Bioethics

Satisfied with higher cost, mortality?

Everyone who questioned the endless emphasis on patient satisfaction surveys in modern healthcare might be vindicated by a new study.  The Cost of Satisfaction: A National Study of Patient Satisfaction, Health Care Utilization, Expenditures, and Mortality concluded,

Conclusion: In a nationally representative sample, higher
patient satisfaction was associated with less emergency
department use but with greater inpatient use, higher overall
health care and prescription drug expenditures, and
increased mortality.

The results may be skewed by a phenomenon noted in the article: among seniors, there is no correlation at all between satisfaction and the “technical quality of care.”

I also question research that indicates that less and/or cheaper care is better, or that doctors over-treat their patients. I sometimes suspect the motive is to advocate for knee-jerk protocols and eventual rationing along with the removal of individual physician judgement in the treatment of individual patients.   (Dont’ think “death panels.” Okay, go ahead.)

However, this particular research looks at whether doctors order tests and treatments their patients ask for, whether or not the evidence supports that route. The researchers correlated these “discretionary” treatments and tests with satisfaction and with mortality, and came up with a 25% higher risk of mortality or death with in the time studied. (In the world of medical statistics, this is not a very high risk, but it is significant to those who die, right?)

The caveat is to watch and wait as the medical community evaluates the study and how the data was “cooked” by the statisticians. One area where the conclusion may be weak is that the health status of the patient was self reported (although mortality was not). I’d like to see correlation with lab values such as measurements of kidney function.

One of my fears has always been that I might become like some of the older docs I saw when I was training:  a very nice doctor who is well-liked but incompetent because I’ve failed to keep up my skills and knowledge. I should have worried about being the doctor who goes along to get along – or to make more money because my pay is directly related to how happy – not how healthy – I keep my patients.

Celltex Announces Glenn McGee, Ph.D. as President of Ethics and Strategic Initiatives

The “rest of the story,” at LifeEthics.org.

We wanted Glenn at Celltex because from the start we have been determined to do things right,” said David Eller, chairman and chief executive officer of Celltex, which is based in Houston, Texas. “Celltex is a leader in adult stem banking and multiplication technology. We already have state-of-the-art technology, and with Glenn, we are assured that we will be using it in the most ethical way possible.”

Dr. McGee, who resigned his position as the John B. Francis Chair at the Center for Practical Bioethics and his role as editor-in-chief of The American Journal of Bioethics in November 2011, was the founder of the publication. Under his leadership, The American Journal of Bioethics became the leading journal in its field. He is now serving in an advisory capacity with the journal until March 1, 2011. [sic]

via Celltex Announces Glenn McGee, Ph.D. as President of Ethics and Strategic Initiatives | NEWS.GNOM.ES.

Unfunded “compromise:” who pays for it?

I mean, besides the insurance companies? Your neighborhood doctor and pharmacist will be forced to pay their “fair share,” too, I bet

Washington (CNN) — The White House announced a compromise Friday in the dispute over whether to require full contraception insurance coverage for female employees at religiously affiliated institutions.

Under the new plan, religiously affiliated universities and hospitals will not be forced to offer contraception coverage to their employees. Insurers will be required, however, to offer complete coverage free of charge to any women who work at such institutions.

There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. And pills, diaphragms, and sterilizations don’t come free, either.

The end goal and the certain end result of this administration is to push private medicine out of business. We will all soon work for Uncle Sam unless we can turn the policies around.

Do you want to go to DC, hat in hand, for the health care your family and loved ones need?

Christian Medical Association on Contraception Mandate:Senate Dems block debate

The CMA sent out a couple of press releases by email, today on the attempts by members of Congress and the Senate, including some Democrats, to overturn the ObamaCare mandate that everyone who offers health insurance to their employees must offer plans that pay for contraception. The mandate would require Catholic health systems and schools to provide coverage that is against long held Church teachings.  (Disclosure, I’m Baptist, think true contraception is ok, and I’m the Chair of the Family Medicine Section of the CMA which is the same as the much longer, Christian Medical and Dental Association, the CMDA.)

Christian Medical Association: Contraception mandate fits pattern of assaults on conscience and religious liberty

Washington, DC–February 9, 2012: The 16,000-member Christian Medical Association today issued a statement asserting that the government’s mandate of contraception coverage nationwide fits a growing pattern of assaulting and restricting First Amendment freedoms of conscience and faith.

CMA CEO Dr. David Stevens noted, “The government contraception mandate violates the First Amendment rights and sensibilities of any individual or organization morally committed to life-honoring faith principles. The coercion likewise tramples the conscience rights of health care professionals ethically committed to the historic Hippocratic oath. And it fits a deplorable pattern of disregard for First Amendment freedoms.

“In the past three years, people of faith and conscience have witnessed the gutting of the only federal regulation protecting the exercise of conscience in health care; the denial of federal grant funds for aiding human trafficking victims because a faith-based organization refused to participate in abortion; the administration’s lobbying of the Supreme Court to restrict faith-based organizations’ hiring rights; and a coercive contraceptive mandate that imposes the government’s ideology on the faith-based and pro-life communities.

