A Look Back and Lessons Learned

The "take home" lessons are listed below the article.
--------------


Peoria Journal Star
December 21, 2001

ELAINE HOPKINS

St. Francis quietly fires doctor -- Renowned Haitian Hearts founder will keep healing children

PEORIA - A prominent OSF Saint Francis Medical Center physician who founded the Haitian Hearts program has lost his job at the hospital.

Dr. John Carroll, whose program brings sick children from Haiti to Peoria for treatment, said he was fired from St. Francis on Tuesday. ''I was told to leave the premises,'' he said Thursday, adding the ''situation had evolved over a number of weeks.''

St. Francis spokesman Chris Lofgren said the hospital cannot comment on why Carroll lost his job as an emergency room physician.

''This was not done lightly,'' Lofgren said. ''it was done thoughtfully over a long period of time.''

Carroll said he was not sure of his long-term plans, but he is planning to leave for Haiti on Jan. 9 for a monthlong stay. He wants to bring back more children, he said. Without advanced medical care, these children will die, he said.

''The main thing to me is the future of Haitian Hearts,'' Carroll said. He would not discuss the reasons for his job loss, but said he regretted leaving.

Carroll, 48, worked in the hospital's emergency department and has been at the hospital for 21 years. A Peoria native, he did his residency there and never has worked anywhere else.

Carroll has won numerous awards and brought national publicity to St. Francis and its Children's Hospital for the Haitian Hearts program, and also raised money for the program.

He said he has raised $819,000 in donations and pledges for the Children's Hospital of Illinois at OSF St. Francis Medical Center in the past three years.
''We're the single-highest private donor to OSF Children's Hospital,'' he said.
Carroll still has hospital privileges to practice medicine at St. Francis, Lofgren said.

Asked about the Haitian Hearts program, Lofgren responded, ''as it stands right now, it's unaffected by John's departure.''

Carroll will have to discuss future treatment of the Haitian children with the staff and physicians who treat them, Lofgren added.

Heart surgeon Dr. Dale Geiss, who has worked with Carroll and donated his services for the Haitian children, termed Carroll ''an outstanding individual and superb physician.'' He said he was not familiar with the issues leading to Carroll's job loss.

Saying he hopes Carroll stays in Peoria, Geiss added, ''I've been assured that Haitian Hearts will continue to be supported by St. Francis if that is what Dr. Carroll wants.''

Other physicians also support the program, he said.

Dr. Greg Tudor, who worked with Carroll, said hospital employees were told not to comment on Carroll's departure. Carroll is ''a community icon and nothing short of that. I can't believe it,'' he said.

Karol Holmes of Tremont is caring for a 1-year-old Haitian baby who has been treated at St. Francis since May.

''Everybody in Haitian Hearts is devastated,'' she said. ''I can't begin to understand it.''

Carroll has given ''his whole life for this. The emergency room and Haitian Hearts is his whole life. His compassion is incredible. I've never known a man like him,'' she said.

She told of Carroll fighting to save the baby's life, and at one point, personally carrying the infant to the pediatric intensive care unit without prior approval, saying ''I hope I don't get in trouble for this.''

She and others described Carroll as a perfectionist and a fighter for his patients.
''He's pretty strong willed. That's not a bad thing. If I'm sick and dying, I want him on my side,'' Holmes said.

Holmes is planning to accompany Carroll to Haiti in January, where they will seek the mother's approval for the Holmes family to adopt the baby, who will need medical care for years.

In the months before that adoption can take place, she said, the family will be dependent on Haitian Hearts and St. Francis for medical care for the boy. Carroll's situation has her worried, she said. ''What am I going to do without Carroll?''

Geiss said that Carroll's use of expensive medical resources for the Haitian children is not an issue for St. Francis, whose officials have often expressed support for Haitian Hearts.

About 75 children from Haiti have been treated since 1995, Carroll said.

''A lot of families are involved,'' he said. ''I don't think it's done anywhere else in the U.S., and I don't think the generosity of hospitals anywhere in the U.S.'' can match the generosity at St. Francis.
--------------------
My comments today, February 16, 2009:


1. This article was written a few days after I was fired from OSF in 2001. As documented in Peoria’s Medical Mafia, I was placed on probation at OSF on September 28, 2001. The day before I had written OSF administrator Keith Steffen warning him of the overcrowded and dangerous Emergency Department at OSF.

I was also aware of OSF Emergency Department Director Dr. George Hevesy’s financial conflict of interest with Advanced Medical Transport. I did not feel that Dr. Hevesy or Dr. Rick Miller, previous OSF-ER Director, would be able to do much of anything about overcrowding in the ER due to the fact that they both had excellent jobs in the ER and Mr. Steffen had too much on them for either of them to contest him on anything.

2. I was attempting to save Haitian Hearts at this point. I had been told by an insider that Mr. Steffen was going to withdraw all financial support from Haitian Hearts…I just didn’t know when he was going to do this. (OSF withdrew all financial support for Haitian Hearts in July, 2002...six months after I was fired.) Dr. Geiss was given the wrong information when he was quoted above saying that OSF would continue their support of Haitian Hearts. Paul Kramer, Executive Director of Children's Hospital of Illinois (CHOI), told me in his office before I was fired, that Haitian Hearts was becoming "too much competition" for Children's (due to our very successful volunteer fundraising). Caterpillar Inc. was donating significant money to Haitian Hearts that went directly to CHOI. I think this really unnerved OSF because they wanted donated money to go to the Milestone Project, not to children from Haiti who needed heart surgery. (Also, $9,500 dollars from Caterpillar to Haitian Hearts in 2001, months before I was fired, turned up missing at Children's Hospital of Illinois...I wonder where it went...)

Even though I was fired, we were able to keep Haitian Hearts alive at many other medical centers in the United States.

3. In the months before he fired me, in his office, Mr. Steffen would smile and tell me, “When this comes out about you, John, it won’t be good.” When I asked him what he was talking about, he would just shake his head and smile. He spoke to other employees about me and to people outside of the hospital. They told me what he said.

Mr. Lofgren, hospital spokesman, also spoke inappropriately about my termination... he admitted to me that he did. (Much of what Mr. Steffen and Mr. Lofgren were saying came back to me and my family.)

How was I supposed to explain this bizarre behavior by OSF to Elaine Hopkins, the Journal Star reporter and, at the same time, try to protect Haitian Hearts from OSF's Administration?

I know that Mr. Steffen and some of his administrative staff are very dangerous people. They sure shouldn’t be in charge of OSF-SFMC. But OSF-Corporate and the OSF Sisters and the Catholic Diocese of Peoria know much of Mr. Steffen’s history and must just using him. And from a very good source, they will terminate him when the time is right.

4. As reported above, the Emergency Room staff of doctors and nurses were told by OSF ER directors not to comment on my firing. Everyone was being muzzled. Mr. Lofgren even sent out an e mail to the entire hospital saying that no one should comment. (I guess it was ok if he did.) The Executive Committee of physicians at OSF weren’t even consulted with my termination.

5. As stated in the article, I was grateful to OSF for their support of the Haitian kids. All physicians and the perfusionists on the open heart team donated all of their services. During 2002, the year after I was fired, and the year that OSF terminated Haitian Hearts, we donated $445,000 more dollars to OSF-Children's Hospital of Illinois.

6. So what have I learned from this experience with the OSF-Administrative team? I have learned alot. I have seen a few people cover for their colleagues when things get tough. I have also seen how people react when they are scared. People are afraid to take on OSF for so many reasons.

And most importantly I have seen how a small group of people at the top of OSF-SFMC destroyed the lives of many Haitian kids who deserved a chance. I have had the privilege of working with so many good people that took care of Haitian kids in their homes. I have seen their pain too as Haitian Hearts at OSF was destroyed.

A Look Back

Peoria Journal Star

August 14, 2003
ELAINE HOPKINS


Haitian Hearts will continue its program -- Patients will be treated in the U.S. and elsewhere


PEORIA - Haitian Hearts will continue to bring heart patients from Haiti for treatment at hospitals in the U.S. and perhaps elsewhere, its founder, Dr. John Carroll said Wednesday.

Carroll returned last week from Haiti where he arranged for two adult patients to be treated in the U.S. One is scheduled to receive a pacemaker at St. John's Hospital in Springfield, he said, and the other is to have heart valve surgery at a Jacksonville, Fla., hospital.

In July, OSF Healthcare System and the Catholic Diocese of Peoria announced they would no longer participate in the Haitian Hearts program.

Haitian Hearts has brought nearly 100 Haitians, mainly children, from Haiti to Peoria for medical treatment, mostly heart surgery at OSF Saint Francis Medical Center.

On Tuesday, the last Haitian child in Peoria, a 10-year-old girl who has been in the U.S. since last year, received heart surgery at St. Francis, a follow-up to earlier surgery. Carroll said the surgery went well.

