The tinfoil around my head this morning must be a little tight - I keep

[BR_Parkway]

thinking about how a guy, with TB

1) gets told by Dr's not to travel
2) doesn't have his passport pulled
3) who's father-in-law actually works at CDC with TB (and didn't say don't travel)
4) gets let back into the country even though the border guard knew
5) the uber media hype at least as large as any blonde-in-distress story

and

6) subpoenas, investigations and the tattered ends of scandals starting to be tied into pretty bows that everyone can see
7) GWB's "I shall be the Dictator-in-Chief" if anything catastrophic occurs....


A couple of well placed CDC press releases in the next few days could have people sitting in their homes, behind locked doors with their guns locked and loaded....

or

Maybe it's early and I just haven't had enough coffee yet

[rasputin1952]

1. Get the caffeine level up first...

There are so many scenarios that bush could name himself emporer and then a god, that life seems surreal these days. The chances of this actually happening are incredibly small, but I've seen and heard of some pretty weird stuff during my life.

One ting is on our side w/bush possibly declaring himself emperor...I don't believe that the militarty and police forces of this nation would accept that, and w/o that kind of power...he could ever get away w/it. There would be a 'coup' to keep him from maintaining and kind of power. But still....:scared:

[radfringe]

2. it's this summer's booga-booga story

until there's a rash of shark attacks or alligator attacks or bird flu reports....

[wakeme2008]

3. add to that he just got married and

did his wife know about his TB..

[displacedtexan]

5. And she's from Roswell.

Cue that Twilight Zone theme song.

[peaches2003]

10. Roswell, GA

an Atlanta suburb. Don't know if you thought it was Roswell, NM or not.

[displacedtexan]

12. Pesky "facts" are getting in my way today.

I was trying to be snarky.

I failed, Fact-Based peaces2003!

:hi:

[peaches2003]

14. That's what I thought, but wasn't sure

:think:

[TZ]

4. The CDC is saying that very few people are at risk..

only the ones on the planes, and even then the risk of transmission is low. The CDC, if you get past the MSM statements is actually not hyping this at all. In fact they are trying to play down fears. The way the organization is set up, its not the politicians speaking, its the head epidemiologists talking. Don't get scared by the media. It is indeed their current "shark attack" story.

[Clark2008]

8. What about all those people in Europe?

Wasn't he in close contact with merchants, hotel staff, citizens on his honeymoon?

Or, don't they count, since they aren't Americans?

[TZ]

9. TB does not transmit well in places like hotels, malls or outdoors.

Unless you remain in close contact (Ie living with, traveling with) with the person. Airplanes are enclosed systems with recycled air. They are indeed germ incubators. Even then epidemiologists say that only the people 4 or 5 rows around this guy are at risk.
This has nothing to do with whether the people were American or not, and all to do with the facts of TB transmission. TB is actually something that has popped up from time to time in Washington DC, mostly the homeless but sometimes others and there have been cases of people who didn't know they had it and riding on crowded subways without getting anyone else sick. Also its coughing that usually transmit it, so if he wasn't coughing (from what I heard he was asymptomatic) he couldn't transmit. And I would bet thats what his father in law told him and what made him think it was okay to travel to Europe.

[liberal N proud]

6. Wasn't his wedding just before or during the trip?

I though I heard somewhere that the guy didn't want to miss his wedding thus the reason for the travel. If his father-in-law is a TB specialist, why did he not recommend to his daughter to hold off on marriage?

As a father, that one boggles my mind, you don't let your kids do things that are danger to their health if you have information to protect them.

[TZ]

7. father in law says he didn't recommend him to travel

but like the CDC he didn't know this guy had the really resistant strain. I don't find it a big stretch to think this guy thought I feel fine, and I want my wedding so ignored the advice. Plenty of people in this world always think they "know better" than experts and lawyers are notorious for that.

[robcon]

11. It's the SARS or West Nile virus story of 2007

It'll blow over.

[blueworld]

13. I've had too much coffee

What if his father-in-law snuck some TB germs home & infected the guy so * could declare himself Emperor-in-chief? Then, ironically, the super germs sweep the nation and the world and we all start dreaming about an old black woman in Nebraska playing the guitar in a cornfield...no, I did that one last week.

But still I love a great conspiracy theory.

[peaches2003]

15. If the Border Patrol guys make up the rules as they go

why do we bother with Homeland Security at all. This could just as easily been a terrorist as the idiot it was. In either case there was no security at all.