The irony of practicing medicine and having TERRIBLE access to it?

[AbeTheBabe]

4 hours ago, rev ronin said:

I'm going to skip the arguments about abortion, because this gives us enough material to talk about, without getting into OTHER inflammatory rights issues.

Medical paternalism would be what happened to my Mom's best friend; she had an emergency C-section due to awful pre-eclampsia that prompted the physician to tie her tubes, taking positive action to destroy her fertility based on his judgment that another pregnancy would likely kill her.  Oh, an she is college educated and white, in case it matters.  The doctor took an action, performing a separate surgical procedure that wasn't an emergency at the time, for which "informed consent" was pretty sketchy at best--I honestly don't know if her husband was aware of what was going on, but I've had to consult on GYN surgery while my wife was asleep, this was long before I had any medical training at all, and I can tell you I had no idea what I was consenting to on her behalf.  At any rate, THAT is medical paternalism: doctor does something to patient based on his or her best judgment.

I won't harm my patients, nor through my inaction allow them to come to harm.  Sound Asimovian? It should; the "three laws of robotics" short stories are where I learned medical ethics before I knew I was learning medical ethics.  What, did you think I was going to say The Bible?

I do not restrict the patient from fighting. I do not write up a 'failed' physical on a pretext.  If presented with a form, I simply don't do it, and the patient can go to the urgent care up the street, which does. That balances the patient's right to do self-destructive things (autonomy), with my right not to be involved in their own self-destructive things (non-maleficence).

Ultimately, I am a professional. The profession of medicine is founded in (professing) the Hippocratic Oath; if one violates that oath, one is outside the profession of medicine.  Of course, there have been efforts to amend it or rewrite it wholesale, and most modern medical schools don't teach it, but beyond changing the deities to which one swears, and the long-past merger of surgery and medicine, the rest of it remains strikingly relevant 2500 years later.  To deny any medical provider the right to NOT contribute to the harm of a patient, regardless of how indirectly that harm might be, on the basis of elevating autonomy above other medical ethics considerations, is untenable.  Would you require that I provide a Z-pack for a URI just because the patient asks for it?

That is very unfortunate what happened to your mom's best friend, that's definitely paternalism and should never have happened. We need to allow patients to make their own decisions. You say you won't harm your patients through inaction. Isn't refusing to do the physical exam inaction? I mean, they are just going to go somewhere else, aren't they? Wouldn't the action in this scenario doing the physical, making sure they are healthy, and discussing with them the dangers/risks of the sport? In the grand scheme of things, this is really inconsequential though and you should do whatever makes you comfortable.

[CAdamsPAC]

On 9/13/2019 at 1:58 PM, sas5814 said:

This has been an interesting, if wandering, thread. Just my .5 cents worth.

Health care isn't a right. If it was the governement could force me and every other health care provider to give it away to anyone who needs it.

We haven't made food and a roof over your head a right. How can something like health care be a right?

Most people need health care. That doesn't automatically entitle them to it.

It would be nice if everyone who needed care got it. Right now the perfect system, including the oft lauded universal health care system, doesn't exist.

The words "fair" and "entitled" and "free" have become trigger words for me.

Fair is you eat what you kill. Fair is taking care of people who can't take care of themselves. Fair is letting people who could take care of themselves but won't devolve naturally.

Free doesn't exist. You can't give something to someone without taking something from someone else. Free things provided by the government are only free to the recipient. The rest of us pay for it in taxes.

You aren't entitled to anything in this life except a fair shot at succeeding under your own power.

 

Life, Liberty and the PURSUIT of Happiness  are that is promised to and deserved by all!!

 

[AbeTheBabe]

4 hours ago, Boatswain2PA said:

I agree, a "right" doesn't make it slavery, but what people (like you a page or so back) say that healthcare is a "right", they aren't talking about an individual "right", but rather an entitlement.   Let me explain that a bit further.  If I say that I agree that we have a "right" to healthcare, what I mean is that each of us has the right to seek out and purchase whatever kind of healthcare we want.  I don't mean that anyone has a "right" to high quality healthcare paid for by someone else.  Please correct me if I'm wrong, but that is what you meant when you said you think healthcare is a right.

Using your example of the 2nd amendment, you have the right to purchase whatever gun you want.  But can you imagine if I changed the definition of the "right to bear arms" to what you meant by "right to healthcare"?  The government could then come up with a mandate that each of us buy a personal defense weapon.  They could even take it a step further, like Obamacare, and fine us if we don't prove to the IRS each year that we have a firearm!  Oh, and not just any firearm, would have to be an approved firearm, with biometric safety locks etc that drive the cost of the firearms up.

So, to clearly answer your question - no, gun manufacturers are not held in slavery because the "right" to bear arms is the freedom to buy, or not buy, what you want.  That is a far cry from what people who declare "healthcare is a right" want with healthcare.

Admittedly, the analogy is not perfect. I think we are getting way too off track with what's a right and what shouldn't be a right. Let's just say universal healthcare.

4 hours ago, Boatswain2PA said:

Correct.  Doesn't mean it will be any better either.

So because it might not be better we shouldn't try? Covering the 30-50 million that are uninsured would already be better, in my opinion.

4 hours ago, Boatswain2PA said:

Was this the bill that Nancy Pelosi famously said "we have to pass the bill to see what's in the bill" as she rammed it down our throats without a single Republican vote?  Yeah, that's the one....

