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UPDATE: 15-year-old girl held at Boston Children’s Hospital against parent’s will still not allowed to go home

December 06, 2013
Wilson

Writer

Last month, Glenn shared the stunning story of Justina Pelletier, a 15-year-old girl who has been stuck in a hospital for the last nine months after the medical facility took custody of her when her parents argued against her diagnosis.

The hospital claims that the parents over-medicalized the girl, leading them to take custody. The parents have provided ample evidence that every time they’ve taken their daughter to the hospital or to the doctor, they did exactly what the doctors told them to do. But now the family finds themselves in a bitter dispute to get their girl home. It’s been ten months since they lost custody, and following the latest court hearing, Justina was still not allowed to go home.

On radio this morning, Cristy Balcells, executive director of Mitoaction.org, who is working with the Pelletier family to help them bring their daughter home, joined Glenn to discuss how Justina is doing and how people can help the Pelletier family. Learn more about Christy’s organization and how you can help HERE.

Listen to the interview below. Applicable audio begins around the 1 hour 34 min mark:

Read a transcript of the interview below:

BALCELLS: Thank you so much, Glenn, and thank you so much for helping to bring this issue to this level of awareness. It's really heartbreaking.

GLENN: This is -- this is not -- this is not the only case, and we'll get into that. But you have -- since we started talking about it, you're getting calls from people all over the country saying, "This is happening to me too."

BALCELLS: It's overwhelming. It's phenomenal. You know, we had high hopes yesterday because so many people have actually come forward to share their story and we felt like we had such a huge show of support from families, both in Boston and around the country, particularly who have had this type of experience with a child with a rare chronic disease at a children's hospital, where everything that the parent was doing was called into question and the parent was left powerless and was basically accused of harming the child when they were just trying to do the best they could to make their child better.

GLENN: I tell you, this is -- this is criminal what's happening. Cristy, explain -- explain, if you can. Tell quickly the story of what happened yesterday and what this means for the family.

BALCELLS: Well, here's what happened yesterday. Nothing. It's so incredibly frustrating. We had really -- and thought that we were going to see some progress because what else could we decide after 10 months of holding this girl captive in the hospital. Really, you need another week to get some more information? I'm flabbergasted and heartbroken for this family, and I speak on behalf of I think the entire community of parents who have children with chronic diseases and mitochondrial disease when I say that. We're horrified, and it really makes me lose faith in the legal system. I already had lost faith, I think, in our hospitals and in our medical system. As you know, I have a child who has mitochondrial disease as well, and it's an uphill battle. But to -- I had a little bit of faith left that the legal system would realize that if the child had been in the hospital for 10 months and they couldn't make her better while she was away from her parents, then maybe that original diagnosis should be reviewed again. And this little girl should be home with her family.

GLENN: Okay. Hang on just a second.

BALCELLS: Instead they told them, they said, come back next week. We'll talk about it some more.

GLENN: Okay. So it's not that they haven't made her better in 10 months. It is that she has actually gotten worse in 10 months, correct?

BALCELLS: She has gotten worse, and that's probably one of the saddest parts of this story as well. So the family is terrified. They're under such a strict gag order that the family is so afraid to open their mouth even to ask for support from the people who are reaching out to them to help because they think that if they even say one word saying how they feel that that is going to be used against them as a reason to prove that they're negligent and that they won't get their daughter back.

GLENN: This is criminal.

BALCELLS: That's the first thing. The gag order is flabbergasting to me.

GLENN: This is absolutely criminal. I mean, if there was anybody in public office in the Northeast that I trusted, I would get them on the phone. But this is -- this is crazy. How can a parent have a gag order and be told not to say anything? That's their -- it's their child, for the love of Pete. How can --

BALCELLS: It's their child. Since when did you lose your right to even be able to reach out to the people who are there saying "How can I help you" and you're supposed to say "I'm not allowed to talk about it. My child is not with me. It's almost Christmas and I'm not allowed to talk about it." I mean, the devastation on this family is just -- can you imagine having your child taken away from you?

