A brilliant brain surgeon. Former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development. Author, inspirational speaker, and a visitor to Alaska who was unceremoniously banned from speaking at an Anchorage public school.
Dr. Ben Carson is now reportedly on the short list for vice presidential nominee, should former President Donald Trump become the Republicans’ nominee, which appears likely.
Carson has a resume that puts him in the top one-tenth of one-percent, in terms of knowledge, skill, talent, and overcoming adversity. His life story started out in a single-parent home, where his mother raised him and helped him make the best of his early challenges.
When Carson was invited to Anchorage last year, Anchorage School Superintendent Dr. Jharett Bryantt canceled a school assembly that had been arranged for him at Mountain View Elementary School, a Title 1 school in Northeast Anchorage, where many children from lower-income families attend and where 91% of the students are minorities.
It was the beginning of the school year, Bryantt said, and Carson would be a distraction. Bryantt didn’t want to disrupt the pace of the first week of school.
Instead, organizers of the Carson visit — the Anchorage Republican Women’s Club — hastily put together a press conference with Gov. Mike Dunleavy and Dr. Carson was able to have an event for students at the local Boys and Girls Club after school.
That was in August. Today, Trump advisor Kellyanne Conway said on Fox News that Carson is the Trump insider favorite for vice president right now.
Charlie Kirk, of Turning Point USA, agreed.
“There are many good candidates for VP, but Dr. Ben Carson would be an amazing choice. He’s brilliant, he’s a devoted Christian, and he’s a man of honor and strong conservative principles. Dr. Carson is a great American,” said Kirk, who leads an organization that fosters conservative principles in public high schools and universities.
Carson has authored several books, including “Gifted Hands, The Ben Carson Story,” in which he describes how, as a boy, he did poorly in school and struggled with anger. He authored “You Have a Brain: A Teen’s Guide to T.H.I.N.K. B.I.G.” He recently authored a children’s book, “Why America Matters.”
He credits his mother, who worked three jobs and pushed her sons to do their best, for his successes in life.
In 1987, Carson, by then an established neurosurgeon, led a team of 70-member surgical professionals who separated the brains of conjoined twins Patrick and Benjamin Binder, who were joined at the back of the head. It was the first-ever surgery of its type.
Carson ran for president in 2016 and was the first presidential candidate to qualify for the Alaska Republican Party’s Presidential Preference Poll, a type of caucus-by-ballot that the Alaska GOP pioneered.