Politicians suck, damn near all of them.

I agree wholeheartedly that most politicians suck, but you can't compare the PROCESS in which the ACA was passed to the process which Republicans tried to pass their own healthcare bill.

4 hours ago, Boatswain2PA said:

But your last sentence here begs the question....who will choose what is/isn't covered under a universal healthcare plan?  A  panel of "experts", right? (who conservatives refer to as a "death panel").  There's your rationing....

Death panels? So private insurance companies trying to deny care and limit coverage any way they can is not a death panel?

4 hours ago, Boatswain2PA said:

I'm enjoying the discussion with you.  I doubt we will change each other's minds, but that's okay.  It is nice to be able to have a discussion with someone like you who doesn't throw personal insults (I haven't been called an evil/racist/bigot/mysogenist/planet hater...yet! lol)

I think philosophical/theological discussions are not only practical, but absolutely necessary if we are to maintain a society.  When does life begin?  I don't know for sure, and neither do you.

But I think we can both agree that life is precious and should be protected, right?  So the crux of the abortion argument is exactly what you asked, "when does life begin?"

To me that is at conception when a wholly different (but still dependent) organism is formed with a unique set of DNA. That 8 week old with a heartbeat is just a clump of contracting cells....with a unique set of DNA that makes them a human being.  A baby who should be loved, cared for, and protected.

I don't think a baby should be punished (killed) because of the sins of his/her parents. Rape is terrible, and I'm sure carrying a child who is the product of rape would be even more excruciating, but since the baby is a separate human being they should not be aborted. This is a terrible situation, and fortunately rare, but to expound on my ideology - would you kill the baby after it was born because it was a product of rape? Of course not. Would you kill a 36 weeker still in uterus because it was a product of rape?  Most would say no.  What about 32 weeks?  28 weeks? 24 weeks?  20 weeks?   What's the difference between them other than age and development?

So we have learned that you believe life begins when an egg is fertilized and you would not allow a woman who was raped to have an abortion. To me, that's unbelievably cruel to force a woman to carry and deliver a child that was a product of rape. I hope no one you know has to go through that, and I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy. To answer your question, I believe life begins at birth so if the mother decided not to have an abortion, she can take care of the child or give it up for adoption. It's not my place to force my beliefs about abortion, it's her decision. You or I can't begin to imagine the emotions and turmoil and difficulty of the decision she has to make, and should not have a say in what she can and can't do.

The vast majority of abortions occur in the first trimester (over 90%), and about 1% occur after 24 weeks. I would imagine most of those are likely due to fetal abnormality or maternal risk. Why let the fetus continue to develop if you want to abort? And unfortunately, many red states pass restrictions and decrease access to an abortion which does just that.

If someone put a gun to your head and forced you to kill a living infant child or abort a fertilized egg, what would be your choice? (Don't tell me you can't make a choice or would let them kill you, just a thought experiment). If you believe life begins at conception, that life is worth exactly the same as the infants. If you choose to save the living baby, then you understand that the two "lives" are not the same. If you agree that they are not the same, then we realize that deciding when life begins anytime before birth is arbitrary.

4 hours ago, Boatswain2PA said:

With regard to abortion to protect the mother's life (side note - I appreciate that you wrote "mother" in that scenario, probably indicates that you understand that this is a mother and her baby) - our society has pretty clearly established criteria for when it is acceptable to kill someone, and one of them is for the protection of yourself or others.  If there is a clear and present danger to the mother's life, or danger of serious bodily injury, then taking a life in exchange for protecting a life is acceptable. 

Yes, childbirth is a risk, but so is driving a car.  Doesn't justify killing a baby.

No.  The human race has 100% mortality.  We all die, most of us from "natural causes" if you will.

There are no need for exceptions to these rules.  Murder is bad.  Self-defense (or defense of others) is acceptable reason to kill someone.  Accidents have nothing to do with this.  And there are mountains of reading that can be done regarding the ethics and morality of warfare.

I'm confused, so you're saying an all powerful and all knowing and benevolent higher being allowing a miscarriage, or a child to develop cancer is natural and perfectly acceptable? We're here discussing whether an abortion of unborn fetus should be legal or not, but we don't have the same standards for God? And please spare me the "we can't begin to understand his plan" line.

"Killing a baby" is an insulting and inflammatory phrase. I hope that you are more respectful of others choices in real life, especially in a professional setting. You don't know what other people have been through, even people close to you. Don't judge.

You just said we don't need an exception to murder, but said killing in self defense is an acceptable reason. That's the definition of an exception.

[Boatswain2PA]

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

Admittedly, the analogy is not perfect. I think we are getting way too off track with what's a right and what shouldn't be a right. Let's just say universal healthcare.

Okay, I think we agree that there is no "right" to healthcare other than the right to go attain healthcare.  And by "universal healthcare" you mean expanding a public system to provide healthcare financing to all Americans.  Again, the devil is in the details here, but that's probably for another thread!

 

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

So because it might not be better we shouldn't try? Covering the 30-50 million that are uninsured would already be better, in my opinion.

I'm not for trying things of this scale just to "see if it works", because it may make things much worse and will be hard to reverse.  Look at the impacts Obamacare is having on many millennials who can't afford the rapidly growing premiums/deductibles, don't really need health insurance because they are young/healthy, but were forced to pay a penalty they can't afford.  

