2017 Jan 18^th

Cal Thomas’ column a few days ago touts Dr. Ben Carson as a role model. Dr. Carson rose from poverty to become a famous pediatric neurosurgeon. Some of the impediments along the way were produced by Carson himself. He has written extensively about the very poor background from which he came, but pictures of the house where he, his brother, mother and father lived show a perfectly nice single family home in suburban Detroit. He tells us that his mother was one of 24 children and that she was married at 13. Records show that neither is true; his mother had about thirteen siblings and she was still living at home and going to school at fourteen.

Dr. Carson has had a brilliant career as a pediatric neurosurgeon. He is justifiably proud of himself. One entire wall in the entry-way of his home is covered with framed accolades, diplomas, citations and other indicators of his accomplishments. Dr. Carson apparently believes that that your worth is measured by how far you’ve come to get where you are, and so it is important to emphasize the poverty of your beginnings. In Carson’s case emphasis has morphed into exaggerate and that does not make for an attractive role model.

Carson is academically talented but he is terribly naïve about some academic issues. He claims that “one of the Detroit newspapers said I had the highest SAT scores of any student in the Detroit public schools in 20 years.” We don’t know what these scores were but because SAT scores are not made public no newspaper could possibly verify such a claim and, consequently, would be very unlikely to make it. Carson again is saying, “Am I great or what?” in a way no one can check.

There is no doubt that he gained entrance to Yale, that he graduated with grades and with MCAT scores high enough to gain admission to U. of Michigan’s medical school, then he got a prestigious residency in neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins. For Cal Thomas to suggest that this enormously talented young black man should be a role model for the urban youth of inner city Detroit is ridiculous. A role model is someone whose example of success can or should be emulated by others. So, Cal Thomas do you really believe that poor young people from Detroit’s inner city should all aspire to a top Ivy school education and then on to a highly selective professional school.

An unnamed blogger has some comments about Carson while acknowledging his brilliance as a  surgeon. Here is a portion of that blog:  As a physician and a surgeon, I never cease to be amazed at how brilliant physicians, who are so knowledgeable and skilled at medicine, can be so irredeemably ignorant about topics not related to medicine, and even, as was the case with Ben Carson’s dubious cancer cure testimonial for Mannatech, medical topics not related to their specific specialty. Indeed, Andy Borowitz nailed it well when he portrayed Carson as “shattering the stereotype about brain surgeons being smart.”

It might be helpful to expand on “Mannatech.” This is a dietary supplement touted as helpful for curing whatever physical difficulty you suffer from and with no reputable scientific evidence supporting any or its claims. For some reason Carson has been willing to do what amounts to commercials for this outfit. A lengthy report by The National Review on Carson’s involvement with Mannatech leaves no doubt that his support for the supplement is without any scientific backing.

Of course Carson has other anti-scientific beliefs. He believes that evolution, other than at the microbial level, is a plot by the devil to discredit God. How Cal Thomas decides on the person to present as a role model would be interesting to know, but I don’t think he’ll tell us because I doubt that he knows himself.