3 stories of life and death in the morning news

By Tom Quiner

How do we treat life?

Just read the morning newspaper for a glimpse into the workings of the American culture regarding life issues.

The Des Moines Register had a huge story, complete with huge photograph, emblazoned across the front page on a life and death issue. A $31 million dollar road project has come to a screeching halt because federal investigators discovered a single Indiana bat in close proximity to the construction site.

Not a thousand bats.

Not a hundred.

One.

The Indiana Bat is protected by Endangered Species laws at both the federal and state level.

The finding of this lonely little bat resulted in a call from the feds to conduct a $30,000 study to determine if the bat population will be hurt by this project.

The same federal government is taking taxpayer money to provide abortions through various backdoor channels via Obamacare. (As a point of reference: at about $500 per abortion, that’s about 60 human beings that could be aborted for the same amount of money.)

Recap:

Indiana bats: worth saving … at taxpayer expense.

Human beings in the womb: disposable … at taxpayer expense.

Also on the front page of the Register, an elderly woman died in a California retirement home.

The woman collapsed and was barely breathing. What to do?

Here’s what employees were told they could NOT do at this facility: apply CPR. It is against company policy. Robyn Grant, director of public policy and advocacy for the National Consumer Voice for Quality Longterm Care was stunned:

“I was appalled to hear of a policy at a facility that will not give CPR. Who knew? I guess this has never come up before, but it will from now on. It’s an incredible tragedy.”

The executive director of Glenwood Gardens, Jeffrey Toomer confirmed that this is indeed their policy:

“In the event of a health emergency at this independent living community, our practice is to immediately call emergency medical personnel for assistance and to wait with the individual needing attention until such personnel arrives. That is the protocol we followed.”

This policy reflects a growing tension in our culture on when does life stop being valuable. The euthanasia and assisted suicide movements have tremendous energy from the political left. The policy of withholding CPR from the elderly is of a piece with their thinking.

On page three, the Register reported on a hit and run accident in New York. A young couple were killed. The woman was pregnant. Doctors delivered her 4 pound son by Caesarean section, but he did not survive.

The parents were Orthodox Jews. A spokesman for the victim’s Orthodox Jewish community, Isaac Abraham, call for justice:

“It is of upmost importance that the driver be charged with a triple homicide when he’s caught … and nothing less.”

Authorities have not yet found the driver of the BMW that killed the three victims. When they do, will they acknowledge the humanity of the baby and charge the driver with a triple homicide?

In other words, will they consider his brief life to be as valuable as an Indiana Bat, or will they consider it to be disposable, much like the elderly woman in the California retirement home?

How do we treat life? It depends on whether you’re a rodent or a human being.