“The contraception mandate’s affront to religious freedom actually extends well beyond the Catholic Church, since many physicians and patients outside the Catholic tradition hold that it is morally or ethically wrong to risk ending the life of a developing human being by using pills such as ella and the morning-after pill. These pills are falsely promoted as ordinary contraceptives despite clear FDA label warnings that ‘ella may also work by preventing attachment (implantation) to the uterus’ and that the morning-after pill (Plan B) “may inhibit implantation by altering the endometrium.'”

“To force every American to subsidize an ideological agenda that many find morally or ethically abhorrent is the antithesis of American First Amendment freedoms of religion and conscience.

“The First Amendment issue of religious and conscience liberty impacts Americans of all political stripes. Conscience freedoms protect Americans left, right and center, on issues ranging from abortion to the death penalty, from participation in war to the right to protest political actions such as we are witnessing now.

“Every American, regardless of political persuasion, should be protesting these assaults on our freedoms and contacting legislators to enact conscience-protecting legislation such as the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act, introduced in the House by Jeff Fortenberry (R-Neb. 1st) and in the Senate by Roy Blunt (R-Mo.).

“As Dr. Martin Luther King reminds us, ‘Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.'”

To remedy the assault on religious liberty and conscience freedoms, the Christian Medical Association supports the following legislation:

S. 1467 – Respect for Rights of Conscience Act

S. 2043 – Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 2012

S. 906 – No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act

S. 877 – Protect Life Act

S. 165 – Abortion Non-Discrimination Act

H.R. 1179 – Respect for Rights of Conscience Act

H.R. 361 – Abortion Non-Discrimination Act

H.R. 358 – Protect Life Act

H.R. 3 – No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act

Senate Democrats Block Debate on Religious Freedom Amendment

‘Our founders believed so strongly that the government should neither establish a religion, nor prevent its free exercise that they listed it as the very first item in the Bill of Rights.  And Republicans are trying today to reaffirm that basic right. But Democrats won’t allow it.’

Washington, D.C.– U.S. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell made the following statement on the Senate floor Thursday regarding the Democrats’ refusal to allow consideration of an amendment on the Obama administration’s mandate in the health care law that violates the First Amendment rights of religious institutions:

“Our country is unique in the world because it was established on the basis of an idea: that we are all endowed by our creator with certain unalienable rights — in other words, rights that are conferred not by a king or a president or a Congress, but by the Creator himself. The state protects these rights, but it doesn’t grant them.

“And what the state doesn’t grant, the state can’t take away. That’s what this week’s debate on a particularly odious outcome from the President’s health care law has been about: Our founders believed so strongly that the government should neither establish a religion, nor prevent its free exercise that they listed it as the very first item in the Bill of Rights.

“And Republicans are trying today to reaffirm that basic right. But Democrats won’t allow it. They won’t allow those of us who were sworn to uphold the U.S. Constitution to even offer an amendment that says we believe in our First Amendment right to religious freedom. I never thought I’d see the day. I’ve spent a lot of time in my life defending the First Amendment. But I never thought I’d see the day when the elected representatives of the people of this country would be blocked by a majority party in Congress to even express their support for it.”

Jonathan Imbody

Vice President for Government Relations

Christian Medical Association – est. 1931, now 16,000 members

CMA Washington office: P.O. Box 16351 • Washington, DC 20041

703.723.8688 • http://www.cmawashington.org

Director, Freedom2Care – 50 groups and 29,000 individuals advancing conscience rights

http://www.Freedom2Care.org  Twitter: @Freedom2Care

Pa. Vending Machine Dispenses ‘morning-after’ Pill | Fox News

I’ll admit that I don’t like Over The Counter hormone preparations. But isn’t this going too far in the name of convenience?

Students at Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania can get the “morning-after” pill by sliding $25 into a vending machine, an idea that has drawn the attention of federal regulators and raised questions about how accessible emergency contraception should be.

via Pa. Vending Machine Dispenses ‘morning-after’ Pill | Fox News.

The pill only works during 5 or 6 days of a girl’s cycle. But what if she throws her cycle off several times a month?

And studies show that even when women have the pills in the medicine cabinet, they don’t use it correctly.

BTW, I’m convinced that Plan B is not an abortifacient – does not cause abortions by interfering with implantation or development if there is fertilization. It can block ovulation for 5 days before ovulation and it makes the mucus thick at the cervix and uterus so sperm and egg have a hard time getting together. It doesn’t change the way that implantation goes and it may even encourage the protection of the new embryo by moma’s body

See my “Review: Plan B, How It Works and Doesn’t Work” at this link:

If, as I believe, the pills only work in preventing fertilization, they are only medically justified/necessary 5 days before or one or 2 days just after ovulation, the window of fertility. The other 20 days or so of the menstrual cycle, the pills are useless and un-necessary.

The best evidence is that Plan B works to prevent ovulation or to prevent the oocyte (the “egg”) from being released from the ovary and passing to the fallopian tube. This is why the pill is best (and only?) functional before ovulation. In nature, the egg only lives about 24 hours and sperm can live from 2 to 5 days. If the egg is not released, is over 24 hours old, if the sperm cannot get to the egg or if they are dead or incapacitated, there can be no fertilization.