I do think we should have an open and honest discussion about how we can make it better, and that might include a public option for everyone.  But we should openly and honestly discuss how/where the rationing will take place in any system.

 

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

So private insurance companies trying to deny care and limit coverage any way they can is not a death panel?

I wouldn't call either of them (a guv'ment run one or a private insurance one) a "death panel", but they certainly are a "rationing panel."

 

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

To me, that's unbelievably cruel to force a woman to carry and deliver a child that was a product of rape. 

It is unbelievably cruel to force a woman to have sex and become pregnant.  But that 5 week fetus has it's own unique DNA, and is as unique a person as is the mother, or you are, or I am.  

 

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

To answer your question, I believe life begins at birth

Why then?  What about the babies who have in-vivo surgeries where they are removed from the womb, have a procedure, and then put back into the womb to be "born" in another month or so?  Are they born and alive, then not alive yet, then born and alive again?

 

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

You or I can't begin to imagine the emotions and turmoil and difficulty of the decision she has to make, and should not have a say in what she can and can't do.

Since this hypothetical woman was recently violated in a terrible way, and assuredly suffering from terrible emotions and turmoil, should we allow her to kill her perpetrator?  Of course not.
 

 We, as a society, should support her (and anyone else who has such traumatic experiences), but we have a duty to protect those who are too weak to protect themselves, including an unborn baby created under such terrible circumstances.

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

The vast majority of abortions occur in the first trimester (over 90%), and about 1% occur after 24 weeks. I would imagine most of those are likely due to fetal abnormality or maternal risk.

I don't think that is the cause of most abortions.  From my personal experience, every woman I know who has had an abortion did it electively because they did not want to have a baby at that time.  I'm not counting ectopics there...

 

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

If someone put a gun to your head and forced you to kill a living infant child or abort a fertilized egg, what would be your choice?

The zygote because if you are forced to do a bad thing, then you should do the "least bad" thing you can.  The zygote is less likely to feel pain, has less maternal attachments, etc.  Same thing if your hypothetical scenario was of an elderly person vs a child, I would choose the elderly person.  

Now please answer this one:  The Democrat Party platform used to be that abortion should be safe, legal, and rare.  Do you believe abortion should be rare?  If so, why?  Why rare?  If abortion is not understood to be an inherent bad/evil, then why should it be rare?  Why not use it as a primary method of contraception?

 

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

I'm confused, so you're saying an all powerful and all knowing and benevolent higher being allowing a miscarriage, or a child to develop cancer is natural and perfectly acceptable? We're here discussing whether an abortion of unborn fetus should be legal or not, but we don't have the same standards for God? And please spare me the "we can't begin to understand his plan" line.

I struggled with this for a long time in my younger adult years.  I grew up with an understanding of the Christian bible, but certainly not in a devout home.  I believed in God...kind of.  Then I was presented with a potentially terrible situation and I briefly prayed that everyone would be okay.  Turns out nobody was okay, tremendous loss of innocent life (hundreds of innocent people, including scores of children).  My team worked for days, with virtually zero sleep, at first trying to find someone alive, then recovering bodies.  

Really turned me off of God.  I was an adult, I had this right & wrong thing figgured out, why in the hell would any living/loving God allow such horrific things to happen.  I just couldn't wrap my head around it, so I turned away from him.  

Fast forward almost 20 painful years and I find myself being drawn, for several reasons, toward attending Catholic services.  I'm at mass when one of the readings was John 9.  In that story, Jesus had just healed a blind man.  The belief system at the time was that bad things, like blindness, happened to people because of some sin they had committed.  But this man had been born blind, and in a brutally hard time where he must have been a terrible burden to his parents to support him into his adulthood.   This was one of those devastating things that make us question why a just and loving God would allow such things to happen (like carrying the child of a rapist, or losing a child, or events that kill hundreds of innocents).  Jesus' disciples asked Jesus what sin this man had committed as a baby to be born blind.

And Jesus answered "so that the Grace of God could be shown."  In other words, this baby was born blind, and assuredly brought tremendous struggles to his parents, so that the Grace of God could be shown to others by healing him, and thus leading hundreds, of millions of people back to God.  

That just struck me, and it made sense to me.  I've seen more than my fair share of death and destruction, and I continue to see it in my job as an EM PA.  I can't tell you how many times I have seen people, and families, as they struggle with devastation, turn to God for consolation or guidance.  People who haven't sought Him in years, or maybe ever, suddenly finding the consolation and guidance of prayer.

Maybe that doesn't make sense to you, or to anyone else, but it really made sense to me.  

Oh, and yeah....as I get older I realize how little I know, so I'm going to pull the "I can't begin to understand His plan."  I'm certainly not saying He lets all bad things happen just so that one person can return to Him, but it's a possibility that I can understand, and live with.

 

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

"Killing a baby" is an insulting and inflammatory phrase. I hope that you are more respectful of others choices in real life, especially in a professional setting. You don't know what other people have been through, even people close to you. Don't judge.

I mean no insult.  Trust me, few people have made the mistakes I have made in my life.  Inflammatory....no, not really in the context I used it.  And no, I wouldn't use that language to a woman (or couple) who had made the terrible choice to terminate their pregnancy.

