posted on September 18, 2002 06:18:28 PM new
Sorry so long, I didn't want to leave anything out. aposter
========================
By Rick Weiss
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, September 17, 2002; Page A01
HHS Seeks Science Advice to Match Bush Views
The Bush administration has begun a broad restructuring of the scientific advisory committees that guide federal policy in areas such as patients' rights and public health, eliminating some committees that were coming to conclusions at odds with the president's views and in other cases replacing members with handpicked choices.
In the past few weeks, the Department of Health and Human Services has retired two expert committees before their work was complete. One had recommended that the Food and Drug Administration expand its regulation of the increasingly lucrative genetic testing industry, which has so far been free of such oversight. The other committee, which was rethinking federal protections for human research subjects, had drawn the ire of administration supporters on the religious right, according to government sources.
A third committee, which had been assessing the effects of environmental chemicals on human health, has been told that nearly all of its members will be replaced -- in several instances by people with links to the industries that make those chemicals. One new member is a California scientist who helped defend Pacific Gas and Electric Co. against the real-life Erin Brockovich.
The changes are among the first in a gradual restructuring of the system that funnels expert advice to Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson.
That system includes more than 250 committees, each composed of people with scientific, legal or academic expertise who volunteer their services over multiyear terms.
The committees typically toil in near anonymity, but they are important because their interpretation of scientific data can sway an agency's approach to health risk and regulation.
The overhaul is rattling some HHS employees, some of whom said they have not seen such a political makeover of the department since Ronald Reagan took office in 1981.
HHS spokesman William Pierce said he could not provide a tally of the number of committees that had been eliminated or changed so far, but he denied that the degree of change was out of the ordinary for the first years after a change of administration.
He acknowledged that Thompson has irritated some HHS veterans with his "top down" approach to reshaping the department, but he defended Thompson's prerogative to hear preferentially from experts who share the president's philosophical sensibilities.
"No one should be surprised when an administration makes changes like this," Pierce said. "I don't think there is anything going on here that has not gone on with each and every administration since George Washington."
Routine or not, the restructuring offers a view into how tomorrow's science policies are being constructed -- and how the previous administration's influence is being quietly dismantled.
One example of the recent changes is the Secretary's Advisory Committee on Genetic Testing, created during the Clinton administration after a major federal report concluded that the public was at risk of being harmed by the emerging gene-testing industry.
One of the first topics tackled by the committee was how to deal with the proliferation of so-called home-brew genetic tests, which are offered by a growing number of companies and doctors.
The blood tests can detect DNA variations that may increase a person's odds of getting a disease or affect a patient's response to medicines.
The Food and Drug Administration has long asserted that it has the authority to regulate these tests, but it has opted not to do so -- in part because of a lack of resources. As a result, companies are free to market tests for genes even if those genes have no proven role in disease susceptibility or any proven usefulness at all. A growing number of companies are doing just that -- at no small expense to consumers -- in some cases needlessly alarming people with meaningless results and in other cases offering false reassurance.
The committee convinced the FDA to use its authority to oversee the marketing of these tests, and the agency was developing rules when the Bush administration took over. Suddenly the FDA's stance changed: The agency was no longer certain it had the regulatory authority in question. Oversight plans stalled. Today the FDA is still mulling whether it has authority, Pierce said, and last week members learned that the committee's charter, which just expired, will not be renewed.
"This is a real turnaround. It's bad. It's terrible," said Neil A. "Tony" Holtzman, a Johns Hopkins University professor emeritus who chaired the HHS task force that led to the committee's creation.
Wylie Burke, who chairs the department of medical history and ethics at the University of Washington and was a member of the committee, said gene-test oversight is needed now more than ever because companies are starting to advertise tests directly to consumers and are offering questionable services over the Internet.
"People need to know what they're getting," Burke said. "We were making real headway with informed-consent issues and with categorizing levels of risk. It would be a shame if that does not get completed."
Pierce said the committee's demise had nothing to do with its recommendations or regulatory approach. Rather, he said, HHS intends to create a new committee that will deal with a broader range of genetic technologies. The department has not said who will sit on that committee.
Another example is the National Human Research Protections Advisory Committee, created under President Bill Clinton after a series of government reports found serious deficiencies in the federal system for protecting human subjects in research. The call from HHS to disband "came out of the blue," said committee chair Mary Faith Marshall, a professor of medicine and bioethics at the University of Kansas in Kansas City.
Some sources suggested the committee had angered the pharmaceutical industry or other research enterprises because of its recommendations to tighten up conflict-of-interest rules and impose new restrictions on research involving the mentally ill.
