Lots of Catching Up to Do

Holy shit! It's been a loooong time since I posted anything. With this being the case, I'm just going to go over some of the things I've been meaning to write about recently. But don't worry, I promise that next time I write, I'll have time to go more into depth.

What Part of Doctor-Patient Confidentiality Do You Not Understand?

A couple of months ago, a law was passed in Oklahoma requiring that in order to undergo an abortion procedure, a woman would have to fill out a questionnaire providing information about herself and the circumstances related to the procedure. The questions can be viewed here, specifically on p. 8-17. The 37 questions in and of themselves aren't that unusual. In fact, a bunch of them are yes/no questions, and many of them basically ask something along the lines of: "Was this procedure performed in compliance of Section X of state law, which mandates that the doctor do A, B, and C." A few of the questions, though, are a bit more unusual, but they're definitely interesting from a statistical perspective (i.e. There's a question about reasons for getting an abortion.), and quite frankly, they seem less appropriate to be compulsory under the law. So, based purely on the information I've presented thus far, this questionnaire seems like a small nuisance on the path to getting an abortion, but surely I wouldn't waste my time blogging about 15 minutes worth of paperwork involved in getting an abortion unless something stranger was going on.

So, what's the catch? Why am I so baffled that this law was passed? As it turns out, the answers to each person's questionnaire, minus things like name and address, are supposed to be submitted to the state so they can be be posted online. While I could definitely understand posting aggregate statistics, such as listing the percent of people who answer yes and no to each question, posting indivdual pieces of raw data is disturbing. When you think about, there's really no reason to do this except to discourage women from exercising their ability to have a legal abortion. After all, if the interest was learning about demographics and such surrounding this procedure, the total, calculated data would be posted, not individuals' raw data. The raw data just provides people with a way of connecting the results to indivduals. After all, with so few places to get an abortion, and some basic knowledge of someone's circumstances, such as the date of the procedure, an acquaintance or family member could go online and get info about that woman's abortion. The fear of being found out could shame women into keeping unwanted pregnancies and facilitate acts of violence against women who chose to get abortions.

But the thing that bothers me more is that this is a clear violation of the role of doctors. Now, I may not be a doctor, but I do know a bit about the field. For instance, right now I'm training to be an EMT, a basic and relatively easily obtained level of medical rank. In my training I learned the basics of the role of a medical professional very early on, and one of these basic things I learned about was patient confidentiality and HIPAA. (When I refer to the basics, I mean stuff taught by day 2 of the course. In theory, anything that someone could learn by undergoing less than a week of EMT training should be common knowledge to most other medical professionals.) The basic idea of confidentiality in a medical setting, when viewed in a broad sense, is pretty straightforward. Basically, it's inappropriate to to tell anyone about a particular patient's medical history unless the person being told is another medical professional who could potentially use that information to provide further care to that patient, the doctor is required to report the incident to police because the cause of the injury is a particularly heinous crime like child abuse, or if a court grants someone special access to one's medical records, an event that often occurs in medical malpratice lawsuits. (The exceptions are a bit more complicated, but the spirit of the law remains.) This custom exists to ensure a special trust between the doctor and the patient, thereby increasing the odds that the patient is honest and unintimidated, providing the physician with the best information available, and improving treatment. It's very clear that posting one's name and address with the questionnaire would be blatantly illegal, but what about the rest of the information? As I said earlier, particularly when one considers the rarity of abortions, the raw data could be enough to identity a patient (potentially leading to violence against her), and information in such a format serves no interest other than the restriction of abortion rights. Therefore, this law unnecessarily forces women to risk face an additional threat while obtaining an abortion, and it puts doctors in an inappropriate role as purveyors of their patients' personal information.

Newsflash: Obama Isn't a Muslim, Kenyan, Socialist Secretly Trying to Destroy America

On the air, Rush Limbaugh talked about President Obama and, believe it or not, he wasn't to pleased with the man's views. Specifically, he had a problem with Obama'a college thesis, entitled "Aristocracy Reborn." This paper contained many criticisms of contemporary views of the constitution, suggesting that "The so-called Founders did not allow for economic freedom." However, there was one tiny errorone tiny error with Limbaugh's analysis: The paper was a satirical essay on how people view Obama, and not the president's actual work. Oops.

