If you watched “Death by Lightning,” which Newsmax TV host Rob Finnerty obviously did, you’ll know that it wasn’t an assassin’s bullet that brought down President James Garfield.
Instead, it was doctors who worked on his gunshot wound without clean hands or sterilized instruments. Garfield died of sepsis.
I mention Finnerty, a man who needs to develop a sense of humor, because he hosted ubiquitous doctor-on-TV-call Drew Pinsky last night to discuss the Garifled incident and related presidential deaths.
Dr. Pinsky, who does have a sense of humor and can be engaging, spoke of two other presidential deaths hastened — or even brought on — by doctors practicing what was then considered state-of-the-art medicine.
Our Founding Father, George Washington, contracted pneumonia while riding his horse. His doctor, seeing a patient with a life-threatening condition, did to Washington what was considered the proper procedure. He bled him. A weakened Washington then died.
Another famous death, that of Abraham Lincoln, was also facilitated by a doctor, according to Pinsky. In this case, the doctor thrust his finger into the president’s head wound, thereby pushing the lodged bullet into Lincoln’s brain. Sepsis no doubt was involved as well.
That’s two out of four presidents venerated on Mt. Rushmore [pictured above] whose demises were rushed by do-good doctors who didn’t do so good.