GLENN: I have to tell you --

BALCELLS: I almost think it's worse than the child dying because this is like a Purgatory that goes on forever.

GLENN: I have to tell you if I were the family, when this whole thing is over, I hope to God that they get the biggest damn attorney they can possibly find and sue this children's hospital until their eyes bleed. This is the -- this -- because this is not the only case of this. Tell me about the doctor who is vested in -- or maybe -- you may not know this. The doctor up at this hospital that is vested in this particular disease that they're trying to say the parents have inflicted on this young girl. Do you know this part of the story?

BALCELLS: The doctor at Tufts.

GLENN: No, the doctor at -- the doctor at Boston Children's who is vested in -- yeah, who's vested in the -- what is the name of the disease that children's hospital is saying that she has?

BALCELLS: Somatoform disorder, psychiatric disease.

GLENN: Yeah, it's a psychiatric disease. And this doctor who is at Boston Children's, this is -- you know, she wrote her paper on this, this is her disease. And she is -- every single time this has happened in the past, she's been involved and she's -- I think she's trying to make a name for herself.

BALCELLS: Well, you know, it's kind of one of those positions, if your job is to be the naysayer of those things, you have to prove your position's worthwhile, right? You have to create work for yourself. I mean, we see that all the time. I really don't feel like any one doctor, though, can truly be held responsible for this. I think that this is just a horrific example of a broken --

GLENN: System.

BALCELLS: No one paying attention to common sense here, including the judge.

GLENN: So --

BALCELLS: I don't understand.

GLENN: Okay. So Cristy, what can people do?

BALCELLS: So here's what we're trying to do as an organization. We're mounting an advocacy campaign asking for donations to try to help this family mount an even larger legal response. And you can look at that at mitoaction.org/advocacy. And, you know, I think that the social media aspect is helping. I think that the national awareness and pressure from the media is helping. The family does feel that they are in a corner and they don't know what else to do. So we hope that by showing our support nationally, we can make a difference. We are talking now and have reached out to the legislature to try to emphasize how unjust this is and to ask for some transparency. I find it really appalling that in all of this time, no one has asked Boston Children's Hospital to be transparent with their decision to really, to make a statement and that it is always like the parent being crucified while the hospitals, you know, stands at the top of the mountain. I find that, you know, unspeakable, especially when in this case we're talking about taxpayers contributing their money to pay for this girl's ten-month hospitalization. Her family is not after money. They don't want a dime. They want their little girl to come back home. This child has no parents right now. She hasn't even been put into custody of, like, a family member or an aunt and uncle or someone who could at least be acting like a mom or a dad for her. She has no parent. She lives in a hospital room. Alone.

GLENN: And she is -- she is in a psych ward, is she not?

BALCELLS: She's in a psych ward at the hospital. With a guard.

GLENN: This is one of the --

BALCELLS: It makes you disgusted, right? It makes you sick.

GLENN: Oh, yeah. This is -- this is the kind of stuff that, you know, you read about in the 19 -- you know, from the 1950s and Sixties where you read about what they used to do to people who were, you know, crazy and they would lock these people up in institutions, and you watch them and you just turn away from it in disgust and you think, oh, thank God we're past that. No, we're not past that. No, we're not past that. That's what's happening right here. We have a young girl who is sick. Her parents are trying to do the best thing for her. The State has decided they disagree with the parents and the State wins. What this is saying to you, America, is you don't have a right of your own child. That child does not belong to you. That child belongs to the State. They're allowing you to take care of that child unless they disagree and then the State takes. And this is not like, "Well, we're just going to say Jesus at her at the top of the hour and hope that she gets better." That's not what this is. This is a child that was diagnosed with one disease at Tufts University. She goes in for something else at Boston Children's. They decide that that's -- "We don't agree." They don't have a right to another opinion? They have to take Boston children's Hospital opinion and so because the parents said to hell with that; we're taking our child. The hospital goes to the court and takes custody of the child and puts her in a psych ward. Meanwhile she could walk into the hospital -- now nine months later the girl can't walk.

