Pro-Death Lobby Not As Powerful As They Think

There seems to be more conversation about assisted sucide and euthanasia now more than several years ago.

Currently, there are governmental hearings on euthanasia all over Quebec, a parliamentary debate in the Scottish Parliament, and a resurrection of the euthanasia debate in Western Australia.

The Dignitas death-clinic in Switzerland continues unhindered in spite of the Swedish Government tut-tutting that the clinic is giving Swiss euthanasia a bad name.

Even in parts of the developing world, including India, are being sucked in to this horror, to say nothing of New Zealand, Spain, and Tasmania.

I’d love to report that these are informed, serious debates that would show, quite obviously, that killing people for whatever reasons the pro-death lobby can manufacture is wrong.

Just wrong.

However, that’s hardly the case. The pro-death lobby is in high gear shaping most of these “debates” as nothing more than pro-death spin. Our side has been represented, to be sure, but it’s hardly a well-matched battle.

However, if you read reports from all these places carefully, there is a distinct shrill quality about the pro-death position.

It’s easy explained: The moment the pro-death lobby faces opposition they become startled and somewhat even more unreasonable.

Why?

Because they know, deep down, that what they are promulgating is killing, not “dignity” or “deliverance."

We need even more people to oppose the pro-death lobby; they’re not anywhere as powerful as they would have us believe.

President Obama’s Pro-Death Propaganda Machine: I’m Not Impressed

Several weeks ago, when a White House website overtly called for turning people in if they had “fishy” ideas about what the President was proposing about healthcare (read: your disagreement will be noted, officially, by the government) I spent a lot of energy restraining myself from blogging here to say something like this:

Mr. President: Given that Disability Matters is all over the web, one of your sycophants may well have turned me in for my “fishy” ideas.

If not, I’m here to tell you that I admit, confess, and am willing to sign a public confession (to be released to state media, of course, and where I will stipulate that I was not coerced) that I have “fishy” ideas about your healthcare proposals. Ahead of the signed confession, I have publically so confessed, and I consider it a badge of honor that as of this notification, I am on your government “Fishy List.”

Knocks on the door in the dead of night are half expected.

Bring it on.

Here’s why, Mr. President. I grew up as a privileged white person in apartheid South Africa. I was raised as an English-speaking minority within the white minority. I was raised in the understanding that apartheid was evil, but that there really wasn’t much that could be done, on an individual level, to change it.

As a college student, I disagreed.

I spoke up.

It cost me.

The apartheid regime’s security police followed me for years. They rode by and took my photo. They opened my mail. Thugs all. Somewhere in the dusty vaults of the previous South African regime there is a fat folder with this label: “Mostert, Mark P., Fishy Ideas.”

So, Mr. President, I understand propaganda and state coercion. I believe we have seen it in the healthcare debate.

We’ve seen it in the just-reported coercion of the National Endowment for the Arts commandeered to strong-arm the arts for your healthcare agenda.

And, Mr. President, be aware that there are many of us, the Fishy Family, who understand that in the House bill, H.R. 3200 the forces of death, aka the former Hemlock Society, and (no aka) some members of Congress who never saw an assisted suicide they didn’t like, are preening and chattering about how they helped write the parts of the bill endorsing killing, and, dare I say (gasp) death panels.

I understand in this new season of change and hope that the change is a shadowy pro-death process whose authors cannot contain their glee at what they might accomplish.

And that hope, Mr. President, leans precariously toward the chilling idea that our most vulnerable, our elderly, sick, veterans, and disabled, will be disposed of because, after all, (as the former Hemlock Society, and members of your party in Congress would say) they don’t have a good quality of life.

The Government giveth. The Government taketh away.

President Obama’s Medicare Welcomes the Grim Reaper, Part II

The healthcare debate is gathering momentum because people are beginning to understand what the government is intending.

What the government is intending, of course, is controlling who lives and who dies, who gets treatment and who doesn’t.

I’ve already addressed this intention via the President’s repeated public statements, and how certain phrases are repeated, mantra-like, so that they will become embedded in the public mind.

That’s why the President is constantly in media-blitz mode, repeating the same themes time after time. He does that because he wants you to believe certain things and not believe other things. He’s intent on bending public opinion to his will.

My favorite propaganda theme? Well, the President has a way of explaining things about healthcare in terms of “making people healthier.” Over and over again, in print, all over television, town hall meetings, and YouTube chats, the drumbeat is healthier is the administration's goal.

However, as far as I can tell, nobody has ever challenged the President with this question, so let me try:

President Obama, you repeatedly emphasize how your heathcare proposals will “make people healthier.” What does that mean for people who have no hope of becoming healthier? What of people with chronic conditions, disabilities, and the elderly?

I’m not holding my breath for an answer.

So, we need to look for clues. Let’s say among people on Medicare (the elderly, people with disabilities, and those with chronic health conditions).

