If I had to think about one trend that is really causing me to doubt the morality of the secular left, it’s their continued support for transing children. I can understand why they think that unborn children are too small to care about. That’s why they support abortion. But I just can’t understand why they want to mislead children into a life of suffering just to make “a lot of money”.

Take a look at this article from the Daily Caller:

U.S. hospitals charged nearly $120 million over five years for sex-change procedures performed on around 14,000 children, according to new data compiled by medical watchdog Do No Harm.

The first-of-its-kind database, which logs sex-change procedures given to children nationwide between 2019 and 2023, catalogs a total of 5,747 minors who underwent sex-change surgeries, along with 8,579 who obtained puberty blockers or cross sex hormones.

Do No Harm believes the problem is likely even bigger than the data shows. The numbers, which are drawn from insurance claims data across all 50 states, do not include self-pay, charity payments, internal Veterans Affairs claims or patients covered by Kaiser Health Plans.

To create its dataset, the watchdog group matched gender-related diagnosis codes with codes for procedures related to gender transitions, such as body modification surgeries, cross sex hormones and puberty blockers.

Do No Harm Chairman Dr. Stanley Goldfarb said during a press call that the database should dispel myths that these procedures are a “rare” event or localized to a few places.

In case you missed my previous post about what secular leftists in the medical field think they are doing, their motivation is very simple.

This article from the Daily Wire explains it:

“It’s a lot of money,” VUMC Clinic for Transgender Health’s Dr. Shayne Sebold Taylor said at one Medicine Grand Rounds lecture, video reveals. “These surgeries make a lot of money.”

Taylor noted that a “chest reconstruction” can bring in $40,000 per patient, and someone “just on routine hormone treatment, who I’m only seeing a few times a year, can bring in several thousand dollars … and actually makes money for the hospital.”

Citing the Philadelphia Center for Transgender Surgery, Taylor said vaginoplasty surgeries can generate $20,000, gushing that it “has to be an underestimate,” since hospital stay, anesthesia, post-op visits, and other add-ons are not included in the total.

“And the female-to-male bottom surgeries, these are huge money makers,” the doctor continued, adding that such surgeries could bring in “up to $100,000” for the hospital.

Some clinics are “entirely” “supported” financially by such phalloplasty surgeries, Taylor boasted.

“These surgeries are labor intensive, there are a lot of follow-ups, they require a lot of our time, and they make money,” she emphasized. “They make money for the hospital.”

They’re saying “it’s a lot of money” but can’t we do something to help kids other than give them dangerous drugs and violent mutilation? Seriously. It’s better to just talk things out with children who, for one reason or another, clearly have mental issues that need care and therapy. I don’t know why our response to the problems of kids is always to do what’s best for the (greedy) adults who want “money for the hospital”.

How should we fix this? Well, Tennessee attorney general Jonathan Skrmetti seems to be doing a pretty good job of doing things the right way – by winning case after case.

The Daily Signal explains:

Skrmetti has been at the forefront of battles with progressives over gender ideology, most notably foiling the Biden-Harris administration’s proposed Title IX changes.

The administration’s adjustments would have mandated that biological boys be allowed to play girls sports at school and to use girls’ restrooms and locker rooms, among other things.

Despite facing several challenges from the Biden-Harris Justice Department, Skrmetti successfully defended Tennessee’s ban on so-called gender-affirming care for children. This is the case pending at the U.S. Supreme Court.

The attorney general also won a U.S. District Court case against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which sought to mandate that medical providers perform, and insurers cover, some sex-change procedures.

Skrmetti also went to the District Court as well as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit to successfully defend Tennessee’s policy forbidding a change in the biological sex listed on birth certificates.

Regarding that case pending at the Supreme Court, the Biden administration is going after Tennessee for banning irreversible, unproven medical procedures on children.