The only post-ovulation effect that has been proven that could prevent pregnancy also prevents fertilization. Levonorgestrel causes the mucus in the cervix to be thick (so sperm have a hard time getting to the uterus and then the fallopian tube where the egg is) and by making the sperm unable to penetrate the zona pellucida, the covering and nurturing cells around the oocyte or egg.

Remember Natural Family Planning? This is the method of following body temp and cervical mucus changes to help figure out when a woman is fertile and when she’s not. The post-ovulatory changes that indicate the non-fertile time immediately following ovulation are due to a progesterone similar to the one that is in Plan B.

Also, the progesterone increases the likelihood of implantation and supports that early pregnancy by delaying the period and encouraging the lining of the uterus to develop.

Of course, the single, small dose in Plan B doesn’t have as great an effect as the hormones from the corpus luteum after ovulation.

IF PARISHIONERS ARE READY TO BE WARRIORS SHOULD THEN NOT THE PRIESTS? | Conservatives in Action

Sonja Harris, the Blogger “Red Sonja” of Conservatives in Action, noted that the Obama Administration told the Church that it has a whole year to make peace. She’s astounded that the speaker meant peace with Obama, not with God.

In my life time, the Catholic Church has not experienced such brutal attacks coming from the President of the United States of America. It even hurts typing that line. Never have Catholics and other Christians been so assaulted for trying to live their faith.

I have to remind myself as to why the Conservatives in Action came to be. It was because Obama began his assault on the Catholic Church early by using Joe Biden, a joke as a Catholic, to bring in the Catholic vote. And immediately after Obama’s inauguration, the day after the Right to Life March in 2009, and three days after taking his oath to protect us on January 20th, he signed the Executive Order on January 23rd to repeal the Mexico City policy thereby having the American taxpayer pay for abortions overseas.

It is imperative that as Christians we understand that politics do play a significant role in our lives. Politics dictate our every move. The amount of times we flush the toilet, the light bulb we should use, how fast we should drive, the age of retirement, how many septic tanks we can have on our property, these are a mere drop as to the hundreds of thousands of restrictions that are upon us today. Until Catholics understand that politics and religion are indeed intertwined, we can kiss our faith good bye.

via IF PARISHIONERS ARE READY TO BE WARRIORS SHOULD THEN NOT THE PRIESTS? | Conservatives in Action.

Sonja Harris for CPAC Blogger of the year!

Federal judge says he can’t block Texas sonogram law, says higher court forced ruling

Sonogram (while awake and aware) and informed consent to be enforced in Texas.

District Judge Sam Sparks had previously struck down parts of the law, but his latest ruling said he’s bound to follow the direction of the New Orleans-based appeals court

via Federal judge says he can’t block Texas sonogram law, says higher court forced ruling – The Washington Post.

Human Embryology 101

In another forum tonight, I read a juvenile argument that human embryos are no more significant than the cells of the cheek removed by scraping it with our fingernail. This is a common statement by someone who has read a little in some chat room, but who hasn’t had a serious discussion about humanity, much less engaged in a study of embryology or human ethics. This time, the young man went a little farther for shock value and noted the millions of cells lost by each of us when we have a bowel movement.

Let me refute this silliness with simple biology.

The cells of the cheeks and of the gut wall are specialized body cells at the end of their life cycle. They *are* no more and no less than epithelial cells. The same can be said for the oocyte and sperm if there is no fertilization. As they are, without intensive – and still highly speculative – technical manipulation, nothing can make them anything other than cells at the end of their life cycle.

The zygote and subsequent cells of the embryo *are* an entire, intact, developing human being who is functioning as he or she should at that stage of life. (Occasionally, in nature, the zygote may divide in such a way to result in identical twins, triplets or quadruplets, all of whom are entire, intact, functioning, and developing humans at that stage of life.) There is no “potential,” only an organism that *is* a human being.

Individual organisms rarely display all the qualities of the species at any one time in the life cycle. It’s true that a human embryo can’t breathe air or walk but neither can grown men or even post-menopausal women ovulate. However, “organisms” do function in an *organized* manner to develop and function as they should at any given stage of life for that species.

Humans are the only species which engages in the discussion about “rights” and which organisms within our species are human enough for their right to not be killed to be protected. This conversation is the essence of “human dignity.” I suppose that I shouldn’t be surprised that some humans don’t function at the highest level of human dignity and the conversation devolves so often into human *indignities* such as slavery, the deeming of women and children as chattel, and petty little comments that we were each equivalent to bowel movements at some time in our life cycle.

Pfizer Recalls Birth Control Pills (how soon the baby boom?)

I’m both encouraged and discouraged by this recall. Machines and the people who run them make errors and it’s good to see quality control efforts and that those errors are discovered by the manufacturer. However, if the pill packets have been released into the market – as much as 5 months ago –  it appears that the controls weren’t strict enough.

From the Pfizer news release, available here, it appears that some of the pills were manufactured beginning at least last August, assuming that the expiration date is for 2 years after manufacturing.

There are only 26 lots – 13 of the brand name “Lo-Ovral” and 13 of the generic equivalent – that are involved. Lot numbers are given in the link, above.

More from the media coverage at Fox News:

Pfizer said the birth control pills posed no health threat to women but urged consumers affected by the recall to “begin using a non-hormonal form of contraception immediately.”

