WingRight
Medicine
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)
@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.”
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.)
Ms. Charo who introduces morality and her anti-religion bias into the conversation, by making it a matter of personal opinion whether or not embryonic humans are humans. The species of human embryos is a matter of taxonomy, since it’s scientifically documented and verifiable that the offspring of a given species are members of that species. Discrimination between the amount of protection given to some members of a species is much more a “religious” or moral decision than whether or not a given individual is a member of that species.
I’ve said it many times before, but: Break the egg of a bird, turtle, or lizard on the Endangered species list and it won’t matter that the animal couldn’t survive or was an embryo or fetus. The Feds know that an embryonic pelican is a pelican. We don’t have the same protection for our own children of tomorrow that we give lesser species, although we are the only species having the conversation in the first place.
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”
[Perry] Asserted that his July spine surgery, which he noted involved the use of his own stem cells, was “incredibly successful.”
Blitzer’s question included the issue of pain medication, and Perry said, “I’m back running again, three to four miles, four to five times a week and I was off for 10 weeks. I probably took pain medication for the first 10 days, two weeks. And after that, the surgery has been awesome. … You guys are a bigger pain than the back surgery.”
But of course, the real problem for both Blitz and the Chronicle’s blogger is the Governor’s statements concerning pro-life, faith-based Catholic hospitals and adoption services, the lawsuits against the Boy Scouts who refuse to admit openly gay scout leaders and the limits on Catholic aide to victims of human trafficking. The Chronicle and Blitz each call these acts of “discrimination.” Blitz even asked Governor Perry whether “separation of church and state, does that mean anything to you?”
Perry pointed out the difference between “freedom *of* religion” and “freedom *from* religion. The question should be whether the First Amendment phrase “and the free exercise thereof” means anything.
Under the Bush Administration, Catholic Charities and hospitals weren’t forced to provide adoption services for homosexual couples or to pay for abortifacients like EllaOne or refer to abortionists in order to provide adoption assistance or prenatal care.
The Obama Administration is doing just the opposite. On top of the policies of the States of Illinois, Massachusetts, and others that are limiting Christian, pro-life adoption agencies, the Obama Administration is moving forward on regulations to severely restrict conscience.
Must every agency that receives tax money provide an absolutly full range of services? Lay aside the fact that adoption and abortion are not compatible with one another. It seems evident that birth mothers and and adoptive parents that go to Catholic charities and adoption agencies would have a pretty good idea about the philosophy of the group based on religious tenets.
That’s probably the fear of the prospective gay adopters: as the Governor says, “People will vote with their feet.” Why would a prolife Catholic girl who finds herself an unplanned pregnancy – who admittedly has most become pregnant by committing what she considers a sin – “choose” to have her baby raised in a home that doesn’t share her values? And why on earth would she ever “choose” to seek care for herself and her baby from a doctor who also kills the babies of other women?
The advocates for choice must, in fact, hate choice – they certainly fight to prevent it, even to demand that we act against our own “choice” and conscience.
@Governor Perry, @Freedom2Care: Abortion Ideology Trumps Aid for Victims of Human Trafficking
Regarding Governor Perry’s comments about the Obama Administration’s war on religion:
A grueling December 1 hearing by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee revealed the disturbing answers to these questions, in the process infuriating Republican committee members and others concerned with aiding victims of human trafficking.
By the end of an over three-hour long grilling of U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services (HHS) officials, one message had become clear about the Obama administration’s criteria for receiving the $4.5 million in federal grants for trafficking victims services:
Pro-life groups need not apply.
via Freedom2Care: Abortion Ideology Trumps Aid for Victims of Human Trafficking.
The regulations were written to prevent any pro-life group from receiving grant money:
The funding opportunity announcement for the “competitive” grant stipulated:
Translation: Participate in abortion or forget the grant.
“Will You Live Forever—or Until Your Next Software Release—By Uploading Your Brain into a Computer?”
Transhumanism is a field composed of many interesting mind games (pun intended) but the really great title of this Scientific American review of Connectome, a new book by Sebastian Seung on cutting edge neuroscience, the state of the science behind the Human Brain Project and the transhumanist religion that is adopting it, is what made me post tonight.
Can you remember the last update of the operating system software on your phone or the browser you’re using to read this note? Or did you buy a Windows 7 computer only to find that your year-old wireless printer was not supported? Or – horrors! – have you, like me, found that your entire computer system is no longer “compliant” and won’t be supported by your vendor after a change in Federal law?