Let’s go to HR 3200, the 1,017 behemoth healthcare bill that many of our public representatives arrogantly admit to not reading.

Despite what some of our representatives say, the language of the bill is quite plain. The clues are there, but you must read carefully not only for what is said, but for what is not said.

Exhibit 1: Advocates insist that the bill says absolutely nothing about end-of-life counseling being “mandatory.” Well, the bill first describes what this ‘advance care planning consultation’ will look like, and then says this:

the term ‘advance care planning consultation’ means a consultation between the individual and a practitioner described in paragraph (2) [doctor, nurse, or nurse practitioner] regarding advance care planning, if . . . the individual involved has not had such a consultation within the last 5 years . . . An advance care planning consultation with respect to an individual may be conducted more frequently . . . if there is a significant change in the health condition of the individual, including diagnosis of a chronic, progressive, life-limiting disease, a life-threatening or terminal diagnosis or life-threatening injury, or upon admission to a skilled nursing facility, a long-term care facility (as defined by the Secretary), hospice program.

So, if you’re “healthy,” such a consultation will be every 5 years. If you get less healthy, you might have more consultations as your state of health declines.

Here’s the deception that the pro-death lobby doesn’t want you to understand: If this bill becomes law, there is no way that it will not be a mandatory requirement.

Why??

Because nowhere in the bill does it say that the “consultation” is OPTIONAL.

Now, if a law says something is not optional, then there’s only one other way to interpret its legal intent: Yes, mandatory.

Wouldn’t surprise me at some point, if this becomes law, and people finally wake up, they might hear the administration say the following:

Well, we never said it would be mandatory, I think we can all agree on that. We just made sure that it wasn’t optional.

Gotcha!!!

Doublespeak is not new, but it’s still chilling.

President Obama: Potential for Getting Healthy? You Win!!

Let’s be clear: President Obama’s push for healthcare reform will significantly change the way people with serious medical conditions, especially among the elderly, those with disabilities, and the terminally ill, will be treated.

Well, not treated, actually.

There’s no doubt that the President’s message, hammered relentlessly at every turn, is made in starkly economic terms – that medical care is very expensive, costs need to be controlled, and resources have to be allocated in new ways.

That’s half the pitch.

Here’s the other half: Because of this problem, it’s important to see which groups of people disproportionately consume the lion’s share of medical care dollars.

We already know: People with disabilities, people with serious chronic illnesses, the terminally ill, and the elderly.

The president hasn’t gotten around to making his economic case about people with disabilities yet, but he has in terms of the elderly and the terminally ill. My take is that among the targeted groups, it’s the disability community that will raise stiff opposition. The elderly and the terminally ill are more vulnerable, and are less likely to protest.

Let me put the president’s strategy more bluntly:

"Medical care is expensive. Some people get a lot of care, others very little. Many people who get a lot of expensive care are the elderly, those with disabilities, and those who are probably not going to ever be as healthy as they used to be. We don’t have the money to pay for every expensive procedure for everyone, so we need to decide who gets the care that’ll give us most bang for the buck."

The President doesn’t say it this way, instead he uses a euphemism it’s hard not to like: Health. We must give medical care to make people healthier.

Note what’s not said: If you have no prospect of getting healthy, then the government needs to step in and decide whether or not you are worth getting the treatment.

President Obama drive this point home in his interview to the New York Times in April (all italics are mine):

And part of what I think government can do effectively is to be an honest broker in assessing and evaluating treatment options. And certainly that’s true when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid, where the taxpayers are footing the bill and we have an obligation to get those costs under control. And right now we’re footing the bill for a lot of things that don’t make people healthier.

The president drummed the “Health” theme again in his ABC News Health Care Forum at the White House last week:

But here's the problem that we have in our current health care system, is that there is a whole bunch of care that's being provided that every study, every bit of evidence that we have indicates may not be making us healthier.

And later:

And in terms of how doctors are reimbursed, it's going to be the same system that we have now, except we can start making some changes so that, for example, we're rewarding quality of outcomes rather than the number of procedures that are done. And this is true not just for doctors, it's also true for hospitals. One of the things that we could say to hospitals is, reduce your readmission rate, which is also often a sign that health outcomes have not been so good.

Now, we've put forward some specific ways of paying for the health reform that we talked about. About two-thirds of the cost would be covered by re-allocating dollars that are already in the health care system, taxpayers are already paying for it, but it's not going to stuff that's making you healthier.

Prediction: If the President has his way, expensive medical care will be redirected to the winners in this money game, those who have the potential to be healthier.

If you have a disability, if you’re elderly and in poor health, or if you have a severe chronic or terminal condition, you lose.

Pro-Death Propaganda Steals the Show in the UK

I’m human, just like everyone else, and so when I make a prediction that turns out to be correct, I have been known to say, “I told you so.”