 

1 hour ago, AbeTheBabe said:

You just said we don't need an exception to murder, but said killing in self defense is an acceptable reason. That's the definition of an exception

Correct.  We don't need an exception to murder, because murder (defined as an unjustified homocide) is wrong.  Killing in self defense is NOT murder, but rather an acceptable reason for homocide (defined as a homosapien killing another homosapien), therefore not an exception.  This is Judeo-Christian ideology that was codified in English law, and carried forward into law in every state in the US.
 

Edited September 16, 2019 by Boatswain2PA

[rev ronin]

4 hours ago, AbeTheBabe said:

Isn't refusing to do the physical exam inaction? I mean, they are just going to go somewhere else, aren't they? Wouldn't the action in this scenario doing the physical, making sure they are healthy, and discussing with them the dangers/risks of the sport? In the grand scheme of things, this is really inconsequential though and you should do whatever makes you comfortable.

I'm sorry if that wasn't clear: the 'harm' is competing in full contact bloodsport, and as I think it disingenuous to accept payment on the premise of a full-contact sports physical and not deliver one, I refuse.  Thus, the 'inaction' bit is intentionally limited to my own sphere of influence as a provider--not like I'm going to go try and stop a bout; some activists try that sort of thing, but I don't see that as a provider role.  So, inaction in that context was a bit confusing, but the point is if I need to do something to keep someone healthy, that's just as much an obligation as not doing something harmful.

[surgblumm]

Many of my colleagues across the nation may not agree with me but I have Medicare and a United Healthcare supplemental that my wife has from her lifetime of teaching but the program that I am most satisfied with is VA Healthcare. I know this differers from state to state and from city to city but I am treated at the Northport VA on LI for almost nintey percent of my care and am so more impressed with every aspect of care from clerks, technicians, waiting times and physicians . I have three chiefs of service and one will spend up to forty minutes with a patient. If you qualify as a veteran give it a shot although I will still have surgery in specialty hospitals such as Cleveland clinic for heart. Nope, I have notneeded surgery---yet.

[Cideous]

2 hours ago, surgblumm said:

Many of my colleagues across the nation may not agree with me but I have Medicare and a United Healthcare supplemental that my wife has from her lifetime of teaching but the program that I am most satisfied with is VA Healthcare. I know this differers from state to state and from city to city but I am treated at the Northport VA on LI for almost nintey percent of my care and am so more impressed with every aspect of care from clerks, technicians, waiting times and physicians . I have three chiefs of service and one will spend up to forty minutes with a patient. If you qualify as a veteran give it a shot although I will still have surgery in specialty hospitals such as Cleveland clinic for heart. Nope, I have notneeded surgery---yet.

That's good to hear.  I wish the VA's income brackets were a little more forgiving to qualify for care but nothing is perfect.

 

[Cideous]

8 hours ago, rev ronin said:

I'm sorry if that wasn't clear: the 'harm' is competing in full contact bloodsport, and as I think it disingenuous to accept payment on the premise of a full-contact sports physical and not deliver one, I refuse.  Thus, the 'inaction' bit is intentionally limited to my own sphere of influence as a provider--not like I'm going to go try and stop a bout; some activists try that sort of thing, but I don't see that as a provider role.  So, inaction in that context was a bit confusing, but the point is if I need to do something to keep someone healthy, that's just as much an obligation as not doing something harmful.

 

I played football for 7 years...hard fought.  I loved the intelligence and strategy of the game and yes, the brutality.  I simply use to love to hit people and I was big enough and strong enough to be good at it.  Fast forward 30 years and I am suffering the consequences of all that contact.  Something I would not wish on anyone.  Having said that, I still do sports physicals but I'd be lying if I didn't say they bother me.  Knowing what I am sending those boys out into has really become a grey area ethically for me.  I dunno.  Maybe someone has better insight on it than me.  In the end, I am required to do them.  It's part of my job and I would lose my job if I took a stand not to do them.  

[rev ronin]

58 minutes ago, Cideous said:

In the end, I am required to do them.  It's part of my job and I would lose my job if I took a stand not to do them.  

I'm sorry to hear your experience.  I'm also sorry to hear that your employer doesn't allow a right of conscience for providers to refuse to do legal but possibly harmful things.  Ultimately, it is about protecting the future selves of the young men (and some women, but most of them seem smarter than that. Prefrontal cortex development blah blah....) who get into things with the lust for action and competition that you had.

[Boatswain2PA]

I too played football, including college (well, I was on the team, didnt play much).

Does football punish bodies? Of course it does.  Between football and 20 years of SAR operations/training I have torn up just about everything.  But football, and other strenuous activities, build better men, something that we desperately need in society.

[rev ronin]

13 hours ago, Boatswain2PA said:

But football, and other strenuous activities, build better men, something that we desperately need in society.

I don't disagree that good, hard, fair, strenuous competition is needed at all levels of childhood sports.  The evidence is in that Football causes cumulative traumatic brain injuries, just like boxing.  MMA, Lacrosse, and Rugby probably do, too, but I doubt anyone's collected statistical evidence showing those to be the case.  I'm all in favor of sports that DON'T cause TBIs on a regular basis.

