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For the first time, in a long time, there is actually some tangibility to the abortion debate in this country. Yes, after years of Democrats dodging around the issue by saying they don't approve of abortions, but favor a woman's right to choose (the same way they supported the troops but still were rooting against them in Iraq and Afghanistan) Democrats in the House were forced to vote whether they would support government-subsidized abortions as part of the new health care bill. In an amendment to the House's health care bill, Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) proposed an amendment which essentially...

Trick or Treat: Obamas Expect 2,000 Children at White House for Halloween [See Pic in URL of Michelle Obama] President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, invited more than 2,000 children to the White House on Saturday night for a Halloween party. 31 Oct 2009 Barack and Michelle Obama greet trick or treaters at the North Portico of the White House as they celebrate Halloween Photo: AFP/Getty The children, from Washington DC, Maryland and Virginia, were to do their trick-or-treating on the most famous front porch in America, the North Portico. Later, in the East Room, the first couple were...

Earth: An environmental writer mainstreams an idea floating around the green fringe — save the earth by population control and give carbon credits to one-child families. Are we threatened by the patter of little carbon footprints? New York Times environmental writer Andrew Revkin participated in an Oct. 14 panel discussion on climate change with other media pundits titled "Covering Climate: What's Population Got To Do With It?" People who need people they are not. In a recently rediscovered book, "Ecoscience: Population, Resources, Environment," co-authored with Malthus fans Paul and Anne Ehrlich, Holdren wrote that families "contribute to general social deterioration...

How wide is the line between the right to die and the duty to die? I’m afraid we may find out soon enough. Regular BreakPoint listeners have heard me speak about the impact of declining birth rates around the world. One consequence is that older people comprise an increasing percentage of the population in places like Japan and Western Europe. This increases economic pressures on these countries since an aging population requires more services while having fewer young workers to pay for them. One doctor has come up with a way to address the imbalance between pensioners and workers—that is,...

The Obama administration isn't adequately vetting important presidential appointees. When it was exposed that former "green jobs czar" Van Jones believed in crazy conspiracies about the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, it was questionable whether anyone had even bothered to Google individuals before they received presidential appointments. In that case, the White House strategy was to refuse to answer questions and hope interest faded away. That approach worked for most of the media, which carried water for President Obama's scandal-plagued pick. Stonewalling scandal is not what Americans were expecting from an administration that promised to usher in an "unprecedented level...

If a rapist escapes justice for long enough, should the world hand him a get-out-of-jail-free card? If you're Roman Polanski, world-famous director, a lot of famous and gifted people think the answer is yes. Polanski, who drugged and anally raped a thirteen-year-old girl in 1977 in Los Angeles, pled guilty to the lesser charge of unlawful sex with a minor and fled to Europe before sentencing. Now, 32 years later, he's been arrested in Switzerland on his way to the Zurich film Festival, prompting outrage from international culture stars: Salman Rushdie, Milan Kundera, Martin Scorsese, Pedro Almodavar, Woody Allen (insert...

After World War II, the U.S. government invested an enormous amount of money in medicine; medical research, medical procedures and medical technologies. This investment made contemporary scientific medicine into American medicine, characterized by a continuing flow of new treatment possibilities. These advances raised all kinds of ethical questions. Some were personal and individual, others were social and political. Both type questions are addressed by a new academic discipline called bioethics. The first attempt to develop a scientific medicine took place in Greece in the 5th century B.C. It was called Hippocratic medicine. Closely linked with this first scientific medicine was...

When Republican Rep. Mark Foley was caught chasing congressional pages, he got exactly what was coming to him. In a blizzard of coverage (1,400 stories, according to Google news), Mr. Foley's creepy behavior was examined from every possible angle. Nobody wanted to hear that the congressman's stupid and objectionable behavior was confined to e-mails and text messages. His immediate resignation didn't quiet the furor. When two years of investigations found no crime, the results got barely a peep. Whether the press feeding frenzy around Mr. Foley's disgrace was justified or not, the explosion of coverage was certainly understandable, even predictable....

