Life Advocacy Briefing

A Moment of Peace, Please

ALONG WITH THE VAST MAJORITY OF OUR READERS, we at Life Advocacy will be celebrating this week the Incarnation of God on earth in the gracious birth of Jesus, Savior for mankind and the only true Prince of Peace. We extend to all our readers our best wishes for joy and reflection on eternal realities and a season – brief as it is – in the warm comfort of family and fellow faith walkers. And along with millions of Americans, we invite the Congress to give us the best Christmas gift that august body can offer: Their departure from the District of Columbia.

Our plan is to honor Christmas by suspending publication of Life Advocacy Briefing until 2010 dawns. We hope earnestly to hold to that plan; if, however, news forces us back into your in-box, we’ll at least be off-schedule. So do not expect to see us at the usual time. Indeed, our first edition of 2010 will probably be a day or two late because of the Friday new year holiday.

Omnibus Passes

ANOTHER WEEKEND SESSION, ANOTHER MONSTROSITY from the US Senate, which passed last Sunday a conference report combining overdue FY 2010 appropriations bills for Transportation/Housing & Urban Development, Commerce/Justice/Science, Financial Services (including District of Columbia), Labor/Health & Human Services, Military Construction/Veterans Administration and State/Foreign Operations.

Because 35 Senators, led by Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), had vowed to use every available parliamentary move to block consideration of the measure if it weakened long-standing abortion funding prohibitions, the bill needed three roll calls – two of them procedural – to pass.

We publish those three roll calls at the close of this Life Advocacy Briefing and note with particular dismay the votes of Sen. Christopher Bond (R-MO), Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS) and Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL). We note further: A variety of issues contributed to the decisions taken by each Senator, but unquestionably a “yes” vote on any and all of these roll calls did weaken long-standing federal policy protecting taxpayers from being forced to pay abortionists for their “services.”

The omnibus conference report appropriates public funds for abortions in the District of Columbia, undermining the long-standing Dornan Amendment. It also increases funding for the United Nations Population Fund despite UNFPA’s shameful advocacy of abortion and complicity with Red China’s vicious one-child pogrom. And it boosts funding for international “family planning” operations in the context of Pres. Obama’s suspension of the Reagan Mexico City Policy so that our tax dollars now reward outfits like International Planned Parenthood, despite their involvement in the intentional killing of prenatal boys and girls. The omnibus also ends federal funding for abstinence education and establishes new schemes for the sexual corruption of our youth.

We commend Sen. DeMint and his colleagues for seeking to stop this atrocity. May your numbers increase!

DeMint Letter Signers

AL/Sessions & Shelby, AZ/Kyl & McCain, FL/LeMieux, GA/Chambliss & Isakson, ID/Crapo & Risch, IA/Grassley, KS/Brownback & Roberts, KY/Bunning & McConnell, LA/Vitter, MS/Wicker, MO/Bond, NE/Johanns, NV/Ensign, NH/Gregg, NC/Burr, OH/Voinovich, OK/Coburn & Inhofe, SC/ DeMint & Graham, SD/Thune, TN/Alexander & Corker, TX/Cornyn & Hutchison, UT/Bennett & Hatch, WY/Barrasso & Enzi.

Casey Fronts for Reid in ‘Compromise’ Bid

SEN. ROBERT CASEY (D-PA) ALLOWED HIMSELF TO BE USED last Wednesday as front man for a false compromise amendment dangled in front of Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) in an effort to trick Sen. Nelson into backing down on his rejection of the Senate’s abortion-subsidizing ObamaCare proposal.

Fortunately, Sen. Nelson, though he at first said he was considering the Casey proposal’s merits (if any), took only a few hours to reject it. And then he cast aspersions on Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s plan to push the massive bill through by Christmas, declaring “getting it right” is preferable to meeting a deadline.

While Sen. Nelson was weighing the tortuous language of the Casey fix, National Right to Life Committee’s legislative director Douglas Johnson weighed in, publicly calling the proposal “entirely unacceptable” and “an exercise in cosmetics – like putting lipstick on a legislative warthog.”