[Cideous]

7 hours ago, rev ronin said:

I don't disagree that good, hard, fair, strenuous competition is needed at all levels of childhood sports.  The evidence is in that Football causes cumulative traumatic brain injuries, just like boxing.  MMA, Lacrosse, and Rugby probably do, too, but I doubt anyone's collected statistical evidence showing those to be the case.  I'm all in favor of sports that DON'T cause TBIs on a regular basis.

Exactly.

The statistics of High School Football players with CTE up through even college are downright frightening.  Like I said, I struggle with it because I loved the game so much.  However, I have a hard time blindly sending those guys out there to bang when I know what the science says.

[CAAdmission]

On 9/15/2019 at 5:39 PM, Cideous said:

Times they are a changing.  I think 2018 was just the start.  Once that steam roller starts it's going to crush all things red and not stop.  Which in all honestly will probably over correct for the R's, but considering what the Republicans tried to do to health care when they had the Presidency, House AND Senate?  Americans have had enough.  Hold on to your butt as the saying going.

[CAAdmission]

To people who champion "Medicare for All" are you saying this merely because you want to get everyone some basic level of coverage or because you think it will provide for quality of care?

I know a lot of seniors that don't love it as their insurance, and I know a lot of practices that don't love having Medicare patients due to reimbursement rates. 

[AbeTheBabe]

My apologies I couldn't respond sooner, life is busy when you have a full time job and a 2 year old and a pregnant wife

On 9/15/2019 at 8:39 PM, Boatswain2PA said:

Okay, I think we agree that there is no "right" to healthcare other than the right to go attain healthcare.  And by "universal healthcare" you mean expanding a public system to provide healthcare financing to all Americans.  Again, the devil is in the details here, but that's probably for another thread!

I'm not for trying things of this scale just to "see if it works", because it may make things much worse and will be hard to reverse.  Look at the impacts Obamacare is having on many millennials who can't afford the rapidly growing premiums/deductibles, don't really need health insurance because they are young/healthy, but were forced to pay a penalty they can't afford.  

I do think we should have an open and honest discussion about how we can make it better, and that might include a public option for everyone.  But we should openly and honestly discuss how/where the rationing will take place in any system.

I wouldn't call either of them (a guv'ment run one or a private insurance one) a "death panel", but they certainly are a "rationing panel."

That's the problem, millennial's DO need insurance. I should know, I'm a millennial. Before last year I had never been hospitalized, never had surgery, never been to an ER. Then out of the blue I had a high fevers (104, not able to control with max Tylenol dosage) with fatigue and no appetite for over 2 weeks. After a couple of visits to the UC then the ER with negative flu tests and clean blood tests, I was hospitalized for a week and had every test under the sun and IV antibiotics for FUO. It cost tens of thousands of dollars. If I didn't have insurance, I don't know what I would have done. Luckily I have a good job and can afford the 5K OOP max, but what I can't afford is ten times that in medical bills. It's easy to do, too. Millennials can get cancer. Millennials can break a bone and require surgery. 

Of course insurance will have limits, and much smarter people than I can figure out how to do that. But private insurance makes money by denying care and only cares about the bottom line. Capitalism and free markets have many benefits, but it isn't exactly a free market when it comes to healthcare. You don't get to choose what hospital you're taken to when you're having a heart attack, you can't make sure you anesthesiologist is in network when you're having an emergency appendectomy, etc. Please listen or read some of these horror stories with medical bills, it's awful. People are suffering. I don't believe we can't do better than now. I don't believe that we can't succeed with universal healthcare.

On 9/15/2019 at 8:39 PM, Boatswain2PA said:

It is unbelievably cruel to force a woman to have sex and become pregnant.  But that 5 week fetus has it's own unique DNA, and is as unique a person as is the mother, or you are, or I am.  

Why then?  What about the babies who have in-vivo surgeries where they are removed from the womb, have a procedure, and then put back into the womb to be "born" in another month or so?  Are they born and alive, then not alive yet, then born and alive again?

Since this hypothetical woman was recently violated in a terrible way, and assuredly suffering from terrible emotions and turmoil, should we allow her to kill her perpetrator?  Of course not.

We, as a society, should support her (and anyone else who has such traumatic experiences), but we have a duty to protect those who are too weak to protect themselves, including an unborn baby created under such terrible circumstances.

I don't think that is the cause of most abortions.  From my personal experience, every woman I know who has had an abortion did it electively because they did not want to have a baby at that time.  I'm not counting ectopics there...

The zygote because if you are forced to do a bad thing, then you should do the "least bad" thing you can.  The zygote is less likely to feel pain, has less maternal attachments, etc.  Same thing if your hypothetical scenario was of an elderly person vs a child, I would choose the elderly person.  

Now please answer this one:  The Democrat Party platform used to be that abortion should be safe, legal, and rare.  Do you believe abortion should be rare?  If so, why?  Why rare?  If abortion is not understood to be an inherent bad/evil, then why should it be rare?  Why not use it as a primary method of contraception.

Having unique DNA is not a life. A single cell is not a living person. Does it have the potential to become a life? Of course. But when it becomes a living person in the womb is arbitrary, practically we use birth as the measuring stick because that's when baby is separate from the mother. If it's a life then should we start giving out social security numbers to anyone with a positive pregnancy stick?

