Judge keeps Planned Parenthood out of Women’s Health Program

What happened: Texas passed a law last summer, SB 7, that specifically said that if the State is forced to give money to “entities that affiliate with abortion-promoting entities,” the State would shut down the Women;s Health Program. The Obama Administration tried to force the State to violate this law. Then, a Federal Judge  ruled that the law couldn’t go into effect,

U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel on Monday granted a preliminary injunction to require the state to keep Planned Parenthood in the program until he makes a decision on the merits of the case.

But Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott’s office asked the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for an emergency stay of the injunction, which was granted by Judge Jerry E. Smith.

via Judge keeps Planned Parenthood out of Women’s Health Program – San Antonio Express-News.

If the injunction had stood, there would be no Women’s Health Program in Texas. Planned Parenthood seems to think that if their corporation can’t have money, no one should. Luckily, Judge Smith understood the emergency.

Planned Parenthood wasn’t hard to replace. WingRight reported on the thousands of other doctors and clinics that participate in the WHP and how to find one in your area, here.

Update, 8 AM May 2:

The attacks are on against Judge Smith.

More at the usual suspects like the Texas Tribune.

Funny, the TT doesn’t take this opportunity to link to its own interactive map showing other providers or to link to Obama’s $61 million dollar grant  to Texas public health clinics.

Health Care spending continues to fall

National Review’s James C. Capretta comments on the attempts by some in the Obama Administration would like to take the credit for the decrease in health care spending in 2009-2010.

The decrease in spending follows the previous curve,according to the data.

In addition, we docs haven’t had a real increase in Medicare pay in years. We waited for Medicare to – and find out how much they would – pay us 3 or 4 times in 2010, thanks to the planned, threatened and repeatedly deferred “Sustainable Growth Rate” doc pay cuts.. Then, there was the planned moratorium at the end of the Federal Fiscal year.

As the Dems ramped up their plans for “reform,” the cuts and deferred payment were reinforced by threats of more if organized medicine didn’t play ball. I reported on the threats at LifeEthics.org in October, 2009.

Physics, philosophy and God when there’s “nothing.”

The Atlantic has a funny little interview with physicist Lawrence Krauss, the author of last year’s A Universe From Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing,

Krauss states that he likes to “provoke people” and believes that science is meant to make people “uncomfortable.”

The joke is that the interview’s subject is whether science has made philosophy and religion “obsolete.”   What they should really be discussing is the claim by Krauss that physics can answer the question, “Why?”

Science is pretty good at answering the questions “How?” and “What?” In fact, one of the criteria of a scientific experiment or statement is that observers around the world should be able to replicate that experiment if they work with the same variables as the first reporter.

But science never answers “Why?”

The hypothesis of the article is that theoretical physics has answered enough “whys” that philosophy and religion – and the notion of a Creator – are “obsolete.” That’s the “hook” that Krauss says he was looking for in order to make his book sell. It also won him praise from (Red Letter Evangelical) atheists Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris.

It’s ridiculous to talk about any aspect of natural physics within this universe as though the discussion or findings rule out the existence of a Creator. Obviously, what is within the Universe, what can be observed, measured, or even “presumed,” must adhere to the laws of physics of this universe – whether or not there is a Creator.

The problem of “something from nothing” is resolved by Krauss by imagining an infinite number of universes, interconnected so that this universe is not a closed system: “infinite” “calculable” “multiverses.” Where did those multiverses, and the conditions that make Krauss’ quantum physics exist, come from?

We still get back to “something from nothing.”

Without philosophy, I dare anyone to explain the existence of concepts such as “like,” “provoke,” and/or “meant to.”  Or “Beauty,” “Truth,” and “Justice.” And religion is the best way to explain “Love” and to answer “Why?”

Addendum: you can down load the book, “The Irrational Athiest” here, compliments of the author, “Vox Day.” He has other free books available at his blog, “Vox Popoli.”

Egg-Producing Human Ovarian Stem Cells Concern Ethicists | Daily News | NCRegister.com

HUGE “yuck” factor, here.

Everyone should at least be concerned about the huge potential for harm if these oocytes are used to produce embryos.

The dogma that women inherit a fixed “bank account” of irreplaceable eggs at birth that dwindles until it expires in menopause has apparently been rendered obsolete by the team’s isolation of egg-producing stem cells from the ovarian tissue of adult women undergoing “sex-change” operations in Japan.

via Egg-Producing Human Ovarian Stem Cells Concern Ethicists | Daily News | NCRegister.com.

And there are plans to fertilize these “eggs” for experimentation:

Now it is British scientists who intend to carry out the next step of research, work that is banned from receiving federal funding in the United States: the creation of human embryos from eggs derived from those stem cells for experimentation, freezing and destruction.

“The test of an egg is to show that it can be fertilized,” said Dr. Richard Anderson of the MRC Centre for Reproductive Health at Edinburgh University, Scotland. “We see in those initial days after fertilization, in its development, if it is really an egg that can do its business.”

Anderson and his colleague, reproductive biologist Evelyn Telfer, have been working on ripening immature human eggs from adult women in vitro.  Now they are collaborating with the Harvard researchers. Anderson confirmed that they have taken preliminary steps to acquire a research license from the Human Fertility and Embryology Authority (HFEA) — the watchdog organization that grants research licenses to “fertility” clinics throughout the U.K. — to allow them to experiment on human embryos made from ovarian stem-cell-derived eggs as well as from their own artificially ripened eggs. They expect to be under way within the year.

First Amendment on Life Support

“More sparingly should this praise be allowed to a government, where a man’s religious rights are violated by penalties, or fettered by tests, or taxed by a hierarchy. Conscience is the most sacred of all property.” John Madison, “Property,” National Gazette, March 29, 1792.

“In purity and holiness I will guard my life and my art.” Hippocratic Oath, approximately 400 BC.

“Refusals based on moral disapprobation, however, are not typical of medical ethics” R. Alta Charo, ”Health Care Provider Refusals to Treat, Prescribe, Refer or Inform: Professionalism and Conscience.” February, 2007.

Fully enjoying the protections of the First Amendment themselves, the New England Journal of Medicine has published yet another editorial, “Warning: Contraceptive Drugs May Cause Political Headaches,”  by Robin Alta Charo, J.D., denouncing conscience and those of us who abide by ours. I suppose that she thought it was the right thing to do.

The Journal does not offer background on Ms. Charo’s previous editorials on the subject, including the notorious 2005 “The Celestial Fire of Conscience.” The editors don’t include any  note – any “warning’ – that she was part of the political Obama transition team. Ms. Charo did not mention any of these possible conflicts of interest in her “disclosure form,” available online.

Charo’s entire argument relies on readers’ agreement that the argument is about “public policy and contraception.” It is vital to her argument since, as she quotes Georgetown University theologian Tom Reese, “If the argument is over religious liberty, the bishops win.” Because, if we understand that the issue relates to “an establishment of religion,” Congress cannot legitimately pass, and the Executive Branch may not enforce, any law that infringes on the free exercise of religion.

