I am a Neurosurgeon January 10, 2009

I am a Neurosurgeon

By Guest Contributor
January 10, 2009

Aasif Mandvi is right.

All brown people are doctors!

(Even med school dropouts like myself! It doesn’t matter. I get the degree, anyway. I just got out of the formalities.)


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  • Michael

    Lol!

    Seriously though, Sanjay Gupta? I like the guy from what I’ve seen, but is he at the level of professionalism and talent (medical, not television) required for Surgeon General?

    Who were some of the other considerations?

  • Overall I think it’s a good pick (the Surgeon General is in part about star power/ communication/ influence/ being a figure ahead) but I wouldn’t mind someone with a bit more of a public health or policy background (one year as a White House fellow is nice, but there are much better qualified people out there). I’m not being a surgeon is necessarily the best preparation for being Surgeon General either, though if we’re going to stick with Indian American Rhodes Scholar surgeons in their 40’s, I can name at least one better qualified one off the top of my head: Atul Gawande.

  • Ah crap, Gupta’s not even a Rhodes–I got my famous Indian American surgeons mixed up.

  • Rat Bastard

    Interesting…in local news, our soon-to-be Surgeon General is reported to have removed a bullet from a young Marine’s skull while in Iraq- briefly dropping his reporter’s hat for a scalpel. If that is true, he’s definitely a qualified surgeon.

  • Better choices:

    Steve Novella
    David Gorski
    Peter Lipson
    Paul Offit (oh, that would really piss off the anti-vaxxers)

  • Suzanne

    Gupta has seemed to support DRUG COMPANIESwhich, in my view, are suspect.

    He has seemed to support reforms, but towhat extent is he willing to go?

    I think Obama’s choices have been lessthan the change he promised and it worries me.

    I do love Sanjay as a TV personality, but is he really the guy to change the way the government, insurance companies and the American people think?

    I hope so.

    I think this Comedy Central skit was so good. We get it, Jon, even when your study audience doesn’t.

  • Aly

    I loved that episode. I retold it the next day to my friends in first period, even trying my hand at imitating the imitation of an Indian accent. It morphed into a discussion of how Indian people automatically support other Indian people. Then one of them asked me how I would feel if Palin/Jindal ’12 happened. Of course, everyone knows there’s only one solution to that situation: implosion.

    As for Sanjay Gupta, isn’t he kind of America’s doctor already? He shows up on CNN pretty much every day, writes columns in TIME, has a bestseller, etc. The position seems mostly symbolic, and I haven’t heard much from/about the current surgeon general (who is it anyway?). Maybe just having a visible and well-known surgeon general will raise people’s awareness.

  • DSimon

    Then one of them asked me how I would feel if Palin/Jindal ‘12 happened. Of course, everyone knows there’s only one solution to that situation: implosion.

    I hate cold weather, but I’d move to Canada.

  • Rieux

    Enough about Gupta. What about Aasif Mandvi?

    In addition to this bit and the rest of his Daily Show work, we’ve seen him as a dentist in the Ricky Gervais/Greg Kinnear vehicle Ghost Town, a doctor on one episode of The Sopranos, and a crime-scene tech on an episode of Law and Order.

    Looking at Aasif’s IMDB page, it appears he’s also played characters with “Dr.” in their names in Jericho, CSI, Freedomland, Book of Kings, Oz, and Analyze This. Plus, he was on ER, though it’s not obvious from the page whether he was playing an M.D.

    All of which suggests that he knows what he’s talking about in this piece!

  • Aly

    I hate cold weather, but I’d move to Canada.

    Haha, but then, are you Indian? The idea of an Indian becoming Vice-President is outweighed by sheer horror at Palin as President.

    However, Canada is definitely where it’s at. I would move there in a heartbeat, but I’m a high-schooler in Florida. :/