Doctors, nurses and others who have cared for this child and other Haitians have expressed regret that the program is ending in Peoria, Carroll said. Some have donated their time and materials, and even offered to care for Haitian children in their homes while they recovered, he said.

Carroll said he now is working with others interested in Haiti, including the Mercy and Sharing Foundation, founded by philanthropist Susan Scott Krabacher. The organization operates an orphanage and medical center in Haiti. Its Web site is www.haitichildren.com.

Carroll said he hopes that up to 20 children soon will be placed in hospitals in the U.S., Canada and Europe for surgery. He has identified 38 who need surgery. A 19-year-old died while on the waiting list, he said.

Since December, St. Francis has refused to approve any visas for medical care for Haitian Hearts patients.

St. Francis fired Carroll in December 2001 from his job of 21 years as an emergency room physician after a dispute with hospital managers.
-----------------

Looking back from today, February 15, 2009:

1. Many Haitian Hearts patients in Haiti have died since this article was published. Two young men that were operated at OSF, but were denied care at OSF when they needed heart surgery again, have died too. Haitian Hearts has been able to get a few OSF Haitian Hearts patients operated in different medical centers, and all have done well, but they wouldn't have if it were up to OSF. All Haitian Hearts patients are still being refused at OSF.

2. Bishop Daniel Jenky and the The Catholic Diocese of Peoria had one 45 minute meeting with Haitian Hearts in February, 2003. There were no other Haitian Hearts meetings with Bishop Jenky. Ever. When my brother asked Bishop Jenky at this single meeting if I could go to Haiti and bring back five sick Haitian kids to OSF for heart surgery, he replied no.

Yet, two weeks later in his office with Patricia Gibson (Diocesan Chancellor and Canon Law Lawyer) present, Bishop Jenky told me that I needed to go to Confession to him in one year if I petitioned for a Catholic Tribunal Court against OSF. He was holding me responsible for any Haitian deaths that occurred in this time period. My education how the Diocese acted behind closed doors was "up close and personal". I left the Chancery in disbelief.

3. Since this article, Haitian Hearts has personally brought or consulted in approximately 150 Haitians who have come to the United States for surgery. Most have been children. Most have had heart surgery.

4. And my "dispute with hospital managers" noted above, included overcrowding in the OSF Emergency Department. No one who worked there at the time would have disputed this.

Since this article was written, OSF has admitted in the Journal Star that the OSF-ER was dramatically overburdened. Work on a new ER has started as part of the one-half billion dollar OSF Milestone Project and an Observation Unit for ER patients was started several years ago.

Haitian Mom and Kids

This Haitian mom brought her two kids to a pediatric clinic in the Delmas area of Port-au-Prince.

Have you ever seen a more beautiful family?

Letter to New Ethics Director at OSF

Dear Ms. Skujdak Mackiewicz,

I would like to present the following as a formal ethics consult to you as Ethics Director at OSF.

Katina Antoine is a 13 year old Haitian girl who suffers from valvular heart disease. I brought her to OSF in Peoria in 2002 as part of the Haitian Hearts program.

She underwent mitral valve surgery at OSF and recovered at my brother’s home in Peoria. She attended St. Thomas Church with my brother's family and St. Thomas School sends a yearly monetary gift to Katina which pays for her school in Haiti.

I have been following her in Haiti since I took her back in 2002.

I examined her in November, 2008 and obtained an echocardiogram. Her physical exam and echocardiogram revealed that Katina needs a new mitral valve. The repair done on her mitral valve at OSF in Peoria gave her a couple of years, but she now needs a prosthetic valve placed in the mitral position.

As you may know, complex technical heart surgery such as this is not done in Haiti.

Several years ago a letter from Douglass Marshall, OSF attorney, informed me that OSF would not operate on any patient referred by me to OSF. This included Haitian Hearts patients.

Two of OSF’s young Haitian Hearts patients, Jean-Baptiste and Maxime, have died very painful deaths in the last couple of years after being denied care at OSF.

I have tried to get Katina accepted into numerous other medical centers in the United States without success. Other medical centers seem quite concerned that OSF is not following up with their Haitian patients.

I am afraid that Katina is running short on time.

The Catholic Post recently quoted you regarding your belief and reliance on the Ethical and Religious Directives regarding Catholic health care in the United States. I would hope that you and the Ethics Committee would review these Directives with Attorney Marshall and OSF’s Administration so their policy denying OSF’s Haitian Hearts patients care would be changed immediately.

OSF's leaders in Corporate and at the Medical Center need to come together to give Katina the concern and the care she deserves in Peoria.

Since 1995, Haitian Hearts has donated over 1.1 million dollars to Children’s Hospital of Illinois. We are able to pay up to $10,000 dollars for Katina’s care at OSF.

I have sent you this letter via “snail mail” since my OSF e mails have been blocked in the past. I did not think that you would receive my request any other way. (I did leave a voice mail on your phone the other day, but did not hear back from you.)

Also, I have published this letter on my web logs, www.dyinginhaiti.blogspot.com and www.pmmdaily.blogspot.com. Also, these two sites will provide you with an adequate historical background regarding OSF’s negligent and unethical behavior regarding Haitian Hearts patients.

I will publish your response regarding this consult in a future post. As Katina’s physician and guardian in the United States, I will also share this post and your response with Katina’s parents in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

Physicians are supposed to be “attorneys for the poor”. My hope is that you will be an “ethicist for the poor”. Katina and her family are indeed poor.

Haitian Hearts fervently wishes that you and the Ethics Department at OSF will have the courage to convince others at OSF that accepting Katina is the only good ethical decision that can be made.


Sincerely,

John A. Carroll, M.D.
Peoria, Illinois

OSF has New "Ethics Director"

The Peoria Catholic Post February 8, 2009 announced that OSF has a new ethics director.

She is Birgitta Skujdak Mackiewicz.

The Post reports:

"Sujdak Mackiewicz said that when she receives requests for ethics consultations, for example, she tries to eduate all involved so they feel they have the necessary resources to address problems now and in the future.

"They're alway welcome to call, of course, but at least this gives them tools to work through some of these issues, to recognize ethical issues where they may not have seen them before," she told the Post.

"In terms of policy development, Sujdak Mackiewicz said OSF-SFMC, like all Catholic hospitals, relies to a great extent on the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services. This document was developed by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Doctrine.

"Our consultation service here at the hospital is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It has been in existence for some time," according to Sujdak Mackiewicz, who said anyone can request an ethics consultation."

The article reports that she handles ethics calls the majority of the time and works closely with Dr. Gerald McShane, who chairs the OSF Saint Francis Ethics Committee and is president of the OSF Medical Group.

Sujdak Mackiewicz states that "above all, ethics consultations should improve patient care."

My comments on the article:

1. Why does OSF need an "ethics director"? They already have Drs. Gerry McShane and OSF Corporate Ethics Director, Joe Piccione.

2. I feel bad that this new ethics director is working with Gerry and Joe. I have submitted multiple ethics consults to both Gerry and Joe over the past eight years. Never once have I been granted an ethics consultation from either of them that I know of. If the Ethics Department and committee talked about my concerns at OSF (the abandonment of Haitian Hearts patients, the Advanced Medical Transport monopoly on ambulance services, and the management style of OSF Administrator Keith Steffen and his use of fear with employees), I am unaware of any of their conclusions. One one occasion I spoke with Dr. McShane in his office about Mr. Steffen's management style and asked him to present it to the Ethics Committee. He said that he would not because Mr. Steffen sat on the Ethics Committee. Dr. McShane referred me to Howard Wiles at OSF, the Compliance Officer.

3. Both Dr. McShane and Joe Piccione, along with Monsignor Steven Rohlfs, were very instrumental in ending the Haitian Hearts program at OSF. This does not seem to be consistent with Sujdak Mackiewicz's statements above about OSF following the Ethical and Religious Directives. In fact, Dr. McShane, Mr. Piccione, and Monsignor Rohlfs did the opposite.

4. I called Sujdak Mackiewicz's office yesterday, and left a voice mail. I want to make yet another formal consult to the ethics department at OSF for their abandonment of their Haitian patient, 13 year old Katina Antoine. I did not get a return phone call. (My e mails to OSF have been cut off for several years. Dr. McShane played a role in that via an e mail I received several years ago.)

5. So, according to Sujdak Mackiewicz, it looks like anyone can make ethics consults 24 hours per day to OSF unless it is about medical negligence of Haitian children, the OSF-AMT ambulance monopoly and conflict of interest, or fear used against employees by OSF's administrator.

6. I guess I need to give her time. She is new on the job and probably doesn't understand all of the people that will be working against her at OSF.

Katina is Sick

Frandy is a 19 year old Haitian Hearts patient that helps us in Haiti.

He received a call from Katina's father yesterday.