Hello Barry. I’ve decided to write you a few questions in response to the unsolicited emails I keep getting from BarackObama.com. Since most of your form emails concern health care I’ll confine most of my questions to one health-related subject: Abortion. 1. Did you know that about 150 young black people were admitted to Howard University School of Law this year? But, unfortunately, about 1370 black babies were aborted today. How can we effect “social justice” if the health profession kills far more blacks than the legal profession is currently accepting into its ranks? 2. Isn’t abortion sort of like...

A teacher was told by a 15-year-old high school sophomore that he was having homosexual sex with an "older man." At the very least, statutory rape occurred. Fox News reported that the teacher violated a state law requiring that he report the abuse. That former teacher, Kevin Jennings, is President Obama's "safe school czar."-SNIP-In this one case in which Mr. Jennings had a real chance to protect a young boy from a sexual predator, he not only failed to do what the law required but actually encouraged the relationship.  In 2000, Mr. Jennings gave a talk to the Iowa...

Obama science czar John Holdren stated in a college textbook he co-authored that in conditions of emergency, compulsory abortion would be sustainable under the U.S. Constitution, even with Supreme Court review. WND has obtained a copy of "Ecoscience: Population, Resources, Environment," published in 1977 and co-authored by Holdren with Malthusian population alarmist Paul R. Ehrlich and Ehrlich's wife, Ann. As WND reported, the authors argued involuntary birth-control measures, including forced sterilization, may be necessary and morally acceptable under extreme conditions, such as widespread famine brought about by "climate change." To prevent ecological disasters, including "global warming," Holdren argued the U.S....

The development of prenatal diagnostic technologies presents a constellation of moral issues -- with the diagnosis of Down syndrome front and center. Over the past several years, a marked decrease in the number of babies born with Down syndrome has been both observed and widely reported. This decrease can be traced directly to the decision to abort after prenatal diagnosis.As Science Daily reports, a new leading article to be published in Archives of Disease in Childhood points to developments in the near future that will likely increase the diagnosis of Down syndrome [DS] during pregnancy. "New tests expected to...

The House's proposed health national health plan would establish "school-based health clinics" on campuses, and one group is warning it could give Planned Parenthood direct access to American schoolchildren at taxpayer expense. The American Family Association, or AFA, is warning that Section 399Z-1 of H.R. 3200, or the House plan, titled "School-Based Health Clinics," allows a "non-profit health agency" to serve as a "sponsoring facility" for health clinics that operate during school hours. AFA has provided a document with actual language from H.R. 3200 that outlines requirements for the program. AFA notes that under this provision Planned Parenthood would be...

Cass Sunstein, President Barack Obama’s nominee to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), has advocated a policy under which the government would “presume” someone has consented to having his or her organs removed for transplantation into someone else when they die unless that person has explicitly indicated that his or her organs should not be taken. Under such a policy, hospitals would harvest organs from people who never gave permission for this to be done.

Bioethicist Jacob Appel can be relied on to promote the most radical bioethics agendas, assisted suicide for the mentally ill, fetal farming, you name it.  And now he has argued that if Montana affirms a constitutional right to assisted suicide in Montana, the state has a duty to make sure that doctors are willing to do the deed.  Why?  Doctors have a monopoly on a limited commodity–the practice of medicine–and hence they should be able to be forced to participate in the taking of patients’ lives in assisted suicide. From his column: However, it [medical license and professional autonomy]...

The Wall Street Journal just published a shocking editorial written by a respected University President, confirming the Obama Administration is now using VA hospitals to order doctors to pressure all military veterans to sign "pull the plug" do-not-resuscitate orders, hastening their premature deaths through mandatory "end of life" counseling. President Jim Towey of Saint Vincent's College, founder of the non-profit "Aging With Dignity" and former White House Director of faith based initiatives, wrote a blistering expose entitled "The Death Book For Veterans," revealing President Obama's new Veterans Administration (VA) directive, presumably signed by VA Secretary, General (ret.) Eric Shinseki, which...

In a blunder that might top the Baby Shaker app on Apple's App Store, retailing giant Sears.com has been caught offering a Bar-B-Que grill specially designed to roast infants and other human morsels.