So, how did Limbaugh respond to the news that he was basing an analysis of the president on false evidence? He simply refused to admit guilt. Instead of just saying, "I screwed up and I'll fact-check these sorts of things more closely in the future," he insisted that although this particular paper turned out to be the work of someone else, Limbaugh is sure that the president thinks these sorts of things in actuality. Way to go, Rush. You've just proven that there's no actual distinction between the words that come out of your mouth and a news story that's known not to be accurate. Thanks for clarifying the lack of differences for those who didn't already notice.

The Moment of Zen

Here's a video of Rep. Akin (R-MO) emphasizing the importance of the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance... and then forgetting the words to the pledge:



Newsflash: Obama Still Isn't a Muslim, Kenyan, Socialist Secretly Trying to Destroy America

Arlington, Tennessee Mayor Russell Wiseman commented on Facebook that he was upset that Obama was giving a speech that conflicted with the Charlie Brown Christmas special on television. Among the claims Wiseman made was that Obama was a Muslim, that America had become a Muslim nation, and that "...our forefathers had it written in the original Constitution that ONLY property owners could vote, if that had stayed in there, things would be different..." Disregarding for a second that I doubt Obama was familiar with the local television scheduling situation in Tennessee and that the topic of the speech was of interest to Americans of all religions, Wiseman put the blame for this controversy solely on those that made "a mountain out of a molehill" and publicized the mayor's comments, rather than on the guy who actually made a mountain out of the president interrupting a television show. Wouldn't it be such a nice Christmas gift to see a politician take responsiblity for his own words... or at least buy himself a DVD of the Christmas special so that he could watch it after the president is done speaking?

Palin's Book (Insert Your Own Punchline)

Seriously, to anybody reading this, feel free to insert your own punchline in the comments. Here are a couple of videos pertaining to Palin and her new book. In the first, Andrew Sullivan, a conservative writer, says what he really thinks about Palin, and in the second clip, Palin supporters are confronted by an actual quote from the former governor. Look at the change in the Palin-supporters' faces between 2:00 and 2:30. It's priceless.





I love how people who oppose government action by the Democrats somehow see themselves as constitutional scholars who have incredible insights regarding the founders' intentions not possessed by those in congress. I also love how these ideals of limited government don't apply to Republican-supported actions. It's just so funny when people think like that.

Quotemining Gold

"Climategate" occured recently. The controversy revolves around e-mails from climate researchers in which they essentially admit that much of the evidence in support of the idea of global climate change is fraudulent, or at least that's what critics of global warming claim. There's just one problem: That's not what the e-mails actually say, and one would think that some pretty damning stuff would appear in over a decade of private correspondence. For a good video showing the claims made in the media building up "climategate" along with an explanation of why the e-mails don't unveil an elaborate conspiracy to promote global warming, I'd recommend watching this video.

Keeping Teh Gay Out of New York

As a New Yorker, I was dissapointed that my state was unable to pass legislation legalizing gay marriage. However, I have to admit that even though New York is such a blue state, I was not surprised that the bill to legalize gay marriage received insufficient support. The reason I wasn't surprised is that a few months ago, I had spoken to someone (who shall remain anonymous) who was involved in state politics and was previously asked by the Democratic Party to run for a seat in the state legislature. Although he never actually ended up running, this is relevant because it means that he was able to get to know some members of the state legislature, and he is actually able to talk to representatives directly. As a result, he was able to talk directly to some of the state senators for whom it was questionable which way they would vote. According to this source, these senators normally would've supported marriage equality, but because they live in districts with such large conservative populations, they rely heavily on getting votes from Republicans. As a result, there was a fear amongst these Democrats that a vote in favor of legalizing gay marriage would drive away Republican support and cost them their positions. I confess that this isn't shocking news. After all, it's not unusual to see a politician act in a way that will garner the most votes. That being said, it feels so weird seeing this phenomenon hit so close to home. It's one thing to see some congressman or senator from another part of the country blatantly play to his/her constituents, but it's a whole lot harder to be optimistic about legislation when even on the state level it's hard to find a politician with enough of a backbone to not only think for themself, but to also act in accordance with their own views.