"It's very frustrating," said Paul Gelsinger, who became a member of the committee after his son, Jesse, died in a Pennsylvania gene therapy experiment that was later found to have broken basic safety rules. "It's always been my view that money is running the research show," he said. "So with this administration's ties to industry, I'm not surprised" to see the committee killed.
Other sources said the committee had run afoul of religious conservatives when it failed to support an administration push to include fetuses under a federal regulation pertaining to human research on newborns. Some within HHS said they'd heard the department may reconstitute the committee with a purview that includes research on human fetuses or even embryos -- a change seen by some as part of a larger administration effort to bring rights to the unborn.
Consistent with that possibility, HHS officials recently told committee members they hope to name Mildred Jefferson to a reincarnated version of the committee that the department hopes to create. Jefferson is a medical doctor who helped found the National Right to Life Committee and who three times served as that organization's president.
Pierce said HHS had allowed the committee to expire not because of the direction of its work but because, as with the genetic-testing committee, the department wants to create a new panel with a broader, as yet undetermined, charge. That committee has yet to be created or its members named.
Yet another committee caught up in the recent upheaval is one that advises the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Environmental Health on a range of public health issues from pollution to bioterrorism.
Thomas Burke, the Johns Hopkins public health professor who has chaired the committee for almost five years, recently learned that 15 of its 18 members are to be replaced. In the past, he said, HHS had asked him to recommend new members when there were openings. This time, he said, a list of names was imposed. He was among those who were let go.
Burke said he was not offended that his own membership, which was expiring, was not renewed. "There's constant turnover on these boards," he said. "What's of concern though is to see so much turnover at one time, especially at such a critical time for the CDC."
[b]He mentioned another concern: One of the committee's major endeavors has been to assess the health effects of low-level exposures to environmental chemicals, yet as first reported by Science magazine last week, several of the new appointees are well known for their connections to the chemical industry.
They include Roger McClellan, former president of the Chemical Industry Institute of Toxicology, a North Carolina research firm supported by chemical company dues; Becky Norton Dunlop, a vice president of the Heritage Foundation who, as Virginia's secretary of natural resources, fought against environmental regulation; and Lois Swirsky Gold, a University of California risk-assessment specialist who has made a career countering environmentalists' claims of links between pollutants and cancer.
The committee also includes Dennis Paustenbach, the California toxicologist who served as an expert witness for Pacific Gas and Electric when the utility was sued for allowing poisonous chromium to leach into groundwater. The case was made famous in the movie "Erin Brockovich."[/b]
"It's in the nation's interest to avoid any appearance of a conflict of interest on these committees," said Burke, the former chairman. "To see friends of the administration . . . clearly that's what we're seeing here. It's wholesale change. The complexion has changed."
HHS's Pierce said the committee remains balanced overall, and no prospective member of any advisory committee is subjected to political screenings.
"It's always a matter of qualifications first and foremost," Pierce said. "There's no quotas on any of this stuff. There's no litmus test of any kind."
At least one nationally renowned academic, who was recently called by an administration official to talk about serving on an HHS advisory committee, disagreed with that assessment. To the candidate's surprise, the official asked for the professor's views on embryo cell research, cloning and physician-assisted suicide. After that, the candidate said, the interviewer told the candidate that the position would have to go to someone else because the candidate's views did not match those of the administration.
Asked to reconcile that experience with his previous assurance, Pierce said of the interview questions: "Those are not litmus tests."
posted on September 18, 2002 07:56:40 PM new
remaking the world, in the image of the religious right...more and more, these men frighten me much more than any foreign terrorists....
"The ceremony of innocence is drowned, and everywhere the blood-dimmed tide is loosed."
posted on September 19, 2002 05:22:38 AM new
Yesterday NPR stated McConnell does not believe in abortion in case of rape and incest.
How are you going to feel when your daughter, wife or niece is raped and must carry the child to term? You might be fine with that, but others aren't. You may be one of the men here who has made it clear women are still second class citizens, maybe even less than that.
This will be another poor men's/women's law when Bush & group gets enough men on the benches to overturn it. You won't find their wives carrying a child to term after a rape. You won't find a doctor's daughter carrying a child to term after said doctor (or grandfather) raped her.
There will be a trip to whatever country is available for a safe, non-coat hanger delivery. Or maybe an off shore abortion ship. aposter
National Review OnLine
Byron York
NR White House Correspondent
September 18, 2002
Saving McConnell
After savaging a White House nominee, Democrats appear ready to go easy on the next one.