If you have a smartphone and have installed “apps,” how many of them are due an update? That software will completely replace your old program which will be removed from your phone’s memory.
Now, just imagine that your consciousness, your whole brain full of connections and thoughts, a program that, according to a certain group of transhumanists, will think, feel and essentially be you.
The idea is to dispose of the fallible human body that inevitably degrades and dies for a program that will live forever.
My experience with technology is that it, too, decays, degrades or comes with bugs and glitches that require constant upgrades with code that may be worse than a human malignancy. And that security programs can themselves be as bad as the hacks and viruses they’re supposed to protect me from.
I don’t know about you, but I’m not going to beta this one.
Gingrich fails human ethics, human embryology
Even though we are the only species having this conversation, that doesn’t mean that we always get it right.
I was hoping that the recent Catholic conversion of Republican candidate for President Newt Gingrich would ensure that he is pro-life and would act correctly if he is ever elected to an office. Unfortunately, he doesn’t understand the basics of embryology. He fails human ethics and would end up charged with a Federal offense if he tried to make this argument to the Environmental Protection Agency about any animal on the Endangered Species List:
“Well, I think the question of being implanted is a very big question. My friends who have ideological positions that sound good don’t then follow through the logic of: ‘So how many additional potential lives are they talking about? What are they going to do as a practical matter to make this real?’
“I think that if you take a position when a woman has fertilized egg and that’s been successfully implanted that now you’re dealing with life, because otherwise you’re going to open up an extraordinary range of very difficult questions.”
“. . . In addition I would say that I’ve never been for embryonic stem cell research per se. I have been for, there are a lot of different ways to get embryonic stem cells. I think if you can get embryonic stem cells for example from placental blood if you can get it in ways that do not involve the loss of a life that’s a perfectly legitimate avenue of approach.
“What I reject is the idea that we’re going to take one life for the purpose of doing research for other purposes and I think that crosses a threshold of de-humanizing us that’s very very dangerous.”
via Gingrich Breaks from Some in Anti-Abortion Community on When Life Begins – ABC News.
Speaker Gingrich is absolutely wrong to say that we who hold the “ideological” position that human life begins at fertilization have not thought about the implications. If we hadn’t done so on our own, some utilitarian like the Speaker would have forced us to do so.
Just as with any other species, the mammal human embryo is the same species as the mother and father, and the one time when that life begins is at fertilization. What is it that implants? Would the technician in the in vitro lab or even the stem cell lab care what happened to the egg and the sperm if there is no fertilization?
Implantation is another step in that life that began at fertilization of the oocyte by the sperm.
Ectopic pregnancy is an event like cancer or heart attacks or kidney failure: when the normal process doesn’t go the way it should and people die. Because of the immediate and inevitable danger to the life of the mother and the unquestionable inability of human medicine to save the embryonic child, we don’t even count the procedures we do as “abortion.” when documenting abortion and maternal health statistics.
If we did call it abortion, it certainly would not be an “elective” abortion, but a procedure done to remove an eminent and known threat to the life of the mother who could die within minutes due to internal bleeding when the embryo grows too big for the fallopian tube at sometime between 6 and 8 weeks of age.
The sperm is not a life. Some do believe that any sexual act should be directly tied to and open to procreation, but not all Christians who object to abortion or other euthanasia agree agree on this point.
The least educated, lowest technician in the in vitro lab knows the difference between the sperm in the cup, the oocyte and the embryo. Within hours, they know whether the embryo is.
In vitro fertilization is an ethical problem when the embryos are not treated with the respect and care due the human dignity of all our children. The human embryo in the dish is the same species as the embryo in the fallopian tube. (See above.) Several countries have laws limiting in vitro fertilization, the numbers of embryos and some require that any embryo fertilized in the lab be implanted.
First, there is no way to obtain embryonic stem cells other than to destroy or endanger an embryo.The cells obtained from umbilical cord blood and the placenta are technically fetal, not embryonic stem cells. But, as the Speaker notes, no one has to die to obtain them.
And yes, our society has some tough decisions to make. Will we continue to refuse to provide the same protection for our own children that we give to a pelican or a sea turtle?
Legislator says stem cells helped » Times Record News
This is a wonderful story. I’m very glad for the Representative and for all the patients who receive their own stem cells and have good results. (My granddaughter, at 15 months old in 2001, received an anonymous little boy’s umbilical cord blood after her bone marrow completely failed. More here.)