Last January 12th I wrote of assisted suicides at Dignitas in Switzerland, which are hardly gentle and loving:

Here’s the kicker: This nightmare will hardly engender much shock or outrage, I’m afraid.Why? Because the spin and pressure will be to pass laws to make places where people kill themselves nice and comfy, clean, and warm.

Well, I told you so.

A while back, I wrote that the UK was now ground zero for the pro-death movement, currently focusing on the thin end of the wedge, assisted suicide. Assisted suicide is a wedge because the ultimate aim of the pro-death movement is not only legalization of assisted suicide, but also the eventual legal availability of euthanasia for anyone, at any time, for any reason.

I have also written quite a bit about the Swiss killing group, Dignitas (here, here, here, here), who are happy to help kill people – for a price.

Dignitas has become infamous lately because of the many people from the UK who have flocked to their killing facility (read: grubby apartment, strange looking people) in Switzerland. Many of these cases have been widely reported in the media. Dan James. Craig Ewert. The list goes on and on.

I predicted that instead of revealing the lie that assisted suicide is a heinously selfish and soulless act, the pro-death spin would be that the UK laws would be made to be the culprit – that’s it’s not fair or kind to ship people off to unfamiliar places in Europe to commit assisted suicide. They should be allowed to do it at home in familiar surroundings.

Ergo, it’s the LAW that’s the problem, not helping killing people.

Today I’m saddened, but not surprised, that the UK pro-death spin was exactly what I said it would be. 

Read on.

The pressure is building inexorably in the UK to overturn the laws that make assisted suicide illegal on at least two fronts.

The first is the persistent Debbie Purdy, who has multiple sclerosis. She has already made the decision to got to Dignitas to be killed, and wants her husband to be there. She has petitioned all of Britain’s lower courts to clarify whether he will be prosecuted for aiding and abetting her suicide when he returns to the UK. They have all refused to do so. Tomorrow, Purdy takes her case to the highest court in the land, the House of Lords.

It’s important to note that others who have done this have not been prosecuted, but Purdy wants more: She wants the law to say unequivocally that there will be no legal action.

Second, a major piece in today’s edition of London’s Mail reported that there are currently almost 800 people lined up to be killed in Switzerland. 34 have been cleared by their doctors for assisted suicide because they are terminally ill and supposedly competent to make the decision. Others have already set their dates with death. 

This is all bad enough, but, again, let’s look at the media propaganda:

The number of Britons thinking of travelling to the Dignitas suicide clinic in Switzerland has almost reached 800. The figure is ten times the level of seven years ago.

Spin 1: The numbers are increasing, we must do something, this is a growing problem! There is a demand for assisted suicide by the British people!

Well, to me, we might want to ask why there is such a demand. Could it be the pro-death mission of fear, especially playing on peoples’ fear of abandonment, is meant to make more people want to die by assisted suicide?

More:

There is massive public support for a change in the law to allow assisted dying, with polls regularly showing more than 80 per cent of the public want it made legal.

Sarah Wootton, chief executive of Dignity in Dying, which campaigns to allow assisted suicide, said: 'There is clearly a growing demand for a well regulated, legal right for people with terminal illness who are mentally competent to end their life if they choose to.'

Spin 2: If the majority want it, it must be right. Laws should be changed if 8 out of 10 people think they should be changed. That’s how we’ll make it safe and legal for you to have someone help you kill yourself.

Really? Let’s remember that history is full of examples where some very nasty things happened based on popular opinion. Sterilization comes to mind. I’m willing to bet that most of the 80% are significantly misinformed – no, lied to – and that they are responding to pro-death propaganda.

Let’s continue:

The 1961 Suicide Act criminalises anyone who aids, abets, counsels or procures someone else's suicide, and some relatives have been questioned by police.

Oh my gosh!!! The police questioned some relatives related to their possibly breaking the law? What’s next? Public executions? (Pardon the sarcasm).

I repeat: In all these very high-profile cases, what the UK authorities have actually done is turn a blind eye to these goings-on. Seems to me that if they had followed the letter of the law diligently, a lot of relatives who helped kill people at Dignitas would already be charged, found guilty, and be in jail.

But it’s the spin, you see - implying that those big bad Bobbies are hauling off vanloads of poor grieving relatives to languish in the basements of Her Majesty’s Prisons.

Ergo:

Baroness Jay said: 'It's a tragic anomaly that people who are giving a last loving assistance to a loved one find themselves under the threat of imprisonment.'

So, you know what comes as the climax of the piece, don’t you?

Read on:

Lesley Close, who went to Dignitas in 2003 with her brother John, a sufferer from motor neurone disease sufferer, said: 'More and more British people will be travelling to Switzerland to die because more people are aware of the compassionate and peaceful death you can achieve there . . . The interest in Dignitas underlines the case for reform of the law. We need the same facility here.'

Big bad law. Big bad Bobbies. So uncaring of those saints who are helping kill people.

Nice gentle, compassionate Dignitas, where all is dappled light and calm.

However, the truth will out, in my opinion, because there’s no future in assisted suicide.