Roman Catholic leaders are stepping up their fight against the Obama administration’s healthcare plans, urging their faithful nationwide to contact legislators to protest abortion provisions in Democratic bills. Catholics who attended Mass Sunday in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, for example, received weekly bulletins with a call to action from Cardinal Justin Rigali, head of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' pro-life committee. The archdiocese, one of the largest in the nation, serves 1.45 million Catholics. “While this legislation is still in draft form, the request for action at the local level is imperative,” the cardinal wrote. “[W]e must take...

Health Care: Lost in the kerfuffle about a pro-choice president being honored at the University of Notre Dame was the damage the Freedom of Choice Act might do to the nation's health care.Specifically, how many Catholic hospitals will close and how many Catholic doctors will quit if it becomes law? According to the Catholic Health Association, Catholic institutions make up 13% of the nation's nearly 5,000 hospitals, and employ more than 600,000 people. CHA says one of every six Americans hospitalized in the U.S. are cared for in a Catholic hospital. A lot of federal funds flow through the nation's...

SALT LAKE CITY -The Mormon church's vigorous, well-heeled support for Proposition 8, which banned gay marriage in California last year, has turned the Utah-based faith into a lightning rod for gay rights activism, including a nationwide "kiss-in" Saturday. The event comes after gay couples here and in San Antonio and El Paso, Texas, were arrested, cited for trespassing or harassed by police for publicly kissing. In Utah, the July 9 trespassing incident occurred after a couple were observed by security guards on a downtown park-like plaza owned by the 13 million-member Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The court...

You know the show Family Guy. It's essentially a funny/distasteful half hour animated sitcom made to make you cringe and laugh. Recently Fox refused to air an abortion themed episode of the animated series and that, of course, has given the show sudden attention from the media. Family Guy creator Seth Macfarlane was incensed enough by the censorship that he held a stage reading of the script, ironically at the Ricardo Montalban Theater. (Montalban was a pro-life Catholic.) According to the Washington Post: "The episode, in which Griffin matriarch Lois becomes a surrogate mom for a college friend and her...

The news from Barbara Wagner's doctor was bad, but the rejection letter from her insurance company was crushing. The 64-year-old Oregon woman, whose lung cancer had been in remission, learned the disease had returned and would likely kill her. Her last hope was a $4,000-a-month drug that her doctor prescribed for her, but the insurance company refused to pay. What the Oregon Health Plan did agree to cover, however, were drugs for a physician-assisted death. Those drugs would cost about $50. "It was horrible," Wagner told ABCNews.com. "I got a letter in the mail that basically said if you want...

Mike Sola confronted his Congressman Dingell at a Townhall and says he's been visited in the middle of the night by thugs at his house. On Americas Newsroom just now he goes "I challenge you thugs to come visit me in the middle of the day. If I catch you on my property I will use lethal force and will kill you. I will go to prison" This guy is great!

Barbara Wagner’s doctor hoped a new chemotherapy drug would help her, but the Oregon Health Plan told her the treatment was not approved. On the bright side, they offered to have her killed.

Rationing: In the recesses of the House health care "reform" bill is a provision for end-of-life counseling for seniors. Don't worry, granny, they're from the government and they're here to help.At a town hall meeting at AARP headquarters in Washington, D.C., President Obama was asked by a woman from North Carolina if it was true "that everyone that's Medicare age will be visited and told they have to decide how they wish to die." At first, the president joked that not enough government workers existed to ask the elderly how they wanted to die. The idea, he said, was to...

Congress: In exchange for a vague promise of cuts in the cost of health care "reform," a few fiscally conservative Democrats agree to release the bill to a September floor vote. Have the pit bulls become Chihuahuas?Apparently even a Blue Dog Democrat will stop growling if you toss him a big enough bone. Four of the seven who helped keep the House bill bottled up in the Energy and Commerce Committee — Mike Ross of Arkansas, Baron Hill of Indiana, Zack Space of Ohio and Bart Gordon of Tennessee — agreed to vote the bill out of committee in exchange...