Someday, I believe we’ll find the stimulating factors that make the body’s stem cells activate the way we want them. In the meantime, this is what our researchers – and Legislators – are finding out about ethical adult stem cells (not destructive embryonic stem cells.:
State Rep. Rick Hardcastle, R-Vernon, participated in a recent round of autologous adult stem cell treatments to help his multiple sclerosis, similar to what Gov. Rick Perry had done in July.
Although the stem cells are not embryonic, doctors in the U.S. are still skeptical of the procedure because it is not yet approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
Adult stem cells are taken from the patient’s fat, sent to a lab where they are developed, then reintroduced to the patient via intravenous therapy.
The treatments are used to treat patients with autoimmune diseases such as multiple sclerosis, fibromyalgia, Crohn’s disease, Parkinson’s and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
Hardcastle was diagnosed with MS almost 10 years ago and repeatedly said the treatments worked phenomenally for him.
“I’m walking on water and near bulletproof,” Hardcastle said from a casino in Las Vegas, where he was with his wife for the National Finals Rodeo. “Since I had the third treatment, I have fished in the river in Alaska. I have walked up and down stairs without having to hold onto the handrail like a goon. It’s just been phenomenal so far.”
Hardcastle said just having his balance is an amazing thing because since he was diagnosed, his balance was one of the first things to go. He spoke at length about how easily he was able to walk the stairs at the Las Vegas event.
“Eight years ago, I was having to literally … stop to step over a concrete barrier on a parking curb. I just walk across it now like I did 20 years ago,” he said.
Cloning pioneer urges shift away from embryonic stem cells
Universal Truth at work again. I would have loved to be there in order to watch heads explode and hear the susurus of “Did he say that?” buzzing around the room.
Newer and safer forms of stem cell therapy will likely overtake research into the use of human embryonic stem cells, the scientist whose team cloned Dolly the sheep told his peers at a stem cell conference in La Jolla.
Direct “reprogramming” of adult cells into the type needed for therapy is gradually becoming a reality, Ian Wilmut told an audience of several hundred at the Salk Institute at the annual Stem Cell Meeting on the Mesa. Such a feat was once thought impossible, but in recent years it has been demonstrated in at least two publications, he said.
********
But it’s been unclear which types of stem cells would prove most useful: the “adult” kind that have a more limited potential to change, or the embryonic kind. The emergence of direct reprogramming provides a promising new option scientists should consider, Wilmut said.
“I’m not quite sure why this hasn’t been pursued more actively,” Wilmut said.
It is difficult to achieve purity in embryonic and induced pluripotent stem cells because they are prone to forming tumors.
Direct reprogramming of cells from one type to the other avoids that danger, because the cells never enter the pluripotent stage to begin with, Wilmut said.
Direct cell reprogramming didn’t exist when California voters approved the stem cell program in 2004 with the passage of Proposition 71. That program was mainly aimed at funding embryonic stem cell research the federal government wouldn’t fund.
However, the program can also fund research with other types of stem cells, such as “adult” cells from umbilical cord blood.
The use and value of embryonic stem cells is an intensely controversial issue.
Many people object to their use because human embryos, which they consider human individuals, are killed to get the cells. Critics also point to the success of adult cells in approved therapies, while no therapy with embryonic stem cells has yet been approved.
Only one treatment with embryonic stem cells is in clinical testing in people. And that company, Geron Corp., recently ended its involvement in what was described as a business decision.
via Cloning pioneer urges shift away from embryonic stem cells.
More on the Geron decision to end embryonic stem cell research, here, and on the “Stimulus” funds awarded to Geron and the employees that lost their jobs, anyway, here.
Truth, Logic, Siri, and PCMag.com
The Lord does work in mysterious ways, but most of the time He just uses the laws of physics and the logic that He invented. Still, I was surprised to find an argument for pro-life versus abortion logic on a technology blog at PCMag.com. And the simple logic of pointing out that abortionists don’t use the word “abortion” when advertising their services is much more telling than I believe the author knew.
“”Siri is doing exactly what it was built to do—provide answers to questions like, “Where can I get an abortion?” using its own algorithms and the online resources it has available to craft answers.
***********
“”Consider the current kerfuffle. This is simplifying things a bit, but the gist of this story is that Siri is getting hung up on a word, “abortion,” because organizations that actually offer abortion services tend not to use the word as much as anti-abortion organizations do. So when Siri goes looking for where to get an “abortion” in the digital wordscape of the Internet, lo and behold, it returns addresses for Crisis Pregnancy Centers rather than Planned Parenthood.””
