Marlowe's Shade

Baroness Warnock: "The demented have a 'duty to die'"

2008-09-19T05:22:00.003-05:00

From The Telegraph

The veteran Government adviser said pensioners in mental decline are "wasting people's lives" because of the care they require and should be allowed to opt for euthanasia even if they are not in pain.

She insisted there was "nothing wrong" with people being helped to die for the sake of their loved ones or society.

The 84-year-old added that she hoped people will soon be "licensed to put others down" if they are unable to look after themselves.

[snip]

Lady Warnock said: "If you're demented, you're wasting people's lives – your family's lives – and you're wasting the resources of the National Health Service.

"I'm absolutely, fully in agreement with the argument that if pain is insufferable, then someone should be given help to die, but I feel there's a wider argument that if somebody absolutely, desperately wants to die because they're a burden to their family, or the state, then I think they too should be allowed to die.

"Actually I've just written an article called 'A Duty to Die?' for a Norwegian periodical. I wrote it really suggesting that there's nothing wrong with feeling you ought to do so for the sake of others as well as yourself."

She went on: "If you've an advance directive, appointing someone else to act on your behalf, if you become incapacitated, then I think there is a hope that your advocate may say that you would not wish to live in this condition so please try to help her die.

"I think that's the way the future will go, putting it rather brutally, you'd be licensing people to put others down."

A Death in a Dutch Family

2008-09-08T08:46:00.004-05:00

From The Guardian

5.30pm: Dad is bent over the toilet bowl with a brush in his hand and a scowl on his face. I walk up to him. "Shall I give you a hand?" Dad begins to snigger, abandoning any attempt to make sense of the situation. We stand shoulder to shoulder with our backs to Mum, who paces around the landing with a newly fitted catheter in her hand.
The catheter has been put in by nurse Marianne to enable our GP, who will be with us in half an hour, to give Mum a lethal injection. But instead of having a moment of peace with us, as Marianne suggested, Mum demands that we clean the toilets. Both upstairs and downstairs.
My brother, Maarten, is sitting on the edge of the bath, staring out of the bathroom window.
"Imagine," he mutters. "Her last hour, spent like this."
This is the Netherlands, where voluntary euthanasia is permitted, as well as physician-assisted suicide. This is the day my mother has chosen to die, and the toilets need to be spotless.

The mundane stories of everyday euthanasia,those that don't usually make it into the papers are often the most disturbing. The blockquote above doesn't adequately express the essense of this story. For those who haven't seen the grim, desparate and ultimately tragic side of this debate, I encourage you to read the whole article. It does an excellent job of pointing out that those who choose assisted suicide are more often than not motivated not by pain, butdepression and fear. What is needed is not a quicker death, but hope.

Woman Who Begged for Euthanasia Has a Change of Heart

2008-07-11T09:47:00.002-05:00

From SPUC Blog

Alison Davis, who has spina bifida, and leads No Less Human, a division within SPUC, says:

"The story of Mrs. Seema Sood explains in a nutshell why allowing legalised killing of vulnerable people by euthanasia is wrong. Mrs. Sood, who is now 37, longed for death two years ago, and even petitioned the President of India for euthanasia. She had lost all movement of her limbs for 15 years following a severe attack of rheumatoid arthritis, and was in despair. Now two years later, after surgery paid for by the Government of her state and her university alumni association, she says 'I regret the letter to the President. Everything was so dark for me ealier, but I'm excited about my mobility now and I'm confident I will improve.' "

"Euthanasia would have robbed Mrs. Sood of the chance to recover her love of life, and to benefit from the surgery which revolutionised her life, and no one would have known that life held something better for her in the future. She is not the only vulnerable person who has changed her mind about wanting to die. I've been through the same experience myself."

"But euthanasia allows for no changes of mind. It is the philosophy of despair. What sick and disabled people who want to die really need is the sort of help and support which Mrs. Sood received both from politicians and her friends. Note well, politicians. Your actions could save a life like Mrs. Sood's rather than condemning her and others to death."

Mexico Lures Boomers with "Eutho-tourism"

2008-06-05T09:47:00.002-05:00

Thanks to their new strategic marketing partner Dr Phillip Nitschke Mexican tourism has opened up an new frontier to attract elderly Boomers who are looking for an easy way off this mortal coil.

NUEVO LAREDO, Mexico (Reuters) - Elderly foreign tourists are tapping Mexican pet shops for a drug used by veterinarians to put cats and dogs to sleep that has become the sedative of choice for euthanasia campaigners.

Tourists from as far as Australia have travelled to Mexico to buy liquid pentobarbital, which causes a painless death in humans in less than an hour, right-to-die advocates say.

Clutching photos of the bottled drug to overcome a lack of Spanish, they have maps sketched by euthanasia activists to locate back-street pet shops and veterinary supply stores near the U.S. border. There they can buy a bottle for $35 to $50, enough for one suicide, no questions asked.

"We have a moral right to a peaceful death. I don't want to die with a total loss of dignity, incontinent, barely able to see and stand up, suffering as my mother did," said Bron Norman, a healthy 65-year-old Australian woman who spent $2,860 to fly to Mexico in March to buy pentobarbital.

Used legally across the world to anesthetize and euthanize farm animals and pets, pentobarbital, sometimes known by the trade name Nembutal, is tightly restricted to veterinarians.

But lax regulation in Mexico means it can easily be bought.

Euthanasia campaigners call it "the Mexico option" and say they are willing to travel so far because pentobarbital is one of the few drugs that produces a reliable and tranquil death by sending a person to sleep before shutting down breathing.

"There are few countries in the world where the drug is as readily available as in Mexico," said Australian doctor Philip Nitschke, who set up pro-euthanasia group Exit International.

Exit International has helped 250 people from Europe, the United States, Australia and New Zealand get pentobarbital in Mexico over the past few years. And, it says, interest is growing.

"You do this trip because you want an insurance policy," said Michael Irwin, a British euthanasia campaigner and former United Nations medical director who plans to take a dozen Britons to Mexico this year to buy the drug, helped by Exit.

"You make (the trip) in good health so that if you become terminally ill this can guarantee you a quicker exit."

Foreign buyers usually fly to U.S. border cities and cross over to Tijuana, Nuevo Laredo or Ciudad Juarez, the group says.

A Reuters reporter buying a bottle in Nuevo Laredo was given a range of brands to choose from.

How long before some clever entrepreneur sets up an retirement community based on this concept?

Bienvenidos a "Pueblo Fin dela Viaje"!

If you lived here, you'd be dead now.

Former SS Doctor accused of euthanasia honored by German medical group

2008-05-27T08:56:00.002-05:00

From Israel NN

The German Federation of Internal Medicine has awarded a former Nazi SS doctor, suspected of carrying out euthanasia. Dr. Hans-Joachim Sewering, 92, was honored for giving "unequalled services in the cause of freedom of the practice and the independence of the medical profession and to the nation's health system," according to the Federation.

American Jewish organizations previously have charged that Sewering killed 900 Jewish children at a euthanasia center. He has admitted to being part of the elite SS unit but has denied carrying out euthanasia.

Jack Kevorkian has a new fan

2008-03-26T10:00:00.003-05:00

From Newsbusters

Even with the departure of Rosie O'Donnell, The View continues to to be the lowest circle of that outer darkness known as daytime TV. In yesterday's program, Whoopi Goldberg gushes over Jack Kevorkian's run for Congress.

...euthanasia, like race, is one of those things nobody wants to talk about. It makes people very uncomfortable. I think euthanasia is, is an important thing and it should be there for people to make that decision if they chose to. It should be available to them with counseling like a lot of other things. And I’m a big fan of Jack’s because he believed that he could help people who were in, in a place where no one was helping them. And where, where it was too much.

Like most of Jack's fans, Whoopi doesn't have her facts straight. Most of Kevorkian's victims were not terminally ill, and it is likely if they were properly treated for depression they would still be alive today. We don't know if Whoopi is aware of the ghoulish experiments on the dying that Kevorkian performed or planned, or if it would change her opinion of him.

What is clear is that is that the media will always portray Kevorkian as an icon of social activism despite all evidence to the contrary. I don't know how Whoopi came to the conclusion that euthanasia is like race, but it's led her to the same tired propaganda that this attention starved malignant and mentally ill character is somehow a brave crusading pioneer of human rights...

Belgium's Most Acclaimed Writer "Dies Through Euthanasia"

2008-03-19T13:21:00.002-05:00

From AGI News in Italy

Hugo Claus, the Belgian writer considered the greatest in Dutch-Flemish, has died through euthanasia: his publisher 'De Bezige Bij' announced this from The Netherlands, quoted by the Belgian press. Claus suffered from Alzheimer, and he announced his desire to die this way a long time ago, even specifying the precise hour of his death: today, in the clinic of Antwerp. He was 78 years old. Born in Brussels, writer, poet, dramatist but also scriptwriter and painter, anti-conformist, Hugo Maurice Julien Claus obtained his biggest success in '83 with what is considered his masterpieces: "The sorrow of Belgium", on the Nazi occupation of his country.

While it's not exactly shocking that a post-modern angst-filled writer would opt out of existence this way in a country where it is legal, I found the language interesting. "Died through euthanasia" sounds so innocuous, doesn't it? The reality is of course Minheer Claus was incapable of ending his own life so he went to a clinic and some medical staffer was apparently happy to assist him. For some [and perhaps a diminishing number] this would present a moral problem with more consequences for society than can be reliably foreseen by mortals. But this isn't a concern for most of Europe. We are accustomed to phrases like "died after a long illness" and "passed away quietly at home" in the obituaries. Expect "died through euthanasia" to be making more frequent appearances in the future...

Australian Ends Life with Homemade "Suicide Robot"

2008-03-19T09:38:00.002-05:00

The Culture of Death in Australia has take a new technological twist:

AN 81-year-old Gold Coast man built, and yesterday used, an intricate suicide machine to remotely shoot himself, after downloading the plans from the internet.

The Burleigh Heads man, who lived alone, left notes of his plans and thoughts as he struggled to come to terms with demands by interstate relatives that he move out his home and into care.

He spent hours searching the internet for a way to kill himself, downloaded what he needed and then built a complex machine that would remotely fire a gun.

He set the device up in his driveway about 7am yesterday, placed himself in front of it and set it in motion.

His notes explained that he chose the driveway as he knew there were tradesmen working next door who would find his body. The plan worked as the workmen heard the gunshots and ran to investigate.

The Gold Coast Bulletin will not reveal how the machine worked, but it was attached to a .22 semi-automatic pistol loaded with four bullets.

It was able to fire multiple shots into the man's head after he activated it.

Plans to deport gay Iranian teen are a death sentence

2008-03-13T08:32:00.004-05:00

Are the post-Christian societies of England and Holland truly free and liberal if they are unwilling to to give asylum to a gay Iranian 19 year old who faces certain death if he returns to his country? Apparently they love the sin but not the sinner.

The Independent:

A gay teenager who claims he faces the death penalty in Iran after his boyfriend was executed there two years ago has spoken of his anger and disappointment at losing his legal battle against deportation.

Mehdi Kazemi, 19, who sought sanctuary in Britain in 2005 when he discovered that his partner had been hanged in Tehran for engaging in homosexual acts, is expected to be returned to Iran in the next few weeks.

Mr Kazemi fled to Holland from Britain last year after the Home Office rejected his claim for asylum. But yesterday, a Dutch court ruled that he should be sent back to Britain after refusing to consider his claim for asylum.

Speaking from an immigration detention centre in Rotterdam, Mr Kazemi told his uncle, a British citizen, that he was "very, very angry" at the decision, which will see him returned to Britain within 72 hours.

He believed he would have had a much better chance of protection from deportation to Iran in Holland, according to his uncle. But yesterday, Holland's highest administrative court rejected his lawyers' arguments that the UK asylum and immigration system did not take proper account of international conventions that uphold the rights of refugees.

If the secular world won't save Mehdi Kazemi, who will? As Christians who value life, can we reconcile our Biblical view of homosexuality with the plight of this young man? Would we be willing to work with those we usually oppose in the struggle over whose values should guide our culture?

If not, Mehdi may be facing his executioners in a matter of days.

“Persistent Vegetative State” Diagnoses Too Often A Rush To Judgement

2007-08-06T09:08:00.000-05:00

From Political Mavens [HT from DWT at DL]

A study by the Coma Science Group of the University of Liège, Belgium, finds that up to half of patients in an acute vegetative state regain some level of consciousness.

In the study, which analyzed data collected over a five-year period, researchers assessed and classified comatose patients according to the Coma Recovery Scale. The researchers determined that some 40 percent had been incorrectly diagnosed as being in a persistent vegetative state, when they were in fact in a minimally conscious state. And 10 percent of those diagnosed as being minimally conscious were communicating functionally.

Patients who are minimally conscious shows periodic signs of awareness himself and his surroundings but is usually cannot communicate with others, whereas a patient who is in a persistent vegetative state is awake but lacks such awareness.

The Coma Science Group’s Dr. Steven Laureys presented the study findings at the European Neurological Society congress in June:

“Our data show that acute vegetative state is certainly not rare among patients admitted to intensive care … What is important to note is that it may be transient and that the prognosis for patients with impaired consciousness depends to a great extent on the nature of the brain damage. … The study underlines the importance of extreme caution in any decision to limit the life chances of patients during the acute phase of a vegetative state.” …

Take the case of Jesse Ramirez, who suffered major brain injuries after his car flipped over and he was thrown from the vehicle on May 30th. Doctors predicted that the 36-year old Arizonan could remain in a permanent vegetative state. Less than two weeks after the accident, his wife, Rebecca, 33, asked doctors to remove his food and water tubes. But Jesse’s family challenged her decision in court, and a Maricopa County Superior Court judge ordered the tubes reconnected.

And then, Ramirez regained consciousness. The Arizona Republic reports:

[H]e can hug and kiss, nod his head, answer yes and no questions, give a thumbs-up sign and sit in a chair. …

Jesse is now ready to move from a hospice to a rehabilitation facility.

“We have had a lot of miracles,” said Betty Valenzuela, Ramirez’s aunt. “He would have been gone.”

“All of the family is absolutely thrilled that he has now become conscious and is able to go through rehab,” Judge Paul Katz said. …

The Arizona Republic notes that this same Judge Katz had previously scolded the family for not acting in Jesse’s best interest

"I watched as my daughter took her own life"

2007-06-26T13:06:00.000-05:00

From the Daily Mail, this has to be a parent's worst nightmare:

On May 30, Carol, a 55-year-old nurse and midwife with multiple sclerosis, died after drinking a cocktail of drugs at a flat in Zurich, courtesy of Dignitas - the controversial Swiss group which arranges legal euthanasia. Her mother was there, holding Carol's hand when she slipped into a coma three minutes after drinking the deadly liquid. Kathleen's last words to her daughter when she died 30 minutes later were: "Bye, bye, my darling."

It goes against every mother's instinct to stand back and watch her child commit suicide, yet Kathleen fought every maternal urge and did just that. Now she must live with the consequences.

"No parent wants to witness their child dying, no mother wants to outlive her daughter, but this was what Carol wanted. This was all about Carol, not me, it was the last thing I wanted," says Kathleen.

Absolutely tragic.

Kevorkian: The Less they Know, the More They Like Him...

2007-06-05T12:02:00.000-05:00

No doubt I will run across another dozen of these odes to the compassion and courage of Jack Kevorkian. And when the red tunnel vision passes I'll feel compelled to respond. It's an exercise in futility.

The latest of these rhapsodies of support for Kevorkian, a lighthearted piece by Lisa Birnbach in The Huffington Post, explains the why any attempts to counter the media lionization of Kevorkian is useless. Facts are distinctly NOT welcome in any discussion of Kevorkian. In fact the the less you know about him or any related subject the more qualified you are to pronounce his worthiness. Observe how cunningly she establishes her credentials:

I can't say I've spent much time thinking about Jack Kevorkian. I haven't even spent much time thinking about euthanasia. That is, until the Terri Schiavo ratings period on CNN, when I devoted quite a bit of time thinking about the horrific politicization of this young woman in a prolonged vegetative state -- a women who would probably have pulled her own cord had she been able.

