When is grabbing take-out more critical than the risk of spreading Ebola? When you work on Today!

       

Boy, it really does begin to look like the beleaguered "Today" news franchise on NBC just can't catch a break (in general), especially when it comes to the national fear of potentially catching Ebola. The person pictured on the right, above, beside the strutting NBC peacock is none other than NBC's Chief Medical Editor and healthcare talking head, Dr. Nancy Snyderman. 

We have often discussed problems on the show to do with the main players who carry the show each morning (Matt Lauer being the ringleader, natch), but tarely has our Nance come up, even though I personally find her supercilious, phoning-it-in, scratch-the-surface style of "analysis" to border on being mind-numbingly amateurish. Any unemployed science graduate could spend ten minutes on Wikipedia each morning and come up with the same insight she typically provides to even the most serious of medical issues. 

Speaking of serious medical issues and disease, it rarely comes much nastier than the Ebola virus, which in quite embarrassingly typical fashion does not seem to impact or dent Dr. Snyderman like the rest of us humans- she is a big MD on TV, after all! It appears that she brushes Ebola off with the same ease she does most of the more trivial medical issues discussed on the show. I always smile when it gets really scientific or technical, because she tends to look uncomfy real quick, and if there's another MD in the chair, she will ask "Do you want to take that?". She gets to scratch the surface on deep medical subjects, spouts out the prescribed three minutes of airtime, and ends each piece with a "reassuring" outro of "You bet!"

You bet, and all is right with the world. Except when it's not. Our Nance has been under a much hotter spotlight of late, deservedly so, for her own outrageously arrogant actions upon returning from Liberia, and additionally having been in direct contact with an NBC cameraman who was infected with Ebola, and is currently in Nebraska for treatment. Upon return, Synderman and the team were put on voluntary quarantine for 21 days to guarantee both that they were clear and more importantly that they would not put the American public at risk. 

Now, this all sounded fine and dandy, and given that we had a medical "star" at the helm, that American public breathed a sigh of relief that they would not soon be breathing their last breath, due to Ebola. Except that in typically arrogant fashion, Snyderman snidely (snydely?!) appeared to take the kind of advice she coldly shovels onto the public stage with a massive pinch of salt, herself. What's good enough for the rest of us, is apparently not good enough for the superhuman, who completely underplayed any risk of spreading Ebola in public.

Trust me, the real experts in virology know precisely how quickly a breakout in one far-off country can go from being a minor news item to a full-blown national crisis when we have loose cannon quacks who think they know better deciding personally on how they will react to potential exposure. Hence, what a shocker that Snyderman was spotted outside a Hopewell, New Jersey restaurant (the Peasant Grill) DURING her quarantine, and that very presence goes totally against ANY serious medical recommendation for someone in her position. The very fact that the New Jersey Health Authority had to step in and enforce a mandatory quarantine for an NBC CME for violations - well, it is almost certainly a reason for termination. If for no other reason, simply due to a total loss of credibility for the role as well as for the network, while she remains in that role. 

It reminds me of a medical hubris we have all seen from one MD or another, during out lifetimes. Getting a lecture on not smoking, or the evil of eating too much junk food, and then you see the off-duty doc standing against the side of a McDonald's restaurant, smoking after their Big Mac! Somehow, dealing with cancer and heart disease every day almost endows one with a feeling of invincibility to it, because it happens to them (patients) and not us (doctors), right?

That's all well and good, when you are not putting anyone else at risk. But what Snyderman did was unforgivable for any medical professional, never mind one of the most high profile public doctors in the country who speaks to millions of people regularly on the "Today" show. This whole incident is a staggering embarrassment for the NBC brand generally, and essentially has rendered Snyderman's credibility null on the "Today" show. I don't see how her presence on the show can even be justified now, and the title of Chief Medical Editor has been ridiculed - she has effectively handed in her resignation letter. I do hope that NBC were listening!

The fact that the ladies of "The View" savaged her for her hubris was one thing, but Synderman's ongoing arrogance even in her "apology" caused the pot to boil over completely, and they ripped into her with fervour. America gets over the sins of major celebrities but when they apologise vaguely, that is something that brings out the backlash - big time. Think Paula Deen or Lance Armstrong, whose careers were effectively halted or even terminated by such arrogance in the face of public outrage - and let's be clear, nothing either of these two examples did ever put an entire state's (and then country's) lives at risk!

