If your FDA-approved medical device injures, disables or kills you, that's too bad. The "doctrine of pre-emption" protects manufacturers from all liability. You're on your own. You have no recourse. The multibillion-dollar global conglomerates that design and produce these (often laughably flawed) devices, admit they assumed President Obama would revoke the handy pre-emption escape hatch, which is unfair and irrational -- not to mention cruel -- but it has remained intact. Well-funded lobbyists: priceless.
Can you believe it? We're already being dragged through another NPR pledge drive.
(Be sure to get the "officially sanctioned" Carl Kasell doll as a thank-you gift!)
There is a quiet war going on in America, with hundreds of millions of dollars per year at stake. Nobody is being killed, thank goodness. They're already dead.
America, we are constantly reminded, is the richest, most powerful, most industrious and inventive nation on Earth, a beacon of democracy, a model for those who aspire to lives of liberty, equal opportunity and material comfort.
To quote the tell-it-like-it-is singer, Cee Lo Green, "Ain't that some shit?"
There is a charming, cozy enclave of the American psyche in which places such as Lake Wobegon, Mayberry and the Smuckers' family home repose. It's that halcyon world where Father Knows Best, and a man's word is his bond.
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