<snip>
From those words, one might have thought McConnell was facing a Clarence Thomas-style assault from the left. But in fact McConnell has not come under anything like that, and has not even been subjected to the kind of attack that groups like People for the American Way, NARAL, and the Alliance for Justice leveled against defeated Bush nominees Charles Pickering and Priscilla Owen. So far, at least, the groups' relatively half-hearted campaign against McConnell has failed to achieve the traction that the earlier campaigns enjoyed.
<snip>
In the McConnell case, one of those groups, the law professors, who in the past have been staunch opponents of many Bush nominees, strongly supports McConnell.
In fact, three high-profile liberal professors — the [b]University of Chicago's Cass Sunstein, Harvard's Elena Kagan, and the University of Texas's Douglas Laycock — joined Dinh in speaking to reporters (Sunstein and Kagan by conference call). All vouched for McConnell. "He is excellent and not an ideologue," said Sunstein. "He is not an ideologue; he will adhere to the law," said Kagan. "He's not an extremist or an ideologue," said Laycock. Justice officials also handed out a letter supporting McConnell signed by 300 law professors.
What was perhaps most impressive about the news conference was that none of the professors worried much about McConnell's opposition to the Roe v. Wade decision, which has so often been a key factor in judicial nomination battles. McConnell authored a 1998 op-ed in the Wall Street Journal entitled, "Roe v. Wade at 25: Still Illegitimate." In 1994, he wrote in a Michigan Law Review article that "abortion is an evil, all too frequently and casually employed for the destruction of life." He has also endorsed a pro-life constitutional amendment. Any one of those things might be enough to kill a nomination.
When asked why he supports a man so opposed to Roe, Sunstein explained that McConnell's views on abortion are just one part of "a complex record." McConnell's views on a variety of legal issues, Sunstein said, were widely varied — and sometimes surprising. "The people who say he is staunchly pro-life are right," Sunstein said, adding that one might well oppose McConnell, "if abortion is the only thing you care about." But McConnell, Sunstein said again, is no ideologue. "If you're an ideologue, it means you predictably follow a party line," Sunstein explained, and a true conservative ideologue "thinks the Constitution overlaps a lot with the Republican party platform of 1980." McConnell, on the other hand, "is too unpredictable — he doesn't follow party lines."
If Senate Democrats adopt a similar line of reasoning, it would be a startling development after the Owen battle. Owen was rejected because of her opinions in a few cases involving the Texas state law that requires underage girls to tell a parent before having an abortion. Such parental-notification cases are on the fringes of the abortion debate — and notification laws receive heavy support in opinion polls — yet Owen's opinions were enough for every Democrat on the Judiciary Committee to vote against her.
Given that, there would seem to be no logical, principled way a Democrat who voted against Owen could vote in favor of McConnell, who has virtually declared war on Roe v. Wade. But McConnell appears to be heading toward confirmation (see "Will It Be Three?," NRO, Sept. 13), with Democrats working hard to come up with a rationale for voting for him after opposing Owen. Today's New York Times reports that Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, during a meeting with staffers in the Times's Washington bureau, "said last week that the Democrats' recent rejection of two of Mr. Bush's appeals-court nominees, Priscilla Owen of Texas and Charles W. Pickering of Mississippi, was not because of their conservative ideology. Rather, Mr. Daschle said, there was evidence that both were inclined to insert their personal views into their opinions." Daschle implied that McConnell would not be accused of the same thing.
Look for committee Democrats to cite that as their reason for supporting McConnell. But it's almost certainly not the real reason. A much more likely explanation is that Democrats will allow McConnell to survive because of the support he has received from the powerful legal academic establishment. Some significant part of that support seems personal — many of the professors know and like McConnell — and it appears that those personal connections trump any objections to his opinions on abortion.
Priscilla Owen, it seems, just didn't know the right people.
[Edited to put snipped sections back, cause it didn't make sense and for spelling.]
[ edited by aposter on Sep 19, 2002 05:35 AM ]
posted on September 19, 2002 06:20:50 AM new
Very scary.
As for federal protection of human research subjects, now the companies are advertising for more participants in human research. They want to widen testing.
After that, the candidate said, the interviewer told the candidate that the position would have to go to someone else because the candidate's views did not match those of the administration.
So much for hiring the best candidate for the job.
As for the politicizing of medicine, medicine is a science. I see results twisted to conform to the personal biases as contrary to the whole spirit of science, which is rational enquiry.
Next step, the HMOs will control health care, along with these political appointees. I remember the Reagan years well. Many free/lowcost clinics closed because of the sudden cutting of Federal funds. Our census went up dramatically in the NICU when 2 of those clinics closed, because of such closures. We had babies on waiting lists to be transported into the unit because we were continuously full, even when the unit was expanded to cope with the increased census. It led to situations that could cause patient harm, such as babies transported that by report could go in a more stable area, but actually required Level I care, and we couldn't hook up any more vents.
