Opinion
Playing God a role not suitable for human beings
GREENVILLE. NC • At a
service in the small town of
Louisburg, family, friends
and strangers honored a
young woman who likes
Spanish soap operas and
shopping at Wal-Mart. They
shed tears and shared stories
and to some extent, said
gpodbye to someone they
knew and loved or simply
tfead about.
*■ For Jesica Santillan, the
struggle of life is over and
tiie questions about what
happened to her at Duke '
riledical Center and what
should have happened are left
tb others.
I But the failure that cost her
tyfe pricks the nation's
consciousness. We have come
to expect miracles from
places like Duke. Yet miracles
must pass through human
hands.
"As Jesica's surgeon I had
hoped that... Jesica would be
one of those lucky few that
we would be able to prolong
and improve her life ...." said
Dr. James Jaggers. transplant
surgeon at Duke.
Jaggers' hands were the
ones that delivered a new
heart and lungs to the
critically ill 17-year-old on -
Feb. 7. But he put organs of
the wrong blood type into
Jesica's body. A second
transplant did not come in
time. The tragedy caught
everyone's heart, and startled
a culture accustomed to
perfection from medicine as a
matter of course.
The questions have come
hard and fast.
How could this happen at a
top medical center? Who
MARY
SCHULKEN
failed to do what they were
required to do? Where did the
system fall down?
Those details are impor
tant. They must be unraveled,
and unraveled publicly, for
that is the only way to resolve
the doubt that has been cast
over a respected and estab
lished procedure and the life
saving process of organ
donation.
Yet this should be a coming
down to earth.
The services offered inside
the white-front towers of
Duke Hospital, and other
places like it, are not sought
by patients who have a lot of
options. They are sought, in
most instances, by those
without much hope. Jesica
was one of those.'
She was born in Jalisco,
Mexico, with a defect that
kept her heart from pumping
enough oxygen into her
lungs. Her parents paid a
smuggler to lead them across
the border. They wanted to go
somewhere they could expect
a miracle.
Amazing things go on with
every day regularity in the
medical centers of this
nation. Worn-out bodies are
given new life. Babies not
fully formed are nurtured
until their lungs can sustain
a lusty cry Groundbreaking
surgery mends crushed
marrow.
Yet by its nature, such
spectacular work requires
ordinary human beings to
take extraordinary risks. To
defy the odds. To push the
envelope.
To play God.
But just as there are
bounds to flesh and blood,
there are margins to working
without a net. Medicine is not
a practice without limits.
That does not excuse
either Jaggers or Duke - or
the next place - from em
ploying ironclad checks .
that protect against human
error. Nor does it relieve
them of blame for a dread
ful error. It just means the
burden is that much
heavier.
“In each step there is an
individual, and individuals
can make mistakes,”
Jaggers said in a videotaped'
statement released after
Jesica’s death. “As Jesica’s
surgeon, I take responsibil
ity for those errors. I take
responsibility for the entire
team.”
The suffering of Jesica
Santillan has come to an
end. But for a doctor who
made a mistake, a medical
center that trades in
miracles, and for each *
person who has signed an
organ donor card, the
questions about what
happened will go on.
(Mary Schulken is senior
associate editor and edito
rial page editor for The
Daily Reflector in Greenville,
NC. E-mail her at
mschulken@coxnews.com.)
This one isn't
your dad's war
Saddam Hussein, will fight
an American military many
times more lethal than the one
that drove his troops out of
Kuwait a dozen years ago.
Commander in Chief George
W Bush controls military
power a quantum leap ahead of
that commanded by his father
during the Persian Gulf War.
The upside to overpowering
American lethality is that it
makes wars easier to win.
The down side is exactly the
same. Wars will be easier to win
- an intoxicant that threatens
exaggerated self-confidence and
more wars.
An analysis of America’s
technological revolution in the
military by Washington Post
writers Thomas E. Ricks and
Vernon Loeb found that U.S.
military commanders “are
confident almost to the point of
cockiness.”
There is good reason to be
confident. The first war with
Iraq was analog. The next war
with Iraq will be digital.
