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Maybe the State of Mass. should yank Wal-Mart's pharmacy license if Wal-Mart doesn't want to follow the state law.

 

Pharmacists are supposed to dispense pills according to doctors prescriptions. If a pharmacist has a moral problem with this, maybe he should have gone to divinity school instead of pharmacy school.

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Honestly I don't see why any company should be forced to sell anything they don't want to.  Simply more government interference for little gain.

 

Hey Mr. Bar Owner, beer is a regulated substance.  You now have to carry every kind made.  Wait, let me change my stance.  :lol:

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No one is forcing Wal-Mart to operate a phamacy in Massachusetts. However, like any other business in any other state, Wal-Mart should comply with that state's regulations, just like every other pharmacy in Mass. Wal-Mart can not choose which regulations to follow, and which ones not to follow.

 

The beer analogy doesn't work. Yes, it is a regulated substance, but it is "over-the-counter" and there is a variety of choices. You can walk into a bar and they may not have Stella Artois, but you can either choose to go to another establishment, or drink another brand. Medications are prescribed by a professional, to be filled by a professional at a licensed pharmacy. Many medications, until they reach the generic stage, are the only choice the consumer has. To ensure that a burden isn't placed on an individual, in many times a sick individual, to find a pharmacy that caries a specific medication, Masachusetts has a regulation in place ensuring that the individual can walk into any pharmacy in the state and get that prescription filled. Wal-Mart has given no legitimate reason other than an ambiguous "for business reasons" as to why they feel they don't have to comply.

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Honestly I don't see why any company should be forced to sell anything they don't want to.  Simply more government interference for little gain.

 

Hey Mr. Bar Owner, beer is a regulated substance.  You now have to carry every kind made.  Wait, let me change my stance.  :lol:

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I tried to take a doctor's prescription for Ayinger Hefeweizen into the bar and they wouldn't just give it to me. Bastards.

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Honestly I don't see why any company should be forced to sell anything they don't want to.  Simply more government interference for little gain.

 

Hey Mr. Bar Owner, beer is a regulated substance.  You now have to carry every kind made.  Wait, let me change my stance.  :lol:

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The beer analogy doesn't work because regardless of which brand of beer a bar has or does not have, you can still get beer. It may not be the variety you like, but you can still get a feremneted barley-hopps beverage with an alcohol content between 5-10%. If a paharmacy doesn't carry a drug, you can't get it or anything comparable.

 

I also think that when it comes to medicine and medical services, the state has extra authority to ensure everyone has equal access. To start a slippery slope argument, if you allow pharmacies to stock drugs based on their own moral decsions, do you also allow doctors to withhold treatment for people/conditions which they find immoral? Can doctors refuse to treat unmarried patients for STDs because they don't approve of their lifestyles? Can they refuse to treat suspects injured in the commission of a crime?

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The general idea here it that State and Religion must be seperate - no disagreement by me - we watch out for that all the time. But gosh, a prayer session by some students behind closed doors in a public building could cause the most catastrophic results! - like somehow some kids trudging home might have some sort of terrifying dream after walking past a closed door...

 

Now, citizen's personal beliefs in their private affairs, in the public economic sector, is to be a subject of governmental scrutiny? Shall they in the private sector be fired and criminally or civally charged for their personal beliefs?

 

We should be careful when we trample on what our Founding Fathers set up for us, and be very circumspect.

 

Reflect on the words of a mid-century German citizen, a Protestant Minister, Martin Neimoller.  It always starts as a murmer, a minor intolerance, then grows...

 

Said Neimoller:

 

'They came for the Jews

and I did not speak out

because I was not a Jew

 

Then they came for the Communists

and I did not speak out

because I was not a Communist.

 

Then they came for the trade unionists

and I did not speak out

because I was not a trade unionist.

 

Then they came for me

and there was no one left

to speak out for me.

 

Pastor Martin Niemöller"

 

He perished in a concentration camp.

I beg of you, do not countance interference by the State in people's expression, religious or otherwise.

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They can express it all they want, just not when they are performing and being paid to perform, a public service. I don't care what your religion or political beliefs are, if you are an EMT, you can't arrive at the scene of a car accident and refuse to treat a victim who is gay or black or whatever. If you don't like it, get a job where other people don't suffer so your beliefs can remain pure.