Below is an internet chat with Frandy from yesterday February 9, 2009:


6:18 PM Dejean: are you there Maria?
i just have a quick news about Katina
6:19 PM please tell dr Carroll that she's not doing well, her father called me this morning to inform me about that
me: ok frandy. how is she not doing well?
6:20 PM we are looking hard for a hospital
Dejean: she's surffering because of her belly
ok
6:21 PM me: her stomach hurts? is it big?
Dejean: the ball around her neck does not hurt her
6:22 PM yes her stomach, i don't know if it s big
me: frandy this is dr john is she short of breath...eske li soufle anle
6:23 PM Dejean: no
ok
me: please tell the father we are searchig for a hospital
6:24 PM Dejean: her stomach and the place where she was operated on are hurting her
ok i will
me: ok, thanks frandy
Dejean: and i will email you more about that
me: dont let them give up hope
6:25 PM Dejean: no
never

Pressing Forward with Katina

Another medical center will review Katina's case this coming week. They will decide to accept her or not accept her for heart surgery.

With all the money in Peoria, and all the medical expertise, and with all of the people in the area that want Katina to be able to return to OSF, it is so amazing that she is not allowed to come back to OSF.

A few people in key positions are blocking her from returning to Peoria and it may cost Katina her life. This position cost Jean-Baptiste and Maxime their lives.

It does not surprise me that only a few people are obstructing her care. What is bothersome is the silence of people that know better.

What More Can be Said? This is Haiti in 2009

I received this e mail yesterday from a Haitian friend of mine from Cite Soleil:

Dearest john,

forgive me firstly for my disturbing you I just wanted to make you this request about to make this request to someone of you in HAiti

to lend me what he has cause we all in the house are very hunger while I make you this e-mail I am very hungry but, it is only what I can do is to make this e-mail to you to attemp this chance to se if you would answer to me when consider how the situation is very much hard .
like sickness to take care of.
children to feed.
other problem to realize
and so I am completely empty.
hope you will do that for me by tomorrow cause our need is very much great.
I will go back home witout nothing all eyes are on me when I enter home to see if i have brought anyhting .

please I will do that by faith to check my e-mail tomorrow to find a positive answer from you .

please do that for me.
tahnk you

Katina Rejected Again

I received another "Katina rejection" yesterday.

Medical centers are just not anxious to operate OSF-SFMC's patients from Haiti.

OSF-SFMC in Peoria needs to do the right thing. They need to accept Katina and give her state-of-the-art medical care.

But when OSF's heart is constructing a $400 million expansion of their medical center in Peoria, Katina's heart just doesn't count.

Many other children's hospitals around the country are aware of OSF's unethical and negligent behavior abandoning these kids.

How many more Haitian Hearts patients are going to suffer and die while the OSF Sisters and the Catholic Diocese of Peoria remain silent?

Bet You Won't Read This in The Peoria Catholic Post

CBS News Sunday Morning had this story last Sunday.

It is national news....except in Peoria.

About a "carrier", formerly known as "expectant mother", who delivered a baby at OSF-SFMC in Peoria. With in vitro fertilization (IVF) she was paid to be a surrogate mother for a couple from New York.

The Catholic Church does not like IVF.

And OSF continues to let my Haitian kids who need repeat heart surgery die out of site and out of mind. These Haitian kids, who are already out-of-the-womb, have moms(not "carriers") in Haiti that really care about them and do not want to give them up.

But the Haitian kids don't get a bed at OSF. They just don't count.

Katina Needs Surgery

Katina is a 13 year old Haitian girl. She had heart surgery at OSF in Peoria in 2002.

She needs repeat heart surgery and OSF will not operate on her. Haitian Hearts has contacted other medical centers and they believe she is OSF's ethical and medical responsibility. And she is.

I examined her two months ago in Haiti and she needs heart surgery soon or she will die like Jackson and Maxime.

OSF's International Committee needs to accept Katina. Haitian Hearts is able to give OSF $10,000 dollars for her surgery.

Her passport is up to date and I would go to Haiti to get her if OSF accepted her.

See this video of Katina.

How OSF is willing to let this little girl die in Haiti is beyond me.

No Wonder People Don't Trust

The Peoria Catholic Post December 21, 2008 has an article on the Vatican document "Dignitas Personae" (The Dignity of a Person).

This document reaffirms that Catholic teaching opposes all fertilization techniques that separate procreation from the conjugal act.

Paul Kortz, R.N. is FertilityCare coordinator at OSF in Peoria. Paul teaches Natural Family Planning (NFP) at OSF which is consistent with the Church's teaching.

Paul states in the Catholic post article, “Keeping this in mind we are all called by God to use our intellects to become participants in the work of our Creator. The fight of our intellect provides the means to share an ethical responsibility to discern if medical interventions ever compromise the sacredness of life.”

“Challenging as it may be, we must make concerted efforts to educate our family, friends, and associates that participation in any intervention that undermines the dignity of the human person is to be avoided."

So why did the Catholic Diocese of Peoria and OSF create a loophole for OSF physicians to write prescriptions for oral contraceptives? This policy was created about 15 years ago and flies in the face of Catholic teaching.

Humanae Vitae, written in 1968, states this regarding physicians and health care providers:

Paragraph 27: To Doctors and Medical Personnel

We hold those physicians and medical personnel in the highest esteem who, in the exercise of their profession, value above every human interest the superior demands of their Christian vocation. Let them persevere, therefore, in promoting on every occasion the discovery of solutions inspired by faith and right reason, let them strive to arouse this conviction and this respect in their associates. Let them also consider as their proper professional duty the task of acquiring all of the knowledge needed in this delicate sector, so as to be able to give to those married persons who consult them wise counsel and healthy direction, such as they have a right to expect.

Does OSF and the Catholic Diocese of Peoria promote on every occasion the discovery of faith and right reason and arouse this conviction and this respect in their associates?

I don't think so and money is the reason according to OSF Catholic Ethicist Joseph Piccione.

No mention was made in the article regarding any NFP physician working for OSF. I wonder if OSF even has a NFP at this point. Their only NFP doctor was run out after asking for more money for NFP and being told that OSF needed to pay for the half billion dollar Milestone Project. Women's issues regarding Catholic teachings were given very short shrift.

Also, the Catholic Post article is deceiving by casting eyes on embattled Governor Blagojevich and his policy regarding health care providers and following their consciences. The Post left out that OSF and the Diocese were intricately linked in allowing OSF physicians to provide oral contraceptives. It seems to me that The Diocese and OSF were more effective than the Governor regarding this issue.

The Post article ends with the editor pointing the reader to www.popepaulvi.com. (Pope Paul VI Institute). OSF FertilityCare Department takes much of its philosophy from this Institute.

The Pope Paul VI Institute website states it is dedicated to building a culture of life by confronting the culture of death:

• By confronting the contraceptive mentality, which is the gateway to abortion.
• By confronting artificial reproductive technologies that suppress, distort, and alter women's fertility; that negatively impact marriages and families; and that lead to the "new abortion."
• By confronting moral erosion.
• By confronting Planned Parenthood's agenda.

So when all is said and done, the reader should be confused regarding what the Catholic Diocese of Peoria and OSF really believe regarding pro-life issues.

The Catholic Diocese of Peoria

See Elaine Hopkins post today.

Law of Reform

Niccoló Machiavelli presciently wrote in 1513, "There is nothing more difficult to manage, more dubious to accomplish, nor more doubtful of success . . . than to initiate a new order of things. The reformer has enemies in all those who profit from the old order and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit from the new order."

This keenly observed dynamic, known as the "Law of Reform," suggests that a determined and concentrated minority fighting to preserve the status quo has a considerable advantage over a more diffuse majority who favor reform but have varying degrees of willingness to fight for a promised but uncertain benefit.

New England Journal of Medicine, January 2009

Bishop Jenky Needs to March in Peoria

The Peoria Catholic Post has a lead article this week that reports that Bishop Daniel Jenky is going to Washington D.C. to march for a pro life culture in the United States.

"Bishop Daniel R. Jenky, CSC, will join hundreds of representatives from the Diocese of Peoria and tens of thousands of other participants at the national March for Life and supporting events this week in Washington, D.C.

“This year especially, I thought it was necessary to witness in Washington, D.C., to the Gospel of Life,” Bishop Jenky told The Catholic Post, noting the Jan. 22 march recalling the 36th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decisions legalizing abortion comes just days after President-elect Barack Obama is inaugurated.

“The election of the new president is an occasion that I believe is going to ask of the church to redouble our pro-life efforts,” he said.


The print version of the Post has a quote by Bishop Jenky stating that any cooperation that leads to abortion is "evil". This was not on the web version of the article.

I would suggest that Bishop Jenky "redouble" his efforts right here in Peoria.

Why shouldn't Bishop Jenky march with hundreds of central Illinois pro life supporters at OSF-SFMC against OSF's artificial contraceptive policy that the Diocese helped create and seems to support? This OSF policy is definitely not pro life. One of the actions of contraceptives is potentially abortifacient. (See this article.)

My brother and I would march with Bishop Jenky regarding this issue. He has our support regarding this.

Interestingly, an advertisement on the Catholic Diocese web page is from OSF HealthCare--A Commitment to Life. Maybe that is where the answer really is regarding the Diocese's "cooperation" with OSF.