Charo would instead have us focus on “public institutions, public places, and public duties.” Although hospitals and universities serve the public by providing healthcare and education, they are still owned by private, religious entities. In addition, the Obama Administration’s “accommodation” – the suggestion that the institution’s insurance company provide contraception free of charge to the ensured who want it – becomes much more complicated in light of the fact that most large religious hospitals and universities privately self-insure rather than enter into the market to buy first dollar coverage from a third party insurance company.

Charo’s essay is political appeal to emotion and half-truths, full of the “partisan sound bites and slogans” she denounces. However, not even the lie about mandatory transvaginal ultrasounds compares with her earlier error of logic in warning that the institutions could withhold “ordinary salary.” I don’t know of any religious organization that considers agreed-upon salary for agreed-upon service as inherently sinful. Keeping a promise, like that in the First Amendment or a contract with an employee is sacred to those of us with a conscience.

The Constitution demands that Congress “shall make no law” limiting religious freedom. The attempt by the Obama Administration to write regulations that require religious institutions to engage in acts that are contrary to long-standing, organized tenets of that religion goes directly against the First Amendment and cannot be justified.

Vanity: I’m Published in Fort Worth Star-Telegram (Texas Advanced Directive Act)

I submitted an editorial to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram which they have titled, “Nuckols: Navigating healthcare’s difficult decisions.” It was published March 28, 2013, but I can’t tell whether it’s in the dead-tree version.  (In case you ever wondered, no one notifies the author when a piece like this or a letter to the editor is published. I think it increases their readership, all of us checking back to see whether we made it to print.)

The paper had published a very biased and poorly written op-ed calling the Texas Advanced Directive Act, “the Texas Futile Care act.” Although the Star-Telegram corrected this one error, the piece has unfortunately been picked up by several other websites.

The editors edited: giving the piece its name and changing all my references to “TADA” and “the Act” to “the act.” They also did some research and posted a little biography that I was surprised to see. (I wouldn’t have been foolish or brave enough to give these credentials without checking in with the people they might have affected.)

I do wish that the paper had researched the original article more thoroughly. It’s so bad that I decided not to link to it.

I was privileged, back in 2006 and 2007, to sit in on a couple of year’s worth of the meetings that I mention in the article. We all worked diligently to come up with some compromise other than going to court on every disputed case. Because our compromise fell apart at the very last minute, families are still faced with only 48 hours between the notice that an ethics committee has been called and ten days’ notice if transfer is pending. I hope we can come to an agreement in 2013 to make these decisions a little easier, while keeping them out of court and in the realm of physicians’ medical judgment.

Washington Post bias rallies abortion supporters

How unfortunate that the WaPo chose to color this article, “A clinic’s landlord turns the tables on anti-abortion protesters” with “anti-choice” stereotypes depicting all pro-life activists as violent. Obviously, there hasn’t been violence at the Stave office building or, I’m sure, it would have been prominently reported in this article. Instead, the focus goes to Roy Carhartt, who does abortions at the clinic. Carhart isn’t an OB/Gyn, but performs late term abortions for a living and also claims to be a “Family Physician.”

The article is supposed to be about Todd Stave, who founded “Voices for Choice,” which solicits volunteers to contact pro-live activists, supplying names, phone numbers,  addresses and sometimes even the names of children. From the Voices for Choice website,

Todd Stave is an entrepreneur in the Washington, DC area who believes in a woman’s right to choose. He also believes in every American’s fundamental right to his or her own opinions but loathes bullies, harassers and antagonists who cross the lines of civility and decency.

In reality, Stave owns a building that once was his abortionist father’s clinic and is now an abortion business run by his sister.

After Roy Carhart started doing late term abortions there in late 2010, local pro-life activists began to petition Mr. Stave to change his business practices. They called him and personally contacted him, even going so far as to protest at his home.  Last August, two people stood outside of the school where one of the Stave children attended middle school, quietly – and legally – praying and demonstrating with signs.

I don’t support protesting outside the school of such young survivors of abortion and agree that it’s a horrible thing to have to explain to an 11 year old that Daddy makes his living from renting a building to people who perform late term abortions.

I believe in small government and personal responsibility. Communicating our moral beliefs and community standards by personal interaction are much better than sweeping laws in the pursuit of influencing our neighbors.

Speaking of responsibility: I hope and pray that those “pro-life” activists who receive the phone calls from the pro-abortion volunteers are engaging their callers in a real conversation about elective abortion.
I also hope that the pro-life men and women make note of the caller ID information. After all, most violence around those who advocate in favor of elective abortions is committed by the so-called “pro-choice.”  I hope Mr. Stave’s (& now Wapo’s) volunteers at VOChoice.org never commit violence.

May the Lord bless all of our Nation with understanding about what abortion really is. Odd that if you break the egg of a bird on the Endangered Species list, it doesn’t matter that it was an embryo or fetus, you’ve still broken Federal law. But the only species having this conversations doesn’t protect our own children of tomorrow from elective, intentional abortion.

Best questions from Supremes on ObamaCare debate

The only thing sure in life is death and taxes. The difference is that “We the People” can avoid taxes by making sure our Republic is sound and avoid the errors that the founding fathers  and de Tocqueville (and I) warned us about.

Unfortunately, our Nation has decided – whether by default or not – that a group of nine appointed Justices are not only the “highest court in the land,” they are the highest LAW in the land. And so, we find ourselves at the mercy of the whims – and sometimes the least consistent – of these justices

I’ve been scanning the transcript from the Tuesday, March 27, 2012 debate before the Supreme Court, which is available at the SCOTUS website.

A question by Justice Alito :

“All right, suppose that you and I walked around downtown Washington at lunch hour and we found a couple of healthy young people and we stopped them and we said, “You know what you’re doing? You are financing your burial services right now because eventually you’re going to die, and somebody is going to have to pay for it, and if you don’t have burial insurance and you haven’t saved money for it, you’re going to shift the cost to somebody else.”

“Isn’t that a very artificial way of talking about what somebody is doing?”

RedState.com’s Erick Erickson wrote about “Sinners in the hands of Anthony Kennedy,” and noted “the quote heard round the world,” from Justice Kennedy:

“But the reason this is concerning, is because it requires the individual to do an affirmative act. In the law of torts our tradition, our law, has been that you don’t have the duty to rescue someone if that person is in danger. The blind man is walking in front of a car and you do not have a duty to stop him absent some relation between you. And there is some severe moral criticisms of that rule, but that’s generally the rule.

“And here the government is saying that the Federal Government has a duty to tell the individual citizen that it must act, and that is different from what we have in previous cases and that changes the relationship of the Federal Government to the individual in the very fundamental way.”

Hear and read the passage, at Real Clear Politics.