When I was talking about the reasons for the abortion, I was referring to late term abortions which only make up 1% of abortions. I'm sure most first trimester abortions are due to timing, financial reasons, unexpected, etc.

Abortion should be rare because there are better ways to avoid having a child. Abortions take a toll on the mother emotionally who has to make a difficult decision, it's not without risk, it's expensive, it's uncomfortable, etc. I don't LIKE abortions, and I don't think the majority of people who get abortions do either. I don't want my wife or sister or friend to go through that if they don't need to. I just don't believe that it should be illegal. Because like you discussed about doing the "least bad thing", I think access to a safe abortion is better than a backalley abortion. I think allowing a woman who was raped an abortion is less bad than forcing her to carry through term and then forcing her to either keep the baby or put up for adoption.

On 9/15/2019 at 8:39 PM, Boatswain2PA said:

I struggled with this for a long time in my younger adult years.  I grew up with an understanding of the Christian bible, but certainly not in a devout home.  I believed in God...kind of.  Then I was presented with a potentially terrible situation and I briefly prayed that everyone would be okay.  Turns out nobody was okay, tremendous loss of innocent life (hundreds of innocent people, including scores of children).  My team worked for days, with virtually zero sleep, at first trying to find someone alive, then recovering bodies.  

Really turned me off of God.  I was an adult, I had this right & wrong thing figgured out, why in the hell would any living/loving God allow such horrific things to happen.  I just couldn't wrap my head around it, so I turned away from him.  

Fast forward almost 20 painful years and I find myself being drawn, for several reasons, toward attending Catholic services.  I'm at mass when one of the readings was John 9.  In that story, Jesus had just healed a blind man.  The belief system at the time was that bad things, like blindness, happened to people because of some sin they had committed.  But this man had been born blind, and in a brutally hard time where he must have been a terrible burden to his parents to support him into his adulthood.   This was one of those devastating things that make us question why a just and loving God would allow such things to happen (like carrying the child of a rapist, or losing a child, or events that kill hundreds of innocents).  Jesus' disciples asked Jesus what sin this man had committed as a baby to be born blind.

And Jesus answered "so that the Grace of God could be shown."  In other words, this baby was born blind, and assuredly brought tremendous struggles to his parents, so that the Grace of God could be shown to others by healing him, and thus leading hundreds, of millions of people back to God.  

That just struck me, and it made sense to me.  I've seen more than my fair share of death and destruction, and I continue to see it in my job as an EM PA.  I can't tell you how many times I have seen people, and families, as they struggle with devastation, turn to God for consolation or guidance.  People who haven't sought Him in years, or maybe ever, suddenly finding the consolation and guidance of prayer.

Maybe that doesn't make sense to you, or to anyone else, but it really made sense to me.  

Oh, and yeah....as I get older I realize how little I know, so I'm going to pull the "I can't begin to understand His plan."  I'm certainly not saying He lets all bad things happen just so that one person can return to Him, but it's a possibility that I can understand, and live with.

I'm gonna be honest, I wish you had just used the "We can't understand his plan" line. I thought God was benevolent and just, but you're saying he either is he causes death and despair (or allows it to happen) to convince other people to believe in him and you're okay with that. That just makes him sound like an evil, narcissistic and vindictive dictator. I completely understand the comfort and guidance that religion can provide. I believe in freedom of religion. What I also believe in though, is freedom from religion. Religion shouldn't mix with politics, laws should be based on evidence and logic. The founding fathers believed in separation of church and state for a reason.

On 9/15/2019 at 8:39 PM, Boatswain2PA said:

Correct.  We don't need an exception to murder, because murder (defined as an unjustified homocide) is wrong.  Killing in self defense is NOT murder, but rather an acceptable reason for homocide (defined as a homosapien killing another homosapien), therefore not an exception.  This is Judeo-Christian ideology that was codified in English law, and carried forward into law in every state in the US.

When I said murder, I meant killing another person, not the legal definition. I can see how that confuses things. My point was that killing another person is wrong, but there are exceptions.

Anyway, I have a rough week ahead of me so I don't know if I'll be able to respond. Hopefully some of what I said makes sense. Regarding abortion, I understand that if you believe life begins at conception then you are just trying to protect a life. I get that, I don't think makes you a bad person. What I believe is irrelevant. I just don't think making an abortion illegal solves any problems, it just causes more. As for universal healthcare, we'll see what happens in the next few years. Americans deserve better.

[Cideous]

12 hours ago, AbeTheBabe said:

My apologies I couldn't respond sooner, life is busy when you have a full time job and a 2 year old and a pregnant wife

That's the problem, millennial's DO need insurance. I should know, I'm a millennial. Before last year I had never been hospitalized, never had surgery, never been to an ER. Then out of the blue I had a high fevers (104, not able to control with max Tylenol dosage) with fatigue and no appetite for over 2 weeks. After a couple of visits to the UC then the ER with negative flu tests and clean blood tests, I was hospitalized for a week and had every test under the sun and IV antibiotics for FUO. It cost tens of thousands of dollars. If I didn't have insurance, I don't know what I would have done. Luckily I have a good job and can afford the 5K OOP max, but what I can't afford is ten times that in medical bills. It's easy to do, too. Millennials can get cancer. Millennials can break a bone and require surgery. 