Smart-bomb technology has
progressed further and faster
than Bush the elder, then Joint
Chiefs Chairman Colin Powell
or Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf
could have imagined in the
conflict that Saddam Hussein
predicted would be the mother
of all wars.
In Bush the younger’s war
(does anyone doubt it?),
Americans will employ bombs
guided by lasers or a new
generation of smart bombs
guided by satellites.
America’s bombers ranging
Sum the B-l, the B-2 and the old
reliable B-52 will carry multiple
JDAM bombs that can be
individually programmed with
coordinates for different targets.
America's new generation of
cruise missiles now can be
rapidly programmed with
coordinates and guided by on
board GPS satellite receivers.
Also according to the analysis
of Ricks and Loeb, the Army’s
Apache Longbow helicopter
gunships have vastly improved
technologies that can detect and
identify 128 battlefield targets
from five miles away and fire
radar-guided Hellfire missiles
ROWLAND
NETHAWAY
that will lock onto and track the
targets similar to air-to-air
missiles. This new helicopter
technology- is considered 400
percent more lethal than in the
Gulf War and 720 percent more
capable of surviving combat.
Since the Gulf War, the
United States has developed the
Predator pilotless aircraft that
can be used for both reconnais
sance and combat. These-*
drones can stay aloft for
extended periods and be
directed to fire Hellfire laser
guided missiles at targets that
its own sensors identify and
guide.
All the air power, including
five carrier groups steaming
within strike range of Iraq, to
the tanks and infantry troops
on the ground will be coordi
nated in digital real time by
computerized command centers
that beam information in
stantly and simultaneously
throughout the battlefield and
back to Washington, D.C.
This war also could introduce
a new high-power microwave
weapon that converts high "
explosives into a burst of
electrohiagnetic energy capable
of frying electronic circuitry of
everything from cell phones to
computers to communications
, systems. All weapons, vehicles,
planes, missiles or communica
tions systems that rely on
electronics would be disabled
with these futuristic weapons.
Ricks and Loeb report that U.S.
commanders are so confident
that they do not want to fight
alongside allies who will only •
slow them down.
It sounds easy Too easy To
paraphrase warnings from the
Bible to Shakespeare, pride goes
before the falL
(Rowland Nethaway is senior
editor of the Waco Tribune
Herald.)
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Harbour
Calling off war with Iraq:
is it too late to try now?
If President Bush decided
that it was in the national
interest not to have a war with
Iraq at this time, how would
you advise him to avoid the
“unintended consequences”
that would come from such an
action?
I mustered up the courage '
to ask this question to two
experts on the Middle East
who visited North Carolina
last week - Thomas Friedman,
the highly respected New York
Times foreign affairs colum
nist, and Wyche Fowler, a
former United States senator
and the ambassador to Saudi
Arabia during the Clinton
administration.
I will tell you the answer
they gave me in a minute. But
first I’ll explain why I asked
the question.
Actually, there are several
reasons. First, the support of
the American people for a war
against Iraq is withering
away. Friedman supports a
war to bring down Saddam
Hussein under certain
circumstances. But, in his
travels throughout the United
States, he says that he is
always confronted by skepti
cism and questions about the
war and, almost never,
expressions of support.
What about the polls that
show a majority of Americans
still support the overthrow of
Saddam Hussein, even if it
takes a war? As I read these
polls, that majority is dependent
upon the broad-based interna
tional coalition of support and
United Nations sanction.
If the American people are
not ready to support an
American invasion and long
term occupation of Iraq,
President Bush’s advisers must
be telling him that he will be
risking his reelection chances
by moving forward.
Secondly, the President’s
hard-nosed efforts to build an
international coalition are
creating a host of problems. By
pushing countries in the region,
One
on
One
D.G.
MARTIN
like Turkey and Pakistan, to
support an American invasion,
we have inflamed the over
whelming majority of their
citizens against their govern
ments and us. We have done
much the same thing to the
governments in Europe that
support us - Britain, Spain, and
Italy
This is not to mention our old
friends Germany and France,
whose friendships have already
been sacrificed on the altar of
the war against Iraq, since it is
not politically correct to
mention those countries at all
anymore.
the friendly governments
of Saudi Arabia and Egypt
continue to urge us not to go to
war with Iraq. Their pleas can
no longer be explained by
saying that their leaders are
privately urging us to go
forward. The people in those
countries are almost unani
mous in opposing our war.
