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| Home Front: Politix |
| Sanjay Gupta, Surgeon General? |
| 2009-01-06 |
| The Washington Post is reporting that Barack Obama has offered the job of surgeon general to Sanjay Gupta. HeÂ’s expected to accept the job, the Post says, citing two unnamed sources. Gupta declined the PostÂ’s request for comment. Besides his CNN gig, Gupta also appears on CBS and writes for Time Magazine. He was a White House Fellow and a special adviser to Hillary Clinton when she was First Lady. Oh, and heÂ’s a neurosurgeon at Emory and associate chief of the neurosurgery service at AtlantaÂ’s Grady Memorial Hospital. ThereÂ’s a certain logic to picking a TV talking head to be surgeon general, because the surgeon general is largely a talking head. The top doc does oversee the 6,000-member Commissioned Corps of the U.S. Public Health Service, but the real work of the job is traveling around the country, using the title as a bully pulpit to advance a public health agenda. In this media-saturated era, who could do that better than a doc whoÂ’s famous for explaining health issues on cable TV? |
| Posted by:Beavis |
| #8 It's too late for me; anytime someone mentions the office all I remember is the Pinky and the Brain episode... |
| Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain 2009-01-06 21:39 |
| #7 "Bully pulpit" > BUUUULLLEEEYYY, BULLY, BULLY [Song = Teddy Roosevelt]??? Gut Nuthin. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2009-01-06 19:28 |
| #6 "got caught in an attack on US troops and jumped into an operating room to help save their lives" Was he the one who was condemned by the media for actually getting involved, Mike? Or was that a different doctor/reporter? (Not that it matters - good for him for remembering he's a doctor first.) |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2009-01-06 17:50 |
| #5 US Navy-lite uniforms, medals, sprokets, Hindi Turban head gear, multi-cult. What's not to like. The One quite possibly got it right this time. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2009-01-06 17:39 |
| #4 ...I will NOT watch CNN because of their admission that they covered up/ignored evidence of Saddam Hussein's atrocities in Iraq so as not to lose 'access'. However, Dr. Gupta seems like a straight shooter and during a trip to Iraq got caught in an attack on US troops and jumped into an operating room to help save their lives. That counts for a lot, as far as I'm concerned. Mike |
| Posted by: Mike Kozlowski 2009-01-06 17:16 |
| #3 I mean, shit, remember Joycelyn Elders? This was fun though. The word |
| Posted by: Beavis 2009-01-06 16:54 |
| #2 That's actually a smart pick. The Surgeon General is mainly a spokesman for various public health initiatives, not an administrator. Dr. Gupta is a good public speaker and a decent guy. |
| Posted by: Mike 2009-01-06 16:47 |
| #1 In 2003, Gupta traveled to Iraq to cover the medical aspects of 2003 invasion of Iraq. While in Iraq, Gupta performed emergency surgery on both U.S. soldiers and Iraqi civilians. Gupta was embedded with a Marine medical unit at the time. A Marine named Jesus Vidana suffered a severe head injury and the Marines asked for Gupta's assistance because of his background in neurosurgery. Vidana survived and was sent back to the United States for rehabilitation. I don't have a problem with this. I mean, shit, remember Joycelyn Elders? |
| Posted by: tu3031 2009-01-06 16:37 |