FEH You have the right to an informed opinion -Harlan Ellison
posted on September 19, 2002 10:32:10 AM new
As I keep saying: the threat of Terrorism is not from abroad, but from within our very own government. The Republicans have made every effort to corrupt our government from top to bottom. While it is normal to have some change-over in management, but to replace unbiased science with biased science is wrong, no matter what extremeist party gets into office.
posted on September 19, 2002 12:26:52 PM new
Everything is tied to industry now and lives are considered worthless. The Bush administration is placing the entire world in jeopardy.
Senators Question Conservative Professor on Writings
By Edward Walsh
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, September 19, 2002; Page A07
<Snip>
He defended an article that committee Democrats charged had praised a federal judge who refused to enforce an injunction against two men who admitted blocking the driveway of a family planning clinic.
<snip>
He also defended an article that criticized a Supreme Court decision that stripped Bob Jones University of its charitable tax exemption because at the time it banned interracial dating by students. He said that institutions that accepted federal funds could not practice discrimination but that the Bob Jones case was "difficult" because it involved a tax exemption.
<snip>
Asked about his assertion that the Supreme Court was wrong when it upheld the conviction of a Mormon for polygamy, McConnell said it "seems to me a problem" to convict someone for having multiple partners that were "blessed in church" when it is not illegal to have "serial [sexual] relationships."
<snip>
Edit: UBB
[ edited by aposter on Sep 19, 2002 03:33 PM ]
posted on September 19, 2002 03:53:35 PM new
Well, carp! The Post wants personal info. They can kiss my 100 year old nevadan male tush. I don't want their tailored ads, I want to read the dang articles!
Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
From your quotes,aposter, it sounds as though he would uphold his personal faith based beliefs over state and federal law (the Civil Rights Act, state laws against bigamy, local trespassing laws).
And this quote says it all about the approach by this administration to health and human services:
he defended Thompson's prerogative to hear preferentially from experts who share the president's philosophical sensibilities.
So no input from medical experts unless the political and religious sentiments are in conformity with the religious right views.
It's going to be a bumpy ride. Stay healthy.
You have the right to an informed opinion -Harlan Ellison
posted on September 19, 2002 04:14:20 PM new
Yes, it seems the Post could at least ask once and stop. I feel age 16 coming on or maybe 93.
One thing I am really worried about. Our food supply is so unnatural now, and so engineered that Bush & crew may decide it is
unsafe to allow any reports concerning what is in it leaked to the public. A couple years ago we were told we didn't have rights to know, as long as it is considered safe
by the company scientists thinking it up.
If they are already taking scientific information off library computers (NPR), they could already be blacking out some food & drug information.
There are many of us who need to know what they have decided to gene-splice into our food each day. We may lose our right to choose safe food too.
[ edited by aposter on Sep 19, 2002 04:24 PM ]
[ edited by aposter on Sep 19, 2002 04:27 PM ]
posted on September 19, 2002 05:02:44 PM new
Pretty much everything of value left in our society, fiscal, ethical, scientific, or moral, is being insidiously destroyed by this administration's insatiable desire that is unparalled in our history to concentrate wealth and power in the hands of a very small group. Even if we somehow escape soon, it would take decades to rebuild from the cultural and constitutional ashes. They would never allow the burning of the flag--but rather the nation for which it stands. And in the best traditions of the absurd, this unrestrained and unprincipled usurpation is figureheaded by a carciature whose mouth can be made to move but is insentient to the meaning of the words supplied.
posted on September 19, 2002 05:14:57 PM new
Hi Antiquary. I did think the phrase
the president's philosophical sensibilities was giving an awful lot of credit.
How was the trip? You have the right to an informed opinion -Harlan Ellison
posted on September 20, 2002 05:21:40 AM new
And our environment. I can not believe this guy and cohorts are getting away with so much when they weren't even elected in the first place. But, then neither were many dictators.
================
[b] Faster Environmental Reviews Sought
Critics Say Bush Undermining Laws on Transportation Projects [/b]
By Eric Pianin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, September 20, 2002; Page A27
President Bush's decision this week to order federal agencies to speed up environmental reviews of major transportation projects marks the latest in a series of administration challenges to long-standing environmental protection measures.
<snip>
However, some environmentalists charged that the administration is systematically chipping away at environmental protections under the guise of "streamlining" regulations.
Deron Lovaas of the Natural Resources Defense Council's "Smart Growth Program" said the president's executive order "is in keeping with the administration's campaign from day one to undermine the laws that protect our environment and public health."
I did think the phrase