Of course insurance will have limits, and much smarter people than I can figure out how to do that. But private insurance makes money by denying care and only cares about the bottom line. Capitalism and free markets have many benefits, but it isn't exactly a free market when it comes to healthcare. You don't get to choose what hospital you're taken to when you're having a heart attack, you can't make sure you anesthesiologist is in network when you're having an emergency appendectomy, etc. Please listen or read some of these horror stories with medical bills, it's awful. People are suffering. I don't believe we can't do better than now. I don't believe that we can't succeed with universal healthcare.

 

 

You were able to cough up the $5k out of pocket but so many are not.  If you were sick in Dec and then again in Jan it would be $10k.  Life and finances get real interersting when people are all having to cough up that kind of cheddar on demand.  Simply for the crime of becoming ill.

 

The real moral of this whole thread really comes down to you and your fellow Millennials.  It's time for you guys to stand up as a voting block and put a foot in the ass of the "I've got mine screw those kids" Baby Boomers.  Millennials are now the largest voting block in America.  If you guys took a stand and said enough, there would be nothing Boomers could do to challenge you.  As a GenX'er we had to endure Boomers as parents and the terrible decisions they have made for this country from trying to inhibit healthcare for anyone younger than them to leading the charge as climate change deniers.  Why?  Because they won't be here to reap the consequence of their selfishness and they don't give two sh*ts that their kids and grandkids will.  

 

So my advice to you and all millennials is to become active politically and vote.  Vote Vote Vote.  My son turned 18 recently and he can not wait to start voting narcissistic Boomers right out of office.  If Millennials vote in mass, maybe we can finally all have access to decent care without facing bankruptcy every time someone in your family gets sick or injured.  What a concept...

Edited September 18, 2019 by Cideous

[GetMeOuttaThisMess]

Cid, you go to the corner and put your face there until I tell you to come out. You do NOT get dessert tonight. I, your Boomer parent, have to show you tough love. Yes, I’m getting mine so best of luck to the rest. You put me in the nursing home and I’ll pinch every last one of you.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Cideous]

23 minutes ago, GetMeOuttaThisMess said:

Cid, you go to the corner and put your face there until I tell you to come out. You do NOT get dessert tonight. I, your Boomer parent, have to show you tough love. Yes, I’m getting mine so best of luck to the rest. You put me in the nursing home and I’ll pinch every last one of you.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

LOL done.  (Also getting off that lawn..)  

[Boatswain2PA]

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

My apologies I couldn't respond sooner, life is busy when you have a full time job and a 2 year old and a pregnant wife

I understand, have a 2 year old at home as well.
 

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

That's the problem, millennial's DO need insurance.

I should have been more clear.  Millennials rarely need what insurance is mandated to cover today.  Imagine if you and your family was able to purchase a catastrophic coverage policy that cost $150/month, and you were able to put the difference in your premium in your pocket to pay for routine care.  This is what health insurance looked like when I was a child, but insurers are generally not allowed to issue these policies anymore.  Instead they must cover birth control, pre-existing conditions for grandma, ED visits for a fever last week, etc, thus jacking up the premiums and deductibles.  Of course, this system is part of what Cid rails against as it benefits the boomers and all of their co-morbidities, at the expense of the young and healthy millennials.  

 

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

Of course insurance will have limits, and much smarter people than I can figure out how to do that. But private insurance makes money by denying care and only cares about the bottom line.

No, they can't.  You really think Jonathan Gruber is smarter than you?
Private insurance makes money by denying care, but if they deny contractually obligated care they will get sued.  And if they don't cover enough stuff, then they lose customers.  
Government run plans have separate but equal issues.  What remedies do you have if the government denies you coverage?  Only thing you've got is to vote for someone who will give you better coverage.  This leads to politicians promising more and more to get elected, and breaking the bank.  (which is already broken, but that is another topic).

 

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

People are suffering. I don't believe we can't do better than now. I don't believe that we can't succeed with universal healthcare.

I too think we can, but we won't because we still aren't having the open discussion about rationing.  The best health care plan I have ever read about was the Oregon Health Plan in the 1990s where they transparently rationed care.  Of course this didn't last because the legislature started requiring additional things to be covered.  All of the politicians running for office now are just promising socialized medicine, not realistic methods of ration care.   

More later...

[Boatswain2PA]

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

Having unique DNA is not a life.

A single cell, with it's own unique DNA, is called life.  It's what we would consider life if we found it on Mars, it is life here.

 

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

But when it becomes a living person in the womb is arbitrary, practically we use birth as the measuring stick because that's when baby is separate from the mother. 

It's arbitrary to you, not to many others.  That measuring stick isn't so practical for the baby.

 

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

Abortion should be rare because there are better ways to avoid having a child. Abortions take a toll on the mother emotionally who has to make a difficult decision

Why is another way of avoiding having a child "better" than abortion?  Why does an abortion take an emotional toll on the mother? (not to mention father).  Why are you using the term "mother"??

Because most of us know it's a baby.  And since it's a baby, just about anything is better than ending the life of that baby, and there is an emotional toll to ending the life of any human, and because she's a MOTHER.

 

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

I'm gonna be honest, I wish you had just used the "We can't understand his plan" line. I thought God was benevolent and just, but you're saying he either is he causes death and despair (or allows it to happen) to convince other people to believe in him and you're okay with that. That just makes him sound like an evil, narcissistic and vindictive dictator.