That last phrase is crucial. Did you see the aggressive shift from obliviousness to a brazenly uninformed position. So high is the confidence in her stance that she can throw around mangled phrases like "prolonged vegetative state" with impunity, then anchor the crux of the argument on what Terri "probably" would have wanted. It is at that point that it begins to dawn on even the slowest of us [like myself] that the innocence and goodness of Kevorkian and those who only wanted to help Terri achieve the death she probably would have wanted is so OBVIOUS that even a literary layman in ethical issues and humble expert on the culture of the mid to late 20th Century Preppie Nation can see it clear as day. The point is made masterfully here:

Every time CNN showed the one move she made in years, a kind of rolling motion (no proof of brain activity if you ask me, an English major -- no, actually worse, a pass/fail semiotics major) -- I cringed and got progressively angrier. She resembled David's haunting portrait, Death of Marat, or that's what I would have said in an art history paper, had I not already fortunately graduated from college with a degree in semiotics.

Be not embarassed about that liberal arts degree. It turns out that nothing else could better prepare one to discern the heart of Jack Kevorkian than that BA, and no one seems more surprised at this than Ms Birnbach herself. See the awesome effect of this juggernaut of mentation that she forged as an undergrad as it steamrolls all else but the noble object of her praises:

Last week, in advance of Dr. Kevorkian's release from the slammer in Michigan, where he'd spent the previous eight years for assisting in the death of a terminally-ill man afflicted with ALS, I started to think about him. And now I'm a passionate supporter of his work. A spokesman for the Detroit archdiocese which urged his incarceration, said, "For 10 years, Jack Kevorkian's actions resembled those of a pathological serial killer. It will be truly regrettable if he's now treated as a celebrity parolee instead of the convicted murderer he is,"

Aha! The Catholic Church has outsmarted themselves this time! By condemning Kevorkian they really gave away the whole game!

An angel of death or an angel of compassion? I'm voting for the latter. And I wonder, is opposition to euthanasia any different from opposing a woman's right to choose? At some point, we must become the stewards of our bodies. We decide how to feed them, how to dress them, how to medicate them, and whether to take vitamins. If our government wants to get involved in our reproductive lives and our end-of-life plans, will we need to submit our blueprints for tattoos we are considering, piercings we are planning, or whether to grow beards? Will there be an office that will approve (or not) haircuts, permanent waves, and Japanese thermal straightenings? How far can this go, oh party-of-less-government?

Way to run rings around those theocrats logically, sistah! But wait, the pyrotechnic finale is yet to come:

Please give us back our bodies! If you don't tell me how to wear my hair, I won't tell you that you can't have an abortion, or a tattoo. I heard Jack Kevorkian on 60 Minutes tell Mike Wallace, resignedly, that though he still believes in his work, he is forbidden from practicing ever again. It is unlikely that another doctor will take up where Kevorkian left off, at least in the foreseeable future. Of course, that future is filled with federal officials who want you to believe that healthy babies must be killed in order to procure the stem cells needed to solve many of the knottiest medical riddles of our day.

Kevorkian, now 79 years old and a Samuel Beckett look-alike, deserves our thanks for his courageous deeds.

After that last dervish dance of rhetoric you might be temped to think this is parody. Sneer not at the army of ponytailed males and Birkenstocked women reading Waiting for Godot in Starbucks across this preacher plagued nation to confound the Bio-federales and the stem cell spawned hallelujah howling flying monkey-chimeras that do their bidding in a war to enslave our bodily choices. If there is any laughing going on, it's at you. See the debate in the media over euthanasia and the sanctity of life is so long over that they have left the lightweights to deal with the remnant of you who even care about this. And they are just toying with you.

Jack Kevorkian: Larger Than Death

2007-05-30T15:14:00.000-05:00

I've read some nauseating things in the past few months, but this takes the cake.

I can decide when my dog is in enough pain to give him drugs to euthanize him, but where I live, and in all but a single US state, I am not permitted to make the same decision for myself. That fact is ludicrous, but nonetheless true.

Assisted suicide advocate and pioneer Jack Kevorkian gets out of prison soon, thankfully. He was a pioneer in advocating for physician assisted euthanasia, and was severely persecuted by a perverse legal and logical system for his efforts. A system that is permeated by a so called religious culture that advocates capital punishment, and war, yet is often adamantly opposed to stem cell research, and euthanasia - regardless of the circumstances (the entire "culture of life" is a hugely hypocritical fiasco).

I've treated this chasm between the media created in a previous post. But this Wesley Smith article is the best I've seen and it certainly cuts to the chase: Kevorkian was a twisted ghoul who was obsessed with experimenting on living conscious subjects as they died. If you still have any doubts, take a look at some of his paintings. Each one speaks volumes about his character.

Google, Amazon Help Disseminate Illegal Euthanasia Book

2007-03-31T22:24:00.000-05:00

From Sydney Morning Herald

THE outlawed euthanasia manual The Peaceful Pill Handbook will soon be available for download on the internet.

Co-author and euthanasia campaigner Dr Philip Nitschke made a deal with Google Books in the US last week. He said the download version, illegal in Australia, would cost about $37.

Dr Nitschke said The Peaceful Pill Handbook had been a steady seller on Amazon.com, often ranking in the top 1000 books in a pool of 2 million but Australian customers ran the risk of customs confiscating it.

"The download version will be illegal but people will take that risk because they feel they won't be tracked down," Dr Nitschke said.

"We've heard there has been some trouble with buying it on Amazon . . . from people not receiving books. We suspect they've been intercepted or something's gone wrong."

Sad Euthanasia Case from Oregon

2007-03-22T14:52:00.000-05:00

I'm taking this one on faith because it has the ring of truth to it.

Hopefully publicizing it will expose the abuse and neglect in Oregon that hides behind the smokescreen of Oregon's advocacy of euthanasia

I've left out the names and other contact information from the original post.

What I've written here is a true story that must be told. There are people who have gone to great lengths to suppress the information herein. What I
hope to do is compel those reading it to join with me in demanding
accountability from the responsible parties. An investigation
independent of Oregon's Protection and Advocacy agency is needed to
decide exactly who the responsible parties are.

In early April 2006 I found out that a close friend of mine had stage
3 colon cancer. She had a profound developmental disability and was
non-verbal. In order for critical health care decisions to be made on
her behalf, she needed representatives who knew and cared about her to
gather and interpret medical information and weigh all her options. An
Advocacy Team was assembled including myself, two other staff members
from her day program (who knew her well), and her Individual Service
Plan (ISP) team. This consisted of a management staff representative
of the day program provider (who saw her a few times a year), the
owner of her foster home (who supervised her direct caregiver) and a
county case manager (who was assigned my friend a few months earlier,
and didn't know her). A close friend of the day program representative
was brought on board to act as health care representative (who didn't
know my friend prior to her diagnosis). We all met and decided that
the case manager would look into what was covered under her health
plan, the health care representative would get the medical record and
a 2nd opinion. She committed to providing these documents to the team
as soon as she got them. I said that I would look into treatment
options. Without any of this being accomplished, other than the
information I shared about diet and exercise being critical, she was
placed in hospice about two weeks later.

He describes in great detail the months of getting the runaround by the State until the case reaches it's inevitable end:

She continued in her day program until late November, when it was
announced that the cancer had spread and she was back in hospice. At
10:00 A.M. PST on December 14, 2006 my friend gave in to "pain
killers" prescribed while she was on hospice care. I believe my friend
was euthanized. I believe this was because she was unable to say "yes"
or "no". She was someone with a huge spirit and a small body. She was
someone with a quiet demeanor and a profound developmental disability.
In life she was easy to overlook, but the way she died will not be.

On January 10, I submitted a grievance with the P&A regarding their
handling of my friend's case. After not hearing from the executive
director in 15 working days, I sent the grievance on to the board's
grievance committee. After not hearing from them after 30 days, I can
only assume that my friend's death and her life don't merit their
attention.

If you are wondering whether I can back up my claims here, the answer
is YES. I have documentation that supports this true story and will
share it selectively. What I am looking for in sending this out is
feedback, advice, and legal assistance to ensure my friend's death was
not in vain. I also need help in getting as much exposure to this
story as possible.

I don't think the State of Oregon will ever properly police itself. Hopefully the feds will intervene.

No Palliative Care or Adoption on His Watch!

2007-02-26T13:08:00.000-05:00

This article posted on Expatica gives a good sense of what a moral "bizarro world" the Netherlands has become:

AMSTERDAM - Liberal VVD faction leader Mark Rutte thinks that the Christian democrat CDA and Labour PvdA have conceded too much to the ChristenUnie on so-called medical ethical issues in the coalition accord.

The leader of the Liberal party will level this criticism on Thursday during the parliamentary debate on the government statement by submitting a motion on abortion and a second motion on euthanasia.

Rutte says the new government puts too much emphasis on palliative care in the stance it has now taken on euthanasia. He fears that the government will try to somehow make palliative care into an full-fledged alternative that will make euthanasia superfluous. Rutte thinks euthanasia should remain an "independent alternative" in situations of unbearable and untreatable suffering.

The looming threat of the sick, depressed, elderly and terminally ill getting appropriate couselling and adequate pain medication in Holland isn't the only thing keeping Minheer Rutte up at night:

Rutte also pointed out that the coalition wants to urge pregnant women to consider adoption as an alternative for abortion.

The crusading champion of the Liberal Party won't take this assault on revered Dutch values lying down:

The government plans to conduct a study into the psycho-social effects of abortion, but adoption can also have negative effects on both mother and child, Rutte says. He wants to get a motion passed asking the government to first conduct an investigation into the effects of adoption on children and parents.

Moral Muddle on Medical Murder

2007-02-21T09:24:00.000-05:00

Hemlock Society founder Derek Humphrey had an article on his blog about one of his acolytes who complained to some members of an local euthanasia group that medical serial killer Harold Shipman ruined everything for doctors who used help patients commit suicide.

Doctors no longer help terminally ill patients to enjoy a peaceful death because of the Harold Shipman case, according to a leading consultant.

Speaking in Glasgow, Simon Kenwright, a semi-retired consultant gastroenteologist from East Kent hospital, said fears of prosecution are affecting patient treatment.

In a lecture to 100 members of Friends at the end (Fate), the euthanasia organisation, he said such changes makes the need for legislation to allow assisted dying for the terminally ill more urgent.

Dr Kenwright said that in decades past, doctors would help critically ill patients to shorten their lives peacefully but that the fear of prosecution following the case of Harold Shipman, the serial killer, means such treatment is no longer available.

His call for a change in the law comes less than two weeks after The Herald revealed that a prominent Scottish businesswoman chose to end her life at the Dignitas assisted suicide clinic in Switzerland.

If the claim that illegal assisted suicide was rampant is true, that helps explain why Shipman's body count was so high. How many of his colleagues looked the other way? Were coroners that accustomed to not questioning the cause of death? So how much less safe will the elderly and disabled be if euthanasia is legalized?

The "Monty Hall Morality" of Human Cloning

2007-01-26T10:41:00.000-05:00

Joe Carter over at Evangelical Outpost has an interesting variant on the much maligned "slippery slope" argument as it relates to cloning and organ harvesting.

Last week Story Landis, the interim chair of the National Health Institute’s stem cell task force, testified before the U.S. Senate on President Bush’s policy restricting federal funding of embryonic stem cell research. Landis opposes the current policy and declared that “science works best when scientists can pursue all avenues of research.”

If the cure for Parkinson’s disease or juvenile diabetes lay behind one of four doors, wouldn’t you want the option to open all four doors at once instead of one door?
Landis' utilitarian view of ethics--the dominant view in the biomedical research community--seems to be some sort of "Monty Hall morality": If the potential for a cure lies behind any door, then we not only should open that path of research but should have the government fund it to the full satisfaction of the grant-writing researchers. Even if, like embryonic stem cell research, the potential for cures is more science fiction than science fact, we should throw open all doors – even if it means throwing obvious moral intuitions out the window.

Landis would, I presume, disagree with my moral qualms about killing human embryos since such entities are human beings but not human persons. Very well. Perhaps I should set aside my moral repugnance, follow the logical conclusion of this line of reasoning, and concede that we should follow all "avenues of research", including the one in which we harvest the organs of non-person clones.

If embryos (and certain fetuses) are not persons, and therefore are not entitled to either legal rights or moral concern, then we can use them in potentially creative ways. For example, in his forthcoming book, Defending Life: A Moral and Legal Case Against Abortion Choice, Francis Beckwith asks a question that logically follows from this view:

[W]hat would be wrong in a developmental biologist manipulating the development of an early embryo-clone in such a way that what results is an infant without higher brain functions, but whose healthy organs can be used for ordinary transplant purposes or for spare parts for the person from which the embryo was cloned?
For a supporter of abortion or embryo-destructive research* the only logically consistent conclusion is that there is nothing inherently immoral about creating human clones for spare parts. In fact, we could argue that we have a moral obligation to create organ-donating humans clones.**

Joe then goes on to pre-demolish any plausible counter-arguments. I'm glad he's on our side...

UK Catholics Starting to Carry "Do Not Euthanize" Cards

2007-01-14T08:41:00.000-05:00

From The Guardian

Catholics fearing an increasing acceptance of euthanasia in Britain are carrying religious 'ID cards' telling doctors not to withhold liquid from the patient.
Tens of thousands have been sold on the website of the Association of Catholic Women. It reads: 'In case of my admission to hospital, please contact a Roman Catholic priest. I would like my nursing care to include fluids - however administered.'

A General Medical Council spokesman said it was unaware of the card, but insisted that staff and members would be referred to the GMC's religious and ethical guidelines in ensuring respect for patients' religious beliefs

Were I a Catholic Brit, I would not find that last paragraph the least bit reassuring.

Will You Still Need Me, Will You Still Feed Me When I'm 63?

2007-01-11T14:12:00.000-05:00

Bill Starr is back in the news with this latest stunt in his crusade to kill his wife:

Maureen Starr (63) has Alzheimer's Disease and can no longer recognise her husband, Bill.
As exclusively revealed in last week's Dispatch, Bill (76) wants to end Maureen's life and is campaigning for a change in the law to allow voluntary euthanasia.
He said this week: "I want the Queen to see how a failure by her government to act has left my girl having to live on in a truly pitiful condition.
"This photo expresses my feelings more than I could in a thousand words. It is the face of suffering."
Bill has previously written to Prime Minister Tony Blair, the Lord Chancellor's Office and even Prince Charles to press his case.
Maureen has been a resident of Lowmoor Nursing Home at Kirkby-in-Ashfield for the last 18 months.

The events are related somewhat differently in this lastest account:

...last week, the Dispatch reported on a heartrending visit by Bill to the home with the aim of ending Maureen's life by mercy killing.
"I don't want to say how I planned to do it," said Bill. "But I took two changes of clothes because I was prepared for the police to come and arrest me.
"However a nurse told me my wife's brain is dying. That changed everything because she is now in the hands of God."
Bill stressed that he felt no bitterness towards the home for banning him from seeing his wife alone in case he might still try to kill her.
But he is planning a heartfelt appeal to all the country's general medical practices.
He wants them to withhold sending Alzheimer's patients to homes for the elderly mentally ill until two guarantees are put in place.
One is for the option of voluntary euthanasia and the other is one-to-one care to protect patients from "dangers seen and unseen".

From this addled narrative I've begun to suspect that Bill may in fact be a harmless crank in terms of being a direct danger to his wife. But the threat should be taken seriously for the sake of his wife's safety. And based on the tone of these articles there is a great danger to all the disabled and elderly in the UK that Bill will become the media star that helps usher in euthanasia. It's starting to seem inevitable.

Doctors Starve Stroke Victim in UK

2007-01-10T09:17:00.000-05:00

From The Times

HT: Wesley Smith

An elderly stroke victim begged for a beetroot sandwich and macaroni cheese in hospital but no attempt was made to feed her, an inquest was told yesterday.

