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Conscientious Objection Gone Awry — Restoring Selfless Professionalism in Medicine (selfless-not)
New England Journal of Medicine ^ | March 25, 2009 | Julie Cantor, MD, JD

Posted on 03/29/2009 3:36:43 AM PDT by hocndoc

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This is supposed to be available for free online, but you may have to register- again, for free.

For more on the history of this "midnight regulation" that was in the works for 2 years, see my blog: http://www.lifeethics.org/www.lifeethics.org/2008/11/why-we-need-legal-protection-for.html and http://www.lifeethics.org/www.lifeethics.org/labels/conscience.html

or better, still, see "Freedom2Care," an organization of the best minds in the prolife, profamily movement: http://www.freedom2care.org/ Where you can respond to the HHS and those of you in medicine may report incidents of discrimination against you that happened because of your refusal to kill.

1 posted on 03/29/2009 3:36:43 AM PDT by hocndoc
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To: hocndoc

“First: Do No Harm”


2 posted on 03/29/2009 3:38:09 AM PDT by Cringing Negativism Network (Palin / Romney 2012?)
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To: narses; neverdem; socialismisinsidious; MHGinTN; Coleus; cpforlife.org; Brad's Gramma

“Conscience is a burden that belongs to the individual professional; patients should not have to shoulder it.”

Yes, this woman really says this.


3 posted on 03/29/2009 3:43:54 AM PDT by hocndoc (http://www.LifeEthics.org (I've got a mustard seed and I'm not afraid to use it.))
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To: hocndoc
Here the rule sidesteps courts, which interpret statutory ambiguities and discern congressional intent, and offers sweeping definitions. It defines "individual" as physicians, other health care providers, hospitals, laboratories, and insurance companies, as well as "employees, volunteers, trainees, contractors, and other persons" who work for an entity that receives DHHS funds.

This guy is an absolute moron. So Bush is evil because he tried to define ambiguities in the law??? According to this guy, the law is suppose to be ambiguous so no one knows what the law is, so the courts can do their thing and arbitrarily decide what the law means? What a moron.

4 posted on 03/29/2009 3:46:40 AM PDT by Always Right (Obama: more arrogant than Bill Clinton, more naive than Jimmy Carter, and more liberal than LBJ.)
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To: Cringing Negativism Network

That’s the old “burden” that lawyer Dr. Cantor is writing against.
No more judgment on the part of individual doctors.
Although we won’t do it because our conscience tells us to, we can be trusted to follow the law and do whatever it is that patients demand:

Want your daughter lobotomized or circumcized? Sure!

Want your sick parent euthanized? Oh, well that’s government policy and my license is more important than doing the right thing.


5 posted on 03/29/2009 3:48:10 AM PDT by hocndoc (http://www.LifeEthics.org (I've got a mustard seed and I'm not afraid to use it.))
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To: hocndoc; Salvation; NYer; GonzoII
... health care providers — and all those whose jobs affect patient care — should cast off the cloak of conscience when patients' needs demand it.

It's ironic that the date of publication should be the day when some Christians observe that the Incarnation of God took place not when he was born but when he was conceived.

And one of the deaths implicit in this document is the death of conscience. Another is the death of reason. What this guy is saying is that one SHOULD do not what one thinks one should, but what the law says one may. But the next step is one should do not what one thinks one should do but what the writer thinks one should do.

That is he says health care types shouldn't follow their conscience but what he MEANS is they should reform their conscience, they should change their opinion of right and wrong.

And the truly vicious aspect of this (or ONE of many truly vicious aspects) is that he implicitly characterizes being true to one's principles as being selfish. To abandon conscience is to be selflessly professional.

Let's review: The argument comes down to: you should not be guided by what you think is right or wrong; you should be guided by what the writer thinks is right or wrong, because his moral vision is better than yours. There is a moral imperative to abandon YOUR moral imperative. Your conscience should tell you not to follow what your conscience tells you.

It's nihilism of the most absurd kind cloaked as liberal selflessness.

6 posted on 03/29/2009 3:50:12 AM PDT by Mad Dawg (Oh Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.)
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To: hocndoc
Patients rely on health care professionals for their expertise; they should be able expect those professionals to be neutral arbiters of medical care.

Being neutral in providing an abortion is to abstain! If you provide the abortion, you are siding with the women's selfish interest over the best interest of the child to live.

7 posted on 03/29/2009 3:50:55 AM PDT by Always Right (Obama: more arrogant than Bill Clinton, more naive than Jimmy Carter, and more liberal than LBJ.)
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To: Mrs. Don-o

ping


8 posted on 03/29/2009 3:53:03 AM PDT by don-o (My son, Ben - Marine Private First Class - 1/16/09 - Parris Island, SC)
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To: hocndoc
This is a throwback to Nazi Germany. As a physician you are ordered to perform atrocities under the iron law of the regime.

These monsters want a civil war.

9 posted on 03/29/2009 3:54:32 AM PDT by NoControllingLegalAuthority
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To: hocndoc

The ever despicable Julie Cantor is NOT identified as the Planned Parenthood spokesperson that she is.

This was an evil totalitarian commentary by a monster.


