So yesterday Senators Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer addressed a cast of several reporters regarding the current status of funding for the government. The usual points were being made, Republicans are instransigent, they hate Obamacare, the usual, when suddenly a wild reporter appeared from the underbrush bubbling with one powerful question. Here’s the vid, transcript all the way at the bottom. Dana Bash is the CNN reporter who should be relieved of her job for asking such a question.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0lFyFJeZSY&w=584&h=390]
The question is, if you could save just one kid from cancer by refunding the National Institute of Health (NIH) then shouldn’t you? Of course, Dana knows that what this would cost the nation right now would be the Affordable Care Act. She also knows that the NIH conducts clinical trials, they don’t perform everyday cancer treatments. They aren’t a hospital, they’re a research center. So, apparently Dana believes that funding a research center right now at the cost of cancer treatments for the poor who right now don’t have insurance in the future is a reasonable trade. Plus, it’s a little like asking who would win in a fight, Jesus or Buddha?
Nah, she’s trolling and by trolling I mean this is really bad internet comment trolling stuff. It has all the hallmarks of that. It ignores any context about the current situation or discussion. It picks children because oh, won’t someone think of them? It’s asked in a “what, who me” fashion. Listen to the concern in her voice and the sincerity at the beginning of the clip when she’s explaining what happened. This is a woman who really, really cares about clinical trials…I mean she clearly knows that trials of this kind involving a complicated disease like cancer actually last for months and months. She surely knows that they aren’t just going to the NIH to get a shot and then “be off with you, little scamp.” And finally it has the coup de grace of troll determination…is she aware that she’s trolling? Yes, yes she is which is why Reid responds with “to have someone of your intelligence to suggest such a thing maybe means you’re irresponsible and reckless.” Her response? What, who, me? In the Barnes Presidency responding with the following gets you never called upon or answered ever again. It gets you frozen out forever.
I’m just asking a question.
Yes, she knows all of that and everyone now reporting that Harry Reid said “why would we want to do that” in regard to EVER funding cancer research at the NIH also knows that. However that didn’t stop Buzzfeed and Drudge along with a bunch of right wing nutters passing the video around with the headline meant to imply “Reid hates cancer kids.” Anything for da clicks. But all these people know that Reid was echoing Senator Schumer’s question regarding “why put one against another” meaning why would we pit all these defunded agencies against one another? Why wouldn’t we just fund them all like we’re supposed to?
Congratulations Dana, you have brought the worst part of the internet to the vocation of journalism, all for a quick beat, a clip that will play for a couple of days and then be gone. The world needs less reporters like you. It would be a better place, a more civilized place.
Who loses in a fake discussion of this kind? Kids with cancer who are now being treated by cynical reporters and some sites on the internet as a political football. And that, my friends, is how you troll a child with a terminal disease. May God have mercy on your souls.
DANA BASH: You all talked about children with cancer unable to go to clinical trials. The House is presumably going to pass a bill that funds at least the NIH. Given what you’ve said, will you at least pass that? And if not, aren’t you playing the same political games that Republicans are?
HARRY REID: Listen, Sen. Durbin explained that very well, and he did it here, did it on the floor earlier, as did Sen. Schumer. What right did they have to pick and choose what part of government is going to be funded? It’s obvious what’s going on here. You talk about reckless and irresponsible. Wow. What this is all about is Obamacare. They are obsessed. I don’t know what other word I can use. They’re obsessed with this Obamacare thing. It’s working now and it will continue to work and people will love it more than they do now by far. So they have no right to pick and choose.
BASH: But if you can help one child who has cancer, why wouldn’t you do it?
CHUCK SCHUMER: Why put one against the other?
REID: Why would we want to do that? I have 1,100 people at Nellis Air Force base that are sitting home. They have a few problems of their own. This is — to have someone of your intelligence to suggest such a thing maybe means you’re irresponsible and reckless —
BASH: I’m just asking a question.