(via Siri is Dumb. There, We Said It. | News & Opinion | PCMag.com.)
Or, it could be Steve Jobs’ last word from beyond the grave reminding us of all we could have lost if his mother hadn’t chosen life rather than abortion.
For those who don’t use the iPhone: Siri is a voice-activated program that searches for answers to questions. Think of a “Google” that you can talk to.
Okay, I will admit to a lot of bias in favor of protecting the lives of our children of the future. I’m a pro-life advocate and serve on a couple of Boards for Pro-life advocacy: Texas Alliance for Life which lobbies for pro-life laws and regulations in Austin, Texas and even a “Crisis Pregnancy Center,” Options for Women in New Braunfels, Texas. But this irony is too rich.
There is no big conspiracy paid for by “anti-abortion” forces to influence us to “Choose Life.” Steve Jobs most likely didn’t set this up before his death in order to contrast his adoption by loving and nurturing parents with abortion and to remind us of what we lose by the death of every child whose life is intentionally ended before birth.
And this is not a “glitch.”
The Creator of the Universe didn’t have to break a single law of nature to point out the simple fact that abortionists don’t tend to admit what they do. Truth and Logic worked as they should in this case.
Geron Awarded Grants (under ObamaCare Stimulus)
Just one more failed “stimulus” project? This past week, Geron announced they are no longer pursuing their research in embryonic stem cells. They laid off 66 employees.
The US government should never have been in the business of picking and choosing business winners and losers. We certainly shouldn’t be giving money for destructive embryonic stem cell research.
Included as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, the QTDP program provided a tax credit to encourage investments in new therapies to prevent, diagnose, and treat acute and chronic diseases. Companies, such as Geron, that cannot currently use a tax credit were allowed to apply for a cash grant
in lieu of a tax credit.
To be eligible for the program, projects must show reasonable potential to result in new therapies to treat areas of unmet medical need; prevent, detect, or treat chronic or acute disease and conditions; reduce long-term health care costs in the United States; or significantly advance the goal of curing cancer within a 30-year period.
In addition, preference was given to projects that showed the greatest potential to create and sustain (directly or indirectly) high quality, high-paying jobs in the United States, and advance United States competitiveness in the fields of life, biological, and medical sciences.
Projects were selected jointly by the Treasury Department and the Department of Health and Human Services.
via Geron Awarded Grants Under Qualifying Therapeutic Discovery Project Program.
Geron To End Embryonic Stem Cell Research : NPR
Geron is getting out of the business of doing Embryonic Stem cell research. Trust me, if there were any objective truth to the idea that destructive Embryonic Stem cells could make money, the Corp. would stay in.
From NPR:
Earlier this week, the Geron Corporation announced it was abandoning its research into using embryonic stem cells to treat spinal cord injury. Geron was the first company to get the green light from the FDA to conduct clinical trials using embryonic stem cells. That was way back in 2009. And now, citing, quote, “capital scarcity and uncertain economic conditions,” the company is looking to sell off that part of its business and focus on other work.
TEXAS ALLIANCE FOR LIFE FILES BRIEF IN 5TH CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS TO DEFEND TEXAS SONOGRAM LAW
PERRY: When I am president …(Cut spending and regulations!)
From Governor Rick Perry, in an op-ed in today’s Washington Times:
“First, I will issue an executive order prohibiting the Department of Health and Human Services from any further implementation of Obamacare until we can fully repeal this unconstitutional government mandate, which, if it stands, will diminish our health care and kill jobs.
“Second, I will order federal agencies to begin opening American energy fields for exploration and development, which will kick-start economic growth, reduce our dependence on energy from hostile foreign sources and eventually create 1.2 million jobs across every sector of the economy. I also will work with Congress to ensure that new revenue generated from energy production on federal lands is used to pay down the national debt.
“Third, I will impose an immediate moratorium on all pending federal regulations, during which government agencies must audit every measure passed since 2008 to determine its necessity and impact on job creation. Those measures that kill jobs will be repealed.
“And fourth, I will deploy thousands of National Guard personnel to secure our southern border until we can provide the permanent increase in manpower, technology and fencing needed to protect the American homeland in the long run. If I am elected, Washington will no longer abdicate its constitutional responsibility to secure the border or force states to fend for themselves.
“In addition to exercising executive authority during the first 100 days of my presidency, I also will lay out a sweeping legislative agenda that will fundamentally change the way Washington works.
Read more . . . PERRY: When I am president … – Washington Times.