The recall involved 14 lots of Lo/Ovral-28 tablets and 14 lots of Norgestrel and Ethinyl Estradiol tablets, which Reuters reported involved about one million packets of birth control pills.

Pfizer said an investigation found some blister packs of the oral contraceptive might contain an inexact count of inert or active ingredients in the tablets.

“As a result of this packaging error, the daily regimen for these oral contraceptives may be incorrect and could leave women without adequate contraception, and at risk for unintended pregnancy,” the company said in a statement on its website.

via Pfizer Recalls Birth Control Pills In US Because They May Not Work | Fox News.

Would you force Jews and Muslims to sell pork?

Starting next year, religious groups will have to push aside their core doctrines and pay for pills that either prevent pregnancies or end them.

“[I]t would be like the government mandating that all delis, even Kosher delis, serve pork products and then justifying it by saying that protein is healthy, and many Jews don’t follow Kosher laws and many non-Jews go to those delis,” writes Michael Doughtery of Business Insider. “The law wouldn’t technically ban Jews from owning delis, but it would effectively ban their ability to run them according to their conscience.”

via FRC Homepage.

Please let your Representative and Senators know that the new Obama Administration conscience rules and the requirements for insurance are not freedom.

Texas media lies about Texas “Sonogram Law”

An article, based on lies, by the Texas Tribune’s Emily Ramshaw was picked up by the New York Times Sunday (January 29th) edition.

The lies are neatly tied up in these two sentences:

” This past fall, doctors were required to start performing a transvaginal sonogram at least 24 hours ahead of an abortion, a shift they say has had frustrating consequences for clinics and patients.”

and

“Now the physician performing the abortion — not an ultrasound technician, for example, or a secondary doctor — must conduct the sonogram on a separate day.”

(I have a “Google News search” for articles on the Texas Sonogram law, so I get emails as soon as they’re published. These same lies are duplicated in other articles and op-eds, like this one in “The Jurist,” from a law professor at the Saint Louis School of Law.)

Editor-in-Chief, Evan Smith, and Ramshaw at the Texas Tribune must know they’re publishing emotional falsehoods. Even Judge Sam Sparks knew better.

Anyone who has read the text of HB 15 or Judge Sam Spark’s ruling would know that we’ve had a formal informed consent process and a 24 hour waiting period since 2003, that there is no mandate to use a “transvaginal sonogram,” and that “an agent of the physician who is also a sonographer certified by a national registry of medical sonographers” may perform the sonogram. The doctor is required to show the sonogram “images,” to make the heartbeat audible and to describe the development of the embryo or fetus. That the language did not require that the actual, real-time sonogram be conducted by ” the physician performing the abortion” was clear to Judge Sparks. As he said,

     “The net result of these provisions is: (1) a physician is required to say things and take expressive actions with which the physician may not ideologically agree, and which the physician may feel are medically unnecessary; (2) the pregnant woman must not only passively receive this potentially unwanted speech and expression, but must also actively participate—in the best case by simply signing an election form, and in the worst case by disclosing in writing extremely personal, medically irrelevant facts; and (3) the entire experience must be memorialized in records that are,at best, semi-private.”

Still, Ramshaw revealed some truth:

    “. . . a scheduling struggle when doctors providing elective abortions are in short supply and rotate between clinics.

“They’ve had to set aside a whole other day doing ultrasounds, visits that in most parts of medicine would be dedicated to people with less training than a physician,” Hagstrom Miller said. “The effect on their travel schedule, on their reimbursement, on patients’ access to them has been tremendous.”

In the typical elective abortion, there’s rarely any on-going doctor-patient relationship and the real problem is bureaucratic and financial.  The clinic owners are mostly worried about the money and their ability to get doctors to show up for the informed consent and to return the next day to perform the abortion.

And it’s not all about money.  The doctors who “rotate between clinics” usually fly in, sometimes from another state, for “procedure day.” The “Sonogram law” doesn’t force the woman having the abortion to look at her sonogram. But it does force the doctor to spend time counseling the women – possibly more time than the abortion itself will require. They will now have to look the women in the eye and describe the development of the child. How can a doctor “not ideologically agree” with the facts visible on the sonogram when describing the heart or limbs?

The Obama Administration’s Attack on Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton

Friday’s announcement that the Obama Administration would force employers – including nonprofit religious employers – to pay for their employees’ contraception and abortifacients is just the latest example of how the abortion industry and its friends in the Obama Administration are attacking these well established rights of conscience in ways even the authors of Roe and Doe did not envision.

via The Obama Administration’s Attack on Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton |.

Great Day at the Texas Rally For Life in Austin, Texas

It was a beautiful day to go to the Capitol in Austin, Texas! I took my 11-year-old granddaughter to the Texas Rally for Life and we handed out information on the new “Choose Life” license plates that are available in Texas.

Texas’ Attorney General Greg Abbott was our key-note speaker. The video at this link has a portion of his speech and comments from people who attended – by their own free “choice.” The crowd displayed warm, loving support for those lives, mom and baby, threatened by abortion.

Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst (who is running for US Senate) and our Senator John Cornyn also spoke, along with Joe Pojman, PhD, of Texas Alliance for Life, and Carol Everett, a long-time supporter of pregnancy assistance services.

