Support our friend, Andrew Lawton

I haven't been updating a huge amount lately - something I intend to rectify soon - but I thought that this deserved more than its share of attention.

It seems that outspoken conservative writer, blogger, broadcaster, activist, and publisher Andrew Lawton has fallen into some very, very serious health problems. Wendy Sullivan at Girl on the Right has the details:

The Good News: Andrew will be going into surgery at some point today or tonight (I will advise later) to have his blood oxygenator removed, as he no longer needs it. His blood is getting enough oxygen now through natural means + the heart/lung machines.

The Bad News: Andrew is very weak, so any surgery is a risk. Spare an extra-super-duper-double-shot prayer with sprinkles on top for him today.

I’ll update on Twitter when the OR has been booked.

A Show for Andrew

Jerry Lewis has his kids, and we have Lawton. Andrew and his family don’t need money or gifts or anything concrete at this point - they need hope and prayer. So I’m re-joining the crew at Take That Media for a reunion show and impromptu prayer/well-wishes show which will be recorded on Friday night. Mike Williams, my old producer, has opened up the Take That hotline for anyone wanting to leave a message of hope and prayer for Andrew. Your well-wishes will be included throughout the show.

717.892.0353

Lines will be open all day today, tomorrow and till Friday at noon.

And meanwhile:

No flowers are permitted in ICU, but cards are welcomed by the family:

Andrew Lawton, Patient
Victoria Hospital, Critical Care Unit
800 Commissioners Road East
London, Ontario
Canada N6A 5W9

The family has started a separate Facebook page, because they do not have access to his passwords. The link is here. Please show your support. The family will attempt to provide updates, but their schedule is rather harried, as you would expect. Keep checking in with myself here and on Twitter (@RightGirl).

I've known Andrew for a little while, now, as we have tended to move in the same circles, and consider him to be a friend. More recently, he has become my editor at Strictly Pop, which I recently joined as a contributor. For more background, I would suggest that you check out this interview that my editor at the Libertas Post, Nate Hendley, conducted with Andrew back in June.

As Mike Brock has remarked upon at The Volunteer, some will undoubtedly use this emergency situation in Andrew's life to score partisan points: Andrew was a noted critic of Canada's health-care system, and his dependence upon that system undoubtedly presents some of his own critics with an opportunity to jeer at the cruel irony of it all. I think Wendy Sullivan has the best response possible to such criticism:

There are no comments permitted on this post today. I’ve already seen too many comments elsewhere about how he deserves to suffer because he feels Canadians are getting a shitty deal with our health care system. Let that shitty health care system prove Andrew wrong. In any case, assholes don’t get the right to talk about my friend here, when we don’t even know if he will live to Christmas Day.

Any comments to the effect that Wendy mentions above will be deleted from this site as well.

I'll leave the last word to Mark Steyn:

Andrew is only 23 and has already had one serious stroke. Yet, despite ill health, in a few short years he's established himself as one of the most energetic figures in Canadian conservatism. He was not only the ingenious promoter of last month's highly successful Steynapalooza, but also (per a last-minute request from Mark) the piano-playing imam in the closing number. After the Ontario gig, Andrew and his Strictly Right colleagues Ari and Ryan then flew on to Calgary to film Mark's appearance with Fred Thompson and Howard Dean, including Governor Dean's Canadian Content version of his "I have a scream" speech.

We need Andrew out of the hospital and bringing his unique contribution back to the scene.

Indeed. I imagine that Andrew and I would not see eye to eye on every issue, but he is a good man who has been dealt a bad hand. I'm not really into the whole 'prayer' thing myself, but I would urge you, dear reader, to keep Andrew in your thoughts at the very least.