BALCELLS: Correct.

GLENN: Because she's not about treated, she's not being treated for what Tufts University said she --

BALCELLS: For what she has.

GLENN: It's such an outrage. Listen, here's what I would like you to do. If you are able to donate any money, I would like you to go to mitoaction.org, mitoaction.org/advocacy and make a donation and help this poor family. This is a regular run-of-the-mill family. This is a family that is already -- they are trying to do the right thing for their kid. This is not a crazy family, none of that stuff. I want you to go to mitoaction.org/advocacy so these people can hire a really good attorney, so they can have somebody on their side that is really giving them a defense. Let's see if we can get this child home for Christmas. This is the biggest outrage. Go there and see if you can help out. Cristy, thank you so much and we'll talk to you again.

A Sharia enclave is quietly taking root in America. It's time to wake up.

NOVA SAFO / Staff | Getty Images

Sharia-based projects like the Meadow in Texas show how political Islam grows quietly, counting on Americans to stay silent while an incompatible legal system takes root.

Apolitical system completely incompatible with the Constitution is gaining ground in the United States, and we are pretending it is not happening.

Sharia — the legal and political framework of Islam — is being woven into developments, institutions, and neighborhoods, including a massive project in Texas. And the consequences will be enormous if we continue to look the other way.

This is the contradiction at the heart of political Islam: It claims universal authority while insisting its harshest rules will never be enforced here. That promise does not stand up to scrutiny. It never has.

Before we can have an honest debate, we’d better understand what Sharia represents. Sharia is not simply a set of religious rules about prayer or diet. It is a comprehensive legal and political structure that governs marriage, finance, criminal penalties, and civic life. It is a parallel system that claims supremacy wherever it takes hold.

This is where the distinction matters. Many Muslims in America want nothing to do with Sharia governance. They came here precisely because they lived under it. But political Islam — the movement that seeks to implement Sharia as law — is not the same as personal religious belief.

It is a political ideology with global ambitions, much like communism. Secretary of State Marco Rubio recently warned that Islamist movements do not seek peaceful coexistence with the West. They seek dominance. History backs him up.

How Sharia arrives

Political Islam does not begin with dramatic declarations. It starts quietly, through enclaves that operate by their own rules. That is why the development once called EPIC City — now rebranded as the Meadow — is so concerning. Early plans framed it as a Muslim-only community built around a mega-mosque and governed by Sharia-compliant financing. After state investigations were conducted, the branding changed, but the underlying intent remained the same.

Developers have openly described practices designed to keep non-Muslims out, using fees and ownership structures to create de facto religious exclusivity. This is not assimilation. It is the construction of a parallel society within a constitutional republic.

The warning from those who have lived under it

Years ago, local imams in Texas told me, without hesitation, that certain Sharia punishments “just work.” They spoke about cutting off hands for theft, stoning adulterers, and maintaining separate standards of testimony for men and women. They insisted it was logical and effective while insisting they would never attempt to implement it in Texas.

But when pressed, they could not explain why a system they consider divinely mandated would suddenly stop applying once someone crossed a border.

This is the contradiction at the heart of political Islam: It claims universal authority while insisting its harshest rules will never be enforced here. That promise does not stand up to scrutiny. It never has.

AASHISH KIPHAYET / Contributor | Getty Images

America is vulnerable

Europe is already showing us where this road leads. No-go zones, parallel courts, political intimidation, and clerics preaching supremacy have taken root across major cities.

America’s strength has always come from its melting pot, but assimilation requires boundaries. It requires insisting that the Constitution, not religious law, is the supreme authority on this soil.

Yet we are becoming complacent, even fearful, about saying so. We mistake silence for tolerance. We mistake avoidance for fairness. Meanwhile, political Islam views this hesitation as weakness.

Religious freedom is one of America’s greatest gifts. Muslims may worship freely here, as they should. But political Islam must not be permitted to plant a flag on American soil. The Constitution cannot coexist with a system that denies equal rights, restricts speech, subordinates women, and places clerical authority above civil law.