The African-American Womb is a Dangerous Place

In Haiti the maternal mortality rate is one of the highest in the world. This is not good for the baby inside if the mother's health deteriorates prior to delivery.

And the infant mortality rate in Haiti is one of the highest in the world also. And part of the reason many babies die before age one year in Haiti is that their mother is dead.

In the United States the infant mortality rate of black infants is 2.5 times higher than whites. And the maternal mortality rate in the United States for black women is 3 times the mortality rate for white women.

And in the United States, a black baby is 5 times more likely to be killed in the womb (abortion) than is a white baby.

See the following article regarding abortion in African-Americans in the United States. It is written by Reverend Clenard H. Childress, Jr.

Black Genocide

What would Martin Luther King say to a nation where an African-American baby is 5 times more likely to be killed in the womb than a Caucasian baby?

MONTCLAIR, N.J. (Black Genocide.org) - This is probably the most asked question presently in America since the end of the Civil War, but I am wondering: who is asking it more? Due to the historical implications and the political climate throughout the world, the Global spotlight is clearly on the United States. The world wants to see how Barack Obama will navigate the tumultuous course ahead of him.

In his Election Night Acceptance Speech he referenced Dr. Martin Luther King's famous and prophetic speech, "I've been to the mountain top." Barack Obama said, "We may not get there in one year or four years." It was at that point there seemed to be a degree of uncertainty and this is totally understandable when one considers the state of economic and social affairs of our country and global unrest. I would personally encourage and insist the nation ask another question along with the previous inquiry: 'where do we go from here and what will it look like when we get there?'

In Dr. Martin Luther King's last and most radical presidential address to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, he entitled his message just what we find ourselves asking at the moment: "Where Do We Go From Here?" Martin said, "First we must massively assert our dignity and worth, we must stand up amidst a system that will oppress us and develop an unassailable and majestic sense of values." Martin Luther King then says that the priority in getting to your destination, are your values, not economy. If that's what's needed then the journey must be delayed indefinitely until we gain those unassailable, unmovable, indestructible values that are divine, lofty and exalted.

But where do we go from here? We can go nowhere until this nation recognizes all of its citizens, especially our most vulnerable, many whose 'unalienable Rights' are presently denied. Until our national values reflect the Giver of our rights —"endowed by their Creator" — as the Declaration of Independence describes to us, there will be no 'there' there when we arrive. In so saying, as Martin Luther King was speaking at a church conference in Nashville Tennessee, he spoke across the decades these profoundly portentous words:

"There must be the recognition of the sacredness of human personality. Deeply rooted in our political and religious heritage is the conviction that every man is an heir to a legacy of dignity and worth. Our Hebraic Christian tradition refers to this inherent dignity of man in the biblical term the image of God. This innate worth referred to in the phrase the image of God is universal, shared in equal portions by all men. There is no graded scale (not pay scale) of essential worth; there is no divine right of one race that differs from the divine right of another. Every human has etched in his personality the indelible stamp of the creator. The idea of dignity and worth of human personality is expressed eloquently and unequivocally in the Declaration of Independence."

Allan Guttmacher reveals that the most dangerous place for an African-American to be is in the womb of their African-American mother. When the Man on the Mountain, Barack Obama, says one of the first things he is going to do is to get the Freedom of Choice Act passed, FOCA would eliminate all state prohibitions and restrictions on abortion, the leading cause of death of African-Americans; I do not want to go to that land. When King went up, he said, "I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you but we as a people will one day get to the promise land." And what land is this? A land with unassailable and majestic values; a land where America lives out its creed; a land where the endowed rights of the Creator are given to all of its citizens, even the unborn!

Ironically, when Dr. Martin Luther King gave this address, he was deeply concerned with the rate of infant mortality. Dr. King said, "The rate of infant mortality among Negroes is double that of whites and there are twice as many Negroes dying in Vietnam as whites in proportion to their size in the population." In Iraq, 6% of the deaths are African-Americans yet African-Americans make up 12% of the population. When compared to the war against children in the womb, 37% of all abortions are African-Americans or more than 3 times the percentage of representation. 52% of all African-American pregnancies are ended tragically through abortion.

When I read of Martin's deep concerns over the infant mortality rate in the 60s, what would Dr. King say if he could have lived in a nation where 16 million African American infants were victims of the abortion industry? Even if you take into consideration AIDs, violent crimes, accidents, cancer and heart disease, this number would not account for half the amount of infants killed in the womb by abortion. What would Martin Luther King say to a nation where an African-American baby is 5 times more likely to be killed in the womb than a Caucasian baby? Where do we go from here, and what will it look like when we get there if Obama's agenda comes to fruition?

Interestingly, one day a newsman came to Martin Luther King and said, "Dr. King, don't you think you're going to have to stop now opposing the war and be more in line with the administration's policy. As I understand it, it has hurt the budget of your organization and people who once respected you, have lost respect for you. Don't you feel you really have to change your position?"

Dr. King answered, "Sir, I'm sorry you don't know me. I'm not a consensus leader. I do not determine what is right and wrong by looking at the budget of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. I've not taken a Gallup Poll of the majority opinion. Ultimately a genuine leader is not a searcher of consensus, but a molder of consensus. On some positions, cowardice ask the question, is it expedient? And then, expedience comes along and asks the questions, is it politic? Vanity asks the question, is it popular? Conscience asks the question, is it right?"

I absolutely concur!

Rev. Clenard H. Childress, Jr., is the senior pastor of The New Calvary Baptist Church in Montclair, NJ., the founder of the website Blackgenocide.org and president of Life Education And Resource Network, Northeast. He is a contributing writer for Catholic Online.

The Diocese has Problems

See this Forum article in the Peoria Journal Star.

One of the commenters, Celsion, hits it on the head. My experience and my family's experience with Bishop Jenky, Monsignor Rohlfs, and Patricia Gibson regarding saving Haitian Hearts in Peoria was very similar.

Unfortunately, Celsion's advice about needing a lawyer when speaking with the Diocese is good advice.

I can't trust The Catholic Diocese of Peoria to do the right thing.

The question is what to do?

Catholic Diocese of Peoria in Trouble in the 90's, and "We" Didn't Even Know It

I found this article in the Chicago Tribune from 2002.

So while the Catholic Diocese of Peoria was firing a Notre Dame High School teacher and working with OSF-SFMC to create a policy for oral contraceptive prescriptions in the 90's, it seems they were also trying to buy the silence of an "archivist" for the Diocese.

And Archbishop John J. Myers said that when new Peoria Bishop Daniel Jenky defrocked seven priests that he (Bishop Myers) had no real knowledge of the individual allegations against the priests.

What? Why didn't he know?

And how did new Bishop Jenky learn so much so quickly which enabled him to defrock these priests?

I don't get it.

In the early 2000's when the Catholic Diocese of Peoria turned their back on dying Haitian kids, I was so surprised. But I sure didn't know how the Diocese conducted business at that point.

I do now.

The last sentence in the article below says it all.
--------------------


Bishop on Abuse Committee under Fire
Handling of Cases in Peoria Is Cited

By Flynn McRoberts and David Heinzmann
Chicago Tribune
June 2, 2002

The grim news spilling from this central Illinois river town in recent weeks has carried all the hallmarks of the American Catholic Church's present nightmare:

Priests ousted from the ministry after allegations of sexual misconduct. Apologies to angry victims. The belated creation of a committee that includes lay professionals to better deal with abusive pastors.

Lost in the familiarity, though, is the fact that the man who until recently led those priests and victims is now one of eight prelates charged with mapping a way out of the church's crisis.

John J. Myers, who was promoted last year to lead the Newark archdiocese, was recently named to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Ad Hoc Committee on Sexual Abuse. The committee is writing the policy proposal that will be put before the conference in Dallas later this month.

But some parishioners, pastors and victims in the Peoria diocese are challenging Myers' own judgment in the decade he led 240,000 Catholics spread over 26 central Illinois counties. Given his own approach to the issue, they are questioning his fitness to carry out his new role in addressing the church's mishandling of clerical sex abuse.

Those critics describe an ambitious "ecclesiastical politician," as one priest put it, who responded to some victims' cries only after they threatened to go public; moved certain problem priests without informing parishioners; and allegedly sought to purchase the silence of a church archivist who had gathered information on priests.

With his orthodox theology and reputation for relishing the princely trappings of Catholic prelates, Myers has prompted controversy throughout his climb from the Peoria diocese of his childhood to leadership of the 1.3 million-strong archdiocese of Newark.

Among his critics, Myers' notable moves in Peoria included his installation of a hot tub in the bishop's residence and his push to remove a Catholic teacher who had defied a priest's warning and allowed a classroom discussion on the ordination of women.

But it is not Myers' conservative theological bent that has drawn attention in recent weeks. More to the point is the fact that his successor, Bishop Daniel R. Jenky, quickly decided he needed to craft a significantly tougher policy to address sexual misconduct by priests--an issue that some church leaders already had addressed.