I am not competent to understand God, or He does what He does, or allows what He allows.  Just like your 2 year old is not competent to understand why you yell at him as he runs toward the road.

Are you an evil, narcissistic and vindictive dictator when you allow bad things to happen to your child so they can learn something?  When you don't help them accomplish a task so that they can master it on their own?  When he is a teenager and you don't get him out of the trouble he got himself into?  

Of course not.  You want to raise a good human being, and that is a painful process (for both of you).  I think God wants us all to make choices to get to heaven and be with him.  By giving us that freedom, he allows painful things to happen to us, because you can't have freedom without some pain/sacrifice.

Again, this obviously doesn't have to connect with you, although I hope it does some day.  So let's table this....

 

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

What I also believe in though, is freedom from religion. Religion shouldn't mix with politics, laws should be based on evidence and logic. The founding fathers believed in separation of church and state for a reason.

I would fight alongside you if someone was going to force you to believe in their religion.  

But religion is a belief system, and politics is the implementation of belief systems so they will forever be mixed.  And laws are based on these belief systems.

The founding fathers never intended to inhibit religious beliefs or actions in the US, and the mention of religion in the 1st amendment was simply a protection against the congress establishing a national religion (as was common during the centuries before in Europe which led to enormous bloodshed).  Our founding document itself (the Declaration) clearly speaks about the laws of nature and nature's God, and of rights endowed by our Creator.  

 

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

My point was that killing another person is wrong, but there are exceptions.

Minor correction - killing another person is not ALWAYS wrong, because of the exception of defense of self or others.  Otherwise, it's wrong.

 

On 9/17/2019 at 10:59 PM, AbeTheBabe said:

Anyway, I have a rough week ahead of me so I don't know if I'll be able to respond. Hopefully some of what I said makes sense. Regarding abortion, I understand that if you believe life begins at conception then you are just trying to protect a life. I get that, I don't think makes you a bad person. What I believe is irrelevant. I just don't think making an abortion illegal solves any problems, it just causes more. As for universal healthcare, we'll see what happens in the next few years. Americans deserve better.

I hope your week goes as best as it can.  Neither of us are bad people (despite what Cideous thinks of us evil conservatives!).  

Like anything else in life, making abortion illegal solves some problems for some people, and creates other problems for other people.  

Yes, America deserves better, but we won't get it from anything any politician is currently talking about.

[Boatswain2PA]

On 9/18/2019 at 7:37 AM, Cideous said:

The real moral of this whole thread really comes down to you and your fellow Millennials.  It's time for you guys to stand up as a voting block and put a foot in the ass of the "I've got mine screw those kids" Baby Boomers.  Millennials are now the largest voting block in America.

And yet the millennials overwhelmingly voted for a guy who implemented a new healthcare plan that forced them to pay for the Boomer's healthcare.

Whoops......

On 9/18/2019 at 7:37 AM, Cideous said:

If Millennials vote in mass, maybe we can finally all have access to decent care without facing bankruptcy every time someone in your family gets sick or injured.

Yeah, all millennials go vote for universal healthcare so the rapidly aging boomers can get even MORE free stuff that you will have to pay for.  And if you can't afford to pay for it, the government will just fine you for not being able to afford it.

 

 

 

[Cideous]

Care is rationed now.  Those who can pay and those who can not.  Go to any non-Medicaid expansion state and poor adults are screwed.  There are literally dozens of documentaries on the working poor adults with zero healthcare.  Horrible.

That's where we are.

[Boatswain2PA]

26 minutes ago, Cideous said:

Care is rationed now.  Those who can pay and those who can not.  Go to any non-Medicaid expansion state and poor adults are screwed.  There are literally dozens of documentaries on the working poor adults with zero healthcare.  Horrible.

That's where we are.

Agreed.  Like I said, healthcare will ALWAYS be rationed.  The best way to tackle the problem is to transparently discuss how we should ration it.

And those with money will always get what they want, whether it is healthcare, nice cars, boats, etc.   Why did the Canadian Premier come to Boston for his heart surgery?  Because he could afford it.

[GetMeOuttaThisMess]

Cid, don’t make me put you back in the corner again today.

If I’m elected president, I promise all Americans access to a catastrophic health plan for costs above a set percentage of your AGI to prevent medical bankruptcy. Other than that, eat your veggies, exercise, and stay away from the evil Ron McDonald. I am your conservative->moderate voice of reason.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Boatswain2PA]

On 9/14/2019 at 11:01 AM, AbeTheBabe said:

 

On 9/13/2019 at 7:47 AM, Boatswain2PA said:

This sounds great, but falls apart on the details.  Does that mean a devout Catholic or Muslim gynecologist should be forced to perform abortions simply because someone might get their feelings hurt and declare discrimination?  Would the urologist be required to perform sex changes?

What are you talking about? Who is turning providers into servants? You love talking about personal responsibility, maybe if your religion prevents you from performing your job, you should choose a different career. No one is forcing an obgyn to do an elective abortion, but if you can't do an abortion to save your patients life, then you should not be an obgyn. And as far as I know, sex changes are only performed by very few urologists due to the complexity.

Well, here it is.  California forcing Catholic hospitals to do sex change operations.  

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/09/a-california-court-deals-a-blow-to-religious-liberty-its-time-for-scotus-to-act/