Olive Nockels, 91, a former school matron, died after surviving for nearly a month on a subcutaneous drip that delivered only a quarter of the calorie intake specified by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as a short-term starvation diet.

Even that was stopped for four days when the hospital claimed that she was suffering from excess fluid.

Relatives told the inquest that doctors and the Norfolk & Norwich Hospital had no interest in treating Mrs Nockels after she was admitted in September 2003.

Her grandson, Christopher West, told William Armstrong, the Coroner, at the inquest in Norwich: “The only thing that was said most of the time, as the weeks went on, was that she hadn’t died yet.

“Immediately after her admission it became clear it was their intention not to treat her.”

Mr West, 34, obtained a High Court ex parte injunction on October 6, 2003, forcing doctors to reinstate artificial nutrition and hydration, but the next day Mr Justice Forbes varied the order on an application by David Maisey, a consultant.

In the amended version, nutrition and hydration were to be reinstated only “as far as medically possible”.

Mrs Nockels died on October 10, 2003 — three days after the amendments were made.

Mr West said that doctors told him that the quality of life of his grandmother would be so poor that “it would be in her best interests not to intervene and let her die”. He said: “You don’t just let someone die because you think it’s best for them. It’s inhuman. I would class it as starvation, actually.”

Mrs Nockels’s daughter, Ivy West, told the coroner that her mother’s hearing aid and dentures had been removed — for reasons given to her as comfort and safety. She denied that her mother, from Holt, Norfolk, was incapable of responding when she visited.

“I talked to her every day,” she said. “She would tell me she was cold and that she wanted something to eat. She told me she wanted a beetroot sandwich and some macaroni cheese. She could make decisions for herself.”

Even before they get legal euthanasia, it looks like the NHS is already adopting the "ward clearing" policies of the Netherlands...

Celebrating a Life Dedicated to Life's Defense

2007-01-08T09:11:00.000-05:00

In last week's NRO Robert P George eulogizes Elizabeth Fox-Genovese. If as was the case with me, this farewell is also an introduction, then it will be an inspiring and poignant one.

Elizabeth Fox-Genovese was a scholar as notable for her bravery as for her brilliance. After what she described as her “long apprenticeship” in the world of secular liberal intellectuals, it was careful reflection on the central moral questions of our time that led her first to doubt and then to abandon both liberalism and secularism. Needless to say, this did not endear her to her former allies.

At the heart of her doubts about secular liberalism (and what she described as “radical, upscale feminism”) was its embrace of abortion and its (continuing) dalliance with euthanasia. At first, she went along with abortion, albeit reluctantly, believing that women’s rights to develop their talents and control their destinies required its legal permission availability. But Betsey (as she was known by her friends) was not one who could avert her eyes from inconvenient facts. The central fact about abortion is that it is the deliberate killing of a developing child in the womb. For Betsey, euphemisms such as “products of conception,” “termination of pregnancy,” “privacy,” and “choice” ultimately could not hide that fact. She came to see that to countenance abortion is not to respect women’s “privacy” or liberty; it is to suppose that some people have the right to decide whether others will live or die. In a statement that she knew would enflame many on the Left and even cost her valued friendships, she declared that “no amount of past oppression can justify women’s oppression of the most vulnerable among us.”

Betsey knew that public pro-life advocacy would be regarded by many in the intellectual establishment as intolerable apostasy — especially from one of the founding mothers of “women’s studies.” She could have been forgiven for keeping mum on the issue and carrying on with her professional work on the history of the American south. But keeping mum about fundamental matters of right and wrong was not in her character. And though she valued her standing in the intellectual world, she cared for truth and justice more. And so she spoke out ever more passionately in defense of the unborn.

And the more she thought and wrote about abortion and other life issues, the more persuaded she became that the entire secular liberal project was misguided. Secular liberals were not deviating from their principles in endorsing killing whether by abortion or euthanasia in the name of individual “choice”; they were following them to their logical conclusions. But this revealed a profound contradiction at the heart of secular liberal ideology, for the right of some individuals to kill others undermines any ground of principle on which an idea of individual rights or dignity could be founded.

I wish I was familiar with her sooner, but her life is a testimony to both moral and intellectual integrity. It's a rare combination these days.

No Euthanasia Case Too Shady for UK Press

2007-01-04T12:59:00.001-05:00

If doctors are half as cavalier about euthanasia as journalists, this piece about a would-be elderly angel of death is a good example of why "guidelines" in euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide are worse than useless.

AN ANGUISHED ex-Hucknall man has pleaded with a nursing home to allow him to bring the life of his ill wife to an end.

Bill Starr (76) claims he has been told that his wife, Maureen, who suffers from Alzheimer's disease, is now dying.
Hucknall-born Maureen (63) has been a resident of the Lowmoor Home at Kirkby-in-Ashfield for 18 months.
But she no longer recognises her husband and Bill told the Dispatch that he called at the home last week "with the sole intention of releasing my wife's spirit".
He even took a change of clothes because he was prepared for police to arrive and arrest him.
He declined to say how he planned to carry out the mercy killing, which would have been illegal.
Because staff became aware of what Bill proposed to do, he has now been told he can no longer visit Maureen without supervision.
A campaigner for voluntary euthanasia, Bill says he will not be going to see Maureen any more in any case because he cannot bear to watch her condition deteriorate.
He visited the home this week to say his final goodbyes and he is now appealing for friends in Spiritualist churches to pray for Maureen's "early transition from this life".
In the meantime he has written to staff at the home to ask them to make sure Maureen receives a lot of tender loving care.
He says: "It was a heartbreaking decision not to see Maureen any more but I felt it was something I must do.
"I do not really care what happens to me now but I will carry on just for Maureen's sake."

He is quoted as saying in another report:

"My wife is deteriorating before my eyes and it is just heartbreaking to see her in this condition. I want to be able to give her euthanasia and help put her out of this agonising misery.
"I am very angry about this. I have no life and neither does she.
"If this was an animal you would be able to put it out of its misery and the same should apply to humans.
"Her brain is shrinking and it is just downhill all the way from now.
"There needs to be a change in the law to allow euthanasia to go ahead for all those who need it.
"There should be voluntary euthanasia for all those who need it and one-on-one care to protect those who need to be kept from the dangers that they face.
"It has put a massive strain on me but I am determined to remain strong for my wife."

Anguished. Heartbroken. Devasted. Yet angry. And finally...strong. For Maureen. Because really, it's all about her...

No Euthanasia Case Too Shady for UK Press

2007-01-04T12:59:00.000-05:00

If doctors are half as cavalier about euthanasia, this piece about a would-be elderly angel of death is a good example of why "guidelines" in euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide are worse than useless.

AN ANGUISHED ex-Hucknall man has pleaded with a nursing home to allow him to bring the life of his ill wife to an end.

Bill Starr (76) claims he has been told that his wife, Maureen, who suffers from Alzheimer's disease, is now dying.
Hucknall-born Maureen (63) has been a resident of the Lowmoor Home at Kirkby-in-Ashfield for 18 months.
But she no longer recognises her husband and Bill told the Dispatch that he called at the home last week "with the sole intention of releasing my wife's spirit".
He even took a change of clothes because he was prepared for police to arrive and arrest him.
He declined to say how he planned to carry out the mercy killing, which would have been illegal.
Because staff became aware of what Bill proposed to do, he has now been told he can no longer visit Maureen without supervision.
A campaigner for voluntary euthanasia, Bill says he will not be going to see Maureen any more in any case because he cannot bear to watch her condition deteriorate.
He visited the home this week to say his final goodbyes and he is now appealing for friends in Spiritualist churches to pray for Maureen's "early transition from this life".
In the meantime he has written to staff at the home to ask them to make sure Maureen receives a lot of tender loving care.
He says: "It was a heartbreaking decision not to see Maureen any more but I felt it was something I must do.
"I do not really care what happens to me now but I will carry on just for Maureen's sake."

He is quoted as saying in another report:

"My wife is deteriorating before my eyes and it is just heartbreaking to see her in this condition. I want to be able to give her euthanasia and help put her out of this agonising misery.
"I am very angry about this. I have no life and neither does she.
"If this was an animal you would be able to put it out of its misery and the same should apply to humans.
"Her brain is shrinking and it is just downhill all the way from now.
"There needs to be a change in the law to allow euthanasia to go ahead for all those who need it.
"There should be voluntary euthanasia for all those who need it and one-on-one care to protect those who need to be kept from the dangers that they face.
"It has put a massive strain on me but I am determined to remain strong for my wife."

Anguished. Heartbroken. Devasted. Yet angry. And finally...strong. For Maureen. Because really, it's all about her...

More on Down's Syndrome Testing

2007-01-03T10:24:00.000-05:00

Steve Ertelt's LifeNews featured the report of obstetricians pushing for more Down's Syndrome testing that I posted about yesterday. There was some fascinating analysis including this view from the UK:

Most British doctors who are treating pregnant women with unborn children diagnosed with Down syndrome are telling their patients to have abortions. Official figures show as many as 94 percent of women with babies with Down syndrome are having abortions.

The story of this couple seems to be typical:

Green's obstetrician informed her that her child would grow up to be "mentally retarded," she told the London Daily Mail newspaper. But the 35 year-old rejected her doctor's advice to have an abortion at 35 weeks into the pregnancy.

Two weeks after the suggestion she have an abortion, she gave birth to a baby boy she named Harrison. He is now a much-loved son and the Daily Mail reports the two year-old just started nursery school.
Green described to the London newspaper what happened when she and her 33 year-old fireman husband Tim were given the news.

"The doctor said, "I have some bad news -- your baby has Down syndrome,'" she said. "We were both in total shock but this was considerably worsened when he said, "You can have a termination.'"

"My baby was fully-formed and his name was decided. I was appalled," she told the Daily Mail.

Green accused the doctor of pressuring her to have an abortion by telling her only negative things about having a mentally handicapped baby.

"The doctor urged us to think about the termination and how having a baby with "mental retardation" would affect our lives," she said. "He listed only the potential negatives about Down syndrome, without giving us any information to read for a more balanced view."

"The midwife tried to interject and offer us some leaflets but he talked her down. The frightening thing is, had we been told by the same doctor about Down syndrome earlier in the pregnancy, there is a chance we might have decided to abort," she said.

Still, Green has no regrets about her decision to keep Harrison.

"We don't know what we'd do without Harrison - he's so adored," she said.

Obstetricians Push to Expand Down's Syndrome Screening

2007-01-02T09:45:00.000-05:00

From The Examiner

There's a big change coming for pregnant women: Down syndrome testing no longer hinges on whether they're older or younger than 35. This week, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists begins recommending that every pregnant woman, regardless of age, be offered a choice of tests for this common birth defect.
The main reason: Tests far less invasive than the long-used amniocentesis are now widely available, some that can tell in the first trimester the risk of a fetus having Down syndrome or other chromosomal defects.
It's a change that promises to decrease unnecessary amnios - giving mothers-to-be peace of mind without the ordeal - while also detecting Down syndrome in moms who otherwise would have gone unchecked.
The new guideline is published in the January issue of the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology.

Naturally the article has the obligatory disclaimer to show it not just all about aborting Down's Syndrome babies:

It's not just a question of whether to continue the pregnancy. Prenatal diagnosis also is important for those who wouldn't consider abortion, because babies with Down syndrome can need specialized care at delivery that affects hospital selection, he added.

Uh-huh...

The profession of obstetrics is well on it's way to eradicating Down's Syndrome in our time.

Welby's Doctor Defies Judge, Turns Off Respirator

2006-12-21T09:35:00.000-05:00

From Yahoo

An Italian doctor said on Thursday he had switched off the life support system of a terminally ill man who died after losing a legal battle to have his respirator disconnected, but the doctor denied it was illegal euthanasia.
Piergiorgio Welby, who would have turned 61 next week, had advanced muscular dystrophy, leaving him bedridden but lucid. His pleas to be allowed to die sparked an impassioned debate over the right to die which split predominantly Catholic Italy.
"Welby's case is not one of euthanasia. It is about refusing treatment," anesthetist Mario Riccio told a news conference.
Riccio said he gave Welby an intravenous cocktail of sedatives, then removed his respirator. The 47-year-old doctor said he believed he had not broken the law but that he was willing to answer magistrate's questions about Welby's death.
Euthanasia is banned in predominantly Catholic Italy and the Vatican opposes euthanasia. Only Switzerland, the Netherlands, Belgium and the U.S. state of Oregon permit assisted suicide for the terminally ill.
Doctors who perform euthanasia can face up to 15 years in prison. But doctors and politicians supporting Welby said the Italian constitution gives patients the right to refuse medical treatment, and they had volunteered to remove his respirator.

I still don't consider turning off the respirator euthanasia.

I am however extremely suspicious of the "cocktail of sedatives". It sounds like terminal sedation.

Is Dr Welby's Case in Italy Really About Euthanasia?

2006-12-18T11:09:00.000-05:00

From Daily Telegraph

AN Italian court has overnight rejected a request by a paralysed, terminally ill man who wants doctors to take him off life support in a case that has split the predominantly Catholic country, where euthanasia is illegal.Italian court rejects euthanasia appeal
The pale, listless face of Piergiorgio Welby, 60, who suffers from advanced muscular dystrophy and is confined to bed but is lucid, has become one of the most recognised in Italy.
Speaking via a computer that interprets his eye movements, Mr Welby has appeared on news programmes and written to Italy's president asking to be taken off the respirator that keeps him alive so he can "find peace for my tortured and shattered body".
But in a 15-page verdict underscoring the legal complexity of the case, a Rome judge said that while Mr Welby had a right to have the respirator removed, that right was not "concretely safeguarded" by Italian law.

In general I don't consider shutting off a respirator euthanasia. The problem here is that the right-to-die supporters of Dr Welby intend to use this case to apply to other situations where life sustaining treatment can be legally removed. This law currently seems unfair. However Terri Schiavo never would have died at her husband's hand had she been in Italy.

My solution would be to configure the computer technology that allows Dr Welby to communicate to give him control of the power switch for his own respirator. Had nature been allowed to take its course he would have died long ago. I can't see this as suicide.

Spain Ready to Jump on Euthanasia Bandwagon

2006-11-30T13:03:00.000-05:00

From The Boston Herald

GRANADA, Spain - Inmaculada Echevarria has spent much of her life watching muscular dystrophy ruin her body. She’s been in a hospital bed for 20 years, her movements are now reduced to wiggling her fingers and toes and she wants to die.

“For me, life stopped having meaning a long time ago. I want them to help me die because I have spent my whole life suffering,” said 51-year-old Echevarria, whose case has triggered debate in Spain on the rights of people with incurable diseases to seek help in dying.

Euthanasia is illegal in Spain and people who help someone else die can be punished with at least six months in prison. But Spain’s Socialist government wants to legalize it as part of a wave of liberal reforms that have largely transformed this traditionally Roman Catholic country.

Under Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Spain is one of only a half-dozen countries in the world that have legalized gay marriage. He has also made it easier for Spaniards to divorce, eased laws on stem cell research, stiffened laws on violence against women and ended direct government financing of the Catholic church.

ACT Backs Down

2006-11-27T08:32:00.000-05:00

Despite their bluster earlier this month, Advanced Cell Technology has modified its claims in its now notorious Nature paper.

From LifeNews

Los Angeles, CA (LifeNews.com) -- A leading biotech firm that came under fire for claiming to have created a new technique to obtain embryonic stem cells without destroying human life has modified its claims. In a new paper submitted to the scientific journal Nature, Advanced Cell Technology confirmed previous LifeNews.com reports indicating the assertions were false.
In an addendum to the original report, ACT admitted that none of the 16 human embryos in the original experiments survived the attempt at creating a new technique.

ACT also clarified its own claims about it's research, now saying that it "might" be possible to obtain stem cells from a human embryo without killing it.

In the Thursday paper, ACT went on to say that "none of the biopsied [human] embryos" involved in the research survived.