Erickson points out that the media are changing the meme of the debate from whether the law is Constitutional to a rant that the Conservatives on the Court are bullying the rest. The Houston Chronicle joins the chorus and proves Erick’s point.

To think that I almost posted this without adding the Category “Media Abuse.”

Abortion of the Teaching Moment

Public policy in education and ethics discourse are approaching a climate in which there are no standards of morality and no expectation of – much less recognition of – any ultimate Truth and no acknowledgement of right or wrong other than arbitrary enforcement of faddish laws.

“The Journal does not specifically support substantive moral views, ideologies, theories, dogmas or moral outlooks, over others. It supports sound rational argument. Moreover, it supports freedom of ethical expression.”

Earlier this month, I reported on the Journal of Medical Ethics’ “After Birth Abortion; Why should the baby live?” The quote above is from one of the editors of the Journal, Julian Savulescu, who apparently does not understand that his support of “rational argument” and “freedom of ethical expression” is a substantive moral view, dogma or moral outlook. Savulescu is a perfect example that my opening statement is true.

Among the many unintended consequences of this lack of standards is that there is now seems to be no place for teaching and learning. How do our teachers, much less our students, develop judgment about ethics in a world with only subjective standards? How do our teachers correct a horrible overstepping of what were once considered boundaries if there are no boundaries?

Where and when do we find the teaching moment, an opportunity to review basic ethics and learn once again why these ethics fit the event or question?

Generation of blood vessel with patient’s own stem cells.

In the article, “To Fix a Heart, Doctors Train Girl’s Body to Grow New Part,” the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday on an adult stem cell treatment which may revolutionize care of as many as 3,000 children a year. The story focuses on Angela, now 4 years old, who was born with “hypoplastic left heart syndrome,” a condition in which a child never develops a normal 4 chamber heart.

Think of the heart as two tubes, each with an atrium or upper chamber and a lower chamber, the ventricle. The lungs are between the two, and the system is set up so that  low oxygen blood does not mix with the blood that is saturated with oxygen. 

If there is only one ventricle, the system can’t adapt to increased need for oxygen. Not only is the ability to pump the blood not enough to increase when exercising, excited, or scared – or even growing – but the oxygen-rich blood always mixes with the depleted blood, even on the way to the lungs.

Without surgery, 70% of children die before they turn one year old. Up until now, the corrective surgery has involved using grafts of artificial tubes, that don’t grow, and need to be replaced every so often.

The new technique uses a “bio-absorbable” scaffold on which the patient’s own stem cells are seeded and grown. This new blood vessel is surgically implanted so that the anatomy, and the blood flow, is more like the normal heart. It’s hoped that the new graft will grow with the child and prevent the need for repeat surgeries as the child grows.

In the end, the choice to become the first patient in Dr. Breuer’s study turned on three things, Ms. Irizarry says: the family’s faith in God, their trust in the doctor, and the potential for a natural blood vessel that could possibly help avoid more surgeries. “Before, they were using plastic, now they’re using this special graft that will grow with her,” Ms. Irizarry says.

Angela is the first, so we don’t really know whether the new vessel will grow with her. But there’s evidence from other, similar procedures to build new bladders and other organs.

Unfortunately, the process of getting the new procedures from early trials to use for those 3,000 babies a year is complicated and slow, even with an FDA “exemption:”

Development of the procedure has been painstaking. Dr. Breuer undertook four years of laboratory research after he joined Yale in 2003 before seeking approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2007 to test the approach on patients. It took four more years and 3,000 pages of data before he got a greenlight. The study builds on the cases of 25 children and young adults successfully treated in Japan a decade ago with a similar approach.

Dr. Breuer, who holds several patents through Yale related to the technology, expects to implant a tissue-engineered blood vessel in a second patient soon as part of a six-patient study to test the safety of the procedure and determine whether the blood vessels actually grow in the body as a child gets bigger. The hope is that if these patients are treated without a hitch, the procedure may be available under a special FDA humanitarian device exemption, which would allow Yale to charge for it while conducting a larger study.

It’s a shame that it took so long to get the procedure to the first patient, and that many more will have to wait even longer. There must be a way to place judgement before bureaucracy in these cases.

Cross posted at LifeEthics.org

David Dewhurst for Senate, Ted Cruz should retract his negative ads

I’m endorsing Texas‘ Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst in his race for US Senator and calling on Ted Cruz to retract his false, negative ads.

As a stalwart champion for the right to life, marriage and small government, David Dewhurst has demonstrated the strength of his Conservative philosophy and credentials while serving as President of the Texas Senate.  He supported the passage of our Tort Reform, Prenatal Protection Act, Woman’s Right to Know Act,and this year’s Sonogram Law, “Loser Pays,” and Voter ID Law. He has opposed ObamaCare, called for the resignation of Eric Holder for his part in running guns to Mexico and backed Governor Perry in his fight against Federal attempts to encroach on Texas’ state sovereignty.  He stood his ground in spite of stunts pulled by Senate Democrats, including their month-long trip to New Mexico in 2003. His answers to the committee that interviewed him, as well as his history, won him the endorsement of Texas Alliance for Life. (I’m on the Board of Directors of TAL.)

I am impressed with his ability to work out agreements among Conservatives separated by degrees on fine points. One day in 2007 stands out in my memory as an example of Dewhurst’s leadership: Lt. Governor Dewhurst brought a group of us together in his office to hammer out an agreement on significant reform for the Texas Advanced Directive Act. He was a calming, firm influence on the large group. I didn’t detect any pressure from him, although the Session was winding down and this would be the last day the legislation could be passed in the Senate.

Last Fall, I wanted the Lieutenant Governor to remain in his current office so we’d have the security of his experience and leadership  when (as I had hoped) Governor Perry became President. Because I hoped to have a Governor Dewhurst sworn in in December, I originally decided to support Ted Cruz and even gave him a donation, even though I wondered about his switch from an aspiring Attorney General to the Senate race.

Unfortunately, Ted Cruz and his Senate campaign staff haven’t built their campaign on why Mr. Cruz is qualified and should be Senator. Instead, they’ve spent time and money on abrasive, negative attacks on the Lieutenant Governor, a fine man who has served Texas honorably. Several of the ads have been blatantly false, including a very early one concerning the Transportation Security Agency anti-groping bill (passed in the Special Session) and another claiming that Dewhurst had backed an income tax in 2005 (debunked by the Austin-American “Politi-facts” as “Pants on Fire“).

I spoke to Mr. Cruz’ staff about my disapproval of their attempts to sully the Lieutenant Governor’s reputation last November at the Texas Federation of Republican Women Convention and again at the Comal County Candidate forum on the first of February. The staffers argued with me both times and nothing changed.

The negativity continued. On February 23, Ben Shapiro of Big Government helped spread a false rumor about a “fundraiser” supposedly held by Obama supporters at the home of one of the Podestas. There were no funds raised, and the “home” is actually a townhouse that is often used by a PR firm for meetings. Neither the sponsors nor the invited guests were Democrats or “Liberals.” Shapiro wrote a luke-warm retraction on February 24th, but noted that Cruz’ staffer, James Bernson, defended using the earlier version. Many of us received emails with the false claims on February 28th.