“If Only There Were A Vaccine for Hysteria” Redux*
World Net Daily sometimes goes off the path, but this time, they are posting emotional noise in the article, “’My headache’s about to explode’: U.S. girls just dropping dead.” Author Joe Kovacs even goes so far as to support the claim by the organization, Judicial Watch, that the vaccine against Human Papilloma Virus, Gardasil, is harmful by citing a case of “meningococcal disease,” caused by the bacteria, Neisseria meningitides.
The article or the claims have no basis in fact. There was one case of anaphylactic shock, but no other deaths due to the vaccine. There has been no pattern of serious adverse effects and the major problems have been sore arms and fainting which looks like a seizure to those who haven’t seen it before. (I’m a Family Physician who has had fathers faint in my office and the hospital while watching procedures or shots. Mothers tend to sit when I ask them to, so they’re less likely to faint.)
Gardasil is not derived from the actual HPV virus. It is made the same way that insulin is made for patient injection for diabetes: bacteria is tricked into producing proteins that “look” like bits of the virus, but are never in any way active as an infectious agent.
The article notes that there have been over 35 Million doses of Gardasil given in the United States. We have 10 years of experience. Back in 2006, before Governor Rick Perry made news my adding Gardasil to the list of mandatory vaccines for school children, we already had five years of history and reviews of the vaccine. We have all sorts of studies and surveillance going on currently. Take a look at the world-wide surveillance.
Everything that has an effect is likely to have a side effect. However, this article and the hullabaloo over Gardasil is hysteria. There are mechanisms that allow us to predict bodily reactions and enable us to practice medicine: we know how the body is likely to react to disease, a new exposure or stress, or to medications. There is no mechanism for the “my head is going to explode” symptom.
We do know enough to be able to say what does not have a basis in science. Science and medicine are getting *better* at predicting outcomes, not worse. Read up on “biological plausibility.”
In the comments, people are saying that the CDC and FDA are part of big conspiracy, that people shouldn’t trust their doctors. The reason that there are more recommended vaccines is because we are doing research to find more vaccines to prevent diseases, not because some horrible conspiracy is growing.
* We don’t have a vaccine for hysteria, although Michael Fumento called for one back in 1999, in his op-ed on a similar hullabaloo surrounding the anthrax vaccine.
Sequenom to Sell Down Syndrome Test 2 Years After Pullback – Bloomberg
Note the pretty “terminating the pregnancy” phrase that’s used instead of aborting the baby (or even the usual term used, “fetus”).
This new test will, indeed “change the conversation about abortion.” This news story, including comments from utilitarian bioethicist, Art Caplan, Ph.D., will move the conversation much earlier into the pregnancy and remind us about the risk to healthy children in healthy mothers from tests for genetic markers. It will also stir the debate on late-appearing diseases like Alzheimer’s dementia and breast cancer.
(Who knows, we might be getting closer to tests for behavioral tendencies or even the “gay gene,” if one is ever found.)
Sequenom doesn’t indicate whether there are false positives or what the accuracy is in women who are not at “high risk” for having a Down’s Syndrome child.
The blood test is accurate in detecting Trisomy 21, the genetic chromosomal abnormality that most commonly causes Down syndrome, 99.1 percent of the time as early as 10 weeks into a pregnancy, the San Diego-based company said in a statement. The test, and others that will be able to identify genetic abnormalities early in pregnancies, will alter the debate over abortion, said Art Caplan, director of the center for bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania.
“For many people this test makes it morally, emotionally and psychologically easier to have an abortion,” Caplan said in an interview.
Caplan said future prenatal tests may be able to indicate if the fetus had biomarkers for Alzheimer’s disease, or breast cancer, or other diseases. Those tests will raise questions about what issues will trigger potential parents to choose an abortion. A survey published last month in the American Journal of Medical Genetics showed that only 4 percent of parents with Down Syndrome children regretted having them.
Ethical Shift
“Ethically, we are now starting to see the shift in the issue of what counts as a medical disorder, what’s significant enough to test for, what’s a genetic disability or just a difference,” he said. “Many in the Down syndrome community would say it’s just a difference.”
via Sequenom to Sell Down Syndrome Test 2 Years After Pullback – Bloomberg.
Campbell files to oppose Wentworth for state senate seat | The Gonzales Cannon
Good news for Republicans in the Texas Senate District 25!
Since our current Senator refused to allow me to be introduced as “Doctor for the Day” at the Capitol last May because of my efforts to get him to endorse pro-life causes, guess who I endorse?