True Compassion

A NEW INTERNET WEBSITE HAS BEEN LAUNCHED to inform the public about medical advances brought by adult stemcell research.

Focused on a campaign called “Adult Stem Cells Saved My Life,” the website presents inspiring case history videos of real people whose serious illness or debilitating condition was reversed or even cured by adult stem cells. The site, www.stemcellresearchfacts.org, was developed by the Washington-based Family Research Council and SaintMax Worldwide, a media company focused, according to its own website, on “using modern technology to inject the voice of Christ into pop culture.”

The educational tool joins a long-standing website, www.stemcellresearch.org, in helping Americans – particularly those in the media and the public arena – to recover from their own myopia about experiments requiring the utilitarian killing of embryonic human beings for their spare parts. The older site is operated by Do No Harm, a coalition dedicated to true medical ethics, and presents, along with a wide array of publication links, a scorecard currently showing 73 treatments and cures via adult stem cells vs. Zero for cells harvested from embryonic boys and girls.

The Reality of ‘Reid’: Rationing

Opinion column by Sen. Tom Coburn MD (R-OK), first published in the Wall Street Journal, Dec. 16, 2009

I recently suggested that seniors will die sooner if Congress actually implements the Medicare cuts in the healthcare bill put forward by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. My colleagues who defend the bill – none of whom have practiced medicine – predictably dismissed my concern as a scare tactic. They are wrong. Every American, not just seniors, should know that the rationing provisions in the Reid bill will not only reduce their quality of life but their life spans as well.

My 25 years as a practicing physician have shown me what happens when government attempts to practice medicine. Doctors respond to government coercion instead of patient cues, and patients die prematurely. Even if the public option is eliminated from the bill, these onerous rationing provisions will remain intact.

For instance, the Reid bill (in sections 3403 and 2021) explicitly empowers Medicare to deny treatment based on cost. An independent Medicare Advisory Board created by the bill – composed of permanent, unelected and, therefore, unaccountable members – will greatly expand the rationing practices that already occur in the program.

Medicare, for example, has limited cancer patients’ access to Epogen, a costly but vital drug that stimulates red blood cell production. It has limited the use of virtual – and safer – colonoscopies due to cost concerns. And Medicare refuses medical claims at twice the rate of the largest private insurers.

Section 6301 of the Reid bill creates new comparative effectiveness research (CER) programs. CER panels have been used as rationing commissions in other countries such as the UK, where 15,000 cancer patients die prematurely every year, according to the National Cancer Intelligence Network. CER panels here could effectively dictate coverage options and ration care for plans that participate in the state insurance exchanges created by the bill.

Additionally, the Reid bill depends on the recommendations of the US Preventive Services Task Force in no fewer than 14 places. This task force was responsible for advising women under 50 to not undergo annual mammograms. The administration claims the task force recommendations do not carry the force of law, but the Reid bill itself contradicts them in Section 2713. The bill explicitly states, on page 17, that health insurance plans “shall provide coverage for” services approved by the task force. This chilling provision represents the government stepping between doctors and patients. When the government asserts the power to provide care, it also asserts the power to deny care.

If the bill expands Medicaid eligibility to 133% of the poverty level, that too will lead to rationing. Because Washington bureaucrats have created a system that underpays doctors, 40% of doctors already restrict access to Medicaid patients and therefore ration care.

Medicaid demonstrates, tragically in some cases, that access to a government program does not guarantee access to health care. In Maryland, 17,000 Medicaid patients are currently on a waiting list for medical services, and as many as 250 may have died while awaiting care, according to state auditors. Kansas, the home state of Health & Human Services Secy. Kathleen Sebelius, faces a Medicaid backlog of more than 15,000 applicants.