Cruz’ facebook page still contained these false claims as late as last week.

Mr. Cruz is very young and has never held an elective office or proven himself able to build coalitions that we all know are necessary for legislation to pass in either the State or Federal House and Senate. Texas Legislators learn that it is better to persuade their opponents than to tear them down, even when one side has a majority, because of the pressures of our short Sessions. Cruz only knows the adversarial techniques that he must have used to argue cases in court where it’s evidently not enough to be right: the opponent must be depicted as wrong – and guilty.

The race for the open Texas Senate is not a matter of Conservative vs. RINO. It’s not incumbent vs. fresh ideas and energy. It is experience and a proven legislative ability vs. what appears to be a win-at-all-costs, aggressive and arrogant display of disregard for the history and the truth of a good man’s record.

David Dewhurst is conservative and a leader. He has a record over the years that proves that he is not timid or a RINO, at all. Neither is he abrasive and negative as Mr. Cruz has proven himself. I hope you will join with me in supporting David Dewhurst for the Senate.

Planned Parenthood “affiliates” and the Texas Women’s Health Program

Today, the Austin Chronicle, the local “alternative” news source, has yet another article “Perry continues assault on women’s healthcare,” claiming that Governor Perry and the Commissioner of Health and Human Services Suehs have acted – seemingly on their own – to shut down the Texas Women’s Health Program (more info here) in order to spite the poor underdog, Planned Parenthood.

Today’s statement is that “The new regulation signed by Suehs – redefining “affiliate” to mean that Planned Parenthood clinics not providing abortions are deemed affiliated with those clinics that do – conflicts with federal law, as confirmed last week by U.S. Health and Human Ser­vices Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.”

Actually, the Attorney General ruled on the definition of “Affiliate.” The Secretary must follow the law passed last Spring by the 82nd Texas Legislature.

It’s not surprising – in fact it’s common sense – that subsidiary corporations are considered “affiliates” by the State, since they are members of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.  The annual report of PPFA calls these facilities their “medical affiliates.” The President of PPFA, Cecile Richards, shown above with Texas Senator Jeff Wentworth at a Planned Parenthood of San Antonio and South Texas event, visits these subsidiaries in her official duties.

(Photo from the 2009 Annual Report of Planned Parenthood of San Antonio and South Texas)

Doomesbury defends abortion

Yeah, I know it’s “Doonesbury.”

Garry Trudeau has always been a leftist, pro-abort (he “satirized” the movie “Silent Scream” in 1985.) who has no problem flaunting the power of his cartoon, Doonesbury. This week, he’s taking on the Texas sonogram law. And he claims that “the GOP” has declared “war” and that for him to ignore it would be “comedy malpractice:”

“I chose the topic of compulsory sonograms because it was in the news and because of its relevance to the broader battle over women’s health currently being waged in several states. For some reason, the GOP has chosen 2012 to re-litigate reproductive freedom, an issue that was resolved decades ago. Why [Rick] Santorum, [Rush] Limbaugh et al. thought this would be a good time to declare war on half the electorate, I cannot say. But to ignore it would have been comedy malpractice.”

Two years ago, he mocked Sarah Palin. One week in July, 2010 he was laughing at the fact that her family was being stalked. The next week, he gave us a dream sequence depicting a Sarah Palin doll “refudiating the lame stream media” and trying to convince Mr. Potato Head and assorted toys to fight “to water the tree of liberty by spilling the tyrant blood” of the little girl who owns them. Then, we hear the girl’s mom tell her that everything Sarah says is “programmed in. Her brain is empty. Sarah’s a dummy. A shiny plaything. A cypher. A blank. A total nothing. Not a thought in her head. Just a piece of plastic crap.” and on and on . . .

Last year, Trudeau “partnered” with bogus biographer, Joe McGinnis to push the latter’s book in the cartoon.

Even though the comic strip is published in San Antonio and Austin papers, I didn’t know about these past incidents until I started doing research for this post.  Was there any outrage or demands for an apology from Trudeau or that advertisers or papers withdraw their support?

This week, some papers won’t run the abortion series, others will move the strip to the editorial section. A few plan to run an alternate series.

I subscribed to the SA Express News until 2010, when it became obvious that it was too politically biased in favor of Dems and the Obama “Health care reform.” It may be time to contact their advertisers to let them know what trash they support.

What will your paper do? And, how do you feel about it?

Oppose theObama Standoff!

Bravo, to all the Letters to the Editors and comments in favor of religious free expression, conscience and State’s rights that I’m seeing. (My hometown paper has one from a man I don’t know – but only subscribers can read it.)

It’s been said before: if the Federal government can make you buy anything, it can make you buy *anything.* Will the mandated insurance packages in Washington include Physician Assisted Suicide?

This administration has already imposed regulations that infringe on the right of conscience of physicians and other health care providers. (“Anti-abortion” docs should never serve under-served areas and should have cooperative referral agreements with abortionists according to previous opinions by Sebelius.)

Who wants a doctor or church leader without a conscience giving you medical or spiritual care?  Or even picking out what you hope is a reliable insurance company who will be there when you really need them?

In a particularly unconscionable moment, one Obama Administration representative told representatives of religious organizations that they had a year to reconcile – with Obama, not with God.

“Obama Standoff,” or To Coin a Phrase – Revised

We used to call it a “Mexican standoff,” but that could be considered bigoted these days. Or at least non-PC.

“Obama Standoff”  is a better description for a specific condition – one that’s becoming more common and hitting us more frequently. In the “Obama Standoff,” the Obama administration demands that Texas, some other State, or any individual or organization of individuals with a conscience,  violate their own laws, Constitution, or conscience – threatening to withhold Federal tax money, fine, or break that law himself if others don’t comply.

Unbelievably, Obama’s Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathleen Sebelius visited Houston today and announced – on the Friday before the funding for Texas’ Women’s Health Program expires on Wednesday, March 14 – that she is going to deny renewal of the Medicaid waiver. She did this *before* notifying the State or the Commissioner! See the Governor’s announcement in response, here. http://governor.state.tx.us/news/press-release/17025/ )

The Obama Administration doesn’t even care that there will be no meeting of the Texas Legislature until January 2013. Of course, this is the Constitutional scholar in the White House who ignored the meaning of “recess appointment” in January. Why should he honor concepts like the Legislature makes laws and the Executive Branch must follow them?

It doesn’t matter that Texas has had the same law for 10 years  any more than it matters that the Catholic Church has opposed contraception for thousands of years. It doesn’t matter that physicians have defended the right to follow their consciences for 2500 years, since Hippocrates’ oath was adopted by the Profession.

Why should they? They don’t care that the First Amendment guarantees the free expression of religion — to “establishments of religion,” by the way!