Wake up before it is too late

Projects like the Meadow are not isolated. They are test runs, footholds, proofs of concept. Political Islam operates with patience. It advances through demographic growth, legal ambiguity, and cultural hesitation — and it counts on Americans being too polite, too distracted, or too afraid to confront it.

We cannot afford that luxury. If we fail to defend the principles that make this country free, we will one day find ourselves asking how a parallel system gained power right in front of us. The answer will be simple: We looked away.

The time to draw boundaries and to speak honestly is now. The time to defend the Constitution as the supreme law of the land is now. Act while there is still time.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

The Crisis of Meaning: Searching for truth and purpose

Mario Tama / Staff | Getty Images

Anxiety, anger, and chronic dissatisfaction signal a country searching for meaning. Without truth and purpose, politics becomes a dangerous substitute for identity.

We have built a world overflowing with noise, convenience, and endless choice, yet something essential has slipped out of reach. You can sense it in the restless mood of the country, the anxiety among young people who cannot explain why they feel empty, in the angry confusion that dominates our politics.

We have more wealth than any nation in history, but the heart of the culture feels strangely malnourished. Before we can debate debt or elections, we must confront the reality that we created a world of things, but not a world of purpose.

You cannot survive a crisis you refuse to name, and you cannot rebuild a world whose foundations you no longer understand.

What we are living through is not just economic or political dysfunction. It is the vacuum that appears when a civilization mistakes abundance for meaning.

Modern life is stuffed with everything except what the human soul actually needs. We built systems to make life faster, easier, and more efficient — and then wondered why those systems cannot teach our children who they are, why they matter, or what is worth living for.

We tell the next generation to chase success, influence, and wealth, turning childhood into branding. We ask kids what they want to do, not who they want to be. We build a world wired for dopamine rather than dignity, and then we wonder why so many people feel unmoored.

When everything is curated, optimized, and delivered at the push of a button, the question “what is my life for?” gets lost in the static.

The crisis beneath the headlines

It is not just the young who feel this crisis. Every part of our society is straining under the weight of meaninglessness.

Look at the debt cycle — the mathematical fate no civilization has ever escaped once it crosses a threshold that we seem to have already blown by. While ordinary families feel the pressure, our leaders respond with distraction, with denial, or by rewriting the very history that could have warned us.

You cannot survive a crisis you refuse to name, and you cannot rebuild a world whose foundations you no longer understand.

We have entered a cultural moment where the noise is so loud that it drowns out the simplest truths. We are living in a country that no longer knows how to hear itself think.

So people go searching. Some drift toward the false promise of socialism, some toward the empty thrill of rebellion. Some simply check out. When a culture forgets what gives life meaning, it becomes vulnerable to every ideology that offers a quick answer.

The quiet return of meaning

And yet, quietly, something else is happening. Beneath the frustration and cynicism, many Americans are recognizing that meaning does not come from what we own, but from what we honor. It does not rise from success, but from virtue. It does not emerge from noise, but from the small, sacred things that modern life has pushed to the margins — the home, the table, the duty you fulfill, the person you help when no one is watching.

The danger is assuming that this rediscovery happens on its own. It does not.

Reorientation requires intention. It requires rebuilding the habits and virtues that once held us together. It requires telling the truth about our history instead of rewriting it to fit today’s narratives. And it requires acknowledging what has been erased: that meaning is inseparable from God’s presence in a nation’s life.

Harold M. Lambert / Contributor | Getty Images

Where renewal begins

We have built a world without stillness, and then we wondered why no one can hear the questions that matter. Those questions remain, whether we acknowledge them or not. They do not disappear just because we drown them in entertainment or noise. They wait for us, and the longer we ignore them, the more disoriented we become.

Meaning is still available. It is found in rebuilding the smallest, most human spaces — the places that cannot be digitized, globalized, or automated. The home. The family. The community.