Skrmetti tweeted this out on Tuesday:

“The people of Tennessee, through their elected representatives, took measured action with Senate Bill 1 to protect kids from irreversible, unproven medical procedures. Lawmakers recognized that there is little to no credible evidence to justify the serious risks these procedures present to youth and joined a growing number of European countries in restricting their use on minors with gender-identity issues. The federal government, in its arguments to the Supreme Court, puts its faith in a false and manufactured consensus that ignores the many doctors, States, and countries who have looked at the evidence and determined these treatments are too risky for kids. The Constitution does not prevent the States from regulating the practice of medicine where hot-button social issues are concerned. People who disagree with restrictions on irreversible pediatric procedures for gender transition are free to advocate for change through state elections.”

Keep an eye on Tennessee’s attorney general and this Supreme Court case. If anyone can save these poor kids from the greed of the secular left, it’s him. And if you’re still living and paying taxes in these blue states that support these procedures, then maybe it’s time to think about moving to a better state.

Following up on my post from yesterday, I found two more articles showing what poor service we get for our tax dollars from secular leftists. Yesterday, we saw how FEMA was getting in the way of Elon Musk giving aid to hurricane victims, and how FEMA had wasted all their money on illegal immigrant welfare, and how the Democrats would benefit from not helping the hurricane victims at all.

Today, let’s look at a couple of articles from the New York Post. I have to give credit to Dr. Frank Turek for finding both of these articles and posting them on Twitter. If you are not following him, you really should. He tweets a nice mix of apologetics and policy.

Here is Frank’s Twitter account.

First article: (Frank’s tweet)

In FEMA’s alphabet, DEI comes first.

A startling 2023 FEMA webinar features federal health and disaster personnel trumpeting the urgent need to move away from policies that benefit the greatest number of people and instead turn focus toward “disaster equity” where aid is distributed based on innate characteristics like sexual orientation and gender identity.

[…]The initiatives raised at the panel discussion echo many of those on FEMA’s own website, which proudly proclaims instilling “equity as a foundation of emergency management” as goal 1.

“Underserved communities, as well as specific identity groups, often suffer disproportionately from disasters. As a result, disasters worsen inequities already present in society,” the declaration reads in part.

Maybe, as a taxpayer, you thought that the Federal Emergency Management Agency would occupy itself with… emergency management. But that’s not the case. Secular leftists don’t have a rational grounding for morality. When you put them in charge of anything, they don’t see it as their job to serve others. They see their job as looking after themselves – their feelings, and their approval from peers. When you give them money, they don’t solve problems with it. They just use it to virtue signal and buy the approval of their friends. This is why it’s a waste of money to elect secular leftists. They can watch the Black Lives Matter and Antifa domestic terrorists run up 1-2 BILLION dollars in damages, and then turn around and focus on pre-dawn raiding the homes of peaceful pro-lifers with armored vehicles and fully-automatic assault rifles.

Here’s the second article. (Frank’s tweet)

Hundreds of special operations personnel in North Carolina have formed their own homegrown rescue and supply operation in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene after they grew tired of waiting for the federal government to get its act together.

The Post found an all-volunteer operation being run out of a Harley-Davidson dealership with ruthless efficiency and military precision.

“Who’s FEMA?” ex-Green Beret Adam Smith derisively responded when asked about the agency’s presence on the ground since the deadly storm ravaged the rural western part of the state.

“This disaster has definitively proven without a shadow of a doubt FEMA’s incompetence and incapability,” he said, noting that the agency didn’t even show up until Thursday — almost a week after the storm that has killed at least 232, nearly half of them in the mountainous west of the Tar Heel State.

[…]They’re using their own aircraft to fly doctors, medicine, generators, fuel and food to isolated residents cut off from the world by the unprecedented floods to washed out mountain roads and wiped entire towns off the map.

[…]Now that the effort has taken on a life of its own, Smith and others leading the operation have gone from cursing FEMA for its absence to hoping they never come back.

Smith said he fears their carefully calibrated rescue mission will be bogged down with governmental red tape if the feds show up.

“Nobody out here wants the federal agencies to come in. FEMA has walked into operations centers like this and has attempted to just take over and tell them what they’re doing is illegal and they’re not allowed to keep going. I’ve seen it firsthand in this area,” Smith told The Post.