From the Austin, Texas TV station, KVUE.com:

AUSTIN — Crowds carried hundreds of signs in protest of abortion as they marched up Congress Avenue. For decades the Texas Rally for Life has brought people from all across the state to the steps of the capitol.

The Texas Rally for Life brought close to 3,000 people marching through downtown Austin Saturday afternoon.

Crowds listened as anti-abortion leaders urged them to spread their message to everyone.

Keynote speaker Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott explained how he learned the beauty of life when he lost the ability to walk.

Those who took part said the polarizing issue of abortion should not be approached with hate, but with love.

“Being Pro-Life is just such a blessing and seeing how much love we have for everyone — even after they have an abortion,” Elise Bockover said. “We’re still here for them, and I want people to know that — we’re here for them always.”

The date of this year’s rally added significance to everyone. Late January marked the anniversary of Roe V. Wade, the landmark decision legalizing abortion in 1973.

This is very positive coverage of our Texas Rally for Life!

To all who call us “anti-abortion and “anti-choice” and to you who say that we who are pro-life should “adopt all the unwanted children” (see comments at this page): The people who attend this rally are the most likely to give their time and money to charities to directly help mothers, babies, and their families. We are truly “pro-life” and we do support the mothers and babies we defend. Take a look around, I’ll bet there’s a pregnancy crisis center close to you, run by volunteers and donations.

If you would like to support adoption, you can easily donate $22 when you renew your license plate by choosing the “Choose Life” license plate option.

(In the interest of full disclosure, I’m on the board of Texas Alliance for Life and my local “Options for Women” pregnancy assistance center.)

Does Texas ‘informed consent’ law signal a successful new strategy against abortion? : News Headlines – Catholic Culture

Knowledge is power. Especially when it comes to Courts and lawyers. Knowing that the baby who might be aborted is not just a lifeless “tissue” or “product of pregnancy” is bound to change hearts and minds. Someday, abortion will be thought of in the same way that we think of slavery.

Legal scholar Hadley Arkes believes that the groundwork for a powerful challenge to legal abortion has been laid, in a judicial decision affirming the “informed consent” law in Texas.

Judge Edith Jones wrote a carefully reasoned decision in Texas Medical Providers v. Lakey, Arkes writes. Her decision, emphasizing that the new Texas law does not place any barriers in front of a woman seeking an abortion, is very likely to withstand a Supreme Court challenge, Arkes believes.

Beyond the judicial sphere, the Texas precedent should encourage legislators to consider bills that protect the unborn without directly challenging the Roe v. Wade precedent, Arkes suggests.

That move is bound to set off crippling tensions within the party of abortion in Congress. They are the tensions that could make that party come apart, and bring us to the beginning of the End.

via Does Texas ‘informed consent’ law signal a successful new strategy against abortion? : News Headlines – Catholic Culture.

Texas has already determined that it’s wise to regulate doctors, medicines and surgical procedures. In the case of the abortion laws and sonogram requirements, the rules for action are placed on the doctor doing the procedures. The doctor is the only one being “made” to do anything.

We have a 2005 State law mandating 24 hour waiting period and a set of steps to ensure that the patient, the woman who is going to have an abortion, receives thorough informed consent.  Texas also protects other patients with regulations requiring specific informed consent for sterilizations, hysterectomies, radiation therapy and electric shock therapy. These procedures are often performed on patients who may be vulnerable to outside influence (by the doctor or family members pr social expectations) and all carry risks of permanent harm and consequences that the patient should know about.

The Sonogram Bill ensures that the woman seeking an abortion will meet the doctor who will perform the abortion and that the physician will tell her the status of her pregnancy and the development of baby, all before she’s sedated and in a gown, before she’s up in the stirrups.

Who would go for any treatment without first meeting the doctor? Would you consider it “punishment” or “shaming,” much less based on some “religious value” to enforce Texas’ similar informed consent laws for patients about to undergo radiation therapy, electric shock therapy, or a hysterectomy? Where’s the outrage about shaming or frightening the smoker when the doc sits down to explain why you need bypass surgery?

Would any one argue that the man who goes in for radiation therapy does not know that he might have cancer cells remaining in his body? Or that a woman doesn’t know that she won’t ever be able to have children again if she has a hysterectomy? (We’ll skip the problems with consent for electric shock therapy.)

The Bill is reminds me of our earlier fights to allow patients to own their own medical information, to make our own choices with full, informed consent. It’s patronizing to tell women seeking abortion that they don’t need to see their own sonogram or to consider sharing her medical information with her as interference by the State.

Setting the record straight on immigration rule change – The Hill’s Congress Blog

More on the immigration regulations in the previous post.

It’s interesting – besides the obvious – because of the line in the second paragraph about “what administrations do.” This was not the line we heard when the Bush Administration was regulation on conscience laws and health care.

These are precisely the immigrants who have been waiting in line and now face a bureaucratic challenge to obtaining the physical green cards.