 

The notion that christians, the vast, vast, vast majority of people in this country who are running the show from dawn 'til dusk from coast to coast are some poor picked on minority who is in danger of being herded into concentration camps is beyond average paranoia, it boders on the pathological. The party they support controls both houses of congress, the Presidency and has just placed two hand picked judges on the Supreme Court and vetoed a third.

 

Christians are far more in danger of becoming an oppressive majority than an oppressed minority. I understand though that to keep the cash donations flowing from christians, those who rely on their support need to keep them perpetually up in arms by fostering the myth that they are victims of a large, powerful and anti-christian culture. The result of that twisted logic is that rarest of

all breeds: a persecuted majority. Makes sense. Kind of like tall short people, rich poor people and alive dead people.

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Maybe the State of Mass. should yank Wal-Mart's pharmacy license if Wal-Mart doesn't want to follow the state law. 

 

Pharmacists are supposed to dispense pills according to doctors prescriptions.  If a pharmacist has a moral problem with this, maybe he should have gone to divinity school instead of pharmacy school.

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It is an interesting dichotomy for those who profess to be anti-government. The reason for being anti-government isn't that its simply fun or lets you get dates with all the cool chicks. There is a logical basis to it along the lines of government action inhibiting individual freedom. Protecting and enforcing the rights of powerless individuals as against large and powerful institutions like governments makes sense.

 

Wal-Mart is not an individual for one thing. Their customers are individuals. Government isn't the only entity whose actions can negatively impact individual freedom. Politico-religious groups with their endless bundles of cash and armies of lobbyists working hand in hand with a business entity as powerful as Wal-Mart can do the job of inhibiting individual freedom just as effectively as a government can.

 

Here, the anti-government crowd might, in a fit of self flattery as the defenders of freedom, end up supporting Wal-Mart, a large and powerful entity with tons of cash, political power and shady connections to shadier politicians against the needs of solitary individuals to get medicines they and their doctors have decided they need. Thank God someone is watching out for poor Wal-Mart against the nefarious interests of these individual, politically unconnected, pay check to pay check living customers. Cry the beloved corporation.

 

I understand perfectly the Libertarian impulse to favor the rights of individuals such as with gun control and tax collection but I don't understand their tendency to treat corporations as "individuals". They are not, they are institutions, organizations, etc. In this particular case, the power of government is not being harnessed to take away rights of individuals but is instead being harnessed to give individuals and their interests a fighting chance in dealing with institutions that would otherwise have a field day at the public's expense.

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Thanks to Johnny and Avenger for the replies to my "tongue planted firmly in cheek" analogy. Good job, boys.

 

As for the rest of the questions, I think it's OK for pharmacists/doctors to refuse to treat people. Of course, I also think it's perfectly acceptable to bash people's heads in with a baseball bat for really minor transgressions like flipping cigarette butts out the window of the car.

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Thanks to Johnny and Avenger for the replies to my "tongue planted firmly in cheek" analogy.  Good job, boys.

 

As for the rest of the questions, I think it's OK for pharmacists/doctors to refuse to treat people.  Of course, I also think it's perfectly acceptable to bash people's heads in with a baseball bat for really minor transgressions like flipping cigarette butts out the window of the car.

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Sorry - I missed the tongue in cheek smiley guy on your post - my bad.

 

So, what is your real arguement on this topic?

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Thanks to Johnny and Avenger for the replies to my "tongue planted firmly in cheek" analogy.  Good job, boys.

 

As for the rest of the questions, I think it's OK for pharmacists/doctors to refuse to treat people.  Of course, I also think it's perfectly acceptable to bash people's heads in with a baseball bat for really minor transgressions like flipping cigarette butts out the window of the car.

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Well, I knew you were doing the tongue-in-cheek thing. I was just heading off at the pass anyone else who wanted to use some other variation of that analogy.

 

I don't think under any normal circumstances is it OK for a healthcare professional or a pharmacist to refuse to give someone treatment or to fill a doctor prescribed medicine. In this case, we can assume (because Wal-Mart has been tight-lipped about it) that Wal-Mart is making some kind of moral judgement as to which prescriptions they want to fill, and which ones they don't. Under the Mass Board of Pharmacy regulations, they can't make that decision. They are, of course, perfectly welcome to try and sue for that privledge, just as these women are perfectly right to file suit to make them comply with the regulation.

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Well, I knew you were doing the tongue-in-cheek thing.  I was just heading off at the pass anyone else who wanted to use some other variation of that analogy.

