MSNBC Points Finger at NRA For 'Making the Ebola Crisis Worse'

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MSNBC anchor Krystal Ball and NBC correspondent Anne Thompson shamelessly politicized the Ebola crisis in a Thursday op-ed on MSNBC.com. Ball and Thompson bewailed how due to “Senate dysfunction and NRA opposition, we don’t have a surgeon general right now….during a time when, we not only have Ebola arriving on our shores, but are also dealing with the mysterious Enterovirus, which is infecting and contributing to the deaths of children in the U.S.”

The two on-air personalities led their piece, “How the NRA is making the Ebola crisis worse,” by noting that “poll by Harvard found that 39% of U.S. adults are concerned about a large outbreak here, and more than a quarter fear someone in their immediate family could get sick with Ebola.” They continued with a lament: “If only there was someone around who could educate the American public about the actual level of risk. Someone who was trusted as a public health expert and whose job it was to help us understand what we really need to worry about and what precautions we should take.”

Ball (the winner of the MRC’s “#obamacarefail” Dishonor Award) and Thompson underlined that these roles are among the “primary responsibilities of the United States surgeon general,” and that “there’s just one problem: Thanks to Senate dysfunction and NRA opposition, we don’t have a surgeon general right now. In fact, we haven’t had a surgeon general for more than a year now — even though the president nominated the eminently qualified Dr. Vivek Murthy back in November 2013.”

After devoting several paragraphs touting the role of the surgeon general, the two NBC News employees outlined their case for why the National Rifle Association is to blame for the situation:

…Murthy’s nomination has been held up by Republicans and a few red state Democrats due to this surprisingly controversial stance: He believes that guns can impact your health. Well, to be fair, this conservative coalition is not troubled by his stance, so much as they are fearful of the NRA, which decided to try to scuttle Murthy’s confirmation. The NRA wrote a strongly worded letter, Rand Paul put a hold on the nomination, and Red State Democrats begged Harry Reid to not force them to vote. It’s funny that the strongly worded letters of ordinary citizens don’t seem to have quite the same effect.

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Voter Opposition to Obama at 16-Year High, Worse than Bush, Clinton

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Angry and frustrated voters are planning to use the midterm elections in one month to tell President Obama they oppose his agenda, the highest “no vote” percentage in the last 16 years measured by Gallup.

The polling outfit found that 32 percent of voters want to send a message of opposition with their vote, compared to just 20 percent who are sending a signal of support.

That is 13 points higher than in 1998 when former President Clinton was headed to impeachment for lying about his sex affair with a former White House intern and even a smidge higher — 2 points — than in 2008, when Americans were tired of President Bush’s military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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Man Dies of 'Marburg', Fever Similar to Ebola, in Uganda

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Photo Credit: ShutterstockA man has died in Uganda’s capital after an outbreak of Marburg, a highly infectious haemorrhagic fever similar to Ebola, authorities said on Sunday, adding that a total of 80 people who came into contact with him had been put under quarantine.

Marburg starts with a severe headache followed by haemorrhaging and leads to death in 80% or more of cases in about nine days. It is from the same family of viruses as Ebola, which has killed thousands in West Africa in recent months.

There is no vaccine or specific treatment for the Marburg virus, which is transmitted through bodily fluids such as saliva and blood or by handling infected wild animals such as monkeys.

Samples taken

The health ministry said in a statement that the 30-year old radiographer died on 28 September while working at a hospital in Kampala. He had started feeling unwell about 10 days earlier and his condition kept deteriorating.

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Parents of Ex-Army Ranger Held by ISIS Release Letter Written by Son

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Photo Credit: Fox NewsThe parents of a former Army Ranger threatened with beheading by the Islamic State militant group released a letter written by their son earlier this year in which he said he was afraid to die, but was at peace with his conversion to Islam.

Ed and Paula Kassig said in a statement Sunday that they had been told by a former hostage that their son Peter had voluntarily converted to Islam sometime between October and December of last year when he shared a cell with a Syrian Muslim. They said that their son “took Islam’s practices seriously, including praying the five daily prayers and taking on the name Abdul-Rahman.”

The Kassings also released a letter written by their 26-year-old son in which he thanked them for their strength and commitment and appeared to try to prepare them for his death.