In a particularly unconscionable moment, one Obama Administration official told representatives of religious organizations that they had a year to reconcile – with Obama, not with God.

And they certainly don’t understand, much less care, what a “conscience” is other than some roadblock in their goal to control and force every doctor to be complicit with ending human life – or at least make sure to move next door to someone who will.

To paraphrase C. S. Lewis: We laugh at honor and are surprised to find treachery among us.

“Women Speak for Themselves” up to 4 pages

The list of women who have asked to co-sign the open letter to President Obama and Secretary Sebelius is still growing. Have you signed up?
There’s a button on the top of the page, just fill in your name and State, more information is optional. You, too, can say,

Here We Are!

@GovernorPerry appointed me to Texas Institute for Health Care Quality and Efficiency

I can’t say the whole name of the Institute in one breath, so I alternate between calling it “the Institute,” or “tick” for “TIHCQE.”

TIHCQE will make recommendations to the Texas Legislature on how to measure quality and efficiency and help bring innovation to cut costs while still taking care of our Medicaid patients, those who have State health plans, and future “health care collaboratives” or HCC’s. The latter could be the Accountable Care Organizations that are laid out in the Accountable Care Act (“Obamacare”), or something brand new in Texas.

Anyway, I sent out this notice this morning:

For immediate release:
Reference: http://governor.state.tx.us/news/appointment/17014/

Governor Rick Perry Appoints Beverly B. Nuckols, MD, FAAFP, to Texas Institute for Health Care Quality and Efficiency

Austin, Texas – Texas Governor Rick Perry has appointed New Braunfels Family Physician, Beverly B. Nuckols, MD, FAAFP, to the Board of Directors of the Texas Institute for Health Care Quality and Efficiency, for a term to expire January 31, 2013.

The 82nd Legislature created the Texas Institute for Health Care Quality and Efficiency as part of Senate Bill 7.  The Institute is charged with improving health care quality, accountability, education and cost to the state by encouraging health care provider collaboration, effective health care delivery models and coordination of health care services.

Nuckols, a board certified family physician in private practice, has lived in New Braunfels with her husband, Larry, since 1993. She is a member of the Texas Medical Association, American and Texas Academies of Family Physicians, and the Comal County Medical Association. Nuckols serves on the Board of Directors for Texas Alliance for Life, New Braunfels Options for Women and is the Chair of the Family Medicine Section of the Christian Medical and Dental Association. She has served as a member of the National Advisory Committee on Violence Against Women and the Texas Association Against Sexual Assault, and a board member of the Comal County Women’s Shelter and New Braunfels Hospice.

Nuckols received a bachelor’s degree from the University of Texas at Tyler, and completed medical school and family practice residency at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio.  She received a Masters in Bioethics in 2007 from Trinity International University in Deerfield, Illinois.

—End—

Texas Governor Perry Pushes Back (Family Planning, Women’s Health and PP)

Governor Rick Perry is pushing back against the Obama Administration’s threat to kill our Texas Women’s Health Program due to law passed by the Legislature last June. The Governor’s office has produced 4 new videos (one of which includes me) explaining that the State is prepared to ensure that women are able to access continuing comprehensive care under these programs.

If you only have time for one, watch Carol Everett’s video in which she relates that the Commissioner of Health and Human Services has identified 2500 doctors willing to participate with the Well Woman Program and Texas’ Family Planning, even in rural areas where there has never been a Planned Parenthood clinic. There are also videos from former Waco PP Executive Director Abby Johnson, Texas Alliance for Life’s Executive Director Joe Pojman, Ph.D., and me.

The videos can be viewed at the Governor’s YouTube page and via the Office of the Governor website. They are the beginning of a series of announcements and news releases in hopes of convincing the Obama Administration and Secretary Sebelius to preserve these programs. Time is short as the current Medicaid waiver is due to expire at the end of March.

Stop and think about it: What the media is reporting as a single crisis is really the effect of two separate events. One is the cut in funding to Family Planning that went into effect in October,  along with many other cuts that were made in order to balance the State budget according to the Texas Constitution while paying for Medicaid for children and education.  The second is what is happening in a few clinics that are partners with other clinics that do abortions and are panicking because they are about to lose State funds.

Where are the reports about the thousands of providers who have agreed to see patients under both these programs?

The media is also acting as though the law prohibiting anyone who performs or refers to abortions, or who is a business partner with an abortion provider is brand new or that the Governor got up one morning and changed the law. No, the House and Senate of the 82nd Texas Legislature deliberated for months on Medicaid funding, including the best way to provide care under the Family Planning Title X funds and the Medicaid funded Women’s Health Program. They continued the old prohibition on funding affiliates.

The only change is that the Attorney General has clarified that “affiliates” include organizations that are part of the same national corporation.

The media and President Obama also ignore that the legislature won’t meet until January, 2013, so there is no way to change the law that appropriates State Tax funds.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you: I was nervous as I could be and I spent too much time giving a list of my credentials. But if you’re brave, here’s my video.

Wall Street Poll on Marriage

The Wall Street Journal’s “Question of the Day” for February 8th was  “Should gay marriage be legal in the United States?” For some reason, it appeared in the side bar today, so I voted and commented. As of 10 AM, March 6th, the vote is 53.9% to 46.1%, with 2975 votes for “Yes” and 2540 “No” votes.

The comments are typical of these debates: opposition to homosexual marriage is presented as something instigated by people who oppose it due to their hatred of homosexuals, their bigotry, and their narrow religious beliefs.

First, the people who started this “battle” are the ones who want to change the law and continue to push by filing appeal after appeal against laws in existence in order to change the law and the definition of marriage. Proposition 8 in 2008 in California and the Texas Defense of Marriage Constitutional Amendment (DOMA) in 2005 were in response to Court cases such as the one in Massachusetts declaring that it was unconstitutional in that State to define marriage as between one man and one woman.

Second, opposition to changing the law and definition of marriage  does not require that we hate anyone the same way that we hate child abuse.

There is a wide range of sexual attraction among humans, but the norm is opposite-sex-attraction (OSA) between physical adults.

And then, there are the basic facts of anatomy and physiology.

While biology is not destiny, it has consequences: form follows function. In fact, the male and female sexual organs are complimentary in purpose and function. That function involves one set  – the complementary organs of one man and one woman.

There is no parallel between the form of a water fountain or seats on a bus and the race of the user as there is between the male and female form  and sexual function. There certainly is no physiological reason to discriminate between same-race and interracial marriage.

If you want to stick with the cerebral, there are also problems in declaring that same-sex-attraction (SSA) is equivalent to OSA. The history of legalized or non-criminalized homosexual marriage is less than 20 years old. There is much more history to support interracial and polygamous marriage.  There’s no logical reasoning that if the definition of marriage is changed to include homosexual marriages, that these won’t be legalized, too.