“My biggest fear is they’ll move into the area and in the process they’ll reinvent the wheel and rebuild the entire process.”

Smith said he’s even directly told agencies to stay away.

“I’ve respectfully told FEMA individuals on a couple of different occasions, ‘don’t come to our location, we don’t want your help.’”

In just a few days, the “Redneck Air Force” has evolved from surveying road damage and going door-to-door on horseback to the military-scale operation that stands today.

With the group’s rescue operations now complete, they’ve turned their attention to flying supplies to communities cut off from communication and electricity.

By the way, if you are in the Charlotte / Rock Hill area, and would like to attend a really good apologetics conference, check out the Southern Evangelical Seminary National Apologetics conference this Friday and Saturday. It features a few of the recent guests we’ve had on the Knight and Rose Show: Fuz Rana, Casey Luskin and Frank Turek.

On the weekend, I noticed a number of disturbing reports of aid to hurricane victims being blocked by FEMA. Also, FEMA claims that they don’t have the money to help hurricane victims. Did they spend all the taxpayer’s money on illegal immigrants? We’ll see. And finally, I saw people floating theories about why the Democrats might want to block aid to rural voters in Tennessee and North Carolina.

The first article is from Fox Business:

Elon Musk on Friday slammed the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), claiming that it is blocking shipments of Starlink satellite internet deliveries in hurricane-ravaged North Carolina.

“FEMA is not merely failing to adequately help people in trouble, but is actively blocking citizens who try to help!” the billionaire claimed on X.

Musk said he had just received a note from a SpaceX engineer, Starlink’s parent company, in Asheville, North Carolina, who said the company has “powered up two large operating bases for choppers to deliver goods into hands. We’ve deployed 300+ starlinks and outpour is it has saved many lives.”

But Musk said the engineer claimed that FEMA is “actively blocking shipments and seizing goods and services locally and locking them away to state they are their own. It’s very real and scary how much they have taken control to stop people helping. We are blocked now on the shipments of new starlinks coming in until we get an escort from the fire dept. but that may not be enough.”

This second article is from New York Post:

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas set off outrage Wednesday when he told reporters that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) “does not have the funds” to see Americans through the rest of this Atlantic hurricane season — after the agency spent more than $1.4 billion since the fall of 2022 to address the migrant crisis.

[…]Critics pointed out that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) allocated $640.9 million this year in FEMA-administered funds to aid state and local governments coping with the influx of asylum seekers — though Mayorkas’ office fired back late Thursday, insisting that those funds couldn’t be used for hurricane relief because Congress authorized them specifically for the migrant crisis.

The third article is from Daily Signal:

Hurricane Helene wreaked havoc on the deepest red areas of North Carolina. Hundreds are dead and missing in the region. Destroyed roads and bridges and lack of water and electricity will make voting a challenge in a region that contributed a net of 231,000 votes for Donald Trump’s 2020 margin of 74,000 votes in the state.

[…]However, the concern is that measures designed to help voters in hurricane-affected areas might be applied across the state, particularly in densely populated regions that are less affected, creating the potential for partisan advantage. There is a high probability of a sue-and-settle lawsuit on 14th Amendment equal protection grounds brought by the likes of Marc Elias that would argue that loosened voting rules in the West must be applied evenly throughout North Carolina—even in urban areas untouched by the hurricane. This was the same tactic used successfully in 2020 with COVID-19 as the excuse to change election rules.

[…]If Vice President Kamala Harris flips North Carolina, she wins the White House.

The GOP, recognizing these concerns, is mobilizing the state Legislature to push back against some of these changes. However, with early voting fast approaching, the Republican effort faces a race against time. There is also uncertainty about what additional changes may be implemented by Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper or the North Carolina State Board of Elections, potentially bypassing the Legislature entirely.

This reminds me of the words of Rahm Emanuel, former Chicago mayor and chief of staff to President Barack Obama: “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.”

Indeed. That’s how the Democrats in government often see their responsibilities to the people who pay their salaries.