“I am obviously pretty scared to die but the hardest part is not knowing, wondering, hoping, and wondering if I should even hope at all,” Kassig said in the letter, according to his parents. “I am very sad that all this has happened and for what all of you back home are going through. If I do die, I figure that at least you and I can seek refuge and comfort in knowing that I went out as a result of trying to alleviate suffering and helping those in need.”

Kassig was taken captive by the Islamic State group Oct. 1, 2013, in Syria, where he was providing aid for refugees fleeing that country’s civil war.

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Biden Continues to Apologize; First Turkey, Now UAE

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Photo Credit: Olivier Douliery / Abaca Press / MCTVice President Joe Biden apologized to the United Arab Emirates Sunday for charging that the oil-rich ally had been supporting al Qaida and other jihadi groups in Syria’s internal war, his second apology in as many days to a key participant in the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State extremists.

The White House said Biden telephoned Crown Prince Mohamed bin Zayed of Abu Dhabi to say that his recent remarks “regarding the early stages” of the conflict in Syria “were not meant to imply that the Emirates had facilitated or supported” the Islamic State, al Qaida or other extremist groups in Syria.

But his apology, one day after expressing similar regrets to Turkey, left open whether the Emirates had supported the rise of al Qaida during the early stages of the war in Syria.

Biden was answering questions at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government Thursday when he veered off the official talking points to declare, “Our allies in the region were our largest problem” in preventing the spread of al Qaida in Syria.

“The Saudis, the Emiratis; what were they doing?” he said. “They were so determined to take down (Syrian President Bashar) Assad and have a proxy Sunni-Shia war, they poured hundreds of millions of dollars and thousands of tons of weapons into anyone who would fight against Assad. Except that the people who were being supplied were (Jabhat) al Nusra and al Qaida, and the extremist elements of jihadis coming from other parts of the world.”

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'Face the Nation' Leaves Out Netanyahu's Criticism of Obama (+video)

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Photo Credit: Truth RevoltAnyone watching Sunday’s broadcast of Face the Nation on CBS did not hear critical comments about President Obama from Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Those were edited out and sequestered to CBS’s website, leaving only the positive comments aired.

What Americans heard as they sat in front of their televisions Sunday morning was Netanyahu’s positive comments about his relationship with Obama over images of the two leaders smiling in one another’s presence. In describing his relationship with the president, Netanyahu said:

Actually, it’s quite good. We had a conversation, I don’t want to say like an old married couple, but the president said that he’s had more meetings with me than with any other foreign leader. I think you get to a point of mutual respect, you cut to the chase very quickly. You talk about the real things, openly, as is befitting of real allies. I think we have a relationship of mutual respect, and mutual appreciation.

Here’s the clip of what aired:

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Two More Womb-Swap Babies Due in Weeks (And Here's the Boy who Made History)

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Photo Credit: Daily MailTwo women are just weeks away from giving birth – using transplanted wombs donated by their own mothers.

The expectant mums will be the first to carry children using the very uterus that carried them as unborn infants. The pregnancies are part of a revolutionary Swedish project to allow childless women to fulfill their dream of starting a family.

The world’s first womb swap baby, named as Vincent, has already been delivered using an unrelated donor.

Now doctors are preparing for two more arrivals – but this time each one is being nurtured in its grandmother’s womb.

The extraordinary procedure, which doctors have likened in importance to the first successful heart transplant, means each womb will have carried two generations of the same family.

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WATCH: Fired Up Obama to Immigration Activists: 'No Force On Earth Can Stop Us'

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Photo Credit: YouTubeBy Daniel Halper.

A fired up President Barack Obama had a message to immigration activists at a dinner this evening in Washington, D.C.: “no force on earth can stop us.”

“The clearest path to change is to change [the voter turnout] number,” said Obama “Si se puede, si votamos! Yes, we can, if we vote!”

“You know, earlier this year, I had a chance to host a screening of the film Cesar Chavez at the White House, and I was reminded that Cesar organized for nearly 20 years before his first major victory. He never saw that time as a failure. Looking back, he said, I remember the families who joined our movement and paid dues long before there was any hope of winning contracts. I remember thinking then that with spirit like that, no force on earth could stop us.