Kudos to Steve Ertelt at LifeNews for standing his ground.

Biotech CEO threatens Critics

2006-11-20T11:11:00.000-05:00

Two important critics of embryonic stem cell research have been threatened by a biotech firm recently lambasted in the Senate and the press for an embryonic bait and switch

From LifeNews

Los Angeles, CA (LifeNews.com) -- A leading biotech firm that engages in cloning and embryonic stem cell research has launched a scathing attack on LifeNews.com, the pro-life newswire service. The CEO of Advanced Cell Technologies sent LifeNews.com a heated letter late Wednesday threatening the news service if it didn't stop reporting the truth about its research

Steve Ertelt has done yeoman's work in covering the prolife stories we would never hear in the mainsteam media and this attempt to intimidate him is despicable. The biotech firm Advanced Cell Technology [based in my hometown of Worcester MA] has a long history of deception and ethical compromise and this attack is par for the course.

This is a company that moved their headquarters to California to take advantage of the state funding for stem cell research there while the bulk of the company stayed in Massachusetts. They touted their methods in Nature as not harming the embryo when in fact none of the embryos they used to produce the paper survived. And despite being chastised by pro-ESCR Senator Arlen Spector for misrepresenting their research before a Senate subcommittee, they still managed to raise millions in venture funds on the basis of the misleading press releases regarding their Nature paper. This article at bioethics.net gives all the details.

I emailed Wesley Smith who informed me that Micheal Fumento has received a threatening letter as well. Wesley stated that Mr Fumento gave him permission to disseminate the threatening letter and sent me a copy. It is a tour de force of doublespeak in it's defense of ACT's claims and the legal threat is clearly implied at the end. I won't reference the text unless Mr Fumento or Wesley post it first.

Big Biotech is throwing their weight around to smother dissent and free speech. Please let your voice be heard and speak out against companies like ACT that don't want you to know the truth about their research.

UK OB-GYNs Jump On the Groningen Bandwagon

2006-11-06T10:39:00.000-05:00

From The Independent

How cold-blooded is this quote?

"We would like the working party to think more radically about non-resuscitation, withdrawal of treatment decisions, the best interests test, and active euthanasia, as they are ways of widening the management options available to the sickest of newborns."

That was the opinion of the The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecology in a submission to the medical regulatory body, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics.

In this twisted moral thinking, it's being positioned as a way of reducing late term abortions:

Deliberate action to end infants' lives may also reduce the number of late abortions, since it would allow women the chance to decide whether their disabled child should live.

[snip]

John Harris, a member of the official Human Genetics Commission and professor of bioethics at Manchester University, welcomed the college's submission. "We can terminate for serious foetal abnormality up to term, but cannot kill a newborn," he told The Sunday Times. "What do people think has happened in the passage down the birth canal to make it OK to kill the foetus at one end of the birth canal but not the other?"

It's pretty clear that the Dutch model is now spreading to all of Europe. The Continent has become a dangerous place for the disabled.

Wesley Smith on Michael J. Fox

2006-11-03T12:25:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

Michael J. Fox’s ads exemplify what is so wrong with the larger pro-cloning political campaign: Long on hype, steeped in deceit, preying on the fears of disease victims, exploitive of our national fixation with celebrities, and appealing strictly to the emotions so that we will "feel" rather than "think," the ads were a profound disservice those striving to grapple with the crucial ethical issues surrounding embryonic stem cell research and human cloning.

Population Control vs. the Culture of Life

2006-10-23T10:01:00.000-05:00

Jonah Goldberg has a great summary of the history of the Eugenics/Depopulation aspect of the Culture of Death in this recent piece that he wrote for NRO that Steve Ertelt posted at LifeNews:

As I write this, America’s population reportedly has passed the 300 million mark. The most remarkable aspect of this landmark event is how unremarkable it really is.

“If I had my way, I would build a lethal chamber as big as the Crystal Palace, with a military band playing softly, and a Cinematograph working brightly, and then I’d go out in back streets and main streets and bring them all in, all the sick ... the maimed; I would lead them gently, and they would smile me a weary thanks ...”

That was D. H. Lawrence daydreaming about population control. He was hardly alone. During the so-called Progressive Era, “enlightened” social planners were convinced that overpopulation was the gravest problem facing Western society. That’s why Lawrence gave “three cheers for the inventors of poison gas.”

George Bernard Shaw, a thoroughgoing eugenicist, believed that the “the majority of men at present in Europe have no business to be alive.” H. G. Wells smiled at the prospect that the “swarms of black and brown and dirty-white and yellow people” will “have to go.” In America, Wells’s onetime girlfriend, Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, argued that birth control was essential to stem the rising tide of the unfit. Leading feminists, Progressive economists and legal theorists shared a similar vision. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, who concluded in the case of Buck v. Bell that the state had the power to forcibly sterilize “defectives,” believed that forced population control was at the very heart of Progressive reform.

The Holocaust diminished the popularity of eugenics, but the panic over overpopulation endured. Paul Ehrlich, author of the scaremongering “The Population Bomb,” predicted in 1970 that between 1980 and 1989, roughly 4 billion people, including 65 million Americans, would starve or otherwise meet their doom in the “Great Die-Off.” Inspired by such fears, Alan Guttmacher, the former president of Planned Parenthood, was a champion of coerced birth control — i.e. “compulsory sterilization and compulsory abortion” — throughout much of the world.

This is a very enlightening glimpse of how the Culture of Death metastasized in the post-Modern era. However I recently came across an online version of one of Margaret Sanger's books that made me realize that there is nothing at all modern about the Culture of Death.

In it she points out that nearly every other culture practiced infanticide as a form of population control and adds that that it was most prevalent in cultures where woman were more influential in society. From the Greeks and Romans to China and India, she claims the practice was widespread. She also alludes to the "wise woman" of Europe's antiquity who in addition to being midwives and herbalists also had knowledge of abortifacents.

The one culture that stood in opposition to this was of course a small tribe originally known as Habiru. While their neighbors sacrificed their children to furnaces wrought in the likeness of pagan gods, the Deity of the Habiru encouraged them to cherish life.

Today the same Judeo-Christian Culture of Life stands alone against an ancient evil posing as a Brave New World.

Baby Charlotte to be Put in Foster Care

2006-10-16T09:32:00.000-05:00

From The Daily Mail:

A severely disabled child whose parents fought a long legal battle to ensure she was kept alive is to be placed in foster care because her parents have been judged unfit to look after her.

Brain-damaged Charlotte Wyatt has confounded the predictions of doctors who wanted permission to switch off her life support machine and will turn three on Saturday.

Her parents Darren, 34, and Debbie, 25, ran up a £500,000 legal bill for the taxpayer as they fought for two years in the courts to force the hospital looking after her to ensure she was resuscitated.

Eventually, the Wyatts argued, she could be looked after at home. Their successful legal battle was hailed as a moral triumph by those who believe cost should be no object in keeping a child alive even if they require a lifetime of intensive care.

But despite now being well enough to leave hospital, doctors say she cannot go home to her mother or father as there is no stable two-parent home for her to go to.

Doctors say that neither Mr nor Mrs Wyatt, who both survive on benefits, would on their own be able to provide their daughter with the 24-hour care she needs.

And since February it is understood that social workers have been seeking foster parents willing to take on the heavy responsibility of looking after little Charlotte, who has the mental ability of the average 12-week-old baby. So far no-one has been willing do so.

"Euthanasia Blues"

2006-10-12T11:09:00.000-05:00

Canadian disability activist Norman Kunc has created this tour de force. It's a terrific blues number with a message that hits home. And check out his website.

World Gone Mad

2006-10-10T07:38:00.000-05:00

Two great guest posts at Steve Ertelt's LifeNews illustrate the schizophrenic thinking of our world system.

Wesley Smith reports on how the bioethical ground is already being prepared for reproductive cloning, while on another front, despite evidence that birthrates are in free fall, our elected officials have insisted on spending more and more on international depopulation programs

So if we already have too many people, why do we need to clone more?

From Wesley's article, part of the answer seems to be the scientific community's mania for conducting research unfettered by any regulation or oversight:

We are always assured by "the scientists" that they don't support "reproductive cloning," but only want a license to clone so that the asexually created embryos (for now, leading to fetuses later) can be researched upon.

To some degree, that is true--but not because of any moral calculation. Reproductive cloning isn't "safe," meaning it would lead certainly to major birth defects, still births, and the deaths of birth mothers.

Yet, just beneath the radar, some already promote a right to reproductive cloning. As I detailed in Consumer's Guide to a Brave New World, many in bioethics believe that there is a fundamental right to procreate by any means desired, and hence, once it is "safe," they are all for reproductive cloning.

This overlooks, of course, the long process of human experimentation on fetuses as well as embryos making it "safe" would require, but never mind. These nascent humans wouldn't be "persons" anyway, so they would be ours to do with as we saw fit.

Some already go even farther. A professor (aren't they all) from the University of Melbourne, Australia, has published a piece in the current Journal of Medical Ethics (where other writers are pushing for permanently unconscious patients to be used in human-to-animal organ transplant experiments--more about which I plan to write in the near future), proposing a "negative right" to do reproductive cloning as soon as the technology can be applied.

He suggests at least two instances in which cloning through gestation to birth should be allowed now: 1) If it is the only way for a couple to generate genetically related offspring, 2) to create "savior" siblings. (Source: "Just another reproductive technology? The ethics of human reproductive cloning as an experimental medical procedure," D. Elsner, J Med Ethics 2006; 32:596-600) The apparent difference between a negative and a positive right? A positive rights requires public financing.

None of this surprises me.

After some five years of dealing with the cloning issue, this is what I believe: Beneath the hedging, weasel modifiers, and passive prose that are hallmarks of bioethical advocacy, the axis of bioethicists/biotechnologists have an anything goes mentality about these issues. Some are more candid than others about this. Some speak about setting "reasonable limits"--but somehow these suggested impediments seem to always be about what cannot yet be done, not what can be done now or in the near

It would seem that the resolution of this seeming contradiction is in the drive to "engineer" humanity. The depopulation programs of USAID seem to fit into this agenda on a global scale:

Official federal spending on overseas "population assistance," which means population control, has a slim chance of dropping significantly in fiscal year 2007. The Bush Administration proposed only $357 million for such family planning programs early this year, a significant reduction from the $425 million it typically proposed in previous years.

Of course, the usual suspects, unimpressed with the conclusive evidence from secular scientists that birthrates are in free fall in most of the world, immediately geared up to increase the amount in Congress.

Since Congress failed to finish work on spending bills before adjourning for the fall campaign season, the matter is still up in the air until a post-election November session. But it doesn't look good.

It is difficult to calculate how much of the federal budget goes to reduce the populations of Africans, Latinos, and Asians abroad.

Much of the money dedicated to HIV/AIDS prevention, maternal health, economic development, and other programs actually serves to promote population control. Billions of dollars every year from the United States alone gets spent on these goals, and billions more from the European Union.

I'm sure there is a story behind this increase. Someone is doing some powerful lobbying to get Congress to spend more than was actually budgeted. Hopefully I'll find enough for a follow-up post.

Suit Against BRA Suggests Conflict of Interest in ISB Land Deal

2006-10-09T08:13:00.000-05:00

In this press release the David Project announces it's lawsuit against the Boston Redevelopment Authority:

The David Project, a non-profit educational organization, filed a lawsuit against the Boston Redevelopment Authority ("BRA") today, asking a Superior Court Judge to order the BRA to produce public records relating to the BRA-Islamic Society of Boston land deal. These are documents that the BRA has refused to produce. The lawsuit, entitled The David Project v. Boston Redevelopment Authority, was filed earlier today in the Suffolk Superior Court.

Since 2004, the David Project and other citizens have called for governmental review of the land deal whereby the BRA transferred land which its own documents showed was valued at over $2,000,000 to the Islamic Society, in return for only $175,000 in funds.

That's been the unanswered question throughout this case. I think the next few paragraphs of the press release give us a strong hint to the answer:

Among the documents that have emerged are documents which show that shortly before the BRA and the Islamic Society reached this agreement, BRA Deputy Director Mohammad Ali-Salaam, the key BRA official who oversaw, coordinated and managed the deal on behalf of the BRA, was flown to the United Arab Emirates for a 10-day fundraising trip on behalf of the Islamic Society, paid for by the Islamic Society. Indeed, the Islamic Society has publicly identified Mr. Ali-Salaam as one of its principal fundraisers in the Middle East.

Other documents disclose that Mr. Ali-Salaam played what the evidence suggests was a dual role on behalf of the BRA and the Islamic Society for many years on this project. For instance, documents disclose that he used BRA stationery to convey $10,000 in Islamic Society funds to the President of the Roxbury Community College, asking the President to keep the donation "anonymous." Not only did Mr. Ali-Salaam sign the letter written on BRA stationery, but he had two officials of the Islamic Society, who did not work for the BRA, sign the BRA letter as well.

Still other documents disclose that at the same time that he was representing the BRA on the project, he was writing "confidential" memoranda to the Board of Directors of the Islamic Society, counseling them on how "we" can obtain favorable treatment from the BRA and the City of Boston, and using BRA stationery to negotiate favorable contractual arrangements on behalf of the Islamic Society.

In late 2004, the Boston City Council sought to hold hearings about this transaction, the circumstances in which it occurred, and the reasons it occurred as it did. The BRA and the Islamic Society were both asked to attend and provide answers to questions. Both the BRA and the Islamic Society refused to do so.

Earlier this year, the Boston City Council again sought to hold hearings about the transaction. Again the BRA and the Islamic Society were invited to attend and provide answers to questions. Once again the BRA and the Islamic Society refused to do so.

As far back as November, 2005, the David Project filed public records requests with the BRA under the Massachusetts Public Records statute, requesting all BRA documents relating to the valuation of the property, the arrangements leading to the special transaction and the BRA's oversight of it, including the due diligence performed by the BRA into the Islamic Society at the time that it conveyed public land to it at significantly below fair market value. However, the BRA has withheld numerous large categories of such documents. These include all of Mr. Ali-Salaam's e-mails to and from his BRA e-mail account. The BRA has declined to provide any explanation for withholding these or other documents.

Imaging the howls of protest from the ACLU if the beneficiary of the BRA's largesse had been a Christian Church or Jewish Temple.

What Does the NEA Have Against My Kid's Virginity?

2006-10-05T12:48:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews:

The nation's largest teacher's group is attacking abstinence education programs in a new report it co-sponsored. The attack is designed to persuade Congressional lawmakers to cut funding for abstinence education, which studies have shown is achieving its intended results in reducing sex and teen pregnancies.
The National Education Association (NEA) and the anti-abstinence group SIECUS co-sponsored the new report, its fourth annual one attacking abstinence programs.

The report reviews abstinence education curriculum and claims it is "riddled with messages of fear and shame, gender stereotypes, and medical misinformation that put young people at risk."

We've examined the NEA in these pages before, but I was curious about SEICUS. The description of their origins on their site is intentionally vague:

In 1964, a physician, a lawyer, a sociologist, a family life educator, a clergyman, and a public health educator came together to form a new organization dedicated to assuring that all people had access to information about sexuality.

It turns out that it's roots are in the work of Alfred Kinsey and his Institute. If like me you are wondering why the NEA and SEICUS are so motivated to sexualize our kids and rob them of the innocent idyll of childhood, here is a good place to start. Once you better understand Kinsey, his "inner life" and the agenda he created that has now permeated our schools and criminal justice system, you'll start to get an inkling of what a threat successful abstinence programs are to these shock troops of the Sexual Revolution.

Nazi Euthanasia Victims Found in Mass Grave

2006-09-29T11:03:00.000-05:00

From Deutsche Welle

The skeletons of 20 children and five adults believed to be victims of the Nazi euthanasia program have been found in a mass grave in western Germany, officials said Thursday.

The bones of 20 children were discovered this week during excavation work at a cemetery in the German town of Menden, close to where a World War II hospital run by Hitler's personal physician Karl Brandt was located.