Update on Texas, Contraception, and Women Who Vote (and blog)

Over the weekend, there were more op-eds published in online magazines and newspapers all over the Internet championing women’s “right” to contraceptives and nearly everyone of them tied that “right” to the “right” to obtain an abortion. Search the news on “Texas contraception politics” and you’ll find a few dozens of articles published repeatedly in newspapers across the Nation. They often begin discussing cuts in State funding for contraception and move straight to the theme that mean old Republicans in Texas just don’t want to pay for abortions.

Yes, we don’t want to pay for abortions or support corporations that do them. That is our “choice.”

However, the reality is that Texas Legislators had no choice other than to cut spending. Where is the money going to come from?

Texas also cut money to train resident doctors – the future family doctors, OB/Gyns and pediatricians because there was not enough money. But I don’t see any articles on “The war against physician workforce.”

The only way to raise money would be to raise taxes. In order to raise taxes, we would have to have a vote to change our Constitution. I, for one, would vote “no.”

Everyone – including the Obama Administration – ignores the fact that Texas’ part-time Legislature will not meet again until January 2013, so there won’t be a chance to change the funding until after the November election.

Please notice the hateful tone of many of the blogs, op-eds and especially the readers’ comments and letters to the editors. And note that they always focus in on abortion – and that even the National articles narrow in on Texas. The truly mean comments claim that Republicans hate women. Some articles are even titled, “. . . War on Women,” and “When States Abuse Women.” One of the “War on Women” articles was published in the UK’s Guardian.

Women vote in Texas. We believe that life begins at fertilization and that every human being is endowed by our Creator with the right to life.

And we sure don’t have extra money to pay higher taxes. How hard is that concept to understand?

Here are the women – thousands of us

Earlier, I linked to an “Open Letter to President Obama, Secretary Sebelius and Members of Congress.” There are now about 2000 names of women from all over the country who volunteered to add their “signature” to the letter. I believe that more will be added, since I received a response from the organizers on March 3, but can’t find my name on the list.

Here is the “Open Letter” in full:

OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT OBAMA, SECRETARY SEBELIUS AND MEMBERS OF CONGRESS

DON’T CLAIM TO SPEAK FOR ALL WOMEN

We are women who support the competing voice offered by Catholic institutions on matters of sex, marriage and family life. Most of us are Catholic, but some are not. We are Democrats, Republicans and Independents. Many, at some point in our careers, have worked for a Catholic institution. We are proud to have been part of the religious mission of that school, or hospital, or social service organization. We are proud to have been associated not only with the work Catholic institutions perform in the community – particularly for the most vulnerable — but also with the shared sense of purpose found among colleagues who chose their job because, in a religious institution, a job is always also a vocation.

Those currently invoking “women’s health” in an attempt to shout down anyone who disagrees with forcing religious institutions or individuals to violate deeply held beliefs are more than a little mistaken, and more than a little dishonest. Even setting aside their simplistic equation of “costless” birth control with “equality,” note that they have never responded to the large body of scholarly research indicating that many forms of contraception have serious side effects, or that some forms act at some times to destroy embryos, or that government contraceptive programs inevitably change the sex, dating and marriage markets in ways that lead to more empty sex, more non-marital births and more abortions. It is women who suffer disproportionately when these things happen.

No one speaks for all women on these issues. Those who purport to do so are simply attempting to deflect attention from the serious religious liberty issues currently at stake. Each of us, Catholic or not, is proud to stand with the Catholic Church and its rich, life-affirming teachings on sex, marriage and family life. We call on President Obama and our Representatives in Congress to allow religious institutions and individuals to continue to witness to their faiths in all their fullness.

 

(Found my name! Add yours!)

The AMA supports repeal of the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB)

The American Medical Association has published a letter in support of the Congressmen who are attempting to overturn the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB). I’m no longer a member of the AMA, but salute them for this move.

On behalf of the physician and medical student members of the American Medical Association (AMA), I am writing to express our strong support for H.R. 452, which was introduced by Representative Phil Roe, and would repeal the Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB). Accordingly, we strongly support the advancement of this important legislation through the Energy and Commerce Committee.
The AMA has consistently expressed its opposition to the IPAB on several grounds. The IPAB puts important health care payment and policy decisions in the hands of an independent body that has far too little accountability. Major changes in the Medicare program should be decided by elected officials. We have already seen first-hand the ill effects of the flawed sustainable growth rate (SGR) physician target and the steep Medicare cuts that Congress has had to scramble each year to avoid, along with the significantly increasing price tag of a long-term SGR solution. Adding additional formulaic cuts through IPAB is just not rational and would be detrimental to patient care, especially as millions of baby boomers enter Medicare.
The experience with the SGR also raises concerns about policy decisions based on projections that require subsequent adjustments to reflect more accurate data. In 2003, Congress had to take action to allow the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to correct $54 billion in projection errors under the SGR target. The IPAB also imposes a rigid budget target that is prone to “projection errors” that would force Congress to produce billions of dollars in offsets due to inaccurate calculations.
We appreciate the need to reduce the federal budget deficit and control the growth of spending in Medicare. However, we believe that this can best be achieved by Congress working in a bipartisan manner to reform the delivery system and improve quality, access, and efficiency. At a time in which Congress is struggling to eliminate the SGR, it does not make sense to allow another rigid formula to be implemented that risks a bigger set of problems for a broader cross-section of Medicare services.
We thank you for your leadership on this issue, and look forward to working with you to repeal the IPAB and preserve access for seniors to their physicians.

British Journal of Medical Ethics: “after-birth abortion”

“1. The moral status of an infant is equivalent to that of a fetus, that is, neither can be considered a ‘person’ in a morally relevant sense.
“2. It is not possible to damage a newborn by preventing her
from developing the potentiality to become a person in the
morally relevant sense.”

The British Journal of Medical Ethics  continues to publish thought exercises that go against common sense and traditional medical ethics, “emphasising” (British spelling) the utilitarian world-view  of today’s “medical ethics,” without the slightest acknowledgment that there might be harm in the act of arguing that not all human beings are “morally relevant persons.”

This month, Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva, redefine “abortion,” “euthanasia,” and “infanticide” in “After-Birth Abortion: Why should the baby live?”

In spite of the oxymoron in the expression, we propose to call this practice ‘after-birth abortion’, rather than ‘infanticide’, to emphasise that the moral status of the individual killed is comparable with that of a fetus (on which ‘abortions’ in the traditional sense are performed) rather than to that of a child. Therefore, we claim that killing a newborn could be ethically permissible in all the circumstances where abortion would be. Such circumstances include cases where the newborn has the potential to have an (at least) acceptable life, but the well-being of the family is at risk. Accordingly, a second terminological specification is that we call such a practice ‘after-birth abortion’ rather than ‘euthanasia’ because the best interest of the one who dies is not necessarily the primary criterion for the choice, contrary to what happens in the case of euthanasia.

