Posted on 10/16/2014 7:36:04 AM PDT by Covenantor
Top US Lawmakers Urge West Africa Travel Ban
2014-10-16 07:37
Washington - Senior US lawmakers overseeing homeland security on Wednesday joined calls for authorities to impose a temporary ban on travel from West Africa, in order to prevent an Ebola outbreak.
Two American health-care workers at a Dallas, Texas hospital have been diagnosed with Ebola after caring for a Liberian man who died of the disease last week, and President Barack Obama's administration has shifted into overdrive in efforts to contain the disease's spread.
"A temporary ban on travel to the United States from countries afflicted with the virus is something that the president should absolutely consider along with any other appropriate actions as doubts about the security of our air travel systems grow", house speaker John Boehner said in a statement.
House Homeland security committee chairperson Michael McCaul and several of his subcommittee chairs wrote to Homeland Security department boss Jeh Johnson and secretary of state John Kerry urging them to take specific action, alleging that there are weaknesses in the US health care system.
"In light of these current vulnerabilities, we urge you to consider temporarily suspending the visas of individuals from Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone until the outbreak is under control", wrote McCaul and five subcommittee chairs, all Republicans.
They also suggested that anyone who contracts Ebola in the United States be transferred to one of four hospitals best prepared to handle such cases: Emory University Hospital in Georgia, the National Institutes of health in Maryland, Nebraska Medical Centre or the St Patrick Hospital in Montana.
The remarks came a day before top US health experts testify to a House panel about the official response to the outbreak, which has caused concern among several lawmakers, particularly after it was revealed that the second person to contract Ebola in the United States travelled on a commercial flight from Ohio to Texas shortly before being diagnosed.
Senator Ted Cruz of Texas called for stronger leadership from the White House.
"Hope is not a strategy", Cruz wrote in the Texas Tribune. "Given the gravity of the threat, common sense dictates that it's time to ban flights from the countries afflicted by Ebola."
Ground Control to Major Tom ping
Good election line
If the law was passed by both houses of Congress, would President 0bola sign into law?
If signed into law, would Homeland Security abide by the law?
If you answered "no" to these three questions, you are a domestic terrorist and deserve getting 0bola.
Fedzilla is stuck on stoopid.
Obama and his criminals are at the White House right now trying to find someone to blame or maybe Obama can read a speech and Fix everything , D’oh
Post to me or FReep mail to be on/off the Bring Out Your Dead ping list.
The purpose of the “Bring Out Your Dead” ping list (formerly the “Ebola” ping list) is very early warning of emerging pandemics, as such it has a high false positive rate.
So far the false positive rate is 100%.
At some point we may well have a high mortality pandemic, and likely as not the “Bring Out Your Dead” threads will miss the beginning entirely.
*sigh* Such is life, and death...
Is there anyone on FreeRepublic who can make a gif of Obama as Alfred E Neumann with the tradional motto, “What me worry?” Underneath.
The gif could be made with a Pinocchio nose that grows and contracts.
"Them dam Republicans should represent their own dam country.
I'll represent who I dam well please."
“Fedzilla is stuck on stooped.”
Actually the GOP is stuck on stupid. If we were 3 weeks from an election and a Republican president with the exact same incompetence during a health crisis, Pelosi and Reid would be standing outside the White House screaming for the head of the CDC director and every Dem congressional candidate would be pounding their Republican opponents for the inept handling of the crisis.
Remember Katrina? The winds had not died down before the Democrats were screaming loudly for the head of FEMA, thereby covering up the failure of Mayor Nagin and the Louisiana Democrat governor to prepare and evacuate the town. Within three days the FEMA director had been forced to resign and Bush looked like a total idiot. The administration never recovered.
The GOP should be in full attack mode demanding the head of the CDC director and the head of the new Secretary of HHS, his boss. They should be demanding the border be shut down and visa rescinded for people from the affected countries. They should be demanding anyone involved in the care of ebola patients be put in isolation for 21 days. They should be demanding daily updates as to the condition of the family of the dead ebola patient.
The Democrats pretended outrage at Bush’s handling of Katrina when the failure was their own politicians at the state and local level. Here is a real crisis being totally mismanaged by a Democrat president yet there is no outrage from the opposition party just a few days before the election.
More evidence the stupid party (GOP) is not an opposition party.
Don’t the Obama people know that all it will take is one more West African coming down with ebola in the US and there will be riots here??
MAD magazine has some awesome Obama wehat me worry images. Search their site and grab some
Yup, another Cruz missile hit, must be a Hellfire
Ban the damn flights.
Yes, but the $hithead in chief has ordered that this will not happen.
+1
I'm so sick of hearing Republicans "urging" this or that. DO SOMETHING! - "ARREST LOIS LERNER" - "ARREST ERIC HOLDER". Throw them in a cell with a couple detainees from west Africa.
Is this the GOP that wants us to vote for them in the next couple weeks? For what purpose? What's in it for the American people? More strongly worded letters to tyrant Obama?
Yep, you’re right.
A link to this thread has been posted on the Ebola Surveillance Thread
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