These are the daily virtues that do not trend on social media, but that hold a civilization upright. If we want to repair this country, we begin there, exactly where every durable civilization has always begun: one virtue at a time, one tradition at a time, one generation at a time.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

The Bubba Effect erupts as America’s power brokers go rogue

Gary Hershorn / Contributor | Getty Images

When institutions betray the public’s trust, the country splits, and the spiral is hard to stop.

Something drastic is happening in American life. Headlines that should leave us stunned barely register anymore. Stories that once would have united the country instead dissolve into silence or shrugs.

It is not apathy exactly. It is something deeper — a growing belief that the people in charge either cannot or will not fix what is broken.

When people feel ignored or betrayed, they will align with anyone who appears willing to fight on their behalf.

I call this response the Bubba effect. It describes what happens when institutions lose so much public trust that “Bubba,” the average American minding his own business, finally throws his hands up and says, “Fine. I will handle it myself.” Not because he wants to, but because the system that was supposed to protect him now feels indifferent, corrupt, or openly hostile.

The Bubba effect is not a political movement. It is a survival instinct.

What triggers the Bubba effect

We are watching the triggers unfold in real time. When members of Congress publicly encourage active duty troops to disregard orders from the commander in chief, that is not a political squabble. When a federal judge quietly rewrites the rules so one branch of government can secretly surveil another, that is not normal. That is how republics fall. Yet these stories glided across the news cycle without urgency, without consequence, without explanation.

When the American people see the leadership class shrug, they conclude — correctly — that no one is steering the ship.

This is how the Bubba effect spreads. It is not just individuals resisting authority. It is sheriffs refusing to enforce new policies, school boards ignoring state mandates, entire communities saying, “We do not believe you anymore.” It becomes institutional, cultural, national.

A country cracking from the inside

This effect can be seen in Dearborn, Michigan. In the rise of fringe voices like Nick Fuentes. In the Epstein scandal, where powerful people could not seem to locate a single accountable adult. These stories are different in content but identical in message: The system protects itself, not you.

When people feel ignored or betrayed, they will align with anyone who appears willing to fight on their behalf. That does not mean they suddenly agree with everything that person says. It means they feel abandoned by the institutions that were supposed to be trustworthy.

The Bubba effect is what fills that vacuum.

The dangers of a faithless system

A republic cannot survive without credibility. Congress cannot oversee intelligence agencies if it refuses to discipline its own members. The military cannot remain apolitical if its chain of command becomes optional. The judiciary cannot defend the Constitution while inventing loopholes that erase the separation of powers.

History shows that once a nation militarizes politics, normalizes constitutional shortcuts, or allows government agencies to operate without scrutiny, it does not return to equilibrium peacefully. Something will give.

The question is what — and when.

The responsibility now belongs to us

In a healthy country, this is where the media steps in. This is where universities, pastors, journalists, and cultural leaders pause the outrage machine and explain what is at stake. But today, too many see themselves not as guardians of the republic, but of ideology. Their first loyalty is to narrative, not truth.

The founders never trusted the press more than the public. They trusted citizens who understood their rights, lived their responsibilities, and demanded accountability. That is the antidote to the Bubba effect — not rage, but citizenship.

How to respond without breaking ourselves

Do not riot. Do not withdraw. Do not cheer on destruction just because you dislike the target. That is how nations lose themselves. Instead, demand transparency. Call your representatives. Insist on consequences. Refuse to normalize constitutional violations simply because “everyone does it.” If you expect nothing, you will get nothing.

Do not hand your voice to the loudest warrior simply because he is swinging a bat at the establishment. You do not beat corruption by joining a different version of it. You beat it by modeling the country you want to preserve: principled, accountable, rooted in truth.

Adam Gray / Stringer | Getty Images

Every republic reaches a moment when historians will later say, “That was the warning.” We are living in ours. But warnings are gifts if they are recognized. Institutions bend. People fail. The Constitution can recover — if enough Americans still know and cherish it.

It does not take a majority. Twenty percent of the country — awake, educated, and courageous — can reset the system. It has happened before. It can happen again.