The arguments don’t work other than as an example of the logical results of the utilitarian world view that has come to dominate medical ethics and to illustrate what Leon Kass called “The Wisdom of Repugnance,” or the “yuck factor.”

One of the editors, Julian Salvulescu, who believes that values and conscience lead to “a Pandora’s box of idiosyncratic, bigoted, discriminatory medicine,” defends the piece on the grounds that that the ideas are not new.  Indeed, the authors discuss the history of killing babies before and after birth because of medical diagnoses such as Down’s syndrome and after birth due to suffering of the child or the lack of worth placed on the child by his or her mother. The Netherland’s “Groningen Protocol” for active euthanasia of children is mentioned as precedent for government support for their position.

We should let these “expressions” be a warning to us all in these days of increasing government involvement in healthcare. As the authors argue,

“Nonetheless, to bring up such children might be an unbearable burden on the family and on society as a whole, when the state economically provides for their care.”

Freedom of expression and the discussion of even such unpopular ideas do have a place in our world. However, I wonder at an “ethics” journal whose editors claim that their

“Journal does not specifically support substantive moral views, ideologies, theories, dogmas or moral outlooks, over others. It supports sound rational argument. Moreover, it supports freedom of ethical expression.”

Obviously, they do support “sound rational argument” and “freedom of ethical expression”  over “moral views, ideologies, theories, dogmas or moral outlooks.”

At what point would the editors determine that “ethicists” should be censured, corrected or even retrained? Would the Journal publish a “sound rational argument” that advocates the end of “freedom of ethical expression?”

Obama cares more about Planned Parenthood than women’s health | LifeSiteNews.com

An op-ed by Joe Pojman, PhD, the Executive Director of Texas Alliance for Life, which discusses who is really to “blame” if the Texas Women’s Health Program is cut because we lose our Federal funds. (I’m privileged to be on the Board of Directors of TAL.)

Last June the Texas Legislature overwhelmingly passed Senate Bill 7, which allows for the renewal of the WHP, on a Senate vote of 21-9 and a House vote of 96-48. The bill prohibits the state from contracting with entities that “perform or promote elective abortions or affiliate with entities that perform or promote elective abortions.”

Federal law allows Texas to exclude Planned Parenthood. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott issued an opinion declaring that federal law allows states to exclude abortion providers and their affiliated organizations from Medicaid.

There are ample alternate WHP providers in Texas who are not involved in abortion. These physicians and clinics typically offer comprehensive primary and preventative care in addition to family planning. These providers could become the medical home for low-income women. The Obama Administration is about to deny WHP funds to these quality providers, and to the women they serve, just because Texas wants to fund these without funding Planned Parenthood.

Planned Parenthood is a poor investment of public funds. Planned Parenthood offers only a narrow range of services and is unwilling or incapable of offering comprehensive primary and preventative care. Planned Parenthood cannot treat breast cancer. They do not even have one mammogram machine anywhere in Texas. The only time a woman will see a doctor at Planned Parenthood is if she is there for an abortion. Women deserve better.

Planned Parenthood should not be trusted with our tax dollars. For example, Planned Parenthood of San Antonio operated four abortion facilities illegally without a license for as long as four years until they were discovered by the State in 2009 and fined more than $100,000. They were required to return thousands of dollars billed to the WHP.

The Obama Administration, not the Legislature or the Governor, will be to blame for killing the Women’s Health Program, if the Obama Administration does not renew the program just because Planned Parenthood is excluded.

via Obama cares more about Planned Parenthood than women’s health | LifeSiteNews.com.

Artificial womb and the right to life

It often seems that we fight increasing de-volition of traditional human and medical ethics with new technological advances. Here’s evidence that sometimes ethics and the understanding of human dignity can or could advance.

hat would an artificial womb mean? Well,according to this futurist,

In immediate terms, the foundations on which a woman’s rights to choose are predicated in Roe v. Wade, namely the issue of fetal viability and the right to privacy (the right not to be pregnant), will be rendered virtually meaningless.  First, once a fetus can be safely and entirely gestated outside of a biological womb, it can be removed from its mother.  Second, ectogenesis means that viability starts with conception.

(by Soraya Chemaly, original at RH Reality Check)

I’m  reminded of a science fiction story about the need to duplicate the normal intrauterine environment  that I read in the 80’s, which ended with the advice, “Use original container.”

However, would we say that or the equivalent to a recipient of a heart or kidney transplant? Or even a diabetes patient?

The interesting argument, here, is that the extra uterine *individual* is recognized as a human being, a being with his or her own humanity.

Enabling vs. Providing “Infrastructure” for Family Planning (and a Map of Government-Funded Family Planning Providers in Texas)

It’s not just right wing, Christian “anti-choicers” (we really prefer to be called “pro-life”) who understand that paying abortion providers and those who refer to them under Medicaid and Title X funds enables them to do abortions. From the Guttmacher Institute:

Title X is a grant program under which funds are distributed to grantees who design and operate their own programs—funding can be targeted to local needs and challenges. Unlike Medicaid, for example, Title X can subsidize the intensive outreach necessary to encourage some individuals to seek services. Furthermore, by paying for everything from staff salaries to utility bills to medical supplies, Title X funds provide the essential infrastructure support that enables clinics to go on and claim Medicaid reimbursement for the clients they serve.

So, whoever receives title X funding is “enabled” to stay in business. In these days of low tax revenues and high demand, shouldn’t Texas only “enable” comprehensive, continuing care?

Unfortunately, Texas representatives of Texas taxpayers found themselves limited in funds this year and we had to prioritize where we allocated Family Planning money. Funding for the Family Planning programs and the Texas Women’s Health Program, which receives Medicaid money, was directed toward programs and doctors that offer continuing, comprehensive care, such as Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHC), State, County and local clinics and hospitals, and fee for service doctors that participate with Medicaid.

However, in article after article, the law which sets aside money to pay for contraceptives and never mentions Planned Parenthood, is said to have been a weapon in the war on contraceptives and abortion, and in particular, against Planned Parenthood.

Medicaid is supposed to be a health program for the very poor, but Congress has allowed States some flexibility when it comes to the disabled and to pregnant women, through a system of waivers. Texas began our Women’s Health Program in 2007, asking for a waiver to spend funds to screen women for disease, including high blood pressure, diabetes, and even tuberculosis, not just for STD’s, breast cancer and cervical cancer. The program also pays for the prescription and dispensing of contraception – including Natural Family Planning! – to women who are not pregnant or disabled, and who would not otherwise be eligible for Medicaid.

The Obama Administration’s Department of Health and Human Services has refused this year’s request for a waiver to apportion the funds because of the stipulation that the State’s money will not go to affiliates of those who either perform or refer to elective abortions.

Just to be clear, “elective abortions” mean those that are done because the healthy mother carrying a healthy child seeks an abortion, not those done to prevent damage to her health or save her life. “Elective abortions” don’t even include those done in healthy mothers with healthy babies who were conceived through rape or incest. Procedures to treat tubal or ectopic pregnancies are never considered abortions, either “elective” or medical.