The only real coalition that
we are building is one that is
uniting the people of the world
against our country’s policies -
and against us.
Surely, the President’s
diplomatic advisers are
explaining to him the long-term
consequences that will come
from the loss of our well-earned
position as the “moral leader”
of the world community
Finally the President must be
dealing with the hard responsi
bilities that will come from the
expected military success in
Iraq. Governing this diverse
country composed of warring
factions and peoples, is hard
enough for a brutal dictator like
Saddam Hussein, who has no
reluctance to eliminate dissent
by torture, murder, and
widespread repression. Even if
we had broad-based support
from other countries and the
United Nations, trying to
impose peace and democracy on
Iraq would drain the financial
and spiritual resources of our
country Without that interna
tional help, the President must
be beginning to understand that
he may be committing us to a
“Vietnam-type” enterprise, one
that will keep us from other
important tasks to keep our
country safe and healthy
All of this is why I thought
the President must be having
second thoughts about giving
the order to invade Iraq.
But “backing off” from war at
this stage has its own set of
unintended consequences. We
have made scores of promises -
to the Kurds, the Kuwaitis, the
Turks, the Pakistanis, and the
Iraqi dissidents, just to name a
few. We have told them, “This
time we mean business. This
time we are really going to get
rid of Saddam Hussein.”
Iso, l asked Friedman and
Fowler, how they would advise
President Bush to minimize
these negative consequences, if
he determines it is in our hest
national interests to “back
away” from this war.
Each of them told me that the
process would probably have to
begin in the United Nations,
working out a compromise with
France, China, and Russia that
would result in stronger
international participation in
the real disarmament of Iraq in
return for an agreement by the
United States to let the process
go forward peacefully - at least
for the time being.
But, both of them told me, it
is not going to happen.
Even though these men know
what they are talking about, I
am hoping that this one time
they are wrong.
(D.G.Martin hosts UNC-TVs
North Carolina Bookwatch,
which will return to the air in
April on Sundays at 5p.m.)
Tale of
Golden
Fleece
JOHN
HOOD
RALEIGH - Just before the
November 2002 elections, I
wrote a column warning that by
creating a host of tax incentives
and subsidy programs for
“economic development,”
North Carolina was risking its
reputation as a “good-govern
ment state” and inviting
unprecedented corruption.
Little did I know that the
seeds of this corruption had
already been planted, and that
the ensuing three months
would generate credible
allegations of graft, malfea
sance, campaign irregularities,
and political extortion that,
according to a recently filed
legal proceeding, reach to “the
highest levels of state govern
ment.”
Let me sum up the revela
. tions at this writing (late
February) and group them into
two interconnected categories.
As a mnemonic device, I’ll call
them the Golden Fleece scandal
and the Jackpot Dome scandal.
The former centers on the
Golden LEAF Foundation, a
nominally private organization
created by the legislature in
1999 to spend half of the state’s
share of the national tobacco
settlement. Stating as its
mission the rejuvenation of
“tobacco-dependent communi
ties,” Golden LEAF' quickly
devolved into a piggyback for
the state’s political class who
wish to initiate “economic
development” projects without
having to go directly to the
elected, and fiscally challenged,
uenerai Assembly
Reporting by Carolina
Journal as well as other media
has revealed that: 1) elected
officials such as Gov Mike
Easley and State Senate leader
Marc Basnight exercise
significant influence over the
grantmaking of this “indepen
dent” foundation; 2) Golden
LEAF dollars have gone to
marginally beneficial, but
politically charged, projects
such as tobacco processing
plants, horse parks, and grocery
stores; 3) LEAF “investments”
of tens of millions of dollars in
biotechnology ventures
connected to political activists
were approved without even
rudimentary business plans;
and 4) LE AF subsidies have
been used to benefit businesses
associated with board members
and to harm at least two private
alternative-fuels companies
See HOOD On Page 5-A
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