Thursday, April 01, 2010

Irony Alert


OK, first some givens: the following article is from One News Now, the media organ of the American Family Association. One News Now is absolutely immaculately "conservative," and that includes following the GOP platform in every way, and automatically hating anything having to do with Democrats in general, and Obama and Pelosi in particular. Naturally, they've been consistently against Health Care Reform, because that's the Official Conservative Stand, even if the subject doesn't appear to involve matters of faith at all.

Or does it? Imagine my jaw just dropping this morning as I read this article on their site, presented in its entirety. Read the whole thing:

For the time being, a West Virginia hospital won't be permitted to stop life-saving treatment of a woman in its care.

Forty-year-old Rebecca Bennett is on dialysis and in a coma due to complications from diabetes, and Ruby Memorial Hospital previously informed family members that treatment would end March 27 against their wishes. Jeremiah Dys, general counsel for the Family Policy Council of West Virginia and an affiliated attorney with Alliance Defense Fund (ADF), took the case to court.

"What we've done is to allow the family of Becky Bennett to have more time to exhaust all possible remedies for her care," Dys explains. "The focus here, of course, is that the decision as to what type of medical treatment Becky should receive ought to be made by the family and not by the hospital."

The hospital has agreed to continue treatment until April 9, giving the family time to find another facility to care for Bennett. But despite this situation, the ADF attorney reports that the West Virginia law does not need to be clarified.

"The state law is abundantly clear on this," he assures. "The decision for medical intervention does not belong to the hospital; it belongs to the legal surrogate for the patient, and in this case, that is the daughter of Becky Bennett, Sierra Kisner."

The clock is ticking for the family to find another hospital to take over. The problem is that the family has no money and no insurance.

Read it again and think of all the conservative condemnations of Health Care Reform you've heard over the last year, including the mocking of Democrats using "sob stories" to push for it, government coming between patients and their doctors, etc., etc., and let the multiple cascades of irony and hypocrisy dazzle you.

7 comments:

Fran said...

It disgusts me. The hypocrisy is beyond anything imaginable.

I get these emails at work because I have a general mailbox and my predecessor got them. As you know, they run the gamut from complete hilarity to disgrace.

Matthew Hubbard said...

No money and no insurance? Living in the good old U.S. of A.? I'd say the decision has been made, wouldn't you?

hooverific said...

Uh yeah. wish it were just health care reform and just Republicans. Same techique used by the climate change foes. where's the beef in any political debate these days? Any discussion of numbskulls must include the general public as it often does on these pages (raising my right hand)...

Anonymous said...

Umm...sorry, but there is no irony here whatsoever. The conservatives in this case are fighting to keep a person alive in defiance of the decision of a hospital's Death Panel and will certainly be doing more of this when Zeke's formula is implemented to "cut costs."

What exactly is it that you are pointing to as a demonstration of hypocrisy? I think what this story does is explode the Lefty talking point against pro-lifers, you know, the one about them only caring about people before they're born, but not after.

Anonymous said...

Sheesh, "Anonymous". Do I really have to explain this to you? The Alliance Defense Fund and the Family Policy Council are right wing organizations OPPOSED to HCR. They are vehemently opposed to a health care system that provides for sick people when the family has "no money and no insurance." These right wing organizations are not in the business of "caring about people before they're born." Not before, or during or after. They are in business to push an agenda of hatred, racism, fear, corporatism, and discrimination. That isn't a "talking point."

The poor woman in this report requires extraordinary and expensive life support. Universal, single-payer coverage would have helped her and her family. Perhaps her diabetes would have been better controlled and she would not have ended up with multi-system organ failure, irreversible brain damage and dependant on machinery. She is not the victim of a "hospital's Death Panel." The hospital has no further treatment options to offer her and has referred her for long-term care. It is now up to her family to find a nursing home so she can be transferred. She is just another of the millions of uninsured Americans who die (in her case, a long, lingering death hooked up to machines) because they can't afford health care.

Anonymous said...

Well...perhaps they can take up a collection for her care at the next Tea Party rally. That would be that independent thing to do...right? I challenge you conservatives to take up the cause and dig deep into your own pockets to help her since you oppose the government doing it. Just sayin'......

Peteykins said...

Anonymous #1, perhaps the greatest irony is that here are religious conservatives calling for government to come between them and their doctors.