Fox & Friends Wants An Ebola “Czar” After Suggesting Use Of Czars Was Turning Us Into Russia
Written by Sophia Tesfaye
Published
After spending much of 2009 complaining that President Obama's appointment of “czars” was akin to the crowning of monarchs and Russian practices, Fox & Friends is now calling for the appointment of an Ebola Virus czar.
Fox host Steve Doocy responded to news of the first Ebola diagnosis contracted within the U.S. by calling for an “official Ebola czar” on the October 13 edition of Fox & Friends, echoing the demand of Republican Sen. John McCain. According to Doocy, “We probably need one” because Obama isn't doing enough to fight the virus:
DOOCY: So every time there's an incident like this, you see Thomas Frieden, the guy who heads up CDC, but is he the official -- there he is right there -- Is he the official Ebola czar? We probably need one, because the president isn't, you know, he's not --
KILMEADE: Sen. McCaul is calling for one.
DOOCY: Absolutely. So with all this bad news --
KILMEADE: Congressman McCaul.
DOOCY: Where was the President of the United States over the weekend? Right after he talked to the Secretary of Health and Human Services, he went golfing.
But the Fox program has a long history of mocking previous Obama administration czars.
In 2009, then-host Gretchen Carlson mocked the term and alleged, “You know when I looked up 'czar' in the dictionary, or Googled it, the word that came up was 'king.' And I was wondering to myself, why we are having so many czars/kings now in America?” Doocy added, “When you think about it, 'czar' is a Russian word.” Fox then aired an altered graphic of Obama's cabinet members in Russian czar attire displaying the question, “And Now We're Russia?” Doocy went on to compare administration cabinet members to Russian monarchs:
The same year, Carlson asked whether czars in the Obama administration were “just friends of Obama who need work or payback a favor?”, while Kilmeade previously questioned whether the appointment of a czar was evidence “of a new culture of corruption.”