Dr. Donna Campbell announced Monday her intention to seek the Republican nomination for Texas Senate, District 25 in order to fill a void of conservative leadership.
Campbell ran unsuccessfully to unseat Congressman Lloyd Doggett in last year’s congressional races, carrying every county but one — Travis County — in that district. She will oppose incumbent seven-term Republican state Sen. Jeff Wentworth, who is viewed as a moderate by most party members.
The 25th District includes Guadalupe, Hays, Comal and parts of Bexar and Travis counties.
via Campbell files to oppose Wentworth for state senate seat | The Gonzales Cannon.
Hat tip to Conservatives in Action.
New Obamacare Regulations mandate contraception, re-define pregnancy as disease
Tomorrow is the last day to comment on the Contraceptives mandate that is included in the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as “Obamacare.” I believe that it’s okay to use real contraceptives – the kind that don’t kill anyone. I’m also cautiously convinced that Plan B doesn’t prevent implantation. (See “Plan B, How It Works and Doesn’t Work,” and “Plan B compared to withdrawal method.”)
However, I have real concerns that “EllaOne” might interfere due to its effect of lowering progesterone, even in post-ovulatory women, and I know that the IntraUterine Device (IUD), when placed early in the pregnancy works to prevent implantation.
The current Administration defines pregnancy as beginning at implantation, not at fertilization, in spite of the known fact that any in vitro fertilization lab tech can tell the difference between an embryo and an unfertilized egg.
Please write a brief e-mail to the Secretary of Health and Human Services, Kathryn Sebelius, at this address E-OHPSCA2713.EBSA@dol.gov
Here’s where to get more information:
MESSAGE TO HHS: “Pregnancy is not a disease, and drugs and surgeries to prevent it are not basic health care that the government should require all Americans to purchase. Please remove sterilization and prescription contraceptives from the list of “preventive services” the federal government is mandating in private health plans. It is especially important to exclude any drug that may cause an early abortion, and to fully respect religious freedom as other federal laws do. The narrow religious exemption in HHS’s new rule protects almost no one. I urge you to allow all organizations and individuals to offer, sponsor and obtain health coverage that does not violate their moral and religious convictions.”
WHEN: Please send in your comments to HHS by the September 30 deadline. Thanks! 9/1/11
Coffee prevents depression?
The bloggers over at the Junk Science blog disagree with the statistical significance of researchers who published an article using data from the Nurse’s Health Study. The article is published in the American Medical Association’s Archives of Internal Medicine.
chocolate
Personally, I’d have bet on Chocolate, but that data is still being cooked.
I’ve posted on LifeEthics.org about the link that previous researchers found between coffee and death from all causes (but only for women, not for men) and between coffee and the prevention of Alzheimer’s dementia.
I have often thought that people who become addicted to nicotine and who regularly use other stimulants to calm down are probably self-treating hyperactivity, possibly chemical/neurochemical depression.
Liposuction May Lower Certain Blood Fats, Researcher Says
This makes sense: if there are less fat cells full of stored fat, and less of them to fill after weight loss, then it is intuitive that there will be fewer circulating triglycerides.
Some of us have wondered whether those fat cells, when emptied after weight loss by dieting, cry out to be filled. (or send out hormones or hormone-like signals) to increase calorie intake.
The research doesn’t definitively prove that liposuction caused levels to drop, however, and an outside researcher questioned the value of the study.
The study looked at 270 women and 52 men who underwent either liposuction, a tummy tuck (known as an abdominoplasty), or both. On average, the patients were slightly overweight, although they ranged from nearly underweight to morbidly obese.
The patients underwent fasting blood tests before surgery, one month afterward, and again three months afterward. At three months after surgery, triglyceride levels dropped from an average of 151.8 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL) to 112.8 mg/dL in patients who underwent liposuction alone, representing a decrease of 25.7 percent; they fell by 43 percent in those with levels considered to be “at risk” — that is, 150 mg/dL or more.
Levels of white blood cells also dipped after liposuction and in patients who had both procedures. (High white blood cell counts are linked with an increased level of inflammation within the body and have been associated with coronary heart disease, high blood pressure and diabetes.) Levels of cholesterol and blood sugar didn’t change significantly.
Commenting on the study, University of Colorado researcher Rachael Van Pelt, who has studied the after-effects of liposuction, said the findings are “virtually meaningless” because triglyceride levels vary from day to day, and the researchers didn’t include a control group.
via Liposuction May Lower Certain Blood Fats, Researcher Says – Health News – Health.com.