In the most dramatic move, Jenky on Thursday removed seven accused priests.

In an interview late Friday, Myers, 60, rejected accusations that he was slow or reluctant to respond to allegations of sexual abuse by priests in his diocese.

"The actions that Bishop Jenky has taken were based on information I never had available to me," Myers said of Jenky's removal of the priests. "If I had known, I would have acted like he acted."

But one of Myers' former top aides said that while he assisted Myers, the idea of establishing an independent commission to review sexual misconduct--such as Jenky recently set up--was never discussed.

'Commission never came up'

"A commission never came up. I don't know why," said Monsignor Eric Powell, now pastor of St. Mary Church in Kickapoo, Ill.

Powell said Myers liked to handle sensitive issues personally and quietly. He said he believed Myers always did the right thing to protect victims and potential victims when he was faced with allegations.

Still, Powell acknowledged that parishioners now demand a different approach. Myers used "the older model--to deal with it seriously, but deal with it quietly," Powell said. "This newer model is more satisfying to the people of God."

Some victims and their family members have come forward to say Myers only reacted when faced with media exposure. They include Theresa Koenigs of Cambridge, Ill., who was outraged a year ago to hear that Myers planned to reinstate a priest who acknowledged molesting her son in the 1980s.

Koenigs said the diocese initially didn't respond to her repeated phone calls concerning the priest, Francis Engels, who was removed from active service in 1993 after allegations were brought against him.

"So then I called one last time and I told them, 'You have somebody call me in 10 minutes or I'm going to a newspaper.' They called me within 5 minutes," she recalled.

Koenigs said she was told: "Well, we thought enough time was elapsed, that everybody had healed and it would be OK."

"I said, 'No, it's not OK. Not ever. Some of my family are just now starting to heal, and now you want to put him back on the altar?"

Myers acknowledged in the interview that he did move to allow Engels to return to limited ministry, but only in capacities in which he would not have direct contact with minors. When Koenigs contacted him to object, he relented and kept Engels inactive.

"I didn't realize they would be so upset," he said of the Koenigses' reaction. "I changed my mind on the spot the second I understood how upset they were."

Another alleged victim of Engels also said Myers responded to complaints only after he and his family went to the media.

"He was cordial but didn't do anything," said Michael Emery, a former priest who accused Engels and another priest of abusing him. "I would say we got stonewalled."

Emery said he and his family first spoke face-to-face with Myers in November 1992 but nothing was done about Engels until after the family got frustrated and told their story to the Peoria Journal-Star several months later.

"Given my family's experience ... I think it's crazy" for Myers to be named to the bishops' committee on sex abuse, said Emery, who left the priesthood in 1988 and later got married. "I don't think he's dealt with it in an insightful fashion."

Monsignor Steven Rohlfs, now the chancellor in charge of handling sex-abuse allegations under Jenky, defended Myers' handling of such allegations, saying, "I would hope that we would not act with lightning speed on accusations like this" and be "fair to the victims and fair to the accused."

After Jenky announced the removal of seven priests last week, Myers said through a spokesman that "he really has no knowledge of the individual allegations against these priests."

But Myers was informed of allegations against at least two of the priests as early as 1993. That year, a victim accused Rev. John Anderson of sexual misconduct about a decade earlier, and the family asked that he be moved to administrative duties, said Rohlfs.

"We had an allegation against him. And the victim did not want to go public, and he did not want Anderson removed from the priesthood. He just wanted him removed from any access to children," said Rohlfs.

None of the assignments Anderson subsequently took involved contact with children, he said, including local fundraising for church mission work and later executive director of King's House of Retreats.

Anderson, now 69, was sent away for treatment and continued in regular therapy when he returned to Peoria, according to Myers. The former Peoria bishop said that to his knowledge Anderson was not guilty of sexually abusing minors.

Behavior called 'inappropriate'

"He had not broken the law, as far as we know," Myers said, but he had engaged in behavior that was "inappropriate." Myers declined to elaborate, but acknowledged that the behavior was serious enough to warrant in-depth treatment.

The second priest, whom Myers knew about as of 1997, was Rev. Norm Goodman. The former pastor of Holy Family Church in Lincoln, Ill., Goodman consistently has denied accusations brought by more than a dozen victims. But Bishop Jenky stripped him of his Roman collar last week.

One of the victims who settled a lawsuit with the diocese over Goodman's alleged abuse was Lance Rainforth, whose family owns two candy and gift shops in Peoria and Lincoln.

After the Rainforths approached the diocese with their complaints, according to one Peoria priest who asked not to be identified, Myers seemed to suggest that the family would pay a price for pursuing its charges. "Before this is all over with," the priest recalled Myers telling him, "the diocese could end up owning two candy stores."

On Friday, Myers said he could not recall whether he said that.

"If I said anything, it would have been that 'If you keep pushing this, then people might stop coming to your business,"' he said, because people at the time were very supportive of Goodman.

Three years after becoming Peoria's bishop, Myers purchased files on priests from an archivist at the diocese's cathedral parish.

The archivist, Paul Geers, sold the files to the diocese in November 1993 for $6,000.

The "agreement of sale" document, written in halting sentence fragments, included a reference to "a very large file on priests ... many old photos of priests and histories. Death, Gay, Aids, married, those who left Diocese." The agreement also included a promise that Geers not keep any copies of the documents and that he not discuss their contents with anyone.

The day after the sale, Geers said, he got a call from Powell. "Bishop Myers would like to buy your silence," Geers recalled the priest telling him. "I said, 'My silence is not for sale.'"

At the time, Geers was a parishioner at St. Mary's Cathedral parish and an amateur archivist who came across the information while interviewing priests for research into diocesan history. "He tried to buy my silence to keep me quiet and now he's on this committee? Come on," Geers said of Myers. "I'd like to know what they're hiding."

But Powell and Myers challenged the recollections of Geers. Powell said that if secrecy had been his purpose, he would have been shrewder than to say so openly. "I dispute that," Powell said. "It's not a very clever thing to say."

Myers said the diocese did pay Geers, but did so chiefly because they wanted control of any confidential personnel files, rather than have them circulating among people who shouldn't have access to them.

"We did not know what he had," Myers said. In the end, Myers insisted, Geers' claim of having confidential priest files was false.

Looking back on Myers' Peoria tenure, even some victims' attorneys compare Myers favorably with other bishops in his handling of sexual misconduct cases.

"He sought to compensate the victims, which I think is commendable," said Frederic Nessler, a Springfield attorney who handled the Goodman cases. "Some dioceses defend the cases at any cost on any technical grounds they can muster. That was not the case that I experienced with Myers," said Nessler.

But Nessler said Myers failed to act as forthrightly as his successor. "He did not act to remove the priest as Bishop Jenky has," the attorney said. "I think you need to act transparently, and that's what Bishop Jenky has done. He's acting quickly to rid the diocese of these alleged pedophiles."

Some with whom Myers publicly clashed acknowledge his talents. "Bishop Myers is bright and charming. He's a wonderful managerial person, a gifted canon lawyer," said Marlynn Kelsch, a former scripture teacher at Notre Dame High School in Peoria who was let go in 1993 by one of Myers' proteges; she had defied the priest's order not to allow her students to debate the idea of ordaining women.

Others who know Myers through the painful experience of their loved ones' abuse look at the breadth of bishops who mishandled such cases for years. And they wonder if it's possible to find any prelates who haven't erred.

"The way I look at it as a Catholic and a person, they're not going to find a perfect bishop," said Ron Koenigs, Theresa's husband and a retired factory worker. But "what good is a church if you can't trust the priest?"

Surrounded by Walls

My father-in-law, Ed King, and I traveled to Haiti in mid-November. We went down to transport two young women in the Haitian Hearts program to the United States for heart surgery.

This was Ed’s second trip to Haiti. We stayed at a guest house in Port-au-Prince, the capital of Haiti. Port-au-Prince has an estimated population of 3,000,000.

The first morning Ed looked at me, chuckled, and said, “We are surrounded by walls.”

Ed had surveyed the neighborhood that morning. And he was right. There were walls everywhere.

The top of the walls that surround private homes in Haiti have broken glass and razor wire embedded in cement. One would really have to want to get inside the walls to run the risk of going over top.

Prior to his retirement, Ed served as Dean of Men at Bradley University for many years. He is probably the most respected graduate in Bradley University history.

One midnight in 1969, Ed was awakened and emergently summoned to the Bradley Student Center. He quickly walked from his home which was just off campus and learned that students had taken over the Student Center.

African-American students were inside the Student Center and demonstrating against a university tuition increase. The Peoria Police were there and electricity had been cut to the building. Spotlights were shining and the police and their dogs were ready.

As the students called the police “pigs”, Ed calmly spoke with a microphone to the students inside.

After several hours of negotiations, the students left the building. Ed had confronted a disaster waiting to happen. No one was hurt.