The children, aged from one to seven years, were found alongside the bodies of five adults, Hans-Bernd Besa-von Werden, a spokesman for the district administration said.

Investigations of two of the children's skulls indicated the victims might have been handicapped.

Perhaps like Peter Singer and the Dutch, the Fuehrer didn't think much of their "personhood".

The prosecutor's office in the nearby city of Dortmund said there were indications the deaths might be related to euthanasia, which was secretly practiced by the Nazis from 1939 to 1941.

Some 70,000 people with physical or intellectual disabilities perished in the euthanasia program, which the Nazis believed was necessary to cleanse the German people of racially unsound elements.

Those who were deemed "unworthy to live" by showing symptoms of mental retardation or physical handicap were sent to the so-called killing facilities, where they were murdered by lethal injections or exposure to carbon monoxide gas.

The Nazi euthanasia program, which became an open secret in the Third Reich, was officially terminated in 1941 in the wake of protests from members of the German clergy.

The practice, however, clandestinely continued until the end of World War II with an ever wider range of victims, which included geriatric patients, bombing victims and forced laborers.

Remarkable how little has changed.

China's Gender Gap Growing

2006-09-28T08:05:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

As Chinese people continue to use sex-selection abortions and infanticide to bring only boys into the world, the country's gender imbalance continues to rise. The sex preference is historical in this Asian nation but it's exacerbated by family planning policies that prohibit more than one child per family.
A new report from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences finds that the gender imbalance rose to 121 males were born for every 100 females in 2004. The rate was 117 boys to every 100 girls in 2000.

China instituted the coercive family planning policy in 1979 and Chinese women and families have been the victims of an intense campaign ever since that has involved forced abortions and sterilizations, and the arrest and harassment of those who resist it.

But the policy has caused the gender imbalance to explode.

In 1982, there were 109 boys for every 100 girls in China, but the figures rose to 111 to 100 in 1990 and have been climbing ever since.

According to Steve Ertelt's piece, the policy is already yielding adverse social effects:

The country has also become a nation of bachelors as Chinese men have problems finding potential wives and starting families. This has contributed to a rise in crime, prostitution, and other problems.

Chinese couples determined to have a son easily get around the new laws as a black market has sprung up of people with ultrasound machines in the trunks of cars or house closets are willing to divulge the sex of an unborn baby for a price.

Some Chinese are selling their girl babies to those seeking girls for their sons. Chinese officials have uncovered massive baby-selling schemes including finding newborns in bags in the back of trucks and on buses on their way to be sold.

The poor parents of unwanted newborn girls sell their babies for a little as $8.

The Chinese government apparently doesn't care how the country is effected, as long as it reaches its depopulation goals. And I'm sure having lots of spare cannon fodder is seen as a bonus.

Italian President Pushing Euthanasia Debate

2006-09-27T08:23:00.000-05:00

After a 52 year old man with muscular dystrophy wrote a letter to Italian President Giorgio Napolitano begging for the right to assisted suicide. Now, after a similar request, Napolitano has called for public debate on the subject:

Italian President Giorgio Napolitano has sparked controversy by calling for the European nation's parliament to debate the subject of euthanasia. His calls comes after he received a letter from a terminally ill man who wants the nation to legalize mercy killing so he can be spared from his condition.
Piergiorgio Welby, a 60 year-old man who is afflicted with advanced muscular dystrophy, wrote to Napolitano saying that Italians should have the same access to euthanasia and assisted suicide that residents of Switzerland, Holland and Belgium do.

"When a terminally ill person decides to give up those he loves, his friends and life itself, and asks to be able to end a cruelly biological survival, I believe that will should be respected," Welby wrote, according to the ANSA news agency.

Napolitano said he was "deeply moved" and "touched" by the letter.

The timing of two such similar letters is suspicious. The former case could be resolved by turning off the patient's machine and isn't relevant to the PAS/euthanasia debate at all:

After some years in bed at home, he was taken to hospital. "Giovanni is destined to die" Maddalena said "and simply asks to receive no more medicines. He doesn't want the machine that helps him breath to be stopped, he just want the cures to be ended". The letter he sent to Napolitano and the main national journals says: "I have always loved life, but I am able to accept that life ends, because it is nature. What sense is there in prolonging my life? Is that not against nature? Pope Woijtila understood it, when he asked his doctors to let him die".

As we've seen time and again in Britain, the US, Australia and Canada the right-to-die movement is exploiting human misery to stage its latest PR campaign.

Euthanists at Canadian Conference: Christians are the Enemy

2006-09-21T14:14:00.000-05:00

At the conference mentioned in yesterday's post the speakers came out swinging and they were unanimous as to who their archenemies were: Christians. And the Catholic Church in particular is being singled out.

TORONTO, September 19, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – “The March of the Religious Right - Where Does it Lead?” was the first major talk offered at the international “Challenge in Choice” conference of euthanasia advocates held in Toronto September 7th to 10th.

The talk featured Robert Raben, a former Assistant U.S. Attorney General, Office of Legislative Affairs, and a major figure in the US Democratic party and Jon Eisenberg, an attorney and author of the book, “Using Terri.”

Raben, a political organizer and strategist for the Democrats, offered insight into the strategy of the Right to Die movement and emphasized that the religious right, particularly the Catholic Church, was their most powerful foe.

Raban wasn't the only one taking aim at Christians.

Deborah Annetts, Chief Executive of Britain’s Dignity in Dying, was particularly scathing in her criticism of the Catholic opposition to euthanasia. Annetts was, with Lord Joel Joffe, the co-author of the Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill Bill that was recently before the British House of Lords.

Annetts told conferees that the English bishops opposing the legalization of euthanasia were “just like the Taliban.” “We will never have the same money (as the Catholic Church) so we need to use our brains,” she said.

George Felos, the legal counsel for Michael Schiavo, excoriated the faithful Christians who opposed their efforts to have Michael’s wife, Terri dehydrated to death. He told the conference that the Schiavo case was “highjacked” by the pro-life movement and the religious right.

Though Felos admitted that Terri’s parents, the Schindlers, believed their daughter could recover, he believed they had been used as part of an agenda to overturn the Supreme Court abortion ruling, Roe vs. Wade.

Felos praised Canada as a more “progressive” country on Right to Die issues, and said that their cause has a better chance of succeeding here than in the US where Christians have more political sway.

Euthanasia Prevention Coalition Executive Director, Alex Schadenberg noted, “The Right to Die movement views Christian opponents to euthanasia not simply as a group of people who have a differing point of view but as the enemy.”

Schadenberg said that although the so-called ‘religious right’ was mentioned, and the evangelical Christians, especially in the US, oppose euthanasia, it is the Catholic Church that is particularly singled out for the venom of Right to Die advocates.

“Even with the weakness of the response of some prominent Catholic leaders in the US, to Terri Schiavo’s plight,” Schadenberg said, “the Catholic opposition to euthanasia and assisted suicide is still the most powerful and feared force in the debate. It is the best thought-out and most comprehensive position against assisted dying.”

Schadenberg told LifeSiteNews.com that in his opinion, the fear and hatred of the Right to Die movement for the Catholic defense of the sanctity of human life is the greatest indication of its effectiveness.

I think Catholics need to be encouraged that despite all the body shots the Church has been taking, they are still viewed as the most powerful force protecting the sanctity of life in our world.

Bragging about Euthanasia

2006-09-20T09:36:00.000-05:00

evariste at Discarded Lies comments about a recent admission of volunteers of the "right to die" group Compassion and Choices that they are actively helping their "clients" commit suicide, even in states where physician assisted suicide is illegal:

American euthanists were recently bragging to their foreign peers at an international conference that they do everything they can to kill people, short of breaking the law. I don't believe them. I think they go farther than that. I think they encourage, bait, bully, guilt, and very likely, snuff the candle.

I want to know why these people are operating with impunity. I think it's quite likely they're helping push people over the edge who might not have killed themselves. I've read far too much about the bullying by euthanists of patients to believe in their benevolence.

They want to mainstream the killing of the inconvenient, and they have to be confronted and stopped. The sad thing is how they've taken over the hospice movement. Once a beacon of loving care for the dying, they are now the most likely places to harbor undeclared euthanists.

This particular euthanist ring call themselves "Compassion and Choices". Have you ever seen such cheek? I'm glad they went with choice, though-it's revealing. Choice to kill your baby or choice to kill yourself; it's all choice! And needless to say, the euthanist ring aren't bragging about the number of people they dissuaded from committing suicide—any more than an unrepentant abortionist boasts about saving pregnancies and convincing women to give birth and give their babies up for adoption to a loving home. This isn't medicine, friends-it's a garbage disposal whirring in society's sink, and you're the garbage.

Yes ev, they do in fact bully coerce and cajol, they do want to kill the inconvenient, both in the Netherlands and in Oregon, and they have already gotten well entrenched in the hospice movement. Your analogy is perfect, we've been reduced to an unwanted meat by-product at the end of life.

Stem Cell Research Becomes an Issue in MA Governor's Race

2006-09-15T11:51:00.000-05:00

But not in the way you might think.

From the Boston Herald.

A company founded by Chris Gabrieli is one of the world’s leading patent holders in stem cell research, raising questions about the Democratic candidate for governor’s denials that he stands to profit from his plan to fund the controversial science with tax dollars.

Isis Pharmaceuticals - a company in which Gabrieli owns $1.5 million in stock - ranks third in the country in stem cell patents. Gabrieli sat on the firm’s board of directors until February.

The company holds 46 stem cell patents - second only to the University of California and the Japan Science and Technology Agency - and has as many as 30 more pending.

One Isis patent reviewed by the Herald is for a technique devised by the company for “maintaining a pluripotent stem cell.” The highly technical document also includes mention of “embryonic stem cells” while other patents refer to methods of preserving stem cells.

But Gabrieli insisted yesterday that “Isis doesn’t do stem cell research.”

“Clearly, either Gabrieli doesn’t know what he has or he’s lying,” said Tim O’Brien, spokesman for Lt. Gov. Kerry Healey. “It’s clear that his holdings are a conflict of interest.”

The controversy came to a head yesterday when Healey launched an attack ad accusing Gabrieli of positioning himself to reap a financial windfall from his plan to invest $1 billion in taxpayer money in stem cell research.

But wait, there's more!

The Herald also has learned that Gabrieli has ties to two biotech executives who have come under fire in California for sitting on an independent board that oversees that state’s $3 billion, taxpayer-funded stem cell research program. Gabrieli has called the California program a “model” for his Bay State plan.

Ten of the 29 executives on the California board have been criticized for their investments and interests in biotech companies, including Isis Pharmaceuticals director John Reed. The other with ties to Gabrieli is Ted Love, a board member of Predix Pharmaceuticals, a company that recently merged with Epix Pharmaceuticals, which is in Gabrieli’s investment portfolio.

In another twist, Thomas Shea, who appears in a heart-wrenching Gabrieli political ad touting the benefits of stem cell research, is the chief financial officer for TolerRX. The company does stem cell research. A Gabrieli aide said Shea and Gabrieli met while pushing for Massachusetts’ stem cell bill.

Gabrieli seemed to waver on the investment issue yesterday, saying: “I know of no company in my portfolio - certainly not (Isis) - that does stem cell research.”

He later said, “I don’t believe any of the companies I’ve invested in are doing stem cell research and if they are, I don’t apologize for it. I believe in stem cell research.”

He downplayed allegations he could make millions by approving a taxpayer-funded stem cell research bill if elected governor, and vowed to sell his stocks to eliminate any possible conflict.

It's sounds like at least one of Isis' patents may involve adult stem cells, but the MSM has never been good at making those distinctions. But the patent the Herald mentions has references to ESCR.

As I've stated before, it's the profit motive that makes ESCR so appealing to politicians, and a good case can be made that the entire industry is an enormous scam targeting the taxpayers and exploiting the hopes of the sick and disabled.

Lest anyone think Lt. Gov. Healey is taking the moral high ground, she also supports ESCR.

ACT Debacle Turning into Another Stem Cell Hoax

2006-09-12T10:15:00.000-05:00

Michael Fumento from the Hudson Institute had this great piece on LifeSite about the ongoing fiasco at Advanced Cell Technology over their "ethical" embryonic stem cell "breakthrough":

The fierce public debate over killing human embryos to create lines of embryonic stem cells is over; tout fini; the end. It was buried with a stake thrust through its heart by a study published in the world's most prestigious science magazine, Nature. Trust the media:

• “Stem Cells Created With No Harm to Human Embryos” (Washington Post)

• “In New Method for Stem Cells, Viable Embryos” (New York Times)

• “Embryos Spared in Stem Cell Creation” (USA Today)

• “Stem Cell Advance Spares Embryos” (L.A. Times)

On second thought, don't trust the media.

In fact none of the 16 embryos involved in the study by medical director Robert Lanza of Advanced Cell Technology (ACT) survived. All were harmed; none were viable; none were spared. When a member of ACT’s research advisory panel, Ronald Green, told the Washington Post “You can honestly say this cell line is from an embryo that was in no way harmed or destroyed,” he couldn't have been more dishonest.

For all the media mania, you'd never know the Lanza publication was just a 200-word letter that spent as much verbiage on theory as on actually describing the experiment. As such, Nature had no business running it.

But as I've written elsewhere, Nature has long boosted embryonic stem cell (ESC) technology generally and the lifting of federal funding restrictions specifically, as has its American counterpart Science. Their eagerness to run anything promoting this view recently led to Science being forced to withdraw not one but two “ESC miracle breakthrough” articles.

The rest of the article is very enlightening and worth the time to read. Wesley Smith is a big fan of Michael Fumento's and it's easy to see why.

There is a distinct pattern emerging, which is that ESCR is a racket. Taxpayers and other investors are the marks. And there is a lot of money at stake. The really sad thing is that all of this money could be spent to develop real adult stem cell cures to benefit real people.

If the Towers Had Names, What Would They Have Been?

2006-09-11T05:50:00.000-05:00

The more history I read the odder our post-modern world seems. How strange that we constructed two gigantic towers only to call them "the North Tower" and "the South Tower".

No wonder our commentary on the fifth anniversary of 9-11 is for the most part so meaningless. This morning on the radio an announcer recalled wistfully how the tragedy for a short time brought us all together as a nation.

Personally I would have preferred never to have had that moment of unity. I would have gladly traded it for a return to the world I lived in then. We lost so much that day that will never be restored in our lifetimes. Our children will never experience the innocence and security of that era. I was on a different side then held different views. I didn't want to leave my comfortable place with it's comfortable notions. But after 9-11 that place, like the Towers, was gone.

I'm glad we are remembering the individual victims. I was even planning on a post about Susan Retik and Patti Quigley and how they rose from their personal tragedies to help widows of terrorist acts in Afghanistan. But the coverage I heard this morning set me on another course.

I only care about one thing right now regarding 9-11. Are we smarter than our enemies? Nothing else matters to me. After all the memorials and speeches today the blood of the innocents of 9-11 will cry out to heaven tomorrow and everyday after. It is clear we will never be safe the way we were. Our adversaries crept in and found a way to strike us, rendering all our might useless. They thought out of the box and succeded. They knew us very well and translated that knowledge into success. How is our thinking now? Has 9-11 made us smarter?

I believe the record of the last 5 years shows a disturbing lack of national resolve. We may have initially shown more backbone than the terrorists expected. But true to the stereotype, we haven't been resolute. What should have been most encouraging to the terrorists is the state of siege our leaders who prosecute this war on terror are under from "domestic insurgents" at home and our supposed allies abroad. The truth is that even in wartime we are not unified, or supported by the rest of the world. Probably the greatest of the seditious faction is the media. Their power was demonstrated in the libelous attempts to manufacture evidence to defeat a sitting wartime president during the election. This war can't be won on two fronts.

