Gupta was tailor-made by the TV news gods to cover celebrity traumatic brain injuries. He teaches neurosurgery at Emory University School of Medicine and is the associate chief of neurosurgery at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta. He performed life-saving brain surgery on a soldier in Iraq. He owns the brain beat.

But he was nowhere to be found this week while a million questions were swirling and confusion reigned regarding Natasha Richardson's fatal accident. CNN had a bunch of hack doctors on instead who had probably never performed battlefield surgery.

Why? Gupta's wife gave birth on Monday night, the day before Richardson fell. It must have been killing him! There was so much he could explain to us. Which is why he was back on CNN last night, four days after his daughter was born, talking about Natasha Richardson to Campbell Brown.

Also, Gupta took his name out of the running for surgeon general earlier this month because his wife was expecting and he wanted to "spend more time with his family," according to the New York Times.

Jerry Farrell, who heads the Commissioned Officers Association, told FOXNews.com Thursday that CNN's chief medical correspondent is known to have taken himself out of consideration.

"The general consensus from everybody is Gupta is no longer in contention ... it's more he's withdrawing himself," Farrell said, citing conversations he's had with "well-placed" individuals.

Sanjay, CNN, and Barack Obama's socialist government agencies are all mum on the point, but America has already suffered two long months without Sanjay Gupta's healing touch upon our collective fevered brow. It looks like it just may not come to pass. We might have to break down and see a real doctor.

Update: And now it's official. His employer CNN is reporting:

"Sanjay Gupta was under serious consideration for the job of surgeon general," the official said in an e-mail. "He has removed himself from consideration to focus more on his medical career and his family. We know he will continue to serve and educate the public through his work with media and in the medical arena."

[Fox via TVNewser. Pic via]

"Gupta has told administration officials that he wants the job, and the final vetting process is under way. He has asked for a few days to figure out the financial and logistical details of moving his family from Atlanta to Washington but is expected to accept the offer...

The offer followed a two-hour Chicago meeting in November with Obama, who said that Gupta could be the highest-profile surgeon general in history and would have an expanded role in providing health policy advice, the sources said."

More info TK, but obviously Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman is the big loser here. [WP]

MORE ON SANJAY!: First keep in mind that there's a chance he might not take the gig, because it would be a huge pay cut for him. Now put that out of your mind immediately and gaze upon these fun facts about our probably new Surgeon General!

—Before he was a talking head, he was a real doctor! A neurosurgeon. One time he went to report from Iraq and did emergency surgery to help save a soldier's life!

—He's a New York Times bestselling author!

—And he won an Emmy award!

—And "He has recently had articles published in the Journal of Neurosurgery and Neurosurgical Focus on percutaneous pedicle screw placement."!

—He was one of People's Sexiest Men Alive in 2003.

And the single most famous moment of his career? Getting into a feud with Michael Moore over the tubby filmmaker's movie Sicko, which, let's face it, did have a fair amount of bullshit propaganda in it:

Does any of this qualify him to be Surgeon General of the US? Obama says yes!