Lost amid the reality we must bathe ourselves in chlorine to avoid upsetting the delicate sensibilities of West Africans is the invisible policy discussion of an illegal war being carried out in Syria.

President Hopey Changey has proclaimed both The War Powers Act, and a 2002 congressional authorization (AUMF) intended against al-Qaeda in Iraq, as the baseline for his legal approach to bombing in Syria.
Apparently, we are to ignore the fact the War Powers Act expired after 30 days, and the AUMF was never granted for Syria.
Of course the actual legal route would require congressional leadership to actually do, well, you know, leadership-type things. Currently neither Senator Turtle, nor the House Crier are willing to interrupt election season -or tanning appointments- to put Syrian authorization measures in front of the peoples representatives for a vote.

Unfortunately those pesky details are not lost on Russia, who reminded Secretary Ketchup as such during a recent chat.
Only in 2014’s fundamental change world does our President put constitutional types in a position where we actually end up in agreement with our arch nemesis, Russia.
(CNSNews.com) – Russia is not a member of the U.S.-led anti-ISIS coalition because its military actions are “paradoxical” and not in line with international law, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said this week. He pointed out that the coalition and Russia were arming opposing sides in the Syrian civil war. (more…)

NEW JERSEY – Medical workers at University Hospital in Newark have isolated a sick passenger who landed at Newark Liberty Airport from Brussels and are evaluating him “as if he has Ebola” out of extreme caution, sources tell NBC 4 New York.
The man, a Liberian national, was singled out for screening by agents at Newark Tuesday afternoon because of his recent travel history: he had traveled from Liberia to Brussels before flying into Newark, the sources said.
That’s when officers discovered he had a fever, according to the sources. He was transported to University Hospital, which has a contract with the Port Authority to take all of Newark Airport’s medical cases.
Sources briefed on the treatment of the patient said he was being evaluated “as if he has Ebola” out of an abundance of caution and until proven otherwise. (more…)

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Rush Limbaugh was the first national personality to point out the strategy President Obama uses to distance himself from his own policies. In essence Obama uses anger directed toward his own administration when the consequences from his policies reach sunlight.
As Rush previously stated, the Obama outrage is phony and only reflected to give himself plausible deniability. It’s not that Obama doesn’t support the policy, he does, the outrage is pure politics.
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Previous examples include: Initial faux-anger and outrage over the IRS targeting, which evolves into “not a smidgen of corruption”. Initial faux-anger and outrage over the VA scandal, which evolves into sending a White House Deputy Chief of Staff, Rob Nabors, to Arizona to protect the administration from consequence.
Now the Ebola CDC faux-outrage which requires another White House “political fixer”, Ron Klain, to protect the administration from consequence.  The “outrage” is all part of the strategy.

As previously outlined, after being denied entry to Belize and Mexico, the Carnival Magic is set to arrive in the home port of Galveston Texas early tomorrow morning.

In anticipation of the arrival – the Coast Guard has finished a mission, to retrieve a blood sample for Ebola testing, from the healthcare worker who is quarantined on board. The U.S.C.G. completed the mission by flying  a helicopter to the cruise ship and used a basket extraction to retrieve the blood sample.  The sample is now being flown back to the U.S. Mainland.
The goal is to test the blood sample prior to the ship’s arrival and dissuade any fear the public might have prior to the passengers and crew de-boarding the vessel.  Here’s the statement from Carnival:

“Today we were advised by Texas health officials that they felt it was necessary for the health care worker currently on Carnival Magic to submit a blood sample for testing prior to the ship’s arrival in Galveston tomorrow [Sunday] morning,” Carnival said in a statement.

“As a result, a helicopter rendezvoused with the ship late this afternoon to facilitate the transfer of the sample,” the cruise line said. “At this time Carnival Magic is expected to arrive tomorrow [Sunday] morning as scheduled.”

(Salty language alert toward end)

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Maybe she’s on a Caribbean cruise?  Or, maybe, just maybe, she’s a stand in for Steven Tyler at an Aerosmith reunion?… Anyone?

WASHINGTON DC – Earlier this week, Sen. John McCain called for an Ebola czar, not knowing one already effectively exists. Why should he, since Nicole Lurie, M.D., M.S.P.H., has been completely M.I.A.
You have to wonder sometimes if anyone in a leadership position in the Obama administration bothers to show up to work these days.
Case in point is Dr. Nicole Lurie, who arguably should be front and center in planning for and responding to the Ebola outbreak.
After all, it’s right there in her job title. She’s the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response, a position created in the wake of Hurricane Katrina that reports directly to the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Her mission, according to the HHS website, is “to lead the nation in preventing, responding to and recovering from the adverse health effects of public health emergencies.”
Lead? Well, maybe she’s leading from behind, because Lurie’s been nowhere to be found since Ebola showed up on U.S. soil. (more…)

With zero experience in healthcare, disease controls or medical best practices, Ron Klain is appointed by President Obama to lead the Ebola Crisis Team.  Hey, it’s not all that bad – he could have chosen Ben Affleck…
WASHINGTON (CBSDC/AP) — President Barack Obama on Friday turned to a trusted adviser to lead the nation’s Ebola response as efforts to clamp down on any possible route of infection from three Texas cases expanded, reaching a cruise ship at sea and multiple airline flights.

Facing renewed criticism of his handling of the Ebola risk, Obama will make Ron Klain, a former chief of staff to Vice President Joe Biden, his point man on fighting Ebola at home and in West Africa. Klain will report to national security adviser Susan Rice and to homeland security adviser Lisa Monaco, the White House said. (more…)

Trying to cut through the fog and chatter it appears the Carnival Magic cruise ship has been denied entry to Mexico.

Cruise ship with isolated health care worker who handled Ebola samples was turned away from Mexico: http://t.co/JspTA2nLpk

— ABC News (@ABC) October 17, 2014

….And therein lies the reason for governmental obfuscation and media avoidance of the entire episode.
The political risk is obvious.
Both Belize, and now Mexico, have denied entry for a U.S. cruise ship carrying a healthcare worker who treated Patient Zero Thomas Duncan – yet U.S. President Obama refuses to shut down inbound air passengers from West Africa.
If you take the situation at face value the political argument is that Obama cares less for the risk of his citizenry than the Prime Minister of Belize and the President of Mexico.
The position of Mexico and Belize undermines the position of President Obama.
So what’s going on?
The U.S. government, and Carnival Cruise lines, are stating the cruise passenger, and her husband, are self-quarantined and exhibiting no symptoms. The Belize government has stated a divergent set of facts, at least initially.  Belize was saying the cruise passenger WAS exhibiting Ebola symptoms. (more…)