The proposed rule change falls precisely within the scope of what administrations do. The regulatory change is important because, under current procedures, some persons who have already met the eligibility requirements for green cards must leave the U.S. to obtain their permanent residence status, but as soon as they leave, they are immediately barred from re-entering the U.S. for three or ten years because of a period of unlawful presence in the United States. There is a family unity waiver available, but the way the law is currently implemented, the waiver can only be adjudicated abroad. That adjudication can often take many months, leaving the applicants in limbo, waiting to find out if the waiver has been approved and if they will be able to go back to the U.S to join their US citizen or legal resident family member. As a result, many otherwise eligible applicants do not leave the country to get their green cards, remaining unauthorized in the U.S. rather than risk separation from their families. Under the proposed rule change, spouses and children of U.S. citizens who are eligible for a green card would be allowed to apply for the waiver without leaving the U.S. They would still be required to depart from the U.S. before receiving final approval and their green card.

via Setting the record straight on immigration rule change – The Hill’s Congress Blog.

Sonogram Appeals Court Judgement Online

The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals opinion is available, here in pdf.

And here’s the Conclusion (caps are theirs, underlined emphasis is mine)

Appellees failed to demonstrate constitutional flaws in H.B. 15. Accordingly, they cannot prove a substantial likelihood of success on each of their First Amendment and vagueness claims. This is fatal to their application for a preliminary injunction. Accordingly, we VACATE the district court’s preliminary injunction, REMAND for further proceedings consistent with this opinion, and any further appeals in this matter will be heard by this panel.

5th US Court of Appeals: Texas may enforce abortion law

Wonderful news! The sonogram bill will be enforced as it winds its way through to the Supreme Court. For my critique of the very poor reasoning of the Federal judge who delayed enforcement, see this.

Will post the link to the ruling when it’s available.

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A Texas abortion law passed last year that requires doctors to show sonograms to patients can be enforced while opponents challenge the measure in court, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday.

A three-judge panel of the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned U.S. District Judge Sam Sparks’ temporary order against enforcing the law, saying Sparks was incorrect to rule that doctors had a substantial chance of winning their case.

Sparks ruled in Austin in August that several provisions of the state law violated the free-speech rights of doctors who perform abortions by making them to show and describe the images and describe the fetal heartbeat — all of which doctors have said is not necessary for good treatment.

The appeals court cited a 1992 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that “upheld an informed-consent statute over precisely the same ‘compelled speech’ challenges made” in the current Texas case.

Earlier rulings have found that laws requiring doctors to give “truthful, nonmisleading and relevant” information are reasonable regulation, not ideological speech requiring strict scrutiny under the First Amendment,” the appeals court said.

“‘Relevant’ informed consent may entail not only the physical and psychological risks to the expectant mother facing this ‘difficult moral decision,’ but also the state’s legitimate interests in ‘protecting the potential life within her,'” Chief Judge Edith H. Jones wrote in the appeals’ decision.

via The Associated Press: Appeals court: Texas may enforce abortion law.

Unified Theory of Conservatism: Constitutional Ethics for a Small Government

There’s no conflict between the three legs of Reagan Conservatism, in spite of the confusion surrounding contraception and homosexual “rights” we witnessed during the New Hampshire debates. Social issues such as the right to life and traditional marriage are equally compatible with small government and States’ rights as National security and fiscal responsibility,  just as the Declaration of Independence is compatible with the10th Amendment to the US Constitution. Conservatives agree that the best government governs least, but we don’t forget that there is a proper role for even the Federal government.

After all, the Constitution is based on the existence of inalienable rights endowed by our Creator as outlined in the Declaration of Independence: the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The Preamble to the Bill of Rights explains the States’ desire to ensure Constitutional limits on the Federal Government, using the least force and intervention possible to prevent or punish the infringement of our inalienable rights.

Liberals and Libertarians accuse Conservatives who advocate for social issues and national security of abandoning both the Constitution and the ideal of a small Federal government that is as “inconsequential in our lives as possible.” There are even some in the Tea Party willing to sacrifice these issues in order to form a coalition with the Libertarians to cut spending and lower taxes.

Unfortunately, the Left, Right and middle all manage to stir up not only the divide between Libertarians and Conservatives. They would also exaggerate conflict between socially conservative Catholics and Evangelicals who agree on the definition of marriage and that life begins at conception, but disagree on whether or not true contraception is ethical.

Abortion, medicine and research which result in the destruction of embryos or fetuses infringe on the right to life by causing the death of a human being. (See “Why Ethics.”) In contrast, true contraception prevents conception without endangering any human life. Therefore, unlike abortion, it does not infringe the right to life.

Marriage as a public institution is not merely a means to insurance and legal benefits. The definition of marriage predates the Constitution and goes far beyond culture, religion or National boundaries. Marriage affects the stability of the family and the well-being of both children and the husband and wife. (There’s strong research supporting the latter.) We define and defend traditional marriage in order to secure liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

These same inalienable rights are the justification for establishing National borders, protecting National security, and punishing those who break the law, while opposing high taxes and big Government bureaucracy and regulation that serves to not only redistribute wealth, but creates a dependency on more and bigger Government intervention.

Conservatives like Governor Rick Perry have been just as vocal in opposing the attacks on religious freedom and conscience by the Obama Administration as we have been in opposing increased taxes and regulations and the EPA’s over-reaching. We can stand secure in our understanding that the Conservative, Constitutional and proper use of government is to prevent and punish infringement of inalienable rights.

(Edit 11 AM 1/10/12 “Reagan” added to the first sentence.  04/09/14 – fixed a broken link. BBN)

Biological Politics? Out-Of-Touch Liberals And Fear-Mongering Conservatives

Love this line: “science readers should just ignore the conclusion woo.”