Ed travels the country now and gives workshops on “constructive confrontation” which is about effective communication between people. The formidable walls in our neighborhood in Haiti’s capital startled him since he has spent most of his adult life trying to tear down walls.

Later that first morning in Haiti we piled into a pickup and traveled south and east of Port-au-Prince to an elite suburb called Petionville. We wanted to visit the site of La Promesse, the school that had collapsed suddenly one morning in early November.

This tragedy had riveted the world’s attention on Haiti and its courageous people.

The UN soldiers in Haiti dug through the rubble. International disaster experts were flown in. Pope Benedict sent his condolences. The world seemed to care about these Haitian students and their families.

When we arrived at the site, a small contingent of UN forces from Jordan was walking up the street from the collapsed three story building.

A big empty spot was apparent on the side of the street overlooking a steep ravine. About 30 Haitians were milling about on top of broken cement, rubble, and twisted rebar. Many were staring down into the ravine. Most people were quiet.

As we walked out onto the pancaked collapsed school, I thought I should not even be there. I wondered about crushed little bodies that may lie just beneath my dirty shoes.

One mother had lost 5 kids in the crush at the school named “ The Promise”.

Madame Telemak, a neighbor lady, standing in the debris with us, told me she heard a loud noise at 10 AM the morning the school fell. She ran over and witnessed the panic and screaming that enveloped the neighborhood. Family members and neighborhood people dug with their bare hands attempting to free anyone they could get to.

Another lady near us, wearing a black dress, sat down and put her face in her hand. She had lost no one in the disaster. She just wanted to be there.

This was Haiti’s version of 9-11, although Haiti seems to be one never ending 9-11.

A young man pointed to a small room made of cinderblock that was still standing somehow. He said it was the principal’s office. I peered in a small hole and could see some shadows of objects but I could not tell what they were.

Walls of adjacent homes that had been attached to La Promesse were hanging in various states of disarray and shambles. The walls had been partially ripped off when the school collapsed and again with the process of extrication of survivors and victims.

A tiny shattered one room house perched on the side of the hill was the home of a peanut vendor who was inside the school when it collapsed. He was killed.

After a short time, there wasn’t much more to see or talk about. Helpless doesn’t describe the situation. A few pictures and collective shaking of heads, and it was time to leave.

Ed and I ambled up onto to the street. A black sign had been hung over the street which read, “In memory of the students and professors of Petionville who lost their lives under the politics of the bourgeois and businessman.”

A well to do grocery store owner of Lebanese descent told me that morning that everyone wanted to blame the poor for the tragedy. But he blamed the government for lack of adequate construction safety codes.

I agree with my sagacious father-in-law. Walls everywhere, not just in Haiti, need to be removed so places like La Promesse don’t collapse and crush the future for all of us.

Ronald Accepted Today!!

 

Ronald is 16 years old and has been a Haitian Hearts patient for six years. Ronald is an orphan and lives in Port-au-Prince.

He was accepted by a medical center today for heart surgery which he desperately needs.

Now the paperwork.

Diocese Needs Higher Standards

I am a Catholic.

I have had 14 years of Catholic education and have been attending Mass for 55 years.

But I don’t trust our Catholic leaders in Peoria. I don’t think Bishop Jenky and Monsignor Rohlfs, and Patricia Gibson have behaved like moral Catholic leaders need to act. Especially when times get tough. Like now.

Somehow, and I don’t know how, the laity needs to hold them to higher standards. But the laity is afraid…jobs, health insurance, kids, etc. get in the way of holding the Bishop to a “higher standard”. And that is how the Diocese wants it.

Elaine Hopkins wrote this post today regarding SNAP and their news conference in Peoria.

Before my meetings with Bishop Jenky, Monsignor Rohlfs, and Patricia Gibson, I may have had a hard time believing SNAP and the Diocese’s reaction to SNAP victims. I probably would have sided with the Diocese.

Not any more.

After my personal experience with the Catholic Diocese of Peoria and the way they minimized the importance of Haitian Hearts children’s lives and obstructed the process, I feel the Diocese has been complicit in the abandonment of the very children that they should try and protect. They preach it on Sundays but don't practice it on weekdays.

Whenever I bury a Haitian Hearts patient, I think of our Diocesan leaders in their big offices and new Spalding Pastoral Care Center.

What a shame. What a lot of money. SNAP probably thinks so too.

Haitian Hearts, 2009

 

Corruption Crisis in Illinois

The "corruption crisis" in Illinois probably runs south of I-80.

Here is an article by the Peoria Journal Star emphasizing that what our Governor has touched may be tainted.

See comments that follow.


Corruption crisis creates confusion in Illinois

By CHRISTOPHER WILLS
Associated Press
Posted Dec 27, 2008 @ 03:40 PM

SPRINGFIELD —
Embattled Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich has made a point of regularly going to work at his office in Chicago. He has signed legislation and issued pardons. He has sent out press releases about predatory lending and fighting poverty.

But his arrest on federal corruption charges has clearly complicated his work as the state's chief executive and already cost the state some $20 million. The state is facing a potential $2.5 billion budget deficit and the governor doesn't have the same horsepower — or clout — to address the problem that he had just a month ago.

No one in the state capital trusts Blagojevich enough to give him authority to trim the budget on his own, as he requested in November. Any other idea he advances would probably be rejected out of hand. Yet no other official can take the lead.

"Everything just comes to a halt. You have complete paralysis," said House Republican Leader Tom Cross of Oswego.

Blagojevich, a second-term Democrat, was arrested Dec. 9 on charges accusing him of scheming to swap President-elect Barack Obama's vacant Senate seat for profit, shaking down a hospital executive for campaign donations and other wrongdoing.

The governor has defiantly insisted he's done nothing wrong and that he will not resign. His aides say he is going about business as usual.

His chief of staff, who was arrested along with Blagojevich, has resigned and been replaced by a deputy governor. Another deputy, one with a background in budget matters, has resigned and may not be replaced. Plus, a committee is expected to recommend in early January whether the state House should vote to impeach Blagojevich.

"I think it's difficult for him to manage government in the way a governor normally would," said state Rep. Gary Hannig, a Democrat from Litchfield. "This is a time when you need strong leadership from the governor's office."

The state must find a way to eliminate its deficit. If nothing is done, the most likely outcome is that it won't pay its debts to hospitals, pharmacies and nursing homes that care for the poor, forcing more of them out of business.

The problem cropped up two weeks ago when an effort to borrow money to pay overdue bills — one social-service vendor was owed $8 million and garbage collection stopped for 10 days at a state prison last month — was sidelined because the state attorney general's office refused to give immediate consent.

The delay — blamed on the governor's legal woes — cost Illinois $20 million in extra interest, according to Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias. Because the short-term borrowing plan was put off for several days after Blagojevich's arrest, the state ended up paying higher interest rates.

Standard & Poor's recently put out a negative "credit watch" on the state's AA bond rating, noting the budget deficit and the governor's legal situation could hamper efforts to find a remedy.

The governor's budget director declined an interview request. Blagojevich spokesman Lucio Guerrero said the governor is expected to soon get an update on the budget deficit — including potential solutions — from his staff.

"I think the governor has shown that he continues to govern the state and is performing his duties," he said.

Critics acknowledge that government will grind on despite Blagojevich's problems. State police will patrol. The Revenue Department will collect taxes. Snowplow crews will clear highways.

But when an emergency hits, Illinois will lack a real leader to solve the problem and smaller problems may pile up in the meantime.

Will Blagojevich be able to find people willing to serve under him on the boards and commissions that help set policy? Would those appointments even be approved? Can he hold on to his current staff and agency directors? If he delivers a State of the State address, will anyone even attend, let alone seriously consider his proposals?

"Everything he touches is tainted," said Jay Stewart, executive director of the Better Government Association in Chicago. "We know his thought process: Legal, personal, political. I don't see public interest anywhere in that."

Blagojevich won't be able to call on federal officials for help, even though Obama and some top officials in his incoming administration are from Illinois and Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., is the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate.

And though Obama plans a huge public works program next year, Illinois may not be in position to get its share. State officials have failed year after year to approve construction money that would qualify for federal matching funds. That appears unlikely to change.

Some of the governor's critics say his new problems actually won't mean a dramatic change for Illinois because he wasn't trusted or deeply involved in government even before his arrest.

"We've been leaderless for a long time," said Sen. Christine Radogno, R-Lemont. "Consequently, our state is floundering."
___
Associated Press Writers John O'Connor in Springfield and Deanna Bellandi in Chicago contributed to this report.


Copyright © 2008 GateHouse Media, Inc. Some Rights Reserved.
Original content available for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons license, except where noted.

Comments:


haitianhearts

In 2007 the Illinois Finance Authority (IFA) under Governor Blagojevich loaned OSF-Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria 460 million dollars for OSF's Milestone Project. This was the second largest loan in IFA history.

I wonder if this loan was tainted?

John A. Carroll, M.D.

