---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Discourse for Lign 169, Assignment 1, April 16, 2003 From the CNN talk show Crossfire, with topic "Lifting the AIDS Ban". P is a regular host and M is a guest. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. P: Mr. M, at the same time that we are trying to contain this fatal 2. disease, why would you introduce into the U.S. these new sources of infection? 3. M: The fact of the matter is, people come into the United States every single 4. day infected with the AIDS virus. I know that you might prefer to have people 5. tested for the AIDS virus at the airport, but as it stands, people have come in 6. with AIDS and are always going to be coming in with AIDS as long as we have the 7. disease. What we need to do is listen to the public health officials, not the 8. politicians, when it comes to how we ought to deal with the AIDS virus. 9. P: I think what you ought to do is try answering the question. The question 10. is when you have an epidemic of a dangerous, deadly disease when we are told 11. we are all at risk why would you knowingly bring into the United States 12. hundreds and hundreds of people who are carriers of this infection and who 13. could pass it on and kill American citizens. 14. M: You just showed you don't understand the facts when you say we're all at 15. risk. I don't feel I'm at risk; I'm married and I don't use drugs. 16. P: Mm hmm. 17. M (continuing): Uh, I don't know whether you're at risk. The point is this: 18. people have been coming in with AIDS as long as there has been the virus, but 19. people will continue ... 20. P (interrupting): But why would you increase the number? 21. M: We aren't increasing the numbers. It's the same, it's the same... 22. P: Sure you are -- you're going to let 'em in, even if you know it. 23. M: You know what - they come in anyway, and let me explain to you how. Most 24. people who come into the United States are non-immigrants. They are 25. not tested for AIDS. People can be... 26. P: Hold it. Mr. M - Six hundred people last year with AIDS were stopped and 27. not allowed into the country. Let's assume half are active homosexuals -- 28. 300 people. They have ten contacts a year -- that's 3000 occasions in one 29. year when those people could pass the disease on. < Interruption by onlooking other members of discussion > 30. P: Lemme, lemme, lemme agree with him on one point. I do think there's a lot 31. of propaganda and hysteria about AIDS -- I don't really believe 32. we're all at risk, but there's no doubt that this is the truth: let's take 33. tuberculosis. It is becoming epidemic, now, in New York and other areas. So 34. is hepatitis. The major spreaders of tuberculosis are people who get AIDS and 35. therefore become vulnerable to all these diseases and carry them and spread 36. them -- contagious as well as infectious. Why would you add -- last year they 37. kept out 600 people with AIDS - Why would you even add 600 more people who are 38. going to be carriers of the AIDS virus as well as countless other diseases if 39. they stay permanently in the United States. Why do it?