Raymond Arroyo over at EWTN recently posted a very helpful summary of what the Church's major objections would be to Obamacare as it is coming together. They include: --Federal funding of abortion and/or federal requirements that all insurance plans cover abortion on demand --Lack of any meaningful rights of conscience for health care providers. Without this, doctors and nurses could be compelled to perform abortions, issue contraceptives, sterilize, euthanize, etc. --A chilling requirement for Medicare beneficiaries to go into end of life counseling every five years. The idea would be to bully them into euthanizing themselves. Old people that linger...

White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel's brother, a physician, appointed to Obama health care job admits killing old people is the only way to cut costs! DEADLY DOCTORS O ADVISERS WANT TO RATION CARE By BETSY MCCAUGHEY New York Post July 24, 2009 Emanuel: Believes in withholding care from elderly for greater good. THE health bills coming out of Congress would put the decisions about your care in the hands of presidential appointees. They'd decide what plans cover, how much leeway your doctor will have and what seniors get under Medicare. Yet at least two of President Obama's top...

So here you are. Age 62, you have a nasty looking brown lump on your chest, so you call to set up an appointment to see a dermatologist: YOU: Hi. I have this brown, raised lump on my chest, and it has been getting bigger and changing shape. Could I schedule an appointment to see a dermatologist and perhaps get the melanoma-like lump removed? My name is Smith, 7813246. RECEPTIONIST: I'm sorry sir...the soonest opening is in November 2010, butwe cannot schedule that appointment for you to have that lump removed because you have not undergone your mandatory annual counseling...

Obama's Science Czar Considered Forced Abortions, Sterilization as Population Growth Solutions John Holdren, director of the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy, considered compulsory abortions and other Draconian measures to shrink the human population in a 1977 science textbook. By Joseph Abrams FOXNews.com Tuesday, July 21, 2009 President Obama's "science czar," Paul Holdren, once floated the idea of forced abortions, "compulsory sterilization," and the creation of a "Planetary Regime" that would oversee human population levels and control all natural resources as a means of protecting the planet -- controversial ideas his critics say should have been brought up...

Leadership: Our new science czar, John Holdren, once backed compulsory sterilization and forced abortion as part of a government population-control program. The only thing missing was a Soylent Green recipe.In April, President Obama declared that "the days of science taking a back seat to ideology are over." In everything from stem cell research to climate change and energy policy, reason and science would triumph. The problem is that what the Obama administration considers science, as exemplified by the choice of Holdren, is troubling. In a recently rediscovered 1977 book, "Ecoscience: Population, Resources, Environment," co-authored with doomsters Paul and Anne Ehrlich,...

Pages 317-325: ‘‘(C) PROHIBITION ON EXPANSION OF FA22 CILITY CAPACITY.—Except as provided in para23 graph (2), the number of operating rooms, pro24 cedure rooms, or beds of the hospital at any 25 time on or after the date of the enactment of VerDate Nov 24 2008 12:51 Jul 14, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00317 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 C:\TEMP\AAHCA0~1.XML HOLCPC July 14, 2009 (12:51 p.m.) F:\P11\NHI\TRICOMM\AAHCA09_001.XML f:\VHLC\071409\071409.140.xml (444390|2) 318 1 this subsection are no greater than the number 2 of operating rooms, procedure rooms, or beds, 3 respectively, as of such date. 4 ‘‘(D) ENSURING BONA FIDE OWNERSHIP...

The unlawful federal government's takeover of the financial, banking and insurance industries was just a prelude to the planned complete unconstitutional Marxist takeover of all of America. Your nearly trillion dollar per month spending habits have bankrupted our country. You're running up our taxes and the national debt, saddling future generations with enslaving burdens of taxes and debt that they can never repay. You've taken over car manufacturing companies, illegally wiping out the stockholders, bondholders and distributors and awarding the remaining assets to the labor unions or other political cronies of your choice. You are wasting trillions of our hard...

White House and Democrats are struggling to bring a complex, controversial bill to remake the U.S. health care system to a vote in both houses of Congress before lawmakers recess. A bill passed two key committees Friday. President Obama and his congressional allies tried to rally support to health care reform legislation Friday after it cleared two key committees, playing down concerns that a pair of bills might not pass through Congress by the president's deadline. After working almost around-the-clock, the House Ways and Means Committee approved legislation by a 23-18 vote. A few hours later, the House Education and Labor...