Wake up. Stand up. Demand integrity — from leaders, from institutions, and from yourself. Because the Bubba effect will not end until Americans reclaim the duty that has always belonged to them: preserving the republic for the next generation.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Grim warning: Bad-faith Israel critics duck REAL questions

Spencer Platt / Staff | Getty Images

Bad-faith attacks on Israel and AIPAC warp every debate. Real answers emerge only when people set aside scripts and ask what serves America’s long-term interests.

The search for truth has always required something very much in short supply these days: honesty. Not performative questions, not scripted outrage, not whatever happens to be trending on TikTok, but real curiosity.

Some issues, often focused on foreign aid, AIPAC, or Israel, have become hotbeds of debate and disagreement. Before we jump into those debates, however, we must return to a simpler, more important issue: honest questioning. Without it, nothing in these debates matters.

Ask questions because you want the truth, not because you want a target.

The phrase “just asking questions” has re-entered the zeitgeist, and that’s fine. We should always question power. But too many of those questions feel preloaded with someone else’s answer. If the goal is truth, then the questions should come from a sincere desire to understand, not from a hunt for a villain.

Honest desire for truth is the only foundation that can support a real conversation about these issues.

Truth-seeking is real work

Right now, plenty of people are not seeking the truth at all. They are repeating something they heard from a politician on cable news or from a stranger on TikTok who has never opened a history book. That is not a search for answers. That is simply outsourcing your own thought.

If you want the truth, you need to work for it. You cannot treat the world like a Marvel movie where the good guy appears in a cape and the villain hisses on command. Real life does not give you a neat script with the moral wrapped up in two hours.

But that is how people are approaching politics now. They want the oppressed and the oppressor, the heroic underdog and the cartoon villain. They embrace this fantastical framing because it is easier than wrestling with reality.

This framing took root in the 1960s when the left rebuilt its worldview around colonizers and the colonized. Overnight, Zionism was recast as imperialism. Suddenly, every conflict had to fit the same script. Today’s young activists are just recycling the same narrative with updated graphics. Everything becomes a morality play. No nuance, no context, just the comforting clarity of heroes and villains.

Bad-faith questions

This same mindset is fueling the sudden obsession with Israel, and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee in particular. You hear it from members of Congress and activists alike: AIPAC pulls the strings, AIPAC controls the government, AIPAC should register as a foreign agent under the Foreign Agents Registration Act. The questions are dramatic, but are they being asked in good faith?

FARA is clear. The standard is whether an individual or group acts under the direction or control of a foreign government. AIPAC simply does not qualify.

Here is a detail conveniently left out of these arguments: Dozens of domestic organizations — Armenian, Cuban, Irish, Turkish — lobby Congress on behalf of other countries. None of them registers under FARA because — like AIPAC — they are independent, domestic organizations.

If someone has a sincere problem with the structure of foreign lobbying, fair enough. Let us have that conversation. But singling out AIPAC alone is not a search for truth. It is bias dressed up as bravery.

Anadolu / Contributor | Getty Images

If someone wants to question foreign aid to Israel, fine. Let’s have that debate. But let’s ask the right questions. The issue is not the size of the package but whether the aid advances our interests. What does the United States gain? Does the investment strengthen our position in the region? How does it compare to what we give other nations? And do we examine those countries with the same intensity?

The real target

These questions reflect good-faith scrutiny. But narrowing the entire argument to one country or one dollar amount misses the larger problem. If someone objects to the way America handles foreign aid, the target is not Israel. The target is the system itself — an entrenched bureaucracy, poor transparency, and decades-old commitments that have never been re-examined. Those problems run through programs around the world.

If you want answers, you need to broaden the lens. You have to be willing to put aside the movie script and confront reality. You have to hold yourself to a simple rule: Ask questions because you want the truth, not because you want a target.

That is the only way this country ever gets clarity on foreign aid, influence, alliances, and our place in the world. Questioning is not just allowed. It is essential. But only if it is honest.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.