Like myself those here at home who seek our defeat in the war on terror simply want to return to the days before 9-11. The difference is that they seem to really believe that is a real option. Having awoken from a similar spell I can appreciate how a delusion of this magnitude can exist. Enthralled by a media that has has hypnotic access to all five senses, the sleepwalkers parrot slogans, write checks and occasionally have angry outburst when reality disturbs their slumber like a determined fly. I'm now convinced that if the events of 5 years ago haven't roused them, nothing will.

The military and even literary significance of towers has been lost on us today. Before gunpowder a tower was formidable. It allowed the defenders to see farther and rain death on attackers. And when a tower fell, it meant that the walls had already been breached and the battle lost.

Since our Towers were nameless I've assigned my own symbolic meaning to them. This personal significance became clarified to me after a similar event occurred with the death of Terri Schiavo. In legends of the Golden Age, kings are philosophers and philosophers kings. In a fallen world the necessity for good government is for political and religious leaders to work together to hold chaos at bay. Both institutions failed Terri and this country. The towers defending us had already fallen and the later historical events merely echoed the metaphysical reality.

I don't want to be pessimistic or discouraging this day, but unless as a nation our thinking changes dramatically, we will remain defenseless, outnumbered and blind.

Why Choose Life?

2006-09-06T07:38:00.000-05:00

From the Weekly Standard

Fred Barnes has a great piece on the moral crossroads faced by himself and four other prominent Americans that led to a decision for Life:

HOW DO PEOPLE BECOME PRO-LIFERS? What turns people into passionate foes of abortion and related issues like euthanasia and embryonic stem cell research? I'm not referring to those who supported the pro-life position because of their family upbringing or religious faith or because of a political requirement as, say, a Republican candidate in a red state. I'm talking about people who, as adults or mature teenagers, were either pro-abortion or basically indifferent to the issue. Then something changed their mind, prompting them to take up the anti-abortion cause. Perhaps they began defending the pro-life position without realizing they'd flipped. In any case, what caused the change? What happened?

I addition to his own experience, Fred profiles the ethical journeys of Ronald Reagan, Henry Hyde, Ramesh Ponnuru, and Wesley Smith. By the end, some common themes stand out.

So think for a moment about these five experiences: Reagan's deciding on signing an abortion bill, Hyde's mulling whether to co-sponsor a pro-abortion measure, Ponnuru's watching as the Summer of Mercy unfold, Smith's reading pro-euthanasia tracts as his dead friend's home, and our--my wife and I--adverse reaction to amniocentesis. One common thread is obvious. All of us, because of the circumstances we found ourselves in, were forced to think about the taking of a life and what that means in both practical and moral terms. Most people avoid thinking about troubling moral issues like abortion or euthanasia. We couldn't.

And the other common thread is that something happened to make us choose life and choose it firmly and reject death. I think it was our conscience that intervened or, if you prefer, the basic human instinct that favors life over death. Or it you are a Christian, as I am, it was God.

Now I'm sure there are many exceptions to our experience. Not everyone who contemplates abortion or euthanasia is bound to take the intellectual path that five of us--six, including my wife--did on the way to becoming pro-lifers. But I suspect there are many more than like us than not. And many more to come.

This piece gives me hope for our country but also raises a major concern. As Fred points out, a decision for life seems to require some firm ethical bedrock in our metaphysical make-up, but the signs of the times indicate not only are an increasing number of people in our society are being raised without these core values, but are taught to be hostile to them.

Romney Imposes Regulations on "Orwellian" Stem Cell Research

2006-09-05T07:58:00.000-05:00

From Scientific American

BOSTON (Reuters) - Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a 2008 Republican presidential hopeful, said on Thursday his administration's new restrictions on stem cell research are aimed at heading off an "Orwellian" future.

The state's Department of Public Health this week issued regulations banning the creation of embryos for research purposes. Scientists say stem cell research could lead to breakthroughs in treatments for diseases including cancer. But the issue has become ethically and politically volatile because extracting the cells entails destruction of an embryo.

"I believe it crosses a very bright moral line to take sperm and eggs in the laboratory and start creating human life," Romney told reporters. "It is Orwellian in its scope. In laboratories you could have trays of new embryos being created."

Cynic that I've become, I home Mitt is serious about this and it's not part of the pre-primary courting dance that Republicans use to woo their base before they chase the center before the general elections...

Mainstream Media Continues to Ignore Adult Stem Cell Advances

2006-08-22T08:20:00.000-05:00

This was published published last month, but not a peep out of the rest of the MSM. Imagine the hoopla if an ESCR therapy got results like these...

From Forbes

In Irvine, Calif., a tiny company called PrimeCell Therapeutics has taken adult stem cells found in testes, reprogrammed them, and created human heart, brain, bone and cartilage cells. This marks a breakthrough in developing what are known as "pluripotent" adult stem cells–cells that can be turned into most other cell types. That pluripotent ability, and the fact that stem cells self-renew, is the main attraction of stem cells from human embryos. One challenge with embryonic stem cells, however, is preventing them from creating tumor cells. So far, the PrimeCell researchers have been able to reprogram the cells they extract from testes without any tumor growth.

Plenty of other firms are active in the stem cell field. Stemnion, a small biotech firm in Pittsburgh, is working on using stem cells found in the placenta for healing wounds. Cellerant Therapeutics of San Carlos, Calif., will soon start a human trial using highly purified adult stem cells found in bone marrow to treat patients with Sickle Cell disease, a genetic blood disorder. Osiris Therapeutics of Baltimore has several trials under way using adult stem cells to treat the intestinal inflammation known as Crohn's disease, repair damaged tissue following a heart attack and prevent the progression of arthritis.

[snip]

Outside the U.S., adult stem cells have been used to treat patients with Type 2 diabetes in Argentina, heart disease in countries including Germany, Thailand and India, and babies with malformed hearts in Japan. Success rates among these treatments are all at least 68% or higher. For the diabetics treated in Argentina, more than two-thirds were able to stop taking insulin and diabetes medications following the stem cell treatment.

"There's an incredible amount of research and a very large sum of venture capital and private investment going into the field," says Dr. Amit Patel, a cardiac surgeon and director of Cardiac Cell Therapy at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. Patel has been called by venture capital firms to consult on potential investments. Bush's veto of the stem cell bill on Wednesday "may slow down embryonic stem cell research" adds Patel, but he's optimistic that research will continue nonetheless with private funding. Adult stem cell research will be unaffected.

Patel has pioneered the use of adult stem cells to treat heart disease. He worked with surgeons in Thailand last December to treat Hawaiian singer Don Ho. Ho's own blood-derived adult stem cells were injected into his heart to treat heart failure. Ho's health has improved so much that he has returned to performing.

Patel is particularly impressed with the work done by PrimeCell using what are called "germ line" stem cells–cells that will turn into sperm. Patel says he divides stem cells into thrift-store cells and designer cells. "PrimeCell's cells are like the Prada of cells. They've taken an adult cell and reprogrammed it," he says. "The potential of their cells is incredible." One advantage of these cells is that they do not age as a human ages.

A group of German researchers replicated PrimeCell's proof of concept in mice, and published the results in Nature in March. But PrimeCell appears to be ahead of the German team because it's already moved from mice to human cells. PrimeCell has $10 million in private funding from two sources: an unnamed investor and Thomas Yuen, chairman and chief executive of PrimeCell's parent company, PrimeGen.

Except for one small mention of an ESCR initiative, the entire article concerns itself with advances in adult stem cell research that are largely being ignored. Forbes also had an interesting piece showing that ESCR, like other anti-life causes, thrives on the support of an elite group of billionaires, who are after our tax dollars as well for their pet projects.

Meanwhile new reports of adults stem cell treatments like this one seem to appear daily...

Catching up from the Summer

2006-08-21T09:42:00.000-05:00

Due to an unusually pleasant New England summer, I've gotten behind on quite a few important stories...

China will soon have a major demographic problem on its hands. Partly do to a population bulge among older Chinese and exascerbated by its gender imbalance there soon will be more elderly that the smaller generation of producers will be able to support comfortably. The Chinese government has already signaled its interest in euthanasia as a solution. Now a Catholic news service is reporting that Hong Kong has been targeted as a testing ground for a new euthanasia policy:

The Law Reform Commission wants to suggest to terminally ill people that they sign a declaration about their willingness to die. Patients’ NGOs have hit out at the recommendation, saying it is merely an “immoral” form of euthanasia.

Hong Kong (AsiaNews/SCMP) – It is “morally wrong” to suggest to patients to state in writing that they may allowed to die if they become comatose or are in terminal stages of their illness, said patients’ groups in Hong Kong.

The Law Reform Commission of Hong Kong yesterday “indicated” that someone who is seriously ill may draw up a written directive to be allowed to die if he cannot live without artificial aid and can no longer take decisions. But NGOs for the safeguarding of patients’ rights said this was a hidden form of euthanasia. The “sweet death” is forbidden by law in Hong Kong and even if a sick person asks for it, the family can oppose it and prosecute doctors who apply the patient’s wishes. Doctors are also unhappy about the situation, because they would have preferred clear and unequivocal directions about their duties.

Cheung Tak-hai, chairman of the Alliance of Patients' Organisation which represents 37 groups, said this regulation “is no different from euthanasia” and could weaken patients’ “will to live”.

"Recovery from many illnesses, such as cancer, depends on the patient's own spirit. If they sign this, they will give up,” he said. “Coma patients have a chance of waking up and should be given continuous treatment. If they allow doctors to take them off life-sustaining devices and cause death, there will be a lot of legal disputes between hospitals and families."

There were concerns, he continued, that this move may have been willed by the hospital authorities as a cost-cutting measure to remove long-stay or comatose patients.

The sister of Tsang Kwan-fan, a patient in a coma at the Caritas Hospital, agreed. She said: “It is very clear that they do not want to waste resources on treating patients in comas or vegetative states. The new device leads patients to choose death. It is morally wrong. It treats life as worthless.”

Despite the fact that this crisis was precipitated by China's ill conceived "One Child" policy, China continues to harshly silence its critics, as we see in its ongoing attacks on reformer Chen Guangcheng:

The trial of Chen Guangcheng, the activist attorney who brought international attention to a brutal family planning campaign that involved the forced abortions or sterilizations of 10,000 women, ended in chaos Friday. Chen's attorneys were arrested and he was appointed two state lawyers who knew nothing of his case.
Local officials in Linyi, who previously arrested Chen on trumped up charges, arrested three of his defense attorneys and held two of them until after the trial concluded.

Xu Zhiyong, a lawyer and law professor from Beijing, was detained for 22 hours and false charges of theft to prevent him from attending the trial.
"It's obvious the authorities did not want us to defend Chen Guangcheng," Xu, a member of a district people's congress in Beijing, told Reuters.

Li Fangping, another attorney who was falsely arrested and prevented from helping Chen, said the activist was appointed to state lawyers who knew nothing of his case. He said the repeated denial of rights caused Chen to be physically ill.

Meanwhile, the UN which was a major enabler to China's depopulation program, is facing resistance to its latest binding treaty to establish abortion as a "reproductive right":

New York, NY (LifeNews.com) -- The battle to keep abortion out of a United Nations treaty on the disabled continues as ambassadors from Nicaragua led a coalition of pro-life nations objecting to ambiguous language that could be interpreted as providing for an international right to abortion. The battle is the latest over the phrase "reproductive rights."

UN delegates began gathering on Monday in New York to begin work to finalize the International Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

As LifeNews.com previously reported, Susan Yoshihara of the Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute, said that pro-life advocates were particularly concerned about the language in the treaty because it will be considered “hard” international law.

On Friday, C-FAM reported in its Friday Fax newsletter that Nicaragua led a group of 23 nations in objecting to including “sexual and reproductive health services” in the document saying it was vague and undefined and could be used to promote abortion in pro-life nations.

C-FAM indicated that a diverse group of nations agreed with the Central American nation, including the United States, Honduras, Egypt, Costa Rica, Bangladesh, Tanzania, Tunisia, Qatar, Kenya, and the Philippines.

Surprisingly, according to its Friday Fax report, Norway, which backs abortion, joined in objecting to the phrase as well.

The "reproductive rights" phrase has only been defined as abortion once by the United Nations, in a non-binding document produced at the Cairo population conference in 1995. But pro-abortion non-governmental organizations and some UN committees have interpreted it as promoting abortion.

Yoshihara wrote last week that "most documents negotiated at the UN are non-binding. Treaties, such as this one, require governments to change their domestic laws based on the treaty."

Despite the number of nations opposing inclusion of the phrase, C-FAM's Friday Fax reported that the committee chair, Ambassador Donald McKay of New Zealand, insisted that negotiations continue.

Normally when a large group of nations object, controversial phrases are removed and eventually the Egyptian delegate commented that McKay being partial by not removing the language from the document.

While a large contingent of nations opposed the vague language, the European Union, Canada, Peru, Cuba, and Brazil backing including "reproductive rights." C-FAM's Friday Fax also said that McKay was taking the unusual move of allowing NGOs to participate in the discussions of the language. Normally they are allowed to lobby delegates but not participate in negotiations.

C-FAM expects the negotiations to continue into next week and doesn't expect a final decision until very late on the final day. The meeting lasts until August 25.

Should abortion make its way into the treaty that's bad news for pro-life nations that prohibit abortions and the majority of the world that has laws protecting the disabled and the elderly from losing lifesaving medical treatment.

Despite being exposed as a fraud, cloning con artist Hwang Woo-Suk is back in business:

Hwang Woo-Suk, the scientist who started an international scandal when his research team fabricated all of its embryonic stem cell research, is back in the cloning business. Hwang has opened a new lab with some of his colleagues where he will attempt to clone pigs.
As LifeNews.com reported yesterday, Hwang has resumed his work on animal cloning, which was the only success his research team had.

On Friday, the Ministry of Science and Technology said it gave Hwang approval to set up the laboratory, which will be called the Suam Biotechnology Institute Foundation.

Given the inherently dangerous nature of any genetic research, the decision of the South Korean government is an appalling one. The fact that a scientist with such a complete lack of integrity is still being allowed to tinker with the building blocks of Life is a cause for great concern. And based on denny's fascinating post from last week, the issue is worse that we think...

UK to Allow Women to Sell Eggs

2006-07-31T08:49:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews:

British groups are upset at a decision by a governmental agency that is supposed to be a stem cell research watchdog. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) has ruled that a British stem cell research institute can pay women for their eggs for stem cell studies.
The decision prompts concerns for bioethicists who say that paying women for eggs for research opens up a list of problems including coercion and taking advantage of poor women.

HFEA ruled that the North East England Stem Cell Institute can ask women undergoing infertility treatments if they would like to be paid for any extra eggs produced in the process.

But Josephine Quintavalle, of the British Comment on Reproductive Ethics, called the decision "lunacy."

"Vulnerable women will be put under pressure. They are extremely susceptible to coercion," she explained.

Dr. David King, director of Human Genetics Alert, also opposed the HFEA decision saying it "shows its contempt for public opinion and its general bias in favor of anything the IVF industry asks for."

Arrests Made in Katrina Patient Deaths

2006-07-18T09:15:00.000-05:00

From UPI via Political Gateway

NEW ORLEANS, July 18 (UPI) -- New Orleans authorities have arrested a doctor and two nurses allegedly involved in some of the 45 deaths of hospital patients in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

Sources told WWL-TV, New Orleans, the three staff members were booked at the Orleans Parish Prison Monday night and released by a judge on their own recognizance.

They were charged with being principal to second-degree murder, the report said.

In the days after the Aug. 29 storm battered and then flooded the city, rumors emerged that staff at the Memorial Medical Center had used drug overdoses to euthanize the weakest of the stranded patients who would suffer in the blacked-out stifling hospital.

I'll update as more detail come in.

Canadian Report Claims China Harvesting Organs from Falun Gong Members

2006-07-17T12:42:00.000-05:00

Wesley Smith made a brief reference to this report on his Albany Bioethics Conference post. I googled and found a link to the report from Die Welt

Since it is a PDF I'll summarize rather than post. An independent study by a human rights lawyer and former prosecuter have turned up some serious indictors that China is harvesting organs from the incarcerated adherents of the Falun Gong cult. The number, availability, and short wait period for "donated" organs at Chinese hospitals are all consistent with this kind of program. Also in a "sting" operation, callers posing as middlemen have recorded calls with employees of Chinese hospitals who admit they are supplying or did supply the organs. Here is an eerie example of the kind of conversation that was captured:

"Do you have Falun Gong [organ] suppliers? ..."