The law, HB 7, passed in the Special Session of the 82nd Legislature does not mention Planned Parenthood or any other abortion provider. The text stresses that our State must prioritize how we are to spend our limited tax dollars:

Sec.531.0025. RESTRICTIONS ON AWARDS TO FAMILY PLANNING SERVICE PROVIDERS. (a)Notwithstanding any other law, money
appropriated to the Department of State Health Services for the purpose of providing family planning services must be awarded:
(1) to eligible entities in the following order of descending priority:
(A) public entities that provide family planning services, including state, county, and local community health clinics and federally qualified health centers;
(B) nonpublic entities that provide comprehensive primary and preventive care services in addition to family planning services; and
(C) nonpublic entities that provide family planning services but do not provide comprehensive primary and preventive care services; or
(2) as otherwise directed by the legislature in the General Appropriations Act.
(b) Notwithstanding Subsection (a), the Department of State Health Services shall, in compliance with federal law, ensure distribution of funds for family planning services in a manner that does not severely limit or eliminate access to those services in any region of the state.

(b) Section 32.024, Human Resources Code, is amended by adding Subsection (c-1) to read as follows:
(c-1) The department shall ensure that money spent for purposes of the demonstration project for women ’s health care services under former Section 32.0248, Human Resources Code, or a similar successor program is not used to perform or promote elective abortions, or to contract with entities that perform or promote elective abortions or affiliate with entities that perform or promote elective abortions.

The Texas Tribune has published a map of family planning clinics in Texas, claiming to point out which clinics will stop receiving taxpayer money in March of this year.

The  In Texas, the Legislature has drastically reduced funding for family planning agencies that serve low-income women statewide. There are 41 agencies that receive funding today, down from 71 last year. Those organizations often operate multiple clinics that provide Texans with contraceptives and disease screenings.

Using the most up-to-date information available through the Texas Department of State Health Services, we have mapped out the locations of government-subsidized family planning clinics in 2010, 2011 and 2012. Not only are there fewer contractors each year, but those that receive grants are getting less money. During the 2011 session, lawmakers redirected virtually all state funds that have traditionally gone to family planning services to other programs. Today, nearly all public funding for these clinics comes from the federal government’s four-decade-old Title X program, which is dedicated to family planning.

via Updated: Map of Government-Funded Family Planning Providers in Texas.

Everyone who would like to support those clinics, should send a donation — because the Texas Legislature won’t meet again until January of 2013 and the law can’t be changed until then.

Judge: Washington Can’t Mandate Pharmacists Dispense Plan B | LifeNews.com

A victory – 5 years in the making – for conscience. freedom of religion, and the “free exercise thereof.”

A lower court issued an injunction against the new rules, on the basis that the suit was likely to succeed. In 2009, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the lower court ruling that had temporarily put on hold a requirement for pharmacists to dispense all legal drugs.

Now back at the lower court level ruling on the merits of the case itself, the court issued the pharmacists a legal victory.

“The Board of Pharmacy’s 2007 rules are not neutral, and they are not generally applicable,” the Court explained. “They were designed instead to force religious objectors to dispense Plan B, and they sought to do so despite the fact that refusals to deliver for all sorts of secular reasons were permitted.”

“The Board’s regulations have been aimed at Plan B and conscientious objections from their inception,” the court explained. “Indeed, Plaintiffs have presented reams of [internal government documents] demonstrating that the predominant purpose of the rule was to stamp out the right to refuse [for religious reasons].”

via Judge: Washington Can’t Mandate Pharmacists Dispense Plan B | LifeNews.com.

WomenSpeakForThemselves.org

WomenSpeakForThemselves.org.

Here are the women, President Obama and Secretary Sebelius!

We are not mute. We will not be silenced or ignored. We will make a difference.

UT scientist has found way to get paralyzed rats walking

This is an exciting advance in promoting healing of spinal cord injuries. There are no stem cells – ethical or destructive – involved. This is a new technique using micro-surgery and chemicals to influence healing.

UT neurobiology professor George Bittner, the lead researcher, has spent much of the past 40 years working on solutions to nerve damage. He has come up with a method that had paralyzed rats moving their legs within minutes of treatment and walking within days.

“We are very excited and very optimistic,” said Dr. Wesley Thayer, one of Bittner’s collaborators and an assistant professor of plastic and reconstructive surgery at Vanderbilt University. He said that he expects human trials on the technique within a year.

Trials using the method on the spinal cords of rats are under way at Wayne State University School of Medicine in Detroit.

Bittner’s research focuses on newly injured peripheral nerves — the ones outside the brain or spinal cord. When a peripheral nerve is severed by a deep cut or injury, the broken ends begin to close off and seal. But Bittner has developed a technique to interrupt that natural healing process. By using microsurgery and readily available chemicals, including polyethylene glycol, he has been able to keep the nerve endings open and fuse them back together.

“If you completely sever a nerve, the odds of getting anything like full function … are 20 to 30 percent,” said Bittner, 70. “What we have done is solve that problem for rats.”

Bittner also has tested the technique in other animals, including guinea pigs and rabbits, with the same positive results, he said.

This month, Bittner and his team published two articles online in the Journal of Neuroscience Research involving rats who had their sciatic nerve severed. The nerve begins in the lower back and runs down the leg. Within one to seven days, the rats had a dramatic recovery of the functioning of their legs, according to the research.

That improvement persisted over time, Bittner said.

via UT scientist has found way to get paralyzed rats walking.

Texas Sonogram Law: More media lies

What woman doesn’t want to meet “her” doctor in person and receive her own medical information while awake, alert and before her legs are up in the stirrups? Should abortion be different from a heart bypass or setting a broken bone?

The Austin American-Statesman is once again proving itself an unreliable source of information, with its poor coverage of the Texas pre-abortion informed consent and sonogram law.

Today’s article repeats earlier claims that the doctor who performs the abortion must perform the ultrasound, when the law – and even the original injunction by the Federal judge – note that an agent of the doctor or a certified sonographer may do so.

While admitting, like others before, that the big problem is scheduling between the doctors and the mother, the article also reveals that the abortionists have been working around the intent of the 2003 “Woman’s Right to Know Act” (WRTK) by using telephone calls with the “provider” to satisfy the 24 hour waiting period and informed consent requirement.

Texas already had in place a requirement that a woman take part in a phone call with the provider 24 hours before the abortion so the doctor can tell her certain information mandated by the state. Included in those requirements are that the doctor tells her benefits may be available to help with medical care and that the father is required to help support the child.

Clinic administrators say the new rule, which requires the same doctor who does the sonogram to also perform the abortion, has complicated doctors’ and patients’ schedules.

The intent of the original WRTK and the update has always been to allow the woman to meet her doctor, have a chance to ask questions, and to inform her about alternatives and services available if she decides not to abort the baby.