Jesse Jackson Politicizes Thomas Duncan's Death. Friedan's Gonna Do Something. Meanwhile Ebola Could Become An Epidemic. Our Leaderless Country.

Is Ebola a racist plot?

Posted on October 10, 2014 by Ben Crystal

Mamie Mangoe, a friend of the Duncan family, wipes a tear away during a memorial service for Ebola victim Thomas Eric Duncan in Dallas on Wednesday, Oct. 8, 2014. (Nathan Hunsinger/Dallas Morning News/MCT)

Wednesday morning, Thomas Eric Duncan stamped his name in the history books as the first American to die of Ebola. Duncan, who arrived in the United States from Liberia on Sept. 20, passed away while isolated in a special unit at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, 10 days after he was admitted and 13 days after he first sought care at the same hospital. All things being equal, Duncan’s death is sad. He was only 42; he was attempting to reunite with his estranged family; and he reportedly contracted the deadly virus while assisting a neighbor seeking care for the same disease. I have no doubt he’ll be missed by those who knew and loved him.

In and of itself, Duncan’s case seems fairly straightforward. A man from an Ebola-stricken country contracted Ebola, and it killed him. Given that Ebola victims’ survival prospects are relatively dim under the best of circumstances, it can’t be all that surprising that Duncan didn’t survive. But Duncan didn’t die in Liberia; he died in America. In America, nothing — even fatalities caused by fatal diseases — is straightforward.

Before Duncan’s body began to cool down from its feverish temps, the Rev. Jesse Jackson brought his considerable medical expertise to bear on Duncan’s death. Jackson said: “Whether you are white in Atlanta or whether you are white in Nebraska or black in Dallas — we know there’s different treatment among blacks in this country.” It wasn’t a jacked-up tropical super disease that cut short Duncan’s mortal coil; it was racism. And Jackson would know because he used to watch “ER.” Apparently, Jackson failed to convince others, including Duncan’s nephew, Josephus Weeks, who had nothing but praise for the THPH staffs’ efforts. “No amount of thanks in the world I can give you. [I am] forever in my debt for treating a man who had no means. He had no ways. But you treated him like a diamond. I appreciate all the efforts you’re putting in. Thank you on behalf of my family.”

Following Jackson’s diagnosis, the regressive clown car disgorged a horde of other self-professed medical experts. A CNN anchor named Ashleigh Banfield suggested “Doctor” Jackson might be on to something: “You cannot rule out the notion that he had no Social Security number when he went to the hospital, and had a strong, thick West African accent. And his partner even said he’s from Liberia.”

Prep an OR STAT! America needs a racist-ectomy! Banfield — who is whiter than line dancing at a northern Montana goat rodeo — went on to opine that Duncan’s allegedly poor treatment could precipitate a “wrongful death” lawsuit against THPH. While I’m certain the lawyers were already lined up at the hospital doors like dogs waiting for soup bones, it’s a hell of a stretch to suggest the hospital staffers acted with any malice or neglect — unless the accuser presumes they’re all sociopaths. “OK, Mr. Duncan. You might have a potentially fatal hemorrhagic fever, or it could be allergies. Take two of these and hopefully don’t die.”

Of course, Jackson and his backing chorus of race-baiters are carefully minimizing a few salient facts. Duncan had Ebola. It wasn’t allergies; it wasn’t even SARS. The man contracted a disease that regularly kills people. And Ebola isn’t new, even if its current iteration seems so. Ebola outbreaks have been recorded back as far as 1976, with an associated virus originating in Africa striking a town in Germany as far back as 1967. The idea that Duncan is the victim of a racist conspiracy stretching back at least 40 years is sillier than CNN’s idea of “journalism.” If Ebola is the product of a racist conspiracy, then the white people who have contracted it — including a doctor who risked his life to help fight Ebola and a cameraman for NBC News — must be collateral damage. If Duncan’s treatment were a consequence of racism, then THPH would sport a rather high ratio of black-to-white patient deaths, something that would have been noticed before now.

It’s also worth noting that Duncan lied about his exposure to Ebola in order to get here. I’ll be the first to admit that if I were exposed to Ebola, Liberia would be pretty far down the list of places in which I’d want to be marooned. Of course, I’m an American who would be trying to get home. Duncan was a Liberian trying to leave his. I know President Barack Obama has relaxed immigration standards to “you can enter if you pinkie-swear you’re not in ISIS,” but “exposed to Ebola” ought to fall into the “Do NOT pass go” category.

The current Ebola outbreak is far too serious to drown in a sea of ludicrous sound bites. While Jackson needs the race card in order to secure a paycheck, putty-faced talking hairstyles like Banfield and the rest of Obama’s cheering section are motivated by simple partisanship. A real African disease joins ISIS, Obamacare and the Internal Revenue Service in actively threatening Americans, and the Democrats are busy blaming imaginary causes.

Unfortunately, Obama and his regime have handled the Ebola outbreak with the same double-talk and bumbling which have marked every other gaffe, scandal and/or outright crime they’ve created. Actually, Obama has been largely absent from the proceedings, a consequence of his busy schedule of golf and fundraising. Fortunately, his surrogates have been more than up to the task of embarrassing themselves and the rest of us.

The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Tom Frieden, M.D., fresh from an appearance on CNN in which he managed to argue both for and against heightened Ebola protocols, continued his confused coordination of anti-Ebola efforts. During a Tuesday press conference, Frieden argued both for and against travel restrictions to and from Ebola-stricken countries in Africa, announcing measures that could include questionnaires and temperature readings, precisely the measures that Duncan defeated to deliver Ebola to Dallas. However, he opposes travel restrictions, which might have been more effective than: “Do U have Ebola? Check ‘yes’ or ‘no.’”

Said Frieden: “We’re not today providing the steps that we plan to take, but I can assure you that we will be taking additional steps, and we will be making those public in the coming days, once we can work out the details.”

Right, they don’t know what they’re going to do; but they’re going to do something, and soon-ish. I just hope we can survive their efforts.

–Ben Crystal