"As a health professional I know that we have no symptoms and pose no risk to the public, but I am deeply sorry for the concerns this episode caused," Snyderman said. 

I bet that reassured the nation, Nance! Not. Note that she did not confirm whether or not she had violated the voluntary quarantine. But what conceit to state that simply because she has a degree in medicine, she can be confident that there are no Ebola virions circulating in her veins or in those of her colleagues, when in fact, she has no idea if that is true or not. She exhibits astounding personal and professional hubris that is at the level of the archetypal God-head rock star - except that, even on the medical stage, a rock star she most certainly is not. 

Then again, why am I surprised? This is the same woman, who, on a recent episode of "Today" ridiculously claimed that the regime in Saudi Arabia was fairer to working women than that of the USA! That would be the same Saudi Arabia that requires women to have a male's permission to work in the first place, and the one that bans women from driving, and the one that enforces a strict dress code on women, right?! Cough. Splutter. Or did she actually mean the "alternative" Saudi Arabia, that other one, the one that exists only in her own head? 

Methinks it is beyond time for that strutting NBC peacock to walk away in the opposite direction, and greatly distance itself and the brand from that of its Chief Medical Editor. It is the only solution that works, wherein NBC can walk on from this incident with some credibility left in the medical affairs area. Not only would I further refuse to take anything she says seriously in any way, but if her presence on the "Today" show was continued, I would refuse to watch, period. An MD who so outrageously downplayed the threat of Ebola at home on American soil has no business talking to the American public about any medical news item. 

The extent of Snyderman's arrogance is not even so much depicted by her dangerous, careless action in heading out for take-out, but is rather truly underlined and emphasised by her woeful excuse for an acknowledgement or real apology. Thankfully, in spite of her incredibly risky and arrogant lapse in judgement, New Jersey is alive and well, and the threat has been contained. She will be free soon to go out and about and roam everywhere she wants, just like before. However, when it comes to NBC and the "Today" show? I think our Nance may well already have had her last (TV) dance! - Kevin Mc

Malala revisited again - an inspirational girl who should have been but will be (and now is) a Nobel Peace Prize recipient!

 

This amazing girl had made the news on Wednesday May 29th 2013, in the context of pressure mounting on Barack Obama to limit drone strikes in Pakistan in the war against terror. At the same time, he elaborated that her attempted murder did not fall into the criteria needed to go after a certain Taliban leader, due to the fact that she is not an American. That's one very fine line though, and I thought that the war in Afghanistan was at least in part an attempt to stabilize that country and give new hope to its endogenous population. So her not being an American hardly makes the attempted murder of a child by an enemy currently at war with America any less significant.

I might vouchsafe that it is for precisely the same reason that Time magazine overllooked her and ridiculously chose Obama himself as their #1 person of the year at the end of 2012. We said in 2013 that we would leave it to the Nobel committee to right this particular wrong! And right it they did, with the just-released news that Malala has been given the Nobel Peace Prize, finally, at the ripe old age of 17 (!), along with Indian child rights activist Kailash Satyarthi.  It's very pleasing to see that the Nobel committee heard our comments and subsequently decided to give her the prize that she so clearly deseved! :) 

As it is more topical than ever, we repost the most recent of our blogs that put the spotlight on the new Nobel Peace Prize winner! 

This blog, in quite typical fashion, refuses to conform with what the (often) self-appointed judges and supposed cultural leaders say and do. We have a mind of our own which is not tainted by what fashions or societal mores dictate, and we are extremely proud of that. We are EU, after all! 

That is why we refuse to post yet another pic of a man who gets way too much unmerited praise and press as it is, and choose without hesitation to post this video documentary of a girl who clearly has a mind of her own, and one which is not going to be dictated to - by anybody. This young girl continues to make the news today, not least because since March she is back where she belongs and always wanted to be - in school, in her new home town of Birmingham, England.

This is of course Malala Yousafzai, the young Pakistani schoolgirl who was targeted by the Taliban in a wave of military strikes in the Swat valley, aimed at governmental institutions and including girls schools, which naturally represent a threat to the misogynistic males of the Taliban. At an event in Peshawar in September, 2008, the eleven-year-old girl gave a speech entitled "How dare the Taliban take away my basic right to an education". 