Peoria


BC

Blagojevich is the governor until he is convicted or impeached. If any problems are arising it's from Legislature and the other government officials. Business as usual until this is settled, anyone refusing to work with him should be relieved of duties. At present the Legislature is busy putting back all the cuts despite the fact we can't pay for essentials. That is how we got in this mess and we will remain there as long as the same thieves are in the General Assembly. The governor got caught, but don't think for a minute he is the biggest crook. He had problems with members of legislature because he wouldn't co-operate with their brand of self help. All government is corrupt that is how business is handled. No state has wiped out corruption their elected officials just learned how to be more discrete. Every now and then one gets careless like the stupid move he made using his home phone.

Dr. Carroll..I do agree with you and your view of OSF. I doubt the money is tainted from Blagojevich. That would more come from some back scratching in our local area. The governor may have signed the necessary legislation, the crafting of it probably is closer to home. I thought OSF planned on fleecing the general public out of donations for their huge project. We both know the non-profit hospital is just a feeder for their many for profit enterprises. At least it's a loan, at some point tax payers will get it back unless OSF can figure a way around that. I have nothing but respect for the hard working staff of OSF, their corporate officials have one interest and that is profit at the expense of the patient.

Beyond Belief

Haiti had a bad 2008.

Maybe next year...

Now Katina....

When I was in Haiti last month I examined Katina.

Katina is sick and needs heart surgery again.

OSF in Peoria is rejecting her. She has sickle cell and a large lymph node on the right side of her neck. She needs to come to the United States for a good workup and surgery.

I don't have any place for her. Other medical centers don't want OSF's patients.

Here is a chat I had with Frandy yesterday regarding Katina:


12:22 PM Dejean: Hi dr Carroll
12:23 PM me: frandy,
how is katina? what is her problem??
12:24 PM Dejean: yes i am here and i've a couple of information for you
me: ok
12:25 PM Dejean: i got on the phone with her before yesterday and also this morning
me: good
Dejean: she's not doing well
me: tell me exactly what you mean
Dejean: ok
12:26 PM she's a stomac problem
12:27 PM and she feels it where she was operated on
me: please answer these questions:
Dejean: ok
12:28 PM me: 1. Is she short of breath? Soufle anle?
Dejean: no
me: 2. Does she have pain in her chest or abdomen? Li gen doule nan lestomak oubyen vant la?
Dejean: yes she does
12:29 PM me: 3. Is the boul on her neck still large? In other words, li toujour gen gwo mas la sou kou a?
4. Does she have a fever?
Dejean: yes and it is hurting her
no she does not any fever
12:30 PM she does not have any fever
me: Frandy, please tell her father that she needs a chest xray.
Dejean: ok
me: We have to find out why she has the enlarged lymph node on her neck.
12:31 PM Dejean: ok
me: thank you
Dejean: but do you think an xray would help you to find it out?
me: She can get the chest xray at Grace Children's or in a lab near Champ Mars
12:32 PM Dejean: ok
me: If she has tuberculosis, we could see tuberculosis in her lung (chest xray). Some times people have tuberculosis in their lungs and they have a lump on their neck....
12:33 PM Dejean: ok
me: The chest xray is the most important thing to do STAT...
12:34 PM Frandy, I will go for now, ok?
Dejean: ok i am gonna tell her dad everything
ok
me: thanks
Dejean: see you later
me: many thanks
Dejean: life is important to save!
me: yes
12:36 PM Dejean: you don't have to thanks me, you better thanks God for the way He helped you to save mine and for this great family i have in St louis.

Stupid Deaths, by Paul Farmer

I believe in health care as a human right. I've worked as a doctor in many places, and I've seen where to be poor means to be bereft of rights.

I saw early on, still just a medical student, the panicky dead-end faced by so many of the destitute sick: a young woman dying in childbirth; a child writhing in the spasms of a terrible disease for which a vaccine has existed — for more than a century; a friend whose guts were irreparably shredded by bacteria from impure water; an 8 year old caught in cross-fire. Li mouri bet — what a stupid death, goes one Haitian response.

Fighting such "stupid deaths" is never the work of one, or even of a small group. I've had the privilege of joining many others providing medical care to people who would otherwise not be able to get it. The number of those eager to serve is impressive, and so is the amount that can be accomplished. I believe that stupid deaths can be averted; we've done it again and again. But this hard and painful work has never yet been an urgent global priority.

The fight for health as a human right, a fight with real promise, has so far been plagued by failures. Failure because we are chronically short of resources. Failure because we are too often at the mercy of those with the power and money to decide the fates of hundreds of millions. Failure because ill health, as we have learned again and again, is more often than not a symptom of poverty and violence and inequality — and we do little to fight those when we provide just vaccines, or only treatment for one disease or another. Every premature death, and there are millions of these each year, should be considered a rebuke.

I know it's not enough to attend only to the immediate needs of the patient in front of me. We must also call attention to the failures and inadequacy of our own best efforts. The goal of preventing human suffering must be linked to the task of bringing others, many others, into a movement for basic rights.

The most vulnerable — those whose rights are trampled, those rarely invited to summarize their convictions for a radio audience — still believe in human rights, in spite of — or perhaps because of — their own troubles. Seeing this in Haiti and elsewhere has moved me deeply and taught me a great deal.

I move uneasily between the obligation to intervene and the troubling knowledge that much of the work we do, praised as "humanitarian" or "charitable," does not always lead us closer to our goal. That goal is nothing less than the refashioning of our world into one in which no one starves, drinks impure water, lives in fear of the powerful and violent, or dies ill and unattended.

Of course such a world is a utopia, and most of us know that we live in a dystopia. But all of us carry somewhere within us the belief that moving away from dystopia moves us towards something better and more humane. I still believe this.

(Dr. Paul Farmer is a founding director of Partners In Health, an international organization that provides health care to people living in poverty. Farmer established a health clinic in Hinche, Haiti, and has worked there for many years.)

Photo by John Carroll, Carefour, Haiti. November, 2008.

Independently produced for Weekend Edition Sunday by Jay Allison and Dan Gediman with John Gregory and Viki Merrick.

Christmas 2008, by Joe Zelenka

Christmas 2008

Another year and wondering what the future holds
So much to do and accomplish in so little time
Will I hear God calling me?
Will I stand up for justice?
Touch me Lord, Heal me, Come into my life

Christmas 2008

A newly elected President
A time for change
Putting behind us 8 years of turmoil and violence
Will we come together and create a new tomorrow?
Will we overcome hatred, bitterness and exploitation of others?
Will there be reason to hope?
Touch us Lord, Heal us, Come into our lives

Christmas 2008

Wars continue, racism still exists and hatred escalates into more violence
An economy that threatens our very existence
Our children look to us for hope
Will we give their world reason to believe in goodness?
Will our children inherit a world without war and violence?
We have a challenge
We have time to make this Gospel of nonviolence real
Touch us Lord, Heal us, Come into our lives

Christmas 2008

We have a mandate to feed the hungry and eradicate poverty
Will we make real the Gospel message?
Will our Churches preach the Gospel of nonviolence?
Will we work to make Jesus real in our lives?
Touch us Lord, Heal us, Come into our lives

Christmas 2008

Praise God daily, celebrate life
Pray a lot, laugh a lot, believe in yourself
See in every person you meet the person of God
Forgive, Forgive and Forgive
See everyone as made in the image of God
Make this Christmas a new beginning
And so, touch us Lord, Heal us, Come into our lives.

I Need To Get Over This

Heurese is doing well after her surgery.

As readers of this blog know, Haitian Hearts started on the “Heurese project” in the middle of this past summer.

Please see Maria’s post regarding how Frandy “found” Heurese in Port-au-Prince…a city of 3,000,000 people. The story is almost unbelieveable. And if it didn’t happen in Haiti, I might not believe it.

And readers, please tell me if I should still be disppointed with all of the people of means in Peoria that denied medical care to Heurese. Maybe my disappointment should go away.

Maybe it is my problem.

Am I making too much of a big deal out of the fact that Heurese was repeatedly turned down by the very people that should have been helping her?

And Frandy, one of the poorest kids in the Western Hemisphere is the one that goes the distance for Heurese.

Intuition would not lead me to believe this.

I was not taught this during 14 years of Catholic education. And the priests, Bishops, and their homilies at mass do not say to walk away from people like Heruese. They all say to embrace her.

And OSF, our big Catholic medical center in Peoria, says their mission is to deny no one. But they do. And my Haitian kids are dying in Haiti.

But Frandy gave Heurese some more time that she hadn’t banked on.

I need to be thankful to God for Heurese and Frandy and get over this.

Hiding News is Not Good

The Journal Star published this editorial on December 15.

If the Journal cannot send reporters to Darfur, that is understandable. But they shouldn't hide news happening several miles from their front door.

Journal Star
Posted Dec 15, 2008 @ 10:30 PM

PEORIA — Between Barack Obama running his pre-presidency out of the Windy City and bringing all sorts of global movers and shakers into town, and Rod Blagojevich - no further explanation necessary - Chicago is the media hub of the universe these days.