"We used to have, yes."

"... what about now?"

"... Yes."

"Can we come to select, or you provide directly to us?"

"We provide them to you."

"What about the price?"

"We discuss after you come."

"... How many [Falun Gong suppliers] under age 40 do you have?"

"Quite a few."

"Are they male or female?"

"Male"

"Now, for ... the male Falun Gong [prisoners], How many of them do you have?"

"Seven, eight, we have [at least] five, six now."

"Are they from countryside or from the city?"

"countryside."

The entire report is worth your time reading and you will no doubt find it extremely unsettling.

Michael Reagan Nails It on Embryonic Stem Cell Research

2006-07-12T08:05:00.000-05:00

Michael Reagan does a great guest post in LifeNews. Here he sums it up better than I've seen anywhere:

It needs to be said right up front: at this time those promised ESCR miracles are merely the products of the proponents’ hopes and dreams, and mostly based on the now admittedly falsified claims of a South Korean scientist -- not of the current reality, which is grim. Far from curing everything from Alzheimer’s Disease to spinal cord injuries, and a whole host of other medical problems as proponents promise, all ESCR has produced thus far is cancerous tumors in lab animals. And even top ESCR scientists now admit that any progress in the field is 25 years away, after they stop killing lab animals, that is.

Yet you hear proponents say that cures for Alzheimer’s and spinal cord injuries are right around the corner and if only science had been allowed to go ahead with ESCR a long time ago my dad could have been cured of Alzheimer’s and Christopher Reeve would have lived to walk again.

The fact that Bill Frist is supporting the latest push for ESCR funds is yet another reason why fundraisers who call me from the Republican Party get nothing but an earful lately. Fortunately Bush plans to veto the bill.

China's Crackdown on Sex-Selection Abortions Stalls

2006-06-27T07:51:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

The headline assumes that they were earnest about this in the first place. Looking at the recent developments, China's intent here is unclear at best.

The Chinese government has decided it will not prohibit abortions used to prevent the birth of girl babies even though sex-selection abortions have contributed to a stark gender imbalance that is creating a host of social problems. The nation's state-owned media reported the plan to scrap the idea.
China now has 119 boys for ever 100 girls, a gender imbalance that is far from the normal 103-100 ratio seen in industrialized nations across the globe. The imbalance has given rise to a culture of massive sex-trafficking and the kidnapping of teenagers and young adults to be forced into marriage.

Though it has started to crack down on the use of ultrasound machines to determine the gender of an unborn child, Chinese lawmakers could not agree on penalties for sex-selection abortions for those who get around the policy.

Zhou Kunren, the vice-chairman of the parliamentary Law Committee, told China-run media that lawmakers could not come together to finalize the amendment to the nation's criminal law. He indicated some lawmakers want to pass the sex-selection abortion ban to fix the gender imbalance but others disagree.

"However, other experts argue it is inappropriate to criminalize such practice because pregnant women enjoy the right to know the sex of the fetus," he said.

Somehow I'm skeptical that what scuttled this policy was the individual rights of women in China. Why would Chinese policymakers allow this practice to continue when it is so obviously destructive to their society? The only benefits I can see are a surplus of unmarried men that can be conscripted into the People's Liberation Army, and the way it contributes to the Chinese goverment's depopulation goals.

Bioethics Rumble in Albany

2006-06-26T07:29:00.000-05:00

According to his blog Wesley Smith will soon be taking a much deserved vacation, but not before he joins a bioethics conference in Albany along with Nigel Cameron who has written a bioethics column for Christianity Today. Wesley has predicted some "respectful fireworks", which will be good because right-to-die-friendly bioethicist Art Caplan will be there. Art recently eulogized Dr Ron Cranford in the most glowing of terms.

Hopefully one of my favorite pro-life bloggers, Chana Meira will be able to attend and will give us a report. If any other blogger/readers plan to be there, I'll be happy to post your feedback.

Euthanasia Law Being Considered in India

2006-06-15T11:52:00.000-05:00

From Hindustan Times

SEEKING TO legalise mercy killing in the case of terminally ill patients, the Law Commission has suggested to the government to consider if a legislation can be enacted under which life-support systems can be withdrawn in the patients' "best interests".

In a report, the commission said that under such circumstances, no criminal case should be made against the patient, the doctor or anyone else for the decision.

Sources said the report asked the government to study if a patient could be "competent" to take a decision on "withholding or withdrawing" medical treatment, including artificial nutrition and hydration.

The commission submitted its report recently to the Law Ministry, which has sent it to the Health Ministry for its views. "Ultimately the cabinet has to decide whether such a bill should be brought in Parliament," the sources said.

The Baby Boomer Death Manifesto

2006-06-13T09:33:00.001-05:00

In his op-ed piece in The Guardian Richard Smith gives us the unabashed party line of his generation's secular take on the meaning of life and death.

He starts by confirming my suspicion that the right-to-die movement has an "war of attrition" strategy in pushing euthanasia in the UK:

In 1978 I published one of my first articles in a medical journal - on abortion. It prompted howls of protest, and so did every article on abortion for the next 10 years. But slowly the protesters, some of them very well organised, ran out of steam. We moved - do I dare say progressed? - over a 50-year time scale from refusing termination of pregnancy in a woman whose life was threatened by pregnancy to, effectively, abortion on demand.

I feel I'm watching a similar progression with euthanasia. Len Doyal, "one of Britain's top medical ethicists", arguing that active euthanasia can be acceptable is another step along the path. Len may be in the vanguard, but much of the population is close behind. Other countries and states - the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, Oregon, the Northern Territories - are ahead, but surely a post-religious country like Britain will quickly follow. Lord Joffe's bill on physician-assisted suicide may have been put on ice, but it'll soon be warmed up.

His claim is that in the UK the push is by "the people", but I think it is more accurate to say that it is the boomer hive-mind that is represented by the media:

The progression is mostly led not by doctors or ethicists, but - as it should be - by the people. Why not euthanasia, many think. "I don't want to hang around demented, incontinent, a burden, incapable of joy. I'll get out while the going's relatively good. I'll not be shoved in one of those miserable homes. I'll call the shots." This view is becoming particularly strong as the "baby boomers" confront their deaths. We've had much more privileged lives - and much more choice - than our parents, and we'd like to keep it that way to the end.

That last line is a classic.

Smith says the guiding principle of boomers is autonomy, or as Frank Sinatra would say, doin' it "my way". However that autonomy doesn't extend to the doctors that they require to participate in their perceived right to an autonomous death:

Doctors (and the Pope) have always seen a difference between active killing and either "masterly inactivity" that culminates in death or giving people a high quantity of a drug to help relieve symptoms knowing that the dosage will kill them. Philosophers generally don't see a difference. But it's the doctors and not the philosophers who are doing (or not doing) the business, and they feel they have special rights. One response has been to suggest "philosopher assisted suicide". You don't need to know much medicine to hand somebody a lethal cocktail.

And there's the rub. It's OK to kill yourself. Why shouldn't a doctor help you out? Isn't that what doctors are supposed to do? Aren't we meant to be creating a "patient-led NHS"?

In other words, just do it our way...

The Baby Boomer Death Manifesto

2006-06-13T09:33:00.000-05:00

Hentoff on the Culture of Death

2006-06-12T12:22:00.000-05:00

Nat Hentoff is my kind of liberal. He has already shown he is a mensch in his defense of Terri Schiavo, the only voice in her favor I can recall hearing from the Left. Here he takes on the Culture of Death in both its aspects of euthanasia and abortion. It is simply too good and too intense to pick out one quote. Please take the time to read the entire article, it is relatively short and you won't regret it. Compare his principled stand to that of his former mentor, Jesse Jackson.

Busy Times for the Culture of Death

2006-06-05T07:52:00.000-05:00

From the Telegraph a report that neighbors of the Swiss assisted suicide clinic want them evicted:

Residents who share a block of flats with Dignitas, the controversial assisted suicide charity, have launched a campaign to evict the organisation from the buiding.

In eight years, more than 450 people have killed themselves with barbiturates in a fourth-floor apartment in Zurich, owned by the Swiss charity. The bodies are put in a zipper bag and transported in the three-person lift, or carried downstairs.

Traumatised by the experience of passing living people going up in the lift, only to come across them hours later descending in a body bag, some residents want to move out of the block.

***

According to Australian ABC Radio, the New Zealand Ministry of Health has declined to charge Philip Nitschke for practicing medicine without a license for his assisted suicide workshops. He will return to continue the workshops, but the Medical Council has threatened to try to make another charge stick.

***

I've posted before that Amnesty International was considering a policy making the killing of babies a basic human right. Now it seems they are ready to push this policy at their next general meeting, according to LifeSite. I agree with Congressman Christopher Smith of New Jersey:

"I would hope they reject it," he said. "They would cease to be a human rights organization and morph into just another anti-child, pro-abortion organization."

The bishop who penned the "Amnesty Prayer" and is a thirty year member has already resigned in protest.

***

Finally LifeNews has a great editorial on adult vs. embryonic stem cell research from JunkScience.com's Steve Milloy

Eugenics in the UK

2006-05-31T08:44:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

This is appalling. What next? Will mothers start aborting babies with overbites or because they don't like their eye color?

A British religious official who earlier spoke out on abortions of children with cleft palates is speaking out about new reports showing abortions there on children who have clubbed feet. The condition is operable and not life-threatening and Rev. Joanna Jepson says such abortions should be illegal.
She accused doctors of pressuring women to have abortions when unborn children are diagnosed with any physical or mental disability.

"Women shouldn't be put in the position where they are under pressure to abort from the medical profession," she told the Birmingham Post newspaper.

Wesley Smith Testifies Before the Senate on Euthanasia

2006-05-25T15:30:00.000-05:00

This press release gives us a preview of his testimony.

In his testimony, Smith will "argue that there is a proper public policy role for the federal government against assisted suicide, such as prohibiting federally controlled substances from being used to intentionally end life."

Smith, named by the National Journal as one of the nation's top experts in bioethics, notes that: "In the thirty-plus years since euthanasia was redefined in the Netherlands as a legitimate tool of medical practice instead of a serious crime, ... rather than being rare, statistics show that euthanasia is now almost a matter of medical routine."

"Once we accept the killing of terminally ill patients, as did the Dutch, we will invariably, over time, accept the killing of chronically ill patients, depressed patients, and ultimately perhaps, even children," predicts Smith.

He warns lawmakers that "once killing is redefined as medical treatment, it becomes transformed from 'bad' into 'good.' Thus, the guidelines intended to 'protect against abuse' eventually are viewed not as protections but instead as hurtles separating sick and dying patients from the beneficence of death. In such an intellectual and cultural milieu, it becomes easy to justify ignoring or violating 'guidelines.'"

He promised to post the transcript on his blog when available.

The Adverse Effects of Euthanasia on Doctors

2006-05-23T11:17:00.000-05:00

In yesterday's post at Secondhand Smoke Wesley Smith presented this stunning article on a subject to which few of us have given much thought. The survey methods and responses differed between the Dutch doctors and the physicians in Oregon, but it is clear that for a significant number of doctors there is serious emotional fallout from physician assisted suicide and euthanasia.

Results and Discussion: The physician is centrally involved in PAS and euthanasia, and the emotional and psychological effects on the participating physician can be substantial. The shift away from the fundamental values of medicine to heal and promote human wholeness can have significant effects on many participating physicians. Doctors describe being profoundly adversely affected, being shocked by the suddenness of the death, being caught up in the patient's drive for assisted suicide, having a sense of powerlessness, and feeling isolated. There is evidence of pressure on and intimidation of doctors by some patients to assist in suicide. The effect of countertransference in the doctor-patient relationship may influence physician involvement in PAS and euthanasia.

Conclusion: Many doctors who have participated in euthanasia and/or PAS are adversely affected emotionally and psychologically by their experiences.

The report is worth reading beyond the abstract for the chilling glimpses it gives into the experiences of these doctors. Here's one jaw-dropping comment from a Dutch doctor:

Response by Dr. Zylicz: "I was giving consultations in several situations like this, when the GP was calling me about a patient with gastrointestinal obstruction. He said, 'The problem is that the patient is refusing euthanasia.' I said, 'What happened?' He said, 'In the past, all these kinds of situations, when people were intractably vomiting, I solved by offering euthanasia. Now this patient does not want it, and I do not know what to do.' That was really striking. Providing euthanasia as a solution to every difficult problem in palliative care would completely change our knowledge and practice, and also the possibilities that we have . . . . This is my biggest concern in providing euthanasia and setting a norm of euthanasia in medicine: that it will inhibit the development of our learning from patients, because we will solve everything with euthanasia."

In an interview with a doctor in Oregon there is a good example of a recurring theme: doctors being intimidated into participation in assisted suicide despite their qualms.

I had to accept that this really was going to happen. Of course I could choose not to participate. The thought of Helen dying so soon was almost too much to bear, and only slightly less difficult was the knowledge that many very reasonable people would consider aiding in her death a crime. On the other hand, I found even worse the thought of disappointing this family. If I backed out, they'd feel about me the way they had about their previous doctor, that I had strung them along, and in a way, insulted them.

This experience was found in Holland as well:

Response by Professor Jochemsen: "I know from physicians who are opposed to performing euthanasia that they are afraid of saying so when applying for jobs and trying to find a post as a physician. In certain circumstances, that will make it much more difficult for them to get a job."

The findings of this report support the notion that euthanasia is a juggernaut that cannot be restrained by guidelines and "bio-ethical standards". Once set into motion the process is too powerful for either doctors, patients or policymakers to control. I'm reminded of the medieval momento mori painting that portray Death as a skeletal rider on a white horse, trampling humanity under it's feet, beggar and king alike...

Oregon Has a High Elderly Suicide Rate...Go Figure...

2006-05-22T09:22:00.000-05:00

I missed this on Wesley Smith's blog last Tuesday, but LifeSite caught it.

Oregon’s confusion over the state’s alarming rate of suicide among the elderly would be laughable, if it were not so tragic, said Wesley J. Smith, an expert in the field of bioethics and euthanasia and the author of a critical examination of the assisted suicide/euthanasia movement, Forced Exit: The Slippery Slope from Assisted Suicide to Legalized Murder.

Oregon legalized physician-assisted suicide in November of 1997. Over the ensuing decade, rates of non-physician assisted suicide in the state have outstripped the national elder suicide rate, with about 100 Oregonians aged 65 or older taking their own lives annually.

In a commentary on Oregon’s investigation into the disproportionately high rate of suicide among the state’s elderly, Smith points out that a state that has legalized physician-assisted suicide should not be surprised at an overall increase in suicide rates.

“Oregon is upset that it has a high rate of elder suicide,” Smith wrote on his blogsite Tuesday. “Yet, amid the wringing hands, no one seems to get the point that suicide is fine and dandy in some cases. Despairing people, particularly with health issues, get that point and may think, if it’s okay for the cancer patient, why not also for me?”

I would go so far as to say not only does the PAS law in Oregon suggest to the elderly that they can end their life but to them it hints that maybe they should...

Physician-Assisted Suicide Bill Defeated in House of Lords

2006-05-15T09:08:00.000-05:00

From FoxNews

I suppose it is already old news, but it's good news...

Britain's House of Lords on Friday rejected proposed laws to allow physicians to assist terminally ill people to die, a measure that faces broad public opposition and is not backed by Prime Minister Tony Blair's government.

Seven hours of debate on the issue ranged from spiritual to practical concerns, including Christian theology and the high cost of health care as about 90 peers addressed British parliament's upper chamber, including a phalanx of bishops, led by Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams.