Build a straw man, make him die
When will the progressive left admit that ObamaCare is just one version of “spread the wealth? Because the healthcare plan mandates coverage for all illness or healthcare from first dollar, rather than only spending money for the indigent and extremely sick. Worse, the mandate enforces taxes, rather than allowing charity or compassionate care.
Slate.com has a blog post concerning ObamaCare written by Jacob Weisberg, entitled “Let him die.” The author flatly implies that one or more of the Republican Presidential candidates would let a patient die if he can not pay for needed care.
Forget that none of the candidates said any such thing. One man in the audience at Monday night’s debate for Republican Candidates in Orlando shouted “yeah!” when one of the moderators asked Ron Paul the question. There’s dispute about whether the shout came before or after Congressman Paul answered, “No.”
This incident is being cited as “playing the death card” by another blogger, at the University of Chicago School of Law’s Richard Epstein, who is not satisfied with calling Republicans names. He suggests that rationing is reasonable:
One telling illustration about this example is that Weisberg does not tell us whether the individual who receives this care lives or dies when the treatment is over. If we assume the latter, the initial question is whether intensive care at, say, $10,000 to $20,000 per day represents the best use of social resources. A bit of simple arithmetic says that society has spent $1.83 million to $3.66 million on a venture that may well have kept this person alive in a comatose state or have subjected him to repeated invasive treatments when hospice care may well have been preferable.
(Try not to think about “death panels.”)
Hat tip to Texas Medical Association and Drs.
LGBT patients: Reluctant and underserved :: Sept. 5, 2011 … American Medical News
I’ve taken care of pretty much the full spectrum of LGBT patients, including transexuals at various stages of surgical and hormonal therapy. I think the problems I see are very similar to people who don’t disclose all sorts of other things that they do or things that have happened to them. I’ve had trouble when patients don’t disclose alcohol abuse or that they are survivors of sexual or physical abuse.
My best skill as a doctor is the ability, even when shocked, to deliver a non-committal, attentive, “Oh, okay. Tell me about it.” (and then be alert, patient, and quiet for a while.)
If I could teach doctors one thing, it would be to listen to their patients – especially when they seem reluctant to talk or “Oh, one more thing.” And if I could teach patients one thing, it would be that I really need them to talk to me!
In general, LGBT people have an increased risk of developing cancer and contracting sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV, experts say. They also are more likely to drink alcohol, smoke, use drugs, be overweight, attempt suicide and engage in other risky behaviors than heterosexual counterparts, according to physicians who specialize in treating LGBT individuals. Yet they remain medically underserved, data show.
Twenty-eight percent of transgender and gender nonconforming people postponed medical care when they were sick or injured due to concerns about discrimination, said a 2010 survey of about 7,000 people by the National Center for Transgender Equality and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force. Gender nonconforming individuals are defined as people who do not fit stereotypes about how they should look or act based on the sex they were at birth.
More than one in five LGBT adults withheld information about their sexual practices from their doctor or other health care professional, said a 2004 survey by Witeck-Combs Communications/Harris Interactive.
via amednews: LGBT patients: Reluctant and underserved :: Sept. 5, 2011 … American Medical News.
amednews: Temporary health workers double risk of harmful drug mix-ups :: Sept. 12, 2011 … American Medical News
Several medical school faculty members and I were talking this week at the American Academy of Family Physicians’ national meeting. They confirmed that medical students and residents still do much of the “scut work” in the hospitals where they are trained. Some hospitals have evaluated the cost of training vs. the money saved by (very) cheap labor, and come to the realization that doctors in training save them tons of money over paid staff.
Just another reason to consider or re-consider funding for medical education in State and Federal budgets!
Health professionals working on a temporary basis in emergency departments are twice as likely to make medication errors that harm patients, says a study of nearly 24,000 drug mix-ups at 592 U.S. hospitals.
Most of the temp workers’ mistakes were administration mix-ups made by nursing staff, who accounted for 76% of the errors. Physicians were responsible for 21% of the mix-ups, and other health professionals accounted for the rest.
One more time: Perry, Gardasil and the facts
Governor Sarah Palin and Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann went on Greta Van Sustern’s “On the Record” show on Fox News to accuse Governor Rick Perry of “crony capitalism” because of his Executive Order RP65, which would have mandated Gardasil and which did make it much easier for parents to opt out of all mandatory vaccines.
None of the players explain one very pertinent point: Merck was the only company making the only approved vaccine against the viruses that cause the changes that cause abnormal Pap smears and which lead to cervical cancer. (The only reason to get a pap smear is to check for changes from HPV. Gardasil provides immunity to the specific strains that cause nearly 3/4 of all cervical cancer.)