Seriously, the authors are evidently expanding their publication of research (along the line of this prior study, “Disgust sensitivity and the neurophysiology of left-right political orientations,”Free access at Pub Med), using eye movements and skin conductance changes in response to visual stimuli (pretty bunny vs. violent images and Republican vs. Democratic politicians) and conclude that there is an evolutionary purpose/causation.

The conclusions the researchers draw are not as grounded; rather than showing that tolerances are why people pick parties, they try to say evolution is at the root, claiming political leanings are at least partial products of our biology, which goes to show you that political scientists and psychologists who don’t understand biology should not invoke it, at least as cause and effect. But the new study’s use of cognitive data regarding both positive and negative imagery adds to the understanding of how liberals and conservatives see and experience the world and that has value, even if the more broad conclusions are not evidence-based.

UNL professor of political science and psychology John Hibbing goes too far when he tries to play evolutionary psychologist, claiming the results might mean that those on the right are more attuned and attentive to aversive elements in life and are more naturally inclined to confront them, which makes sense from an evolutionary standpoint, he said. That would mean humans are two distinct species, but only in America, so science readers should just ignore the conclusion woo and focus on the negative/positive responses they found in people already left or right and see where it can take us.

via Biological Politics? Out-Of-Touch Liberals And Fear-Mongering Conservatives.

I’m Interviewed about @GovernorPerry in IA Patch

Rick Perry: Beverly Nuckols, a doctor from New Braunfels, Texas, was among a group of supporters watching results come in at the Texas govenor’s party at the Sheraton West Des Moines.

Dozens of people milled about the main lobby of the hotel and also in the Des Moines Room, where Perry’s disappointing results were flashed across flat panel televisions.

Nuckols arrived from Texas on Wednesday and spoke for the man at a West Des Moines caucus location before coming to the hotel. “I do believe in the man,” she said.

The doctor and pro-life advocate said Perry has a good understanding of bioethics issues.

Perry came out and addressed his supporters in the Sheraton late into the evening thanking the group that had come from more than 30 states to support him. He read a letter from a supporter surrounded by his wife, Anita, and their children and then said that he didn’t run because he thought be would become president, but that he wanted to serve his nation one last time.

“Our country is in trouble,” Perry said. “Our country is not really on the track we want it to be on.”

But with the voters decision in Iowa he said that he would return to Texas and assess the caucus results and “determine whether there is a path forward for myself.”

via UPDATE: Mood at Candidates’ Election Night Parties Varies Greatly – Iowa City, IA Patch.

@GovernorPerry MSM Loves Abortion and Hates a Texas White House

Every time I convince myself that the MSM hates Governor Rick Perry because they don’t want to spend time a hundred miles from nowhere (or 200 miles from Dallas), they remind me that the real problem is the Governor’s core values.

The fuss this time is due to Governor Perry’s statement recognizing that the children of rape and incest are human enough to deserve society’s protection from intentional, elective killing. Last night I wrote about Rachel Maddow’s mad rantings concerning abortion and the children of rape or incest. Today,  (while breaking with the rest of the media in choosing to use the term, “pro-life,” rather than the usual “anti-choice”) WFAA-TV in Dallas made sure that we understand that the Governor “enjoys deep support among pro-life groups, and signed their favored sonogram bill into law earlier this year.” Not only that, but,

“Pro-choice groups and many Democrats say they will keep fighting the sonogram law.

“”This will probably lead to a law saying that if a 14-year-old victim of incest wants to get an abortion, she would then have to submit to a sonogram, which is one of the most invasive procedures this legislature has come up with,” said Andy Brown, chairman of the Travis County Democratic Party.”

via Perry’s tougher abortion stance: What does it mean for Texas? | wfaa.com Dallas – Fort Worth.

I would like to commend WFAA for using the term, “pro-life.” Thank you, WFAA!

Disclaimer: I’m on the Board of Directors of the Texas Alliance for Life, mentioned in the article. And yes, we’d like to see all children, including those of victims of rape and incest, protected at least as much as the eggs of birds on the Endangered Species List.

Spare Parts for Humans: Tissue Engineers Aim for Lab-Grown Limbs, Lungs and More | PBS NewsHour | Dec. 15, 2011 | PBS

“Just because we don’t regenerate doesn’t mean that we can’t regenerate. It just means that we don’t.”

via Spare Parts for Humans: Tissue Engineers Aim for Lab-Grown Limbs, Lungs and More | PBS NewsHour | Dec. 15, 2011 | PBS.

Public Broadcasting System’s PBS NewsHour had a segment on regenerative medicine, reviewing the very impressive progress we’ve made in the last few years. The mere fact that PBS and scientists will state these facts in public is almost as huge, in terms of world view change, as the fact that the matrices plus stem cells work.

I was at a American Bioethics and Humanities annual convention when Yamanaka’s induced pluripotent cells first made the news. The Powers That Be for that group were angry and refused to allow any hopeful conversation that the iPSC’s would replace the need for research on destructive, embryonic stem cells. Damage control included scolding world authority figures *on* the panels for daring to bring up the subject in any serious way.