(This version is much more easily searched, as the index (snip below) is hotlinked SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE; TABLE OF DIVISIONS, TITLES, AND SUBTITLES. DIVISION A--AFFORDABLE HEALTH CARE CHOICES Sec. 100. Purpose; table of contents of division; general definitions. TITLE I--PROTECTIONS AND STANDARDS FOR QUALIFIED HEALTH BENEFITS PLANS Subtitle A--General Standards SEC. 101. REQUIREMENTS REFORMING HEALTH INSURANCE MARKETPLACE. SEC. 102. PROTECTING THE CHOICE TO KEEP CURRENT COVERAGE. Subtitle B--Standards Guaranteeing Access to Affordable Coverage SEC. 111. PROHIBITING PRE-EXISTING CONDITION EXCLUSIONS. SEC. 112. GUARANTEED ISSUE AND RENEWAL FOR INSURED PLANS. SEC. 113. INSURANCE RATING RULES. SEC. 114. NONDISCRIMINATION IN BENEFITS; PARITY...

Local Tea Party patriots held an anti-Obama Care protest at Senator Claire "ACORN" McCaskill’s district offices on Delmar Boulevard today. The protest was organized by Americans for Prosperity and the St. Louis Tea Party Coalition. McCaskill's office manager locked the doors, pull down the blinds, called the cops and forced the protesters across the street.

On Page 425 of Obama’s health care bill, the Federal Government will require EVERYONE who is on Social Security to undergo a counseling session every 5 years with the objective being that they will explain to them just how to end their own life earlier. Yes...They are going to push SUICIDE to cut medicare spending!!! And no, I am NOT SH—ing YOU! So those of you who voted for Obama have now put your own parents in dire straights...Congratulations! Also, planned denial of medical care for seniors. Click the source for audio.

On Page 425 of Obama's health care bill, the Federal Government will require EVERYONE who is on Social Security to undergo a counseling session every 5 years with the objective being that they will explain to them just how to end their own life earlier. Yes...They are going to push SUICIDE to cut medicare spending!!! And no, I am NOT SH--ing YOU! So those of you who voted for Obama have now put your own parents in dire straights...Congratulations! http://fredthompsonshow.com/premiumstream?dispid=320&headerDest=L3BnL2pzcC9tZWRpYS9mbGFzaHdlbGNvbWUuanNwP3BpZD03MzUxJnBsYXlsaXN0PXRydWUmY2hhcnR0eXBlPWNoYXJ0JmNoYXJ0SUQ9MzIwJnBsYXlsaXN0U2l6ZT01 Source: fredthompsonshow.com The official homepage for Fred Thompson.

In the late afternoon of July 1o, President Obama met privately with Pope Benedict XVI for just over 30 minutes. According to official Vatican spokesman Rev. Federico Lombardi, S.J., "The president explicitly expressed his commitment to reducing the numbers of abortions and to listen to the church's concern on moral issues." On July 13 in a Senate committee hearing, Sen. Barbara Mikulski was forced to admit under persistent questioning by Sen. Orrin Hatch that the new health-care bill includes abortion coverage. Planned Parenthood's Guttmacher Institute estimates government funding of abortion increases abortion by 20 to 35 percent. There were 1,206,200...

Bioethics: The former director of the National Institutes of Health, once an enthusiast for embryonic stem cells, now says their future has "dimmed." So why is the administration bailing out research into such therapies while troubled states like California have committed billions?Aside from creating or saving a few research jobs, the administration's decision to federally fund embryonic stem cell research is, as we've noted, a bailout of bad science. It throws money at an avenue of research that time and adult stem cell progress have passed by. Applauding the administration's move was Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pa., who echoed the claims...

"As United States taxpayers know, income tax laws have long implicitly encouraged marriage and childbearing...Such a pronatalist bias of course is no longer appropriate. In countries that are affluent enough for the majority of citizens to pay taxes, tax laws could be adjusted to favor (instead of penalize) single people, working wives, and small families. Other tax measures might also include high marriage fees, taxes on luxury baby goods and toys, and removal of family allowances where they exist. Other possibilities include the limitation of maternal or educational benefits to two children per family."

Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday that she considered Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court case that legalized abortion, to be “settled law”...Dr. Charmaine Yoest, president of Americans United for Life, said Roe is “anything but settled law.”“This question of Roe as settled law goes to a central point in the testimony we’ll be providing on Thursday morning: Roe is not settled law,” Yoest said in a statement

One of Britain's most respected conductors, Sir Edward Downes, and his wife, Joan, a choreographer and TV producer, have died at an assisted suicide clinic in Switzerland, their family said today.Downes, 85, was almost blind when he and his 74-year-old wife, who had become his full-time carer, travelled to Switzerland to end their lives, a family statement released to the BBC said.Born in Birmingham, Downes had a long and distinguished career, including conducting the first performance at the Sydney Opera House. He worked with the BBC Philharmonic and the Royal Opera House in London.The statement from the couple's son and...

LONDON – British conductor Edward Downes, a longtime stalwart at the Royal Opera and maestro of the first-ever performance at Sydney's iconic Opera House, has died with his wife at an assisted suicide clinic in Switzerland. He was 85. The couple's children said Tuesday that Downes and his 74-year-old wife, Joan, died "peacefully and under circumstances of their own choosing" on Friday at a Zurich clinic run by the group Dignitas. "After 54 happy years together, they decided to end their own lives rather than continue to struggle with serious health problems," said a statement from the couple's son and...

The mainstream media have been incredibly slow to pick up on a creepy comment by Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in a New York Times interview published today but flagged last week. In it, Ginsburg talks about on Roe v Wade, the 1973 ruling that legalised abortion: Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of. So that Roe was going to be then set up for Medicaid funding for abortion. What? You can find the full...

In a July 7 New York Times Magazine article ("The Place of Women on the Court"; HT to an e-mailer) apparently scheduled to appear in its July 12 print edition (based on its URL), Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg told the Times's Emily Bazelon that "at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don't want to have too many of." Who is this "we" Ginsburg refers to? Alleged reporter Bazelon did not follow up on this astounding admission. Here, in full context of the Q&A discussion about women's...

Ezekiel Emmanuel MD, Rahm Emmanuel’s brother, who is Barack Obama’s “Special Advisor for Health Policy�, is described by the [1] Huffington Post article as engaged in a very important mission: redesigning the US health care system. Emanuel and the White House are attempting to reorganize the delivery and reimbursement systems of health care, changing what the types of procedures doctors rely on, making people more aware of disease prevention, encouraging insurance companies to expand coverage, and so on. It is a process rife with sensitivities, trickeries and, of course, the potential for failure. It is not, he insists, impossible.“It...

The New Jacobin Elite | Print | Written by William F. Jasper    Wednesday, 24 June 2009 06:00 The Socialist Party of Great Britain is celebrating the reissuing of Peter Taaffe’s book, The Masses Arise: The Great French Revolution 1789 -1815. “Its republication by Socialist Publications, in time for the 220th anniversary of this great event in July 2009, is extremely timely,� says the party’s website. A different page on the party’s site promoting the same book instructs readers: “An understanding of the French Revolution remains crucial for all revolutionaries. Marx, Engels, Lenin and Trotsky studied it intensely to gain an...

Science: The president's Council on Bioethics is summarily dismissed when it disagrees on the need for more federally funded embryonic stem cell research. The scientific method doesn't include firing those who disagree with you.Inspectors general are apparently not the only ones to pay for annoying the White House by doing their job. The 18-member council existed to provide the president with advice on the moral and ethical implications of the rapid advances in science and medical research. It exists no more. The council existed to ponder whether we should do something just because we can. Apparently President Obama wanted not...

Tuesday June 23, 2009 Obama Abruptly Sacks Bio-ethics Panel Critical of Embryonic Stem-Cell Research By Peter J. SmithWASHINGTON, D.C., June 23, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The White House has dismissed the members of the President’s US Council on Bioethics just a few months before their mandate expires, indicating their services are no longer required by the President and that he is looking for a more “practical� advisory board. The New York Times reported that Reid Cherlin, a White House press officer, told the paper that President Barack Obama saw them as "a philosophically leaning advisory group" designed by the previous...