TOO MANY EBOLA COOKS IN THE KITCHEN. THE RECIPE FOR FAILURE IS ASSURED.

Back on October 17, Bureacrat-in-Chief Barry Obama established the job of Ebola Response Coordinator and appointed long-time taxpayer ward Ron Klain to the job.

A congressman from California, Ed Royce, a guy obviously unfamiliar with all of the agencies Congress has created and continues to fund said, "It is right that the President has sought to task a single individual to coordinate its response."

Over the years, successive U.S. Congresses have established far too many overlapping agencies to do the same thing as the Ebola Response Coordinator.

Between 1979 and 1980, Congress established the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) by separating the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, which Congress established in 1953. The DHHS contains the United States Public Health Service (PHS), which Congress established through the Public Health Service Act of 1944.

The Assistant Secretary for Health (ASH) for the DHHS oversees the PHS the PHS oversees all agency divisions of the DHHS and the Commissioned Corps, which Congress established 1871 along with the Office of the Surgeon General.

Congress gave the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services statutory responsibility for to prevent the introduction, transmission, and spread of communicable diseases in the United States. To do so, Congress created the Division of Global Migration and Quarantine.



The U.S. Secretary of the DHHS can prevent the entry and spread of communicable diseases from foreign countries into the United States and between states through another Congress established agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and another Congress established agency, the Office of the Surgeon General.

Under 42 Code of Federal Regulations parts 70 and 71, the CDC has authorization to detain, medically examine, and release persons arriving into the United States and traveling between states who are suspected of carrying these communicable diseases. Whenever a pilot of a plane or captain of a ship, neither who are licensed medical doctors, alerts the CDC about about ill passengers or crew, enforcers of the CDC can detain passengers and crew as  necessary to investigate whether the cause of the illness on board is a communicable disease. Under mere suspicion, enforcers of the CDC can issue a federal isolation or quarantine order if a disease is suspected.

To be sure that Congress totally adds to the confusion that is the United States government, Congress has authorized the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to meddle in such matters. The DHS has the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which can inspect animals and plants. As well, the DHS has the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which Congress has authorized to involve itself in any "catastrophic incident ... any natural disaster, act of terrorism, or other man-made disaster that results in extraordinary levels of casualties or damage or disruption severely affecting the population."

Because Congress can't organize its activities, Congress authorized the U.S. Customs and Border Protection and U.S. Coast Guard officers to help enforce federal quarantine orders.

The DHS even has the Office of Health Affairs (OHA) headed by a Chief Medical Officer who leads 101 bureaucrats whose job is to prepare for, respond to, and recover from all hazards effecting health security of Americans.

The U.S. Congress created The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on July 1, 1946, for the express purpose to protect public health through developing and applying disease control and prevention of infectious diseases and food borne pathogens.

According to the Congress, "Congress finds that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has an essential role in defending against and combatting public health threats domestically and abroad" including "bioterrorism and other public health emergencies." To do this, Congress has authorized the CDC to "establish a near real-time electronic nationwide public health situational awareness" network to detect and manage "potentially catastrophic infectious disease outbreaks, novel emerging threats, and other public health emergencies that originate domestically or abroad."

Congress has authorized the Surgeon General to make and enforce such regulations as in his judgment are necessary to prevent the introduction, transmission, or spread of communicable diseases from foreign countries into the States or possessions, or from one State or possession into any other State or possession. Congress has authorized the Surgeon General to destroy whatever he or she feels like, whether animals or things, if such are "found to be so infected or contaminated as to be sources of dangerous infection to human beings" as well as apprehend and detain individuals "for the purpose of preventing the introduction, transmission, or spread of such communicable diseases ... specified from time to time in Executive orders of the President upon the recommendation of the Secretary" of the DHHS.

So Congress added the president himself to the mix of meddling cooks with authority to handle communicable diseases.

As it is, the U.S. Congress claims authority from the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution to isolate and put in quarantine anyone, anytime, who could have any contagious disease.

Breaking a federal quarantine order is punishable by fines and imprisonment. Federal law allows the conditional release of persons from quarantine if they comply with medical monitoring and surveillance.

Title 42 of the U.S. Code reveals expression of the many muddled minds who inhabit Congress year after year.

Enjoy this kitschy, catchy tune by Colin Moulding, bassist of one-time hit maker XTC.

There's too many cooks in the kitchen
There's too many minds on the job
There's too many cooks in the kitchen

Everybody wants a piece of the action
Cooking the books and getting their fractions wrong

What we need is law and order
Everybody knows
Can't have chiefs without the injuns
Stepping on their toes

There's too many cooks in the kitchen
There's too many dabs in the pie
There's too many cooks in the kitchen

Everybody needs a place in the rat race
Playing games of power, it's only a cat chase

Too many too many too many etc.
Too many cooks in the kitchen