Other unintended consequences of the Reid bill could wreak havoc on patients’ lives. What happens, for instance, when savvy consumers commanded to buy insurance realize the penalty is the de facto premium? It won’t take long for younger, healthier Americans to realize it’s cheaper to pay a $750 tax for coverage instead of, say, $5,000 in annual premiums when coverage can’t be denied if you get sick.

OMB Budget Director Peter Orzsag’s belief that mandatory health insurance will become a “cultural norm” is bureaucratic naivete that will produce skyrocketing premiums and reduced care for everyone. My state’s own insurance commissioner – a Democrat – recently confirmed this concern to me in a letter noting that “the result will be higher insurance rates due to a higher percentage of insured being higher risk/expense individuals.”

But the most fundamental flaw of the Reid bill is best captured by the story of one of my patients I’ll call Sheila. When Sheila came to me at the age of 33 with a lump in her breast, traditional tests like a mammogram under the standard of care indicated she had a cyst and nothing more. Because I knew her medical history, I wasn’t convinced. I aspirated the cyst and discovered she had a highly malignant form of breast cancer. Sheila fought a heroic battle against breast cancer and enjoyed 12 good years with her family before succumbing to the disease.

If I had been practicing under the Reid bill, the government would have likely told me I couldn’t have done the test that discovered Sheila’s cancer because it wasn’t approved under CER. Under the Reid bill, Sheila may have lived another year instead of 12, and her daughters would have missed a decade with their mom.

The bottom line is that under the Reid bill the majority of America’s patients might be fine. But some will be like Sheila – patients whose lives hang in the balance and require the care of a doctor who understands the science and art of medicine and can make decisions without government interference.

The American people are opposing this bill in greater numbers every day because the facts of the bill – not any tactic – are cause for serious concern.

Senate Voting Records

Procedural Motion to waive a Rule in order to allow consideration of the Omnibus Appropriation conference report – Dec. 11, 2009 – Adopted – 60-36 (Needed 60) (Democrats in italics; “Independents” marked “I”)

Voting “no” / pro-life: AL/Sessions & Shelby, AK/Murkowski, AZ/Kyl & McCain, FL/LeMieux, GA/Chambliss & Isakson, ID/Crapo & Risch, IN/ Bayh & Lugar, IA/Grassley, KS/Brownback & Roberts, KY/McConnell, LA/Vitter, ME/Snowe, MS/Wicker, MO/McCaskill, NE/Johanns, NV/Ensign, NH/Gregg, OH/Voinovich, OK/Inhofe, SC/DeMint & Graham, SD/Thune, TN/Alexander & Corker, TX/Cornyn, UT/Bennett & Hatch, WI/Feingold, WY/Barrasso & Enzi.

Voting “yes” / pro-abortion: AK/Begich, AR/Lincoln & Pryor, CA/Boxer & Feinstein, CO/Bennet & Udall, CT/Dodd & Lieberman (I), DE/Carper & Kaufman, FL/Nelson, HI/Akaka & Inouye, IL/Burris & Durbin, IA/Harkin, LA/Landrieu, ME/Collins, MD/Cardin & Mikulski, MA/Kerry & Kirk, MI/Levin & Stabenow, MN/Franken & Klobuchar, MS/Cochran, MO/Bond, MT/Baucus & Tester, NE/Nelson, NV/Reid, NH/Shaheen, NJ/Lautenberg  & Menendez, NM/Bingaman & Udall, NY/Gillibrand & Schumer, NC/Hagan, ND/Conrad & Dorgan, OH/Brown, OR/Merkley & Wyden, PA/Casey & Specter, RI/Reed & Whitehouse, SD/Johnson, VT/Leahy & Sanders (I), VA/Warner & Webb, WA/Cantwell & Murray, WV/Byrd & Rockefeller, WI/Kohl.

Not voting:. KY/Bunning, NC/Burr, OK/Coburn, TX/Hutchison.