To say that it was a courageous move would be gross understatement. Writing under a pseudonym for obvious reasons, Malala started a blog in 2009 and continued to be outspoken about girl's rights to an education in Pakistan, and about women's rights more generally.

"All I want is an education and I am afraid of no one."

Those are very brave words when surrounded by men who think of grown women as second class citizens, never mind an eleven-year-old schoolgirl. Malala's father clearly doesn't agree, and he showed that by putting her name on the family register after her birth: a right reserved exclusively for only male children.

After a battle for control of the Swat valley in 2009, the Pakistani army declared victory and amidst a renewed sense of security, it was revealed that the mysterious blogger was in fact Malala Yousafzai. Immediately, those cowards in the Taliban began to issue threats against her and her family. But she had begun to attract serious attention and in late 2011, Archbishop Desmond Tutu nominated her for the International Children's Peace Prize for which she became a runner-up.

Having become well known by then, at the very end of 2011 she won Pakistan's Youth Peace Prize which has since been renamed after her, and suddenly she became a national and international figure. But that brought increased exposure and led to one of the most disgusting and disgustingly cowardly terrorist acts by the Taliban, who sent an armed gunman into a school bus to shoot her and people sitting near her.

She was seriously injured by a bullet that entered just behind an eye, and after treatment in Pakistan she was moved to Birmingham, England, whereupon the story became truly viral. She later came out of a medically-induced coma and began what will be a very slow process to recovery. But she immediately began communicating and offering support to others in her homeland who had been threatened by the Taliban.

Recently, in a very touching move, Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari announced a new $10 million education fund in her name, which will remind everyone of her courageous fight for her right to learn. She is an inspiration not only for girl's rights everywhere, particularly in places where girls are looked down upon, but also more generally for women's rights everywhere around the globe.

Quite how Barack Obama is considered to be a more appropriate Time Magazine "Person of the Year" is beyond this writer. Don't worry, I am not going to go into some (albeit well deserved) rant about his totally inadequate first four years, but there seems to be some sort of inverse favouritism when it comes to this guy. He was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize in 2009 - for what precisely?! For being elected? He moved into office in 2009, so yes, he got the prize for his tough move into the White House. Redecoration is hard, y'all!

Now, once again, after spending more money than God's banker was prepared to loan him, he managed to get a disillusioned public to elect him again, essentially based on the premise: "Let's go for the best of the two bad choices". One of the reasons that Time Magazine chose to anoint him for the second time in four years is that he was the first incumbent since 1940 to get reelected with unemployment above 7.5%. I don't find that to be anything inspirational, whatsoever. I imagine that the tens of millions still out of work and out of their homes would concur.

Under his watch, Americans suffered increasingly, and he seemed to be like a deer in the headlights, unable to do anything other than give the same tired old rhetorical excuses and promises of "change". If he got voted back in, it had one helluva lot more to do with who he was running against, Mitt Romney, than what he had done. It was a default vote for the safer (but weak leader) choice. It's nothing to give prizes over, at all.

It reeks of political brown nosing by Time, who seem to salivate over him getting out of bed in the morning and showing up in the oval office as some kind of holy ritual. Or perhaps being that kind of magazine, it all comes down to sales, and the face of ol' B.O. on the front is gonna shift way more units off the shelves than some relatively unknown girl's face from Pakistan. But it is supposed to be person of the year, not American of the year. Shame on Time Magazine!

As far as we are concerned, Malala Yousafzai stands so far above Obama as the choice for Person of the Year that there is no comparison. He got his feet wet during Sandy, and was praised for it - it is ridiculous. This schoolgirl made a massive move and achieved enormous impact due to her own courage and defence of women's rights in a way that simply overshadows more or less anything that Obama did (or didn't) do in 2012.

He runs around in armoured cars with an army of secret service and police surrounding him - this girl got shot in an attempted murder on a school bus, for speaking her mind. All because of what she believed in, and what she believed in is what we all know to be the right thing. I think he should do the right thing, and hand it over to her - God knows she did more to deserve it, and God knows he doesn't need any more salivatory praise.

As far as EU is concerned, the Person of the Year for 2012 (and 2013, and now for sure even in 2014!) is Malala Yousafzai. We simply don't care what Time thinks, and we know that we are not alone in that sentiment because a poll taken on NBC's Today show demonstrated that the public agrees with us. Well, of course they do! ;) - Kevin Mc

http://www.malala-yousafzai.com/