Peers later voted 148 to 100 against proposals to take forward discussions about instituting new laws -- meaning current attempts to pass right-to-die laws have failed

Intimations of Spirit

2006-05-12T08:39:00.000-05:00

In the first essay in this spontaneous series, I discussed how materialism informs and (mis)guides the Culture of Death. Now I'd like to question some of its fundamental assumptions in regard to a tradition of acceptance of the spiritual as part of the human experience.

In a recent news story a group of girls in Laos began acting strangely and were deem to be possessed by evil spirits. Buddhist monks were called in to bless them and drive the demons out. This was reported in the Western press as a humorous curiosity piece. It is possible, even likely that there is a natural explanation for this incident. There are similarities to the infamous events in Salem MA, which now appear to have been caused by ergot poisoning. But the story illustrates the kind of magical thinking that persists in much of the world. Like our ancestors, their world is very different from the bleak Cartesian one in which we post-moderns dwell.

Here in the West the same types of supernatural beings recur in our folklore with remarkable consistency. Ghosts, witches, fairies and vampires haunt our myths and sagas from the past. Taking as a hypothesis that this cultural testimony was describing some objective reality, it would seem that our ancestors had a familiarity and perhaps a faculty of perception of a non-material dimension. I discussed in my last essay how materialism acts as a filter on our apprehension of reality. I'm not proposing that this ancient worldview was clearer or more complete than the current one. In fact I think it can easily be demonstrated that it lent itself to superstition and suggestibility. But I do think it is unlikely that so much time, effort and attention would be spent on imaginary subjects by those whose daily survival depended on rigorous practicality.

It is strange to see our modern worldview based on such an obvious absurdity as pure materialism. It is especially curious considering we arrived at that conclusion by such great immaterial effort. Clearly our most vivid experience of life comes not from our perception of the physical world, but through the non-physical agency of though and emotion. And because we do not experience the material world directly, even it's perception, coming through light and sound primarily, have a quality that seems to be in-between the material and non-material. This abstraction from reality has been described in detail in Plato's analogy of the cave, and the Apostle Paul refers to it when he states, "...we see through a glass, darkly..". Our interior life or consciousness can't be described as bound by any laws of the material world, but only those imposed on it by thought itself.

My friend evariste did me a great service when he introduced to me to Julian Jayne's The origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind. It is a dense, challenging book that not only seeks to clarify a scientific definition of what consciousness is and how it relates to our current knowledge, but also in proposing an explanation of how our current mode of awareness developed, gives us a fascinating portrait of how differently man viewed his world in antiquity. The core premise is that ancient man did not operate based on personal decisions and free will, but received signals from the mysterious part of the right side of the brain that corresponds to the speech centers on the left. This was perceived as hearing the speech of a particular god, and Jaynes cites numerous examples from the epic literature of this period, such as Iliad to illustrate how fundamental a feature of human experience this relationship to the gods was at the time. As a scientist and agnostic while he describes this phenomenon as a man-god relationship, it becomes clear that he feels that his "gods" represent a higher brain function that atrophied when civilization and culture became a stronger influence that allowed our more modern mental functioning and moral sense. He also makes some fascinating observations on what he sees as vestigial survives of this older modality such as hypnotism, and schizophrenia that strengthen his argument. I've argued myself that the mesmerizing influence of television might rightfully be added to this list.

I applaud Professor Jaynes achievement in reclaiming an accurate view of the pre-classical world. But I would challenge him on two points. His knowledge outside his field in the areas of classics, history and linguistics is impressive, but shows itself to be thin when he addresses the Old Testament and its historical setting.He breezily refers to the Pentateuch as forgeries of the post-exilic period then reassures us in a footnote that this is based on several sources of modern Biblical scholarship, including the Encyclopedia Britannica. The entirety of his argument shoehorning the story of the covenant of the Jews with their God into his theory of bicameral consciousness could have been based on a few humanities courses taught by an acolyte of the post-modern reductionist school of Biblical criticism. Despite the prevalence of these views,even a mediocre Torah scholar would make short work of these theories, pointing out Egyptian loanwords in Genesis and Exodus, and descriptions of the establishment of temple worship in Deuteronomy and the Nazirite order in Numbers, without which later texts could not have been written. He does in places acknowledge that the prophets, priest and kings of Israel are different in nature than his robotic epic heroes, but as soon as he ignores the story of The Fall (His only other mentions of Genesis is the baffling statement that "...the first and second chapters tell different creation stories..."), he misses the plot of the whole narrative, and with it, the way in which free will distinguishes the Bible personalities from the other actors of his bicameral tragedies.

Also, in general he portrays the "god" function of the right brain as a kind of gestalt of all sensory information about the environment. But it seems illogical that a higher order of understanding could be synthesized from the same sense data available to most creatures without some higher signal or organizing principle. From what did we synthesized our model of a god in the first place? He does outline a somewhat plausible progression from a king who becomes an object of veneration in death, in line with traditions of ancestor worship. But that only postpones addressing the problem, for the concept of an afterlife itself suggests a higher order.

As all our other sense organs are receptors, why wouldn't Jaynes entertain the idea that the "god" area of the right brain might also be receiving signals from a non-material source? Jaynes' work is the closest I've seen the scientific approach comes to acknowledging a spiritual reality that was experientially a daily fact of life for our ancestors. But his work lacked the boldness to see it as anything more than a ghost in the machine of our neural networks. The question remains open whether Jaynes' line of thinking should be pursued further or abandon altogether in favor a different approach.

Disabled in the UK: "Stop trying to kill us off!"

2006-05-09T07:35:00.000-05:00

This eloquent and poignant letter appeared in The Guardian. The whole thing is so well stated that I hope Ms. Campbell won't mind if I post it in it's entirety.

Jane Campbell
Tuesday May 9, 2006
The Guardian

Assisted dying is not a simple question of increasing choice for those of us who live our lives close to death. It raises deep concerns about how we are viewed by society and by ourselves. I have a severe form of spinal muscular atrophy, and require 24-hour assistance. Many people who do not know me believe I would be "better off dead". Even more argue: "I couldn't live like that." And some suggest that advances in genetic screening should be used to enable parents to choose whether to have a child with disabilities.

Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill, Lord Joffe's private member's bill, which will be debated in the House of Lords this Friday, feeds into that lack of knowledge (some might call it ignorance, others prejudice) by endorsing such views and legalising the killing of terminally ill and disabled people. The bill has the backing of the Voluntary Euthanasia Society (recently renamed Dignity in Dying) and, according to their polls, the support of the British public.

Yet it has failed to get the endorsement of a single organisation of disabled people. Three major national charities have condemned it, and leading campaigners have united under the banner of Not Dead Yet UK to make the voice of disabled people heard. The very people the bill is intended to help, the terminally ill and disabled, are frightened by what it seeks to achieve.

Proponents of the bill claim that such criticisms are nonsense: the bill is only intended to help that small minority who, in a similar situation to me, do not think as I do but want to die. While conceding my right to choose life, Lord Joffe deliberately ignores the factors that contribute to my choice. I benefit from excellent medical care. I live in an adapted bungalow, and my local authority provides proper care support that enables me to choose my own personal assistants. I am not dependent on family and loved ones. I love my good life. Lord Joffe, it appears, does not. In 1999, as a member of the royal commission on long-term care for the elderly, he issued a minority report with one other member, saying that social care support should not be free at the point of delivery.

When I think about this, I shudder. To get an image of what it might be like, one has only to think of Diane Pretty. Her life was very different from mine and I would have liked to know the reasons for that. Did she choose to live confined in a downstairs room rather than have adaptations to her home or be rehoused? Did she want her husband to be her full-time carer rather than accept more support from social services? Why was she not fully confident about how her medical team would take care of her as her illness progressed?

This is the third time that Lord Joffe has tried to get doctors to turn their backs on the Hippocratic oath that requires them to "do no harm". Following each rejection, he has returned with a more restrictive bill. This time, we are told, the bill contains two important safeguards. First, it will apply only to the "terminally ill" - the "disabled" are excluded, so have nothing to fear. Second, the doctor will only be permitted to prescribe the lethal dose. The patient must self-administer, so protecting anyone who requests assistance to die but then has a change of heart.

A moment's thought will show that these are not safeguards but devices to silence objectors. The more restrictive the bill, the easier it is to argue for its scope to be expanded once it has passed into law. None of us will be safe. Consider two patients lying side by side in hospital: both ask their doctor to prescribe lethal medication. Although their symptoms and prognosis are similar, one has a terminal illness whereas the other is classed as disabled. One gets the drugs; the other does not. Or will the second patient be reclassified? Consider the two patients again: one has the strength to swallow the poison; the other does not, so it remains by the bed. The message: "die now - before it's too late."

Legalising premature death as a treatment option will place pressures on people near the end of their lives. It will be the cheapest, quickest and simplest option - all more attractive to health and social care services than developing and providing expensive, and potentially long-term, services. The relationship between care givers and receivers will be irrevocably damaged.

Fortunately, disabled and terminally ill people aren't going to let that happen without a fight. Lord Ashley, the life-long campaigner for disabled people, is introducing a bill on the right to independent living later this year to guarantee the services that people like me need to participate fully in society. If Lord Joffe really wants to help, he should start listening and stop trying to kill us off.

· Jane Campbell MBE, chair of the Social Care Institute for Excellence from 2000 to 2006, is a Disability Rights commissioner and Not Dead Yet UK convener Livingwithdignity.info

Amnesty International Considering Making Abortion a "Human Right"

2006-05-08T10:26:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

AI seems ready to jump on the UN abortion bandwagon:

Amnesty International is coming under fire from pro-life groups for asking its membership if it should add promoting abortion to the list of human rights topics it covers. The group is defending itself and saying it's only polling its members and hasn't taken a pro-abortion stance yet.
Last month, AI leaders sent documents to its membership proposing three areas in the abortion debate where the group could be involved.

Pro-life groups have been very vocal in saying AI should not adopt a pro-abortion position, including Catholic 'Aid to the Church in Need' (ACN), which participates in humanitarian assistance campaigns.

Father Joaquin Alliende, ACN’s international ecclesiastical assistant, told Catholic World News that his group regretted learning AI was looking into promoting abortion.

“AI has earned a high reputation for its intensive efforts to gain the release of innocent prisoners on conscience," he explained. "Now by proposing a pro-abortion initiative AI is abandoning its own noble ethical principles, thereby shaking the very foundations on which it is built."

Alliende told CWN that the right to life is the most basic of human rights and "unborn life in a mother’s womb is the very weakest of all threatened and persecuted human beings.”

Here is the address for AI in the US:

admin-us(at)aiusa.org

Email them to let them know what you think about the rights of the unborn. Here ispart of my response:

Most of the planet sees abortion as morally wrong and your plans to promote it as part of "reproductive rights" aligns AI with the senseless global de-population programs of the UN and it's associated NGOs. Promoting the deaths of the world's most innocent and defenseless population entirely negates any moral authority your organization has earned. Please reconsider your support of these insane policies. Our children are the only hope for all of us.

UN Suggestion for Dafur Victims of Genocide and Rape: Abortion

2006-05-05T08:25:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

A leader of a United Nations lobbying group says women who have been victimized in the difficult and brutal conflict in Darfur, Sudan should be given abortions, especially if they have been raped. Tamara Fetters, a researcher for Ipas, a population control advocacy group, says all refugee health facilities should be doing abortions.
There is no doubt that sexual violence against the women in refugee camps in Darfur and Chad is worsening.

Louise Arbour, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, told Reuters Thursday that "The situation (in Darfur) is poor, bad and very alarming and what is particularly sad is to see no progress and a deterioration of the situation."

But instead of increased security, increasing humanitarian aid, peace deals to stop the conflict or moving refugees to other areas, Fetters says abortion is the solution.

Someone at the UN was clearly asleep at the switch. There was not one single mention of providing condoms in the entire report.

Confronting the Culture of Death

2006-05-01T07:30:00.000-05:00

The most fundamental common denominator of the powers arrayed against Terri Schiavo and a Culture of Life was and continues to be materialism. In fact for most well articulated arguments in favor of euthanasia, materialism is a prerequisite. This empirical worldview is so all-pervasive in our society that we have forgotten how recently it came to be so widely held. As a result, it's validity is assumed and goes largely unchallenged.

That is not to say that materialism was a new idea of the Enlightenment either. But it had never been the basis of a model of the universe that itself aspired to be the groundwork for a world order of human society. For those that don't see this Brave New World as a welcome development, it is useful in confronting materialism to consider it as a filter on human experience that that is self-validating. One crystal clear example of this was the radically difference response to the videos of Terri interacting with her her family. Like the sententious experts who used to tell us that a baby's first smiles were merely "gas", all kinds of absurd explanations were floated for Terri's smiles and vocalizations when she was surrounded by those she loved and trusted. It was baffling to those of us that had significant exposure to infants and other non-verbal persons that those who clamored for Terri's execution couldn't see the consciousness internal activity that to us was so obvious.

Once we understand the operations of the filter of materialism, we realize that it makes any possibility of an intuitive perception of any aspect of reality impossible. Not only is any higher level of understanding other than that based on pure sense perception ruled out, but even the imperfect lens of the senses is further clouded. Well disciplined thought and emotion are intended to help us properly interpret the raw data from the senses, but when thought and emotion are not governed by a higher order than materialism, they further distort the picture of reality. One interesting point brought out by several commentators was that our society has become so obsessed with superficial notions of beauty, that Terri's appearance in her impaired condition was so emotionally painful to those similarly obsessed, that they projected their own fears of becoming helpless and in their minds, unattractive. So they could only see her death as a mercy.

Despite my anger and frustration at Terri's tragic death, I can see that for many their support for her execution was not conscious malice, but spiritual blindness. The challenge in this ongoing dialog is to demonstrate that the evidence of experience sifted out by the filter of materialism is compelling and worthy of reconsideration. Part of this debate should include pointing out the negative impact materialism has had on our society, but it must also include a positive alternative. This is a huge challenge, because materialism has been extremely successful in framing the debate in it's own terms due no doubt to how deeply entrenched it is in all of our thinking. But it seems to me clear that in the struggle between the Cultures of Life and Death, the battlefield is the mind, and of course, it's material extension that we call the media. If the outcome hasn't already been settled there, it soon will be.

Rates of Euthanasia Increase Again in Holland

2006-04-28T08:55:00.000-05:00

From Seattle PI

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands -- The number of reported cases of legal euthanasia and doctor-assisted suicide in the Netherlands increased in 2005 for the third year in a row, a Dutch agency said Thursday.

The figures released by the Regional Oversight Boards for Euthanasia showed doctors reported 1,933 cases in 2005, up from 1,886 in 2004 and 1,815 in 2003. Studies have estimated that reported cases represent slightly more than half of all euthanasias.

The Netherlands became the first country to legalize euthanasia in 2001. Belgium legalized it under strict conditions in 2002, and Switzerland allows passive assistance to terminally ill people who have expressed a wish to die. In the United States, only Oregon has an law allowing doctor-assisted suicides.

The Dutch law allows euthanasia for adults of sound mind who ask to die and are deemed to be suffering great pain from illness with no hope of recovery. Two doctors must agree with the decision, and patients are killed with a mix of sedatives and a lethal dose of muscle relaxant.

Let's keep in mind that most cases of euthanasia are not reported, so these numbers are a fraction of the actual cases.

The agency said that in three of the reported cases, the guidelines were not followed correctly and the doctors were referred to judicial authorities for possible prosecution.

In two cases, the doctor who performed the euthanasia did not consult sufficiently with an independent doctor. In the third, the doctor was an acquaintance of the cancer patient and the board found he did not have a strong enough doctor-patient relationship to properly authorize and carry out euthanasia.

Don't hold your breath waiting for a verdict...

Scientists Gleefully Vaulting the Species Barrier

2006-04-25T14:20:00.000-05:00

Hat Tip: Zaideh

From National Geographic

Scientists have begun blurring the line between human and animal by producing chimeras—a hybrid creature that's part human, part animal.

Chinese scientists at the Shanghai Second Medical University in