Clay Wirestone of the Kansas Reflector calls it as he sees it:
When the original medicine shows were popular, let’s say 1890, the average U.S. life expectancy was 44 years. Diseases struck children and adults down in their prime, with doctors helpless to intervene. Prayer and booze were all they had.
In the 130 years since, our life expectancy has shot up to nearly 79 years. Once-fatal diseases have been all but eliminated — thanks to vaccinations and other treatments — and we enjoy a standard of living our forebears could only dream about.
Which brings us one high-profile guest of this medicine show. In 1890, he might have been called the “professor,” the storyteller who knit the whole evening together.
Today, we simply call him Kris Kobach, former Kansas secretary of state and current candidate for attorney general. Defeated in runs for governor and U.S. Senate, Kobach knows all about failing upward, about taking a losing situation and making it sound preordained. Like the professors of old, he gets the grift.
Modern medicine has gotten most of the crowd to where they are, and, by gum, they’re not going to take it anymore!
