Tuesday, May 05, 2009

A Cover-Up, Or Irresponsible Inflammatory Allegations?

Former Congressman Tom Tancredo alleges that 60,000 Mexicans illegally cross into the United States each month. Tancredo urges President Obama to go "lock the barn door" (Obama had remarked last week that closing the borders would be akin to locking the barn door after the horse is stolen). Tancredo reminds Obama that he took an oath of office to defend the United States "against all enemies, foreign and domestic." He points out that over 400 cases of an "atypical pneumonia" were noticed in the Vera Cruz region of Mexico in mid-March, but there was a delay in the official recognition of the epidemic until the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta could verify the cases as swine flu. Tancredo wonders if the delay in recognizing the epidemic had anything to do with President Obama's planned visit to Mexico City on April 16. Is that a scurrilous allegation by Tancredo? I had previously read that Mexico had sent the samples to Canada's national lab, and that is where they were diagnosed as swine flu. Our side should not make allegations, if we do not have facts to back up our claims.

1 comment:

Terri Wagner said...

If the government of Mexico who has access had called any US center for disease and requested immediate assistance somehow I have a feeling it would have been given. The truth of the matter is that no one seems very interested in shutting down the border. Sigh.