut openly.” It’s “risk silently.”
In public health:
Fire the experts.
Confuse the public.
Let preventable disease pick off the vulnerable.
In finance:
Offer shiny private accounts.
Starve the public system.
Normalize a world where government promises are optional.
Why Older Americans Are the True Targets
RFK Jr. and Bessent are not going after 25‑year‑olds.
The 25‑year‑old won’t feel the Social Security risk for decades.
The 25‑year‑old is less likely to die from measles or influenza.
But the 75‑year‑old retiree in Florida?
The 82‑year‑old widow in Pennsylvania?
The retired Navy Chief Petty Officer in Missouri?
They feel it now.
And if they die early?
No more Social Security checks.
No more Medicare payouts.
No angry letter to Congress.
No TRICARE insurance or military retirement pay.
The Political Genius of “Accidental” Harm
If anyone accuses the administration of targeting seniors…they shrug:
“Who, us? We just wanted to empower people to make their own health choices.”
It’s the perfect political crime:
The victims die quietly.
The survivors blame “personal choice” or bad luck.
The budget line for entitlements shrinks.
Whether this started as malice or ignorance doesn’t even matter anymore.
The outcome is the same.
The Emotional Truth
If you’re reading this…you are either:
Counting on Social Security, or
Love someone who is.
And if you’re still trusting the system to protect you in the next outbreak…RFK Jr. just made that bet riskier.
The administration is gambling with your life to fix their budget problem without saying it.
What You Must Do Now
Share this article with everyone in your family over 50.
Call your representatives and demand public statements opposing:
RFK Jr.’s purge of health experts
Any attempt to privatize Social Security, “backdoor” or otherwise
Pay attention to local outbreaks…and vaccinate…regardless of the chaos in D.C.
Stay loud: Silence is the soil their quiet schemes grow in.
Don’t Let Them Pretend This Was an Accident
Scott Bessent whispered the fiscal strategy.
RFK Jr. is carrying the biological half of the plan.
Whether by deep misunderstanding or cold calculation…the effect is the same:
Higher risk for older Americans
Fewer Social Security checks to cut
A nation drifting toward “you’re on your own”
They are counting on you to be tired…distracted…or fatalistic.
Don’t give them that gift.
Keep your chin up. Eyes up. Shoulders back….and remember to breathe….now.
I’ll be back in a flash!
-Jack
P.S. If this shook you, remember: what you just read is the free version. Paid subscribers get the tools to fight back…call scripts…action kits…and the inside track before the next shoe drops. If you’re angry…don’t just read. Join the fight
I guess the brainworm guy figures he is going to live forever even if we are not. Plus he has more money than the average American. I will continue to get vaccinated. At 74 I want to keep living and I like others need my social security and Medicare. This insanity will undoubtedly take many lives. Both young and old. For those who are on the common sense side but very limited income they will be hurt the most. I remember 15 years ago seeing a single elderly woman in low income housing having to decide on a very expensive antibiotic or her insulin. When people are on Medicaid they have to continually report expenses and if family helps with med costs they can lose their full Medicaid and end up on cost of share. Many of the elderly women never worked and collected under their spouse and have less than $1000 for social security. It is not viable now so it will only get worse
Many years ago when I was working in a nursing home in Wisconsin, someone said to me, "You know, don't you, that the government is secretly working toward euthanasia for old people?" This, of course, is paraphrase, because, as I said, it was many years ago. But of course, I never forgot it. Now we have a government that is on the verge of implementing an elaborate version of that, not so quietly thanks to Scott Bessent and his hot mike, and our favorite sewer swimmer RFK jr.
Like Teri, I will continue to get vaccinated and attempt to stay alive if for no other reason than to piss them off. Yes, I need Social Security and, ungainly as it is, Medicare. And I'm not going to be around forever, but my children are headed for a calamitous time in the very near future. The depravity of the minds behind this horror do not even deserve consideration. Unfortunately, because we seem to be teetering on the brink of the inevitable, we need to get busy and appeal to whichever minds are hanging around in our respective states. And I do love forwarding Substacks to Chuck Schumer and Josh Riley.