Rand Paul criticizes Obama Administration's Ebola response, says President is downplaying epidemic

(NaturalNews) In a recent interview on Philadelphia talk radio station 1210 WPHT, potential 2016 presidential contender Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, talked with host Dom Giordano about the current outbreak of Ebola in the United States and how the federal government is handling its spread.

In his interview, Paul said the manner in which the outbreak crisis is being handled by President Obama reflects badly on him and his Democrat Party, and will likely play into the midterm elections next month.

"It adds to just a litany of things that the President has let us down on and failed to show leadership. So, I think it's one thing after another, it's not just one issue," Paul told Giordano. "The lack of leadership on Ebola, the equivocating, the downplaying, the underplaying, the, sort of, trying to calm everyone with really not being completely frank about the transmissibility of the disease, I think, doesn't help any of them at the polls."

Paul went on to say that the federal government has dedicated more than enough taxpayer funds to battle and win against a virus like Ebola, and to keep the nation safe -- despite claims by some Democrats and federal health agencies that recent "budget cuts" have hurt the country's ability to confront it.

"The waste that runs throughout [The National Institute of Health] is just appalling and for them to say they didn't have enough money when their budget has gone up 220 percent for epidemics is really just an insult to the taxpayer," Paul said.

The junior senator from the Bluegrass State also addressed the issue of poverty, noting that his party has much better solutions for the poor than Democrats.

'There's a lot of reasons for people to reconsider who they've been voting for'

"We're right on a lot of the policies and their policies haven't worked for those who live in poverty... for those who are unemployed, they're policies aren't working," said Paul. "Black unemployment is still twice white unemployment. There's a lot of reasons for people to reconsider who they've been voting for but they won't do it unless Republicans show up, unless Republicans show we're concerned."

Others have begun criticizing the Obama Administration's policies and reactions to the spread of Ebola into the U.S. In fact, according to a new CBS News survey, an increasing number of Americans have lost faith in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, after a series of mistakes, misstatements and policy blunders regarding the virus.

The poll found that positive attitudes toward the CDC have fallen dramatically, with just 37 percent of respondents saying the agency was doing an excellent or good job handling the outbreak. CBS News said that was down from 60 percent in a May 2013 Gallup survey, adding further:

Officials from the Obama administration, including the president himself, have acknowledged that missteps were made in the handling of the first confirmed Ebola case diagnosed inside the U.S; a Liberian man who died in a Dallas hospital on Oct. 8.

Few agencies of the government getting high marks

Since the death of Thomas Eric Duncan, two nurses who helped care for him have now tested positive for the disease. One of them, 26-year-old Nina Pham, has been transferred from Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas, where she worked, to the CDC's Clinical Center in Maryland.

The second nurse, Amber Joy Vinson, 29, has been taken to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta.

The poll also asked Americans to rate the jobs of various government agencies and departments, to measure the public's confidence in U.S. institutions. Of the nine government agencies mentioned, only one -- the FBI -- got a positive rating higher than 50 percent -- by just one percentage point.

Among the bottom: The three branches of the federal government, the Legislative, Judicial and Executive Branches.

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Sources:

http://www.cbsnews.com

http://philadelphia.cbslocal.com

http://www.naturalnews.com

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