Seeing Ebola through Obama's eyes

By Cliff Kincaid

The nephew of the black African who brought Ebola to the United States doesn't blame his uncle. He blames us. He writes in The Dallas Morning News that his uncle did everything right in Liberia, but still got Ebola, and wasn't treated correctly in the U.S. The claim is that he had a right to be on U.S. soil and that it's our fault he's dead.

I suspect this is how President Barack Obama views Ebola. How else do you explain his opposition to a common-sense ban on travel to the U.S. by people from Ebola-infected countries? Tragically, Obama's alternative is for the U.S. to become infected. Then, he must figure, there will be more pressure to find a "cure," or at least a vaccine. But who knows how many will die in the process? It could be hundreds, or thousands, or more.

Ordinary Americans are scratching their heads, and some are getting angry, over the "flawed" approach to Ebola by the U.S. government. These people don't understand that Obama views restrictions on African travel to the U.S. as racist. He won't say this publicly, but as someone who has been documenting Obama's Marxist background and approach to public policy for six years, there is no other logical explanation. He sees the people of much of the world, including Africa and the Middle East, as victims of American foreign policy. We are responsible for their problems.

Speaking for the Obama approach, black Congresswoman Gwen Moore (D-WI) says it is "reactionary" to propose a travel ban. It is "unreasonable and dangerous" to keep Africans out, she says.

Rush Limbaugh delivered a commentary that was posted on his website under the headline "Liberals See Ebola Through Prism of Slavery." He quoted a liberal guest on Anderson Cooper's CNN show as saying, "we in America, how dare we turn our backs on Liberia, given the fact that this is a country that was founded in the 1820s, 1830s because of American slavery. We have a responsibility to stay connected with them and help them see this through."

Limbaugh commented, "It's our fault, see. If it hadn't been for us and our evil ways back at the country's founding, why, there might not even be an Ebola wiping out people in Africa. So we have a responsibility, a shared responsibility."

Dinesh D'Souza wrote a book, The Roots of Obama's Rage, on Obama's anti-colonialism. I argue that Marxism, rather than anti-colonialism, motivates Obama. Still, D'Souza's point is a good one. For whatever reason, Obama hates the West and all that it stands for. Permitting Ebola to be imported into the U.S. is one way to make the U.S. pay for its sins.

Barbara Loe Fisher of the National Vaccine Information Center has written a series of questions that illustrate how the Obama administration has facilitated the spread of Ebola to the U.S. Her conclusion is that "some people in industry, government and the World Health Organization did not want the Ebola outbreak to be confined to several nations in Africa because that would fail to create a lucrative global market for mandated use of fast-tracked Ebola vaccines by every one of the seven billion human beings living on this planet."

The flaw in this thinking is that Ebola could spread so fast that millions will die and economies will collapse (including our own) before a vaccine is developed.

One can argue there may have been a similar motivation behind the federal response to AIDS, and yet an AIDS vaccine has still not been developed. Billions of dollars have been spent on it, however, as 39 million have died of AIDS-related causes. AIDS has mostly been dealt with through other drugs and treatments. It's not clear if an Ebola vaccine will be effective or if it can be ready in a short period of time. Fisher is correct, however, that a vaccine is on a fast track, and that a vaccine would affect millions of people who would never have come into contact with Ebola if it had not been for the Obama administration's decision to let infected people in. Fisher's group, the National Vaccine Information Center, warns of deadly side-effects from various vaccines.

Obama's use of the race card in the case of Ebola will become overt if members of Congress persist in calling for a travel ban. However, Obama can argue that a travel ban would violate a U.N. resolution against the "isolation" of the Ebola-infected countries. That measure calls on U.N. member states "to lift general travel and border restrictions, imposed as a result of the Ebola outbreak, and that contribute to the further isolation of the affected countries and undermine their efforts to respond to the Ebola outbreak..." It also "calls on airlines and shipping companies to maintain trade and transport links with the affected countries and the wider region..." Obama's administration voted for this U.N. resolution.

The first member of Congress to call for a travel ban wasn't a "reactionary" right-winger. Rather, it was liberal Democrat Alan Grayson of Florida. He made this common-sense request to the administration in a July 29 letter. "I believe that you have the legal authority to implement" a travel ban, Grayson said in his letter to Secretary of State John Kerry and Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson. But since the crisis has accelerated and his President has come under fire for the federal response, Grayson has gone mostly silent. He doesn't want to hurt his party's chances in the November elections by criticizing the Democratic President.

Isn't it strange that a President who uses and abuses his executive authority to promote his own far-left agenda has failed to exercise his power to protect the American people from a deadly disease?

As Obama's vote for the U.N. resolution that requires open borders and continued flights from West Africa shows, it seems as if the President of the United States wants to deliberately inflict pain and suffering (and death) on the American people. The U.N. approves of his actions, but the American people don't. The Washington Post reports that a poll from The Washington Post and ABC News shows that 67 percent of people support a travel ban.

If Obama's dereliction of duty in this life and death matter isn't grounds for impeachment, what is?

In the House, where impeachment would have to originate, Republican Speaker John Boehner (OH) has just announced he believes that Obama should "consider" a travel ban. This is too little, too late to avoid the death and suffering which has already occurred. And he didn't go far enough in his polite request.

Meanwhile, the House Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, chaired by Rep. Tim Murphy (R-PA), scheduled an oversight hearing on the Ebola outbreak for today (October 16th).

Full committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) says, "The Ebola outbreak is a global public health issue that demands an all-hands-on-deck response. We cannot afford to look back and say we could have done more." Clearly, much more could have and should have been done, if only the Obama administration had acted on the need for a travel ban earlier.

Upton went on: "The United States has a first-class health care system and we will do everything necessary to treat the sick, contain the threat, and protect the public health."

Again, that is clearly not the case. The American people are scared and will not tolerate this "don't worry" rhetoric from Democrats or Republicans. They have seen for themselves how federal officials will lie to them.

Being the opposition political party, it is up to the Republicans to confront the criminally negligent and reckless approach to Ebola that threatens the lives of our families and loved ones. It is time for Congress to act against the President who has knowingly permitted this deadly disease to take root on American soil.

© Cliff Kincaid