The Gardasil vaccine (more, here ) was recommended the FDA’s vaccine approval committee, more than 6 months before Governor Perry’s Executive Order. All girls who qualified for the Federal Vaccines for Children program were eligible to receive the vaccine free of charge: Medicaid, CHIPs, and uninsured or those with insurance that won’t pay for vaccines. The Texas Legislature had previously delegated unconditional authority to mandate new vaccines to the Department of State Health Services, which is under Governor Perry and the Executive Branch.
Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann showed her profound ignorance about the germ theory and modern medicine in general, and the Human Papilloma vaccine, Gardasil, in particular. She seems ignorant of the fact that newborns (little, innocent newborns) receive a shot against the STD, Hepatitis B, on the first or second day of their lives, before they go home from the hospital. They get 2 more of the shots by the time they are 6 months old. And (little, innocent) 12 year old boys and girls get a (measles/mumps/rubella) MMR and a tetanus and diphtheria booster (Td) about the same time. Tetanus, or “lock jaw” is not a communicable disease.
in her zeal to attack Governor Rick Perry, Bachmann did even worse in her post-debate interview with Greta Van Sustern on Fox News. Her emotional, anti-vaccine remarks should be an embarrassment to her.
She told Greta about a conversation with a crying mom who came up to her after the debate, saying that the woman’s daughter suffered from “mental retardation” after receiving the vaccine. “Mental retardation” would not be diagnosed at 9-12 years old. In fact, in over 10 years more than 50 million doses of Gardasil have been given in the United States. There has been more than the usual scrutiny and surveillance for adverse effects. The Center for Disease Control, the FDA and the Institute of Medicine have all reached the conclusion that even with this heightened awareness and concern, there have been no adverse effects from this vaccine other than fainting and allergic reactions that can happen with any medical procedure or treatment.
At the time, Gardasil had over 5 years of history of study in boys and girls, with an official “Four Year Follow Up” article published in the British Medical Journal. To learn more, please see “A Dose of Reason.”
Appeals court shoots down Va. challenge to healthcare law – The Hill’s Healthwatch
Federal judges see no need for Federalism or State sovereignty. Forget that inconvenient Bill of Rights!
But the 4th Circuit panel said Virginia does not have standing to sue over the mandate because it lacks a “personal stake” in the issue.
The judges seemed concerned during oral arguments that allowing his suit to proceed would essentially allow the states to exempt themselves from whatever federal laws they might choose.
via Appeals court shoots down Va. challenge to healthcare law – The Hill’s Healthwatch.
No Time For A Doctor’s Visit? These Apps Can Help | Fox Business
I’m not sure about this “app”
It’s not always feasible to make it to the doctor’s office for every cough and sniffle. Plus heading straight to your doctor can become costly. Here’s a look at apps that will help you maintain your health.
via No Time For A Doctor’s Visit? These Apps Can Help | Fox Business.
Hat tip to Politico’s @benpolitico
Abortionists ordered to follow disputed ‘informed consent’ law
The court found constitutional the state’s decision to demand abortionists tell patients three things:
That the abortion will terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being;
That [the patient] has an existing relationship with that unborn human being and that the relationship enjoys protection under the United States Constitution and under the laws of South Dakota;
That by having an abortion, her existing relationship and her existing constitutional rights with regards to that relationship will be terminated.
via Abortionists ordered to follow disputed ‘informed consent’ law.
Ethical dilemma in fetal stem cell research – UK stroke study | LifeEthics
Ethical dilemma in fetal stem cell research – UK stroke study
“The world’s first clinical trial of brain stem cells to treat stroke has recorded no adverse effects to date, BBC News has reported. The BBC website reports that research using stem cells to treat strokes “is set to move to its next phase” after independent assessors approved continuation of the trial of the experimental treatment. So far the therapy has been tested on three patients left disabled by strokes.”
via Stroke stem cell trial gets extended – Health News – NHS Choices.
The problem is that the cells were harvested from the brains of 12 week old aborted fetuses. The researchers at the University of Glascow, Scotland, working with the company, “ReNeuron,” harvested the cells, manipulated them with genes to induce them to become immortal stem cells that will divide infinitely and now have what appears to an endless supply of proprietary cells for future research and treatments of stroke victims.
More at LifeEthics.org: Ethical dilemma in fetal stem cell research – UK stroke study | LifeEthics.
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