10 posted on 03/29/2009 3:55:11 AM PDT by FormerACLUmember (Chains you can believe in)
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To: Mad Dawg

Bravo!


11 posted on 03/29/2009 3:56:03 AM PDT by hocndoc (http://www.LifeEthics.org (I've got a mustard seed and I'm not afraid to use it.))
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To: don-o

Thank you. (I have got to write and save a ping list someday.)


12 posted on 03/29/2009 3:57:09 AM PDT by hocndoc (http://www.LifeEthics.org (I've got a mustard seed and I'm not afraid to use it.))
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To: hocndoc

Trying again on those url’s

http://www.lifeethics.org/www.lifeethics.org/2008/11/why-we-need-legal-protection-for.html
and http://www.lifeethics.org/www.lifeethics.org/labels/conscience.html

or better, still, see “Freedom2Care,” an organization of the best minds in the prolife, profamily movement: http://www.freedom2care.org/

where you can respond to the HHS and those of you in medicine may report incidents of discrimination against you that happened because of your refusal to kill.


13 posted on 03/29/2009 3:59:05 AM PDT by hocndoc (http://www.LifeEthics.org (I've got a mustard seed and I'm not afraid to use it.))
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To: Always Right

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists’ Ethics Statement - the action that instigated the ruling -
says that we should all provide abortion, but if we don’t, we must refer.

Even worse:
http://www.lifeethics.org/www.lifeethics.org/2009/01/acog-abort-or-refer.html

the Ethics Statement #385 says that if we don’t believe that abortion is a great service to offer our patients, we should not practice where there isn’t any abortionist. Instead we should practice in close “proximity” to an abortionist who doesn’t share our views.

There goes quite a few OB/Gyns who won’t sign their Ethics statement and a lot of rural OB/Gyns, Family Physicians, Pediatricians, and Internal Medicine docs who find themselves at a new risk of malpractice and loss of license.


14 posted on 03/29/2009 4:07:07 AM PDT by hocndoc (http://www.LifeEthics.org (I've got a mustard seed and I'm not afraid to use it.))
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To: hocndoc
Federal laws may make room for the rights of conscience, but health care providers — and all those whose jobs affect patient care — should cast off the cloak of conscience when patients' needs demand it.

I wonder how such a blatant and blunt bombshell as this made the final edit.

15 posted on 03/29/2009 4:09:26 AM PDT by don-o (My son, Ben - Marine Private First Class - 1/16/09 - Parris Island, SC)
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To: don-o

How about this complete change in the way the world works:

“As is often the case with laws touching on reproductive freedom, the debate is polarized and shrill. But there comes a point at which tolerance breaches the standard of care.”


16 posted on 03/29/2009 4:14:18 AM PDT by hocndoc (http://www.LifeEthics.org (I've got a mustard seed and I'm not afraid to use it.))
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To: don-o

For years, the “bioethicists” have been telling us that conscience is just another personally held belief that gets in the way of what they want us to do.

The irony, as Mad Dawg has pointed out, is that the author puts on a moral, “right thing,” “ought” argument, herself.

We “ought” to do something — but what is the basis of “ought”?

Law? law varies by region, local preferences and customs, and sometimes by the whim of a dictator, someone with a gun or an oligarchy representing itself as the judiciary.


17 posted on 03/29/2009 4:18:51 AM PDT by hocndoc (http://www.LifeEthics.org (I've got a mustard seed and I'm not afraid to use it.))
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To: hocndoc

If PCR is rescinded and is unambiguous in intent, scope and penalty, the path the conscientious objector must take is clear.

The only path is resistance. The only choice is defiance. The Socialist government that is now so infatuated with murdering our progeny must be forced to put up or shut up. The ball must be placed squarely in their court.

What was true for the Continental Congress is also good “medicine” for us in the present; If we do not hang together, we shall surely hang separately. Organized and unwavering resistance is the only Rx for such tyranny. If these Socialists close hospitals and suspend licenses to practice, this bit of treachery will be short-lived. Americans will not stand for this for very long.

When citizens see their local hospital close and their choices for medical professionals dwindle, the pitch forks and torches will come out rather quickly. The key is a united front and Life Ethics and others will be seminal in the success of this fight.


18 posted on 03/29/2009 4:26:40 AM PDT by WildcatClan (Iam fimus mos ledo ventus apparatus)
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To: hocndoc

At Obama’s last presser, he was asked to explain how his morality enabled him to overturn the ban on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. He completely failed in his answer, which boiled down to, “It’s the right thing to do.”

Bob Dylan sang about this a long time ago

“They say what’s up is down
They say what isn’t is.
They put ideas in his head, he thought were his.
They took a clean cut kid
And they made a killer out of him
Is what they did.”


19 posted on 03/29/2009 4:27:48 AM PDT by don-o (My son, Ben - Marine Private First Class - 1/16/09 - Parris Island, SC)
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To: hocndoc

Thank ‘ee kindly. I’m off to celebrate Him who did not abandon either me or His principles.


20 posted on 03/29/2009 5:07:27 AM PDT by Mad Dawg (Oh Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.)
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