 

I don't think under any normal circumstances is it OK for a healthcare professional or a pharmacist to refuse to give someone treatment or to fill a doctor prescribed medicine.  In this case, we can assume (because Wal-Mart has been tight-lipped about it) that Wal-Mart is making some kind of moral judgement as to which prescriptions they want to fill, and which ones they don't.  Under the Mass Board of Pharmacy regulations, they can't make that decision.  They are, of course, perfectly welcome to try and sue for that privledge, just as these women are perfectly right to file suit to make them comply with the regulation.

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*Whoooooooooop* (sound of Sarcasmatron being activated) I'm perfectly comfortable leaving the issue of access to needed medications up to Wal Mart executives because I am sure they have my best interests at heart. *ffffffwippp* (sound of sarcasmatron being deactivated).

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Thanks to Johnny and Avenger for the replies to my "tongue planted firmly in cheek" analogy.  Good job, boys.

 

As for the rest of the questions, I think it's OK for pharmacists/doctors to refuse to treat people.  Of course, I also think it's perfectly acceptable to bash people's heads in with a baseball bat for really minor transgressions like flipping cigarette butts out the window of the car.

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Just another missunderstood genius going unappreciated in his time.

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They came for Plan B

and I did not speak out

because I oppose abortion

 

They came for Ortho Novum 777

and I did not speak up

because I am not a promiscuous woman

 

They came for Oxycontin

and I did not speak up

because it is a narcotic like heroin

 

They came for  Viagara

and there was no one left

to speak for me

 

The author died without ever having had another erection...

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:lol:B-):lol:

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It sounds like he's arguing, though, that pharmacists should have the right to stock drugs according to their own morals.

 

Even though women don't have the right to govern their bodies according to their own morals.  Pharmacists should have a choice because women shouldn't.  :lol:  I love the logical fallacy of abortion arguments

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What is up with you lately? That is around 7 or 8 posts in a row that were either funny, made sense or both. Cut it out.

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Anyone read Freakonomics? The economist author makes the argument--well-supported--that legalizing abortions has had more to do with the reduction in crime over the last 15 years than any other factor. He examines all the factors (changes in how crime is reported, underreprorting, gun control laws, death penalty, etc.) and concludes that the only three that have a real consequence are more prisons (keeps criminals off the streets), more cops, and lots of abortions (which he argues is the biggest factor).

 

Without backing this up with his facts (read the book if you want them), the reason for arguing that more abortions cuts crime is this. The women who have abortions often fall into one or more of the following stereotypes: (1) single, (2) poor, (3) drug-user, (4) young, and (5) don't want the child. It's been shown that children of mothers who fall into these categories are more likely to be criminals. Since about a million women have abortions a year (horrifying), that's a lot of potential criminals off the streets.

 

BTW, that's not my personal argument for abortion. Just a tidbit, and my contribution to a thread hijack.

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Anyone read Freakonomics? The economist  author makes the argument--well-supported--that legalizing abortions has had more to do with the reduction in crime over the last 15 years than any other factor. He examines all the factors (changes in how crime is reported, underreprorting, gun control laws, death penalty, etc.) and concludes that the only three that have a real consequence are more prisons (keeps criminals off the streets), more cops, and lots of abortions (which he argues is the biggest factor).

 

Without backing this up with his facts (read the book if you want them), the reason for arguing that more abortions cuts crime is this. The women who have abortions often fall into one or more of the following stereotypes: (1) single, (2) poor, (3) drug-user, (4) young, and (5) don't want the child. It's been shown that children of mothers who fall into these categories are more likely to be criminals. Since about a million women have abortions a year (horrifying), that's a lot of potential criminals off the streets.

 

BTW, that's not my personal argument for abortion. Just a tidbit, and my contribution to a thread hijack.

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I didn't read it but that's pretty much always been my thinking. If you believe the statistics, there are between 750,000 and 4,000,000 abortions in America every year. If even 10% of those kids were born because abortion was made illegal that would be a significant group of at risk.

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pharmacists being required to carry drugs is a VERY grey area. i don't think they have to stock rubbers so i doubt they'd have to stock the morning after pill.

 

there are TONS more prisoners in the US, as well as the abortions mentioned above.

 

i don't know if i read this in freakenomics or somewhere else, but the aborted fetuses would have been members of demographic groups most likely to be criminals

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