Stop the horseshit. Stop the flights.
One infected person already took two flights back and forth to Ohio from Dallas-Ft. Worth. The two planes involved made 27 further flights, potentially exposing thousands of contacts to Ebola.
Another previously non-monitored healthcare worker is "self-quarantining" on a cruise ship loaded with people, 2000 miles away off the coast of Belize. And so far even Belize is smarter than you and the CDC about how to handle that: they said "Fuck no!" when asked if we could waltz her through their country to get her back in lockdown here ASAP. When banana republics are smarter than you are, you should probably take note.
The "voluntary" isolation orders laid on 74 other workers require them not to go out in any public place or use any public transport, including busses, trains, planes, or ships.
So it's far beyond jackassical to make the farcical claim that halting all passenger transport or entry visas from the three most-affected countries won't work.
It works so well, in fact, that it's the exact first thing we do with our own people here at home with even less suspicion than any of the hundreds of travelers proceeding here daily from those three countries engender.
So let's stop the monkey-assed claims that it doesn't work, won't help, and will lead to them sneaking in here some other way.
For both your benefit, and that of your Chief Medical Flying Monkey, CDC Director Frieden, there hasn't been a land route into the US from Africa since somewhere between 6000 and 200,000,000 years ago, according to either biblical or geologic scholars.
So any "experts" telling you that somehow Ebola victims will be able to walk on water to get here are clearly stupider than a bag of hammers. The fact that you can't and won't name any such experts is proof that they're nothing but your Imaginary Friends; all well and good to have when you're four years old, but when you're a sitting president of the US, not so much.
If concerns are that they'll somehow fly to another country and then walk across the southern border, then maybe, since you're already up, you could pull your head out on that and start securing it too. People have only been shouting for that for 20 years, so maybe you could finally get on that, just for the helluvit.
We know it's hard for someone with such strong ties to your native continent to ever put the concerns of the country you were elected to represent first, but grow a little:
Put America First.
I know it's a novel concept in the Oval Office these past 5 or 6 years, but perhaps a small step, like not exposing 316 million of your own citizens needlessly to a deadly pathogen, might be one of the first tentative steps to actually thinking and acting like an American would in similar circumstances. Who knows where that could lead?
I'm not asking you stop waving your latte at the Marine guards on Marine and Air Force One, or actually learning the words to the Pledge of Allegiance, or the National Anthem, or where your hand goes when you say them in public - that would be crazy talk! - because God damn America! knows what a busy golfer President you are.
But hopefully we can agree that not transporting a weekly quota of Ebola-infected plague-drones here to kill people, expose our kids, devastate our hospitals, and wreak havoc on the national economy, psyche, and the peace of mind of everyone living here (with a functioning brain)* is a good idea.
*{Tom Frieden, call your office. Oz left a message: the Wizard's found your diploma!}
But if we can't agree to that, then institute this simple compromise: From here on out, on days you aren't using it, we start flying everyone leaving Liberia, Guinea, and Sierra Leone here on Air Force One. That way we'll all know exactly how safe it is to let them get on planes and come here, and you can get some great photo ops with them!
It's a shame your Aunt Zeituni has passed away, but maybe you can find some other relatives over there to help by giving them work as cabin attendants for the flights, and welcoming folks from their country to ours on your behalf. I hear Chelsea Clinton needs a gig too now that she's no longer working for NBC, and she's got a new baby. Putting her on board would help out a struggling new mom, and give you a chance to pay back Hillary for those long years of faithful service getting our consulates burned down and such, making up wild cover stories, and then forgetting all the details.
So how about it? Show us how much you're buying the "you can't catch Ebola on an airplane" stories, by putting as many of those totally harmless non-symptomatic travelers on your plane, to help support their struggling economies. And then, no one could accuse you of blatant double-talking, flagrant lies, and obvious hypocrisy, because then you'd no longer be recklessly endangering the entire country while carefully ducking any personal consequences.
Unlike what you're doing now, every single day.
and now, for something completely different... Obama has appointed a LAWYER to oversee his non response to this crisis. you cant make this $hit up.
ReplyDelete@8:19 - You don't know anything about Washington, do you?
DeleteThey've already got all the doctors they need (perhaps more than). The problem is bringing all of the bureaucracies together and paddling their respective boats in the same direction. Regardless of what you think of lawyers, a lawyer who has done this before in DC is the best person to beat the different parochial agencies into submission.
Nope, sorry I disagree. This makes about as much sense as GWB putting his friend 'Brownie' in charge of FEMA/Katrina debacle. Political cronies with no experience in the area just exacerbates the problem.
Delete@9:44
DeleteThis clown they appointed was the Chief of Staff for Al Gore, con man.
AND, Joseph Biden.
Tell me again, how the Chief of Staff for Joe Biden is the best choice as the Ebola Czar?
So A Lawyer?
Fo' Shizzle, Obama is finally getting skeert, of the response when American's find out how badly he screwed them, and the democrat's party?
Wait till the back lash hits them, they will be howling for Obama's hide too.
He's gonna need more than a team of lawyers the minute one families students catch Ebola from that nurse in Ohio.
He's gonna need some fairy dust, unicorn shit and a miracle.
As will we all.
@10:11 Or Making Hillary Secretary of State because she was a FLOTUS once.
DeleteAll y'all have no clue about how things actually get done in Washington.
DeleteIt has *nothing* to do with substantive knowledge. It's all about who you know and how many times you've gotten things over the goal line in Congress and the agencies.
It makes as much sense to put a doctor or a nurse in charge of coordinating a federal government response to a crisis as it does to put a lawyer in charge of a cardiac catheterization. Sure, the lawyer can read about it, but he has no freaking clue what to do with that knowledge.
Why do you think the CDC has had its budget whacked so badly? It's because it's run by physicians who have no idea how to play the game in DC.
You're right, we're going to need some fairy dust, unicorn shit and a miracle, but who do you think paid for the under the table supply of fairy dust? A lawyer...
CDC has spent $10B on "biohazard emergency preparedness" alone since 2001, and the HHS budget has gone up every year since it was founded. Nobody's budget got whacked, in any year, except DoD.
DeleteIf it had been cutting actual budgets, we wouldn't be trillions of dollars in debt.
I'd like to have been there when the Captain of that cruise ship told the rest of the passengers about their Ebola suspected infected co passenger.
ReplyDeleteI bet being confined to quarters was more to keep her from being torn apart and tossed to the sharks at that point.