CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta To Be Named Surgeon General?

Quick...name the current Surgeon General (no fair using Google or any search engine). Yeah, me neither.

Well, it looks like the celebrity president is about to have a cable celebrity as Surgeon General.

The Obama transition team approached Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN's chief medical correspondent, about becoming U.S. surgeon general, according to sources inside the transition and at CNN.

...The transition team is impressed with the combination of Gupta's past government experience, as a White House fellow in 1997 and a special adviser to then-first lady Hillary Clinton, along with his medical career as a neurosurgeon and his communication skills, the transition source said.

Gupta is a member of the staff and faculty of the Department of Neurosurgery at Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta, Georgia. He regularly performs surgery at Emory University Hospital and at Grady Memorial Hospital, where he serves as associate chief of neurosurgery.

I have to say I could not care less about who become Surgeon General but Gupta seems to have a lot in his favor. He's likely to want to go back on TV, so I doubt he'll be as stupid as Joycelyn Elders. He's also cuffed Michael Moore around over Moore's film Sicko. Most importantly, while in Iraq doing a story for CNN he operated on and saved the life of a Marine. That makes him okay with me.

posted by DrewM. at 07:20 PM

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