Mitch McConnell: A man of two positions who takes them frequently
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday, endorsing a travel ban for people who have been in West African nations experiencing Ebola outbreaks:
During a Tuesday interview with Fox News' Neil Cavuto, McConnell said he thinks a travel ban "makes a lot of sense." Health experts and the White House routinely say travel bans would be counterproductive and may make the situation worse.
"I would like to see a travel ban," McConnell said. "I think it seems to me to make a lot of sense."
Endorsing travel bans probably make for decent politics, especially in conservative states like McConnell's Kentucky, but they make no sense on policy grounds, and not just because there are no direct flights to the U.S. from stricken countries, but also because a travel ban would create incentives for people to cover up their travel history, making it harder to track the movements of the very small number of infected individuals who might try to travel without actually preventing their entry. As none other than McConnell himself
said two weeks ago:
"I think we ought to listen to what the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] thinks they need either in terms of financing or certainly they'll decide the procedures for travel and all the rest," McConnell told NBC News in an interview. "I think we need to follow the advice of the experts who know how to fight scourges like this."
So, what changed in the two weeks? Certainly not the risk posed by Ebola, which has yet to spread beyond the two nurses infected in late September—both of whom have recovered. The only explanation is politics: We're that much closer to election day, the polls in Kentucky are tightening, and Mitch sees an issue he can exploit to keep his job, so that's exactly what he's doing, because that's what he always does.
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