In a news city, arguably there's never been so much news.

Ironic, then, that at the same time so much is happening and people seem to have such a thirst to know more about it, the city's flagship newspaper, the Chicago Tribune, is in Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization. Oh, well, at least the Trib isn't begging for a bailout.

It's a sign of the times, of course. News organizations across the spectrum of print and broadcast are struggling like never before, for a variety of reasons: the dismal economy, certainly; the overwhelming number of choices for fickle and unforgiving consumers, which makes it more difficult to draw sustainable market share; the competition from the Internet; the strain on customers' time; sometimes ownership's lack of appreciation for the unique demands of this business; the cultural changes in reading and spending habits and a sense that all information is equal and ought to be free.

To be sure, newspapers and other media aren't perfect any more than any human endeavor is, and some of their injuries are self-inflicted. But it still takes people and resources to go out and gather the news, organize it so it makes sense and distribute it, no matter the vehicle of delivery. It doesn't just happen spontaneously, effortlessly, without cost. Covering the Peoria City Council or the District 150 School Board or the Illinois Legislature - at least adequately - is not really something you can outsource to Bangalore, India, or do part-time, though some will no doubt try.

The risk of these unprecedented challenges to the industry is that the kind of investigative journalism that for decades has been uncovering the hard to get - the less-than-ethical exploits of an Illinois governor, or the abuses of an Enron, or the crimes of a Nixon administration, or the genocide of a helpless and innocent population far away - will just go away because it doesn't contribute enough to the bottom line, because the payoff isn't guaranteed up-front, because the potential return doesn't justify the commitment of time.

What this means for Americans is that we don't know what we don't know. Governments and institutions that in many cases would prefer to never have the light shine on their affairs will do things to us, and not always in our best interests. The decisions most make will be less informed. And that's dangerous in a democracy.


Comments:

rjd 2 days ago

The biggest problem with 'news' today is that a lot of it is actually editorial in nature. It's alot of political spin. Case in point, the JS's recent AK47 article. Nothing but a spin. Completely unfactual. A misleading article, to say the very least. People are not going to pay good money for a 'spin' rag. Most of the news media no longer reports the news. Why have a NEWSpaper then?

RealWorld 22 hours ago

I agree RJD. I would care if the newspapers went out of business if they already were not in the pocket of politicians and local money men.

I was personally glad to see the Chicago Trib go under. Really glad. Wouldn't it be funny if a newspaper started that actually gave people the real news, not just the stories that the editors say they can print. Since the reporters are such Private I's, why didn't the tribune know about Blago? Why didn't they report it?

haitianhearts 37 minutes ago

"What this means for Americans is that we don't know what we don't know. Governments and institutions that in many cases would prefer to never have the light shine on their affairs will do things to us, and not always in our best interests. The decisions most make will be less informed. And that's dangerous in a democracy."

Like most newspapers, the Journal Star does hide what they want to hide.

For more than a decade the Journal Star has been against the Peoria Fire Department (PFD) upgrading its services to provide better care for people who call 911 in medical emergencies. Peorias three hospitals did not want the upgrade and the three hospitals advertise a lot in the Journal. This summer when the PFD was finally allowed to upgrade their services for Peorians, the Journal printed not a word of this.

And when OSF stopped Haitian kids from returning with the Haitian Hearts program to OSF for repeat heart surgery, Haitian kids have died. And when surgeries were delayed for Haitian kids in Peoria, Haitian kids in Peoria have suffered. But the Journal did not report these local crimes. The Journal Star reporters knew about these events but were stopped from reporting.

Yes, Journal Star Editors, local institutions will do things to us that our not in our best interest. And for you to hide the light on their affairs only makes sure 'we don't know what we don't know'.

John A. Carroll, M.D.
Peoria

OSF Will Pay

OSF will have to pay for their abandonment of Haitian kids.

OSF’s negligence towards Heurese and many others like her is immoral.

The Catholic Bishops and local business leaders will not be the answer here. They are all using each other.

And the poor relatives of the Haitians involved have no say so at all. They don’t have condos in south Florida and can barely feed themselves.

My guess is that the economy will take OSF down. Business deals won’t go as planned and loans will be harder to pay off. OSF’s business friends will leave them and union workers will have preferred providers elsewhere.

Even the Peoria Journal Star will leave OSF's side.

OSF has driven away good physicians to other areas of the country as OSF has controlled our local medical market but forgotten why they were founded. Individual patient care and care for the community are not OSF’s priorities, no matter what OSF says in their advertisements.

OSF is very misleading. I was mislead for two decades.

Power, money, and corruption are driving forces at OSF in Peoria. There is an intricate web of deception in place here.

OSF’s administrators Keith Steffen and Paul Kramer need to go. But will they? Probably not as long as they make money for OSF. But if they make a bad business deal, they are gone. The Catholics have put them up to be their fall guys, and when they fall, they will fall hard.

OSF is managed by hypocrites.

I think the Sisters should sell while they can. They had to sell their HealthPlans to Humana. Time is a wastin'.

Heurese Has Surgery

Dear Reader(s),

Heurese had heart surgery today. Her chest was closed around noon and all went very well.

She is the owner of a new heart valve.

Heurese received state of the art medical treatment by the medical center and state of the art love by her host family.

I will have more on Heurese's courageous struggle that never gave up and lead her to the operating room today.

Stay tuned.

Will OSF let Katina Die Too?

I examined Katina in Haiti just recently. She needs to return to OSF Children's Hospital for more heart surgery. Katina was operated at OSF in 2002.

OSF has denied all Haitian Hearts' patients that were operated at OSF repeat heart surgery. Two have died.

OSF is in the middle of their hospital expansion that will cost about $500 million. They got a loan from Governor Blagojevich to help out. OSF also had a lobbyist work with Stuart Levine on the Illinois Health Facilities Board to have another OSF project approved. Mr. Levine is in jail now.

OSF is a very busy medical center with alot of its interest at the state level. I doubt they will let Katina back in for heart surgery that she desperately needs. And OSF was founded for people like Katina.

Let me know if you have any ideas what to do to help Katina and many others like her that I am following in Haiti. Other hospitals are not excited about operating on OSF's heart patients from Haiti. They have told me so. (Katina was rejected by a well known medical center in Texas yesterday.)

It is not easy finding another medical center for Katina.

Please help.

Mirterlande Makes It

Well, our young 16 year old girl Mirterlande made it through surgery. She is up and walking and acting like nothing happended. She will be discharged from the hospital today. (See Maria's description of Mirterlande's saga on Live from Haiti.)

The tiny muscles and tendons that support her mitral valve in her heart were all “scrunched up” (medical term) and destroyed from her previous rheumatic fever. As these muscles became distorted over the last few years, the valve leaflets also were injured and the leaflets did not open and close the way they were designed. So with each beat of her heart, blood was regurgitating up into her lung and then, when the heart rests in diastole, too much blood would rush down into her left ventricle which caused it to swell and become weak.

Clinically, because of the above scenario, Mirterlande was barely able to walk because she was in congestive heart failure. When Haitian Hearts first examined her two years ago in Haiti, she was much more robust appearing. She has lost alot of weight due to cardiac cachexia. And she survived a month in the General Hospital in Port-au-Prince earlier this year when she was critically ill and treated for severe heart failure.

Her mother lives in the Artibonite Valley in Haiti and could not provide care for her. The tropical storms washed away her mother's garden in the Valley. So Mirterlande was living in Port-au-Prince with her older sister Karmin who saved her life multiple times during the last couple of years.

Many thoughts rush through my head each time I see one of my Haitian patients asleep on the operating table in the US. I think of all the suffering they have had. I think of what all their families back in Haiti have been through just to keep them alive. When a family member is sick in Haiti, the entire family is stressed. A cow may need to be sold and other family members need to do without.

In the hospital this week, the surgeons and heart surgery team in the operating room worked as a family to save Mirterlande’s life. They have worked for decades together and made a very difficult surgery look routine. The perfusionist, anesthesiologist, and surgeons are constantly talking to each other about the patient’s status during the case. There is no radio playing music, no one is listening to the city council chirp in the background, and there is no idle talk in the operating room.

All eyes and thoughts were on Mirterlande lying in the middle of the cold room.

After surgery, as Mirterlande was wheeled down the hall adjacent to the operating room, in a seamless fashion the cardiovascular intensive care team took control from the operating room team. They are all professionals and know how to troubleshoot any problem that may arise in the early hours after surgery.

This is not the biggest medical center in the world, but it is the best medical center in the world for Mirterlande and many others like her.

In reality, Mirterlande had to wait too long in Haiti for this surgery. And she should have been able to have this surgery in Haiti by Haitian physicians.

And if I really want to be honest, Mirterlande should not have got rheumatic fever in the first place. But poverty breeds diseases like this that steal away young people like this one. However Mirterlande so far has cheated poverty out of another innocent victim.