THE “Red Death” had long devastated the country. No pestilence had ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar and its seal — the redness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, with dissolution. The scarlet stains upon the body and especially upon the face of the victim, were the pest ban which shut him out from the aid and from the sympathy of his fellow-men. And the whole seizure, progress and termination of the disease, were the incidents of half an hour.
Sound familiar? Remind you of the descriptions of any plagues raging through Western African countries right now?
I’m struck by how similar current crises are to the late Tom Clancy’s books. Executive Orders (1996) had a chilling account of Muslims terrorists, backed by Iran, using Ebola to attack the US.
Tom’s last book Command Authority (novel) (December 2013, with Mark Greaney) mirrored what’s happening to the Ukraine. A Russian strong man threatens or attacks East European nations ( Estonia and Ukraine) using shadow forces and Pro-Russian militants in the threatened nations as cover and for an excuse. The easy annexation of the Crimea was so close to the actual events a year later that one has to wonder, how is it that an ex-insurance salesman can correctly predict the Geo-Political future so well and the President of the USA with all his resources and advisers can’t?
By the way, the (real) spokesman for the CDC and the State Dept. did say that the risk of an Ebola epidemic due to bringing the infected patients to the US was “low”. Not zero, but low. I wonder what Tom or Mr. Poe would say to that? And then there is the “Open Borders” problem.
On the North River 