ENEMY OF THE STATE

WHILE EDITING MY FILM LET TRUTH BE THE BIAS in 1994, I was surrounded by people who tried desperately — and unsuccessfully —to exert their will over the contents of my first-ever film about health freedom. I was inundated by the musings of extremists on every side of the issue, and one of the quotes that people kept mailing me was supposedly written by Benjamin Rush, one of the signers of the U.S. Constitution.

The quote attributed to Rush was relatively unknown at the time, but has since become a rallying cry for those pursuing what I call “medical freedom of choice” in America. You can find it on hundreds of websites — but not in LET TRUTH BE THE BIAS.

"Unless we put Medical Freedom into the Constitution,” Rush is reported to have said, “the time will come when medicine will organize into an undercover dictatorship. . . restrict the art of healing to one class of men, and deny equal privilege to others. All such laws are un-American and despotic and have no place in a Republic.”

Rush was a Physician, writer, educator, and was also ‘the father of psychiatry’ in many ways. If it were true that he had spoken or written those words, it would have provided powerful fodder for my film. Imagine, one of the framers of the Constitution who had the foresight to include medical freedom alongside religious freedom!

So like any good journalist, I tried to verify the accuracy of the quote attributed to Rush. I looked in the National Archives, the Library of Congress, and finally, spoke with historian and author Alyn Brodsky, who had examined thousands of documents while researching his book "Benjamin Rush: Patriot and Physician." Brodsky assured me that he had seen nothing even remotely similar to the quote — and told me that it didn’t even sound like Rush, a man who was revered for using bloodletting, mercury and other elixirs as agents of “healing.” He researched it further, however, and months later concluded that the quote was not genuine.

Today, now more than ever, though, I wish Rush had spoken those words. And more importantly, I wish he had inserted those words into our Constitution or Bill of Rights.

For today, I'm commiserating the fact that a poor mother and her 13 year old son were forced to run away from home in Minnesota because the government was going to FORCE chemotherapy on the lad.

It's another sad day in the 'Home of the Free.'

We have allowed often corrupt and ill-educated people — from within corrupt and misguided entities like “Child Protection Services” to exert their will over free beings. . .over parents . . .and in truth, over us all. These are the same groups who decide to “protect” 50 percent of foster children by drugging them with mind-wasting anti-psychotic drugs, who often rip children from the arms of their loved ones, and who force their idealogy on millions of the nation’s most vulnerable citizens.

And now they’ve done so to Daniel Hauser.

Daniel, a 13-year old boy from Minnestota had the audacity to ‘say No to Chemo,’ for his Hodgkins. The “Child Protection” authorities forced his parents into court, where another clueless and spineless judge decided that Daniel must undergo chemotherapy to ‘save’ his life.

Today, now more than ever, I wish Rush had spoken those words.

His mother Colleen took off in the cool of a Minnesota night on Monday — and is now a fugitive from ‘justice.’ There is a nationwide manhunt for Daniel and his Mom, and the blogosphere is full of righteous people screaming “Child Abuse!” and “Throw the Parents in Jail!”

The Hauser's are now enemies of the state.

I love my country. But once more I am ashamed to live in a nation where we really believe that this is justice — that we have the RIGHT to make these decisions for others.

If Rush had written those words, this would not be relevant. Parents — and individuals — would be allowed to make their own personal health choices. Just as proponents of chemotherapy think alternative cures are quackery, I can guarantee you that proponents of alternative medicines — tens of millions of them — believe that chemo is quackery too.

But none of that matters now, evidently. A frightened 13 year old boy — and his equally frightened mother are on the lam, sent into hiding by the powerful forces of "child protection" services, big medicine — and their equally senseless judges. It is they who made the decision, not Colleen Hauser or Daniel. It is they who want to take a precious child away from his loving parents simply because he doesn’t want any more poison in his body.

You can disagree — or you can think the Hauser’s are crazy — but NO ONE should have the right to force medical treatment onto a 13-year-old boy — tied to a gurney like a criminal — against his will. THAT is a medical dictatorship.

Oh, how I wish Rush had spoken those words.