Cloture Motion to end debate on the Omnibus Appropriation conference report – Dec. 12, 2009 – Adopted – 60-34 (Needed 60) (Democrats in italics; “Independents” marked “I”)

Voting “no” / pro-life: AL/Sessions, AK/Murkowski, AZ/Kyl & McCain, FL/LeMieux, GA/Chambliss & Isakson, ID/Crapo & Risch, IN/Bayh, IA/Grassley, KS/Brownback & Roberts, KY/McConnell, LA/Vitter, ME/Snowe, MS/Wicker, MO/McCaskill, NE/Johanns, NV/Ensign, NH/Gregg, NC/Burr, OH/Voinovich, OK/Inhofe, SD/Thune, TN/Alexander & Corker, TX/Cornyn & Hutchison, UT/Bennett & Hatch, WI/Feingold, WY/Barrasso & Enzi.

Voting “yes” / pro-abortion: AL/Shelby,AK/Begich, AR/Lincoln & Pryor, CA/Boxer & Feinstein, CO/Bennet & Udall, CT/Dodd & Lieberman (I), DE/Carper & Kaufman, FL/Nelson, HI/Akaka & Inouye, IL/Burris & Durbin, IA/Harkin, LA/Landrieu, ME/Collins, MD/Cardin & Mikulski, MA/Kerry & Kirk, MI/Levin & Stabenow, MN/Franken & Klobuchar, MS/Cochran, MT/Baucus & Tester, NE/Nelson, NV/Reid, NH/Shaheen, NJ/Lautenberg  & Menendez, NM/Bingaman & Udall, NY/Gillibrand & Schumer, NC/Hagan, ND/Conrad & Dorgan, OH/Brown, OR/Merkley & Wyden, PA/Casey & Specter, RI/Reed & Whitehouse, SD/Johnson, VT/Leahy & Sanders (I), VA/Warner & Webb, WA/Cantwell & Murray, WV/Byrd & Rockefeller, WI/Kohl.

Not voting: IN/Lugar, KY/Bunning, MO/Bond, OK/Coburn, SC/DeMint & Graham.

Adoption of the Omnibus Appropriation conference report – Dec. 13, 2009 – Adopted – 57-35 (Needed 51) (Democrats in italics; “Independents” marked “I”)

Voting “no” / pro-life: AL/Sessions, AK/Murkowski, AZ/Kyl & McCain, FL/LeMieux, GA/Chambliss & Isakson, ID/Crapo & Risch, IN/Lugar & Bayh, IA/Grassley, KS/Brownback & Roberts, KY/McConnell, LA/Vitter, ME/Snowe, MS/Wicker, MO/McCaskill, NE/Johanns, NV/Ensign, NH/Gregg, NC/Burr, SC/DeMint & Graham, SD/Thune, TN/Alexander & Corker, TX/Cornyn & Hutchison, UT/Bennett & Hatch, WI/Feingold, WY/Barrasso & Enzi.

Voting “yes” / pro-abortion: AL/Shelby,AK/Begich, AR/Lincoln & Pryor, CA/Boxer & Feinstein, CO/Bennet & Udall, CT/Dodd & Lieberman (I), DE/Carper & Kaufman, FL/Nelson, HI/Akaka & Inouye, IL/Burris & Durbin, IA/Harkin, LA/Landrieu, ME/Collins, MD/Cardin & Mikulski, MA/Kerry & Kirk, MI/Levin & Stabenow, MN/Franken & Klobuchar, MS/Cochran, MT/Baucus & Tester, NE/Nelson, NV/Reid, NH/Shaheen, NJ/Lautenberg  & Menendez, NM/Bingaman & Udall, NY/Gillibrand & Schumer, NC/Hagan, ND/Conrad, OH/Brown, OR/Wyden, PA/Casey & Specter, RI/Reed & Whitehouse, SD/Johnson, VT/Leahy & Sanders (I), VA/Warner & Webb, WA/Cantwell, WV/Byrd & Rockefeller, WI/Kohl.

Not voting: KY/Bunning, MO/Bond, ND/Dorgan, OH/Voinovich, OK/Coburn & Inhofe, OR/Merkley, WA/Murray.

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