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Photo Credit: John Moore / GettyImmigration News Today: US Mayors Agree to ‘Support and Welcome’ Refugee Central American Children

A dozen U.S. mayors have agreed to support immigrant children from Central America seeking refuge.

Welcoming America, a nonprofit organization that promotes cooperation between foreign-born and U.S.-born Americans, released a letter signed by 12 mayors and a county executive promising to “compassionately support and welcome the young children from Central America seeking refuge in the U.S.”

“As we reflect back on the initial concerns raised around children fleeing violence, we see that our values have prevailed,” said Welcoming America Executive Director David Lubell. “These leaders are demonstrating that communities have responded with compassion, and can successfully help children in need, now and into the future.”

The letter acknowledged young children from Central American countries have traveled thousands of miles to seek shelter in the U.S. According to Welcoming America’s letter, the Central American minors have encountered abuse during the travel north. Despite the minors’ surrender to U.S. border patrol agents, the children still pursue help.

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CDC Warning: Immigrant Children Could Be Spreading This New Mystery Virus In Public Schools

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Photo Credit: Western Center for JournalismThe Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued a warning yesterday about a mysterious polio-like virus that’s causing acute neurological illness and paralysis in children. The virus seems to be related to the nationwide epidemic of EV-D68 that we reported on during the first weeks of the outbreak.

The CDC is investigating nine cases of muscle weakness or paralysis in Colorado children to see if enterovirus 68 (EV-D68) might be the virus responsible for the neurological symptoms.

On Friday, The CDC issued a Health Advisory to doctors about the polio-like cases in Colorado, and said EV-D68 was detected in four of the eight sick children who were tested for the virus.

The CDC says the mysterious illness is characterized by “focal limb weakness and abnormalities of the spinal cord gray matter on MRI.” The cases, which are just now being made public, occurred between August 9 – September 17 among children aged 1-18 years old (with a median age of 10 years-old).

The nine children who have been confirmed to have this neurological illness all had fever and respiratory illness about two weeks before developing varying degrees of limb weakness. Health officials don’t think it’s polio because eight of the nine children are up to date on their polio vaccinations.

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UPDATE: Hospital Says Dallas Ebola Patient in Critical Condition

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Photo Credit: AP / LM OteroBy JAMIE STENGLE AND EMILY SCHMALL.

After hospital officials on Saturday said the condition of the lone Ebola patient diagnosed in the U.S. has worsened, the woman he came to Texas to visit said she is praying for his recovery.

Louise Troh said that she was not aware until a reporter told her that Thomas Eric Duncan’s condition had been deemed critical and that she had not spoken with him Saturday.

“I pray in Jesus’ name that it will be all right,” Troh said in a telephone interview from the home where she and three others are being isolated.

Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas didn’t provide any further details or respond to questions about Duncan’s health on Saturday. The hospital has previously said Duncan, who was being kept in isolation, was in serious but stable condition.

Duncan traveled from disease-ravaged Liberia to Dallas last month before he began showing symptoms of the disease that has killed some 3,400 people in West Africa.

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For CDC team in Dallas, the search is on for those who had contact with Ebola patient

By Amy Ellis Nutt.

For the doctors, nurses and epidemiologists from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who landed in Dallas this week, it all boiled down to this: Who had contact with Thomas Eric Duncan, the first person in this country to be diagnosed with the deadly Ebola infection, and who might have had contact with him? In other words, it was all about information.

First up was interviewing Duncan, known in CDC investigative parlance as the “index subject.” Then the 10-member team led by infectious disease expert David Kuhar began where most information-gatherers begin — by making a list. Actually, by making two lists. One included the names of the people with whom Duncan might have had contact in his two visits to Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital. The other list — well, it included everyone else.

They divided themselves into two teams. Those creating the hospital list took up residence in a human resources office on the eighth floor of Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital. Pediatrician and epidemic intelligence officer Matt Karwowski was assigned to the community list. He and his team holed up in a first-floor conference room in the Fogelson Forum, next to the main medical building.

Three CDC investigators and one county epidemiologist would visit each home on the two lists and interview every person in every household who might have come in contact with Duncan.

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