I’m convinced that the whole embryonic stem cell mess was more about the need to prove that abortion is wonderful and that there is no Creator. In fact, that’s exactly what one of the Clinton/Obama “bioethicists,” Robin Alta Charo, said about cloning in at least one meeting I attended in July, 2006.  (More, here.)

CMS overturns Texas’ abortion provider exclusion @GovernorPerry

The Houston Chronicle article (not available when I wrote this earlier post) implies that the ruling from CMS is much more far-reaching than I’d thought. Our laws prohibiting State funds going to anyone who provides abortions may be overturned. This looks like it goes farther than simply disapproving of the priorities we placed on allocating our funds. It appears that Obama has decided that we can’t continue to make recipients of Texas funds sign a contract to not perform or refer for abortions.

If this is true, women can get prenatal care and teen girls can get their vaccinations in the same building where their neighbor is having her unborn baby killed! Or Texas can refuse Medicaid funds.

Texas will no longer be allowed to prohibit Medicaid recipients from receiving care at family planning clinics that perform abortions, the federal government informed the state Monday.

Arguing that the Social Security Act prohibits states from excluding such clinics, the federal agency that runs the program informed Texas that next year it will not approve an agreement like the one now in place in Texas.

“The issue is … whether a state can restrict access to a qualified health provider simply because they provide other services Medicaid doesn’t pay for,” Cindy Mann, director of the Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services, said in a phone interview with reporters. “The law does not permit this.”

Mann stressed that Medicaid “does not pay for abortions and will not pay for abortions.” She said the agency will extend Texas’ current agreement through March while negotiating a new one.

In a statement, Gov. Rick Perry responded that President Barack Obama is making women “pay the price for its pro-abortion agenda.”

“I am concerned the Obama Administration is playing politics by holding women’s health care hostage because of Texas’ pro-life policies, sacrificing the health of millions of Texas women,” said Perry.

Since 2006, Texas has provided low-income women 18 to 44 with family planning exams, related health screenings and birth control through the Medicaid Women’s Health Program. Last year, it provided services to more than 180,000 women, with 90 percent of its funds coming from the federal government and the rest from the state.

via Texas abortion provider exclusion blocked – Houston Chronicle.

Obama to Texas: Fund PP or no Well Woman money

The Obama Administration has told Texas that our State is not allowed to decide who will provide medical care under Title X Family Planning and Well Woman funds. The Administration has recently ruled in a similar manner for other States. (

This in spite of the fact that the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) did give Texas a waiver allowing Texas to move all Medicaid and CHIP beneficiaries to doctors in managed care plans. The managed care plans, along with cooperative coalitions between hospital systems and the doctors they will pay for seeing managed care patients, is consistent with the plans laid out in “Obamacare.” Evidently, so is Planned Parenthood’s survival.

CMS claims in this letter to Texas’ Health and Human Services Commission that we’re limiting the choices of the women because the State prioritized where to spend our money and who to pay for healthcare, beginning with county clinics and hospital districts, followed by doctors and clinics that provide comprehensive, continuing care. Since we only have so much money, our Legislature decided to support the most vital care givers. Even though we don’t specifically write in law that “Planned Parenthood, Inc., need not apply,” CMS doesn’t like our plan.

CMS was asked to give a “waiver” to Texas since the funding is outside normal Medicaid rules, because it funds care for adults who are not at the rock-bottom income levels. Texas also has a waiver in order to use funds for prenatal care, justified by counting the unborn child. (The pro-aborts have protested over and over that the mother, not her child, should be the one we count and that she should be allowed to use the money for any “reproductive services,” including abortion, that she wants.)

Texas Alliance for Life and Texas Right to Life have both issued statements opposing the CMS ruling.

From Joe Pojman, Ph.D., TAL’s Executive Director:

“We believe the State of Texas has every right to deny millions of tax dollars to Planned Parenthood, which is what the Texas Legislature and Governor Perry has chosen to do,” he said. “Senate Bill 7, passed last summer during a special legislative session, prohibits Medicaid tax dollars under the Women’s Health Program from going to abortion providers and their affiliated organizations.”

“This bill excludes several dozen Planned Parenthood sites from the Women’s Health Program, but it does not exclude any other hundreds of Women’s Health Program providers in Texas. Many of the other providers offer comprehensive primary and preventative care to low- income women in addition to family planning, which Planned Parenthood is unable or unwilling to provide,” he continued. “By threatening to cancel the Women’s Health Program in Texas, the Obama Administration is showing it would sooner deny tens of millions of dollars of medical services to low-income women rather than allow the State of Texas to cut off tax funding to Planned Parenthood.”

Addendum: this article from the Houston Chronicle (I quoted from it here) which implies that the ruling may go so far as to overturn our long-standing law that requires providers to sign a contract affirming that they don’t perform or refer for abortions.

@GovernorPerry to Blitz: “You guys are a bigger pain than the back surgery.”

Governor Rick Perry was grilled by Wolf Blitzer on CNN‘s Situation Room on Wednesday, December 7, with frequent interruptions and repetitious questions. (Full transcript, here.) “Blitz” once again earned the nickname given to him by Herman Cain.

The Houston Chronicle, which leans far to the left, reported on the interview in a blog entry entitled, “Perry talks about pain meds, gay Scouts and the VP job”