Those who admired the success of Dr. Ben Carson as he so humbly in his soft spoken voice told the world at the first Republican Debate (with over 24 million viewers watching),  all learned that he was the first to successfully separate  conjoined Siamese twins. We watched him take all the man credit for his God given gifted hands.  But unfortunately in all his humility, he forgot to mention that he was assisted by a surgical team of  70 other highly skilled members, which included other expert surgeons.   Well, the other doctors and members of the surgical team aren’t running for president so I guess they would understand if Carson didn’t want to acknowledge them.

Let Carson be, in his own way, arrogantly humble.  And definitely let him point out those he deems less humble than himself, like frontrunner Donald Trump.  After all, he knows what humility is. He has made a point of making sure everyone knows how proud he is to be so.

After running the circuit and taking his lion’s share of bows and accolades, and all his awards and lists of achievements he proudly boasts of on line and in his books- Carson seems to have a bit of that pride he so tells Trump and all the world that comes before a fall. Not to mention the capital gains he receives from his highly paid lectures to encourage others to start thinking BIG.  Nor his millions he has made by being a guest commentator for Fox News.  Seems he is a bit of a TV persona as well.

Carson also didn’t mention his past surgery attempts that failed and the twins that died. He performed a similar operation on the Makwaeba twins in South Africa in 1994, they were unsuccessful, and the twins died.  In 2004 he performed another operation to separate Siamese twins at John Hopkins Hospital on the Block twins, one died and one lived.  Perhaps he is just to proud to mention this.

Well the campaign is in full swing,  he certainly won’t be humble enough to speak of any of his past law suits.  That is one area that I am sure he will consider a private matter and humbly keep it to himself.

But if he does get questioned he won’t get hung up on media or campaign sound bytes he always has an answer and faith is part of his never ending excuses for any of his failures.

“I always say if God didn’t allow bad things to happen, we would already be in heaven. And we are not there. That’s where faith and trust come in.”  Dr. Ben Carson.

But all is fair in campaign snippets and sound bytes.  The media does it daily, actually minute by minute. 

It’s just that Dr. Ben Carson has very interesting ideas on pointing his finger of judgment on others and of course he is not God, but admits it is a thing to guard against. He acknowledged that “one big danger for neurosurgeons can be developing a “god complex.”

“You are going into these incredibly delicate places that control who people are, and you’ve got to have a fair ego to think you can do that,” Carson said. “But for me personally, I realize where it all comes from,” he added. “All the good things come from God. I can’t really claim any of them.”

When getting ready to campaign in New Hampshire his views on Fetal Tissue Research were much different than the views he holds as part of the Bioethics Research Team.   Which is the team  who investigates the decision making of professionals regarding the ethical acceptability of using human fetal tissue from elective abortion for research or therapy.

“To willfully ignore evidence that you have for some ideological reason is wrong. If you’re killing babies and taking the tissue, that’s a very different thing than taking a dead specimen and keeping a record of it.”

When he was asked if Planned Parenthood should cease its fetal tissue distribution, Carson said he still favored defunding the group, but would not call for the end of fetal tissue research so long as the fetal tissue was available.

So what is his stance?  Yea or nay?

When asked directly if fetal tissue research should be banned, or if it was immoral, Carson said no.

So how does he justify this?  In an interview Carson in his calm mannered and humble way answered, “Bear this in mind about pathologists, regardless of what their ideology is, when they receive tissue, they prepare the tissue. They label it. They mark how it got there. Regardless of whether it’s from a fetus or someone who’s 150 years old, they bank them in tissue blocks. Other people doing comparative research need to have a basis. When pathologists receive specimen, their job is to prepare the specimen. They have no job opining on where the tissue came from.”

I’d like to see the tissue from the person 150 years old. Wouldn’t you?

Dr. Carson himself said in July that Planned Parenthood’s defense is “spurious” because there is “nothing that can’t be done without fetal tissue.”

 Yet in a past interview with Eric Bolling for the O’Reilly Factor in discussion of the racist origins and purpose of Planned Parenthood, Bolling brought up the claims from his comments to the Washington Post that Carson had engaged in fetal research.  Dr. Carson answered that he had “not actually worked with fetal tissue.”

Carson blamed the left for putting out that information because his name appears on an article in which the pathologist compared specimens that he delivered from the operating room to some fetal tissues, in an attempt to decide which way the cells were being differentiated.  Carson stated, “You know, my part is to do the operation and supply the tissue. At that point, I move on to the next operation. So, to suggest that I’m in the laboratory actually doing the research, or retrieving fetal tissue, is nothing but propaganda.”

So what is Carson’s logic?  He has said, “This has everything to do with how it’s acquired. If you’re killing babies and taking the tissue, that’s a very different thing than taking a dead specimen and keeping a record of it.”

Just where is the line drawn? It appears Carson can justify and or deny anything at any given time.

So by his own admission (at least for today),  Dr. Carson is a fetal tissue harvester?  Not an actual fetal tissue dissector? At this point I have to quote Hilary for he sounds just like her, “What difference does it make?”  After all whether the specimen comes from Planned Parenthood or Carson’s own harvest, he is on the Bioethics Research Team and of course he’s not really bragging about that right now on the campaign trail.  He’s being very humble.

But now we know that Dr. Carson had entirely different core values and beliefs until he announced his run for the presidency. Prior to announcing he had not been registered as a Republican, nor had he held conservative values, His views on the second amendment were progressive and he was on board for planned parenthood, sustainable development, social justice, and a 25% tax on all sporting events. See link below.

By the way, I forgot to mention that Dr. Carson said, “It’s okay to lie as long as you don’t hurt anybody.”

Written by Dianne Marshall, Author

Click here to read what many of his former patients are saying and update on his malpractice law suits:  https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/may/04/ben-carson-malpractice-claims-doctor-for-president

https://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/world/2003-07-08-twins-separate_x.htm

https://www.bustle.com/articles/103079-who-are-the-conjoined-twins-ben-carson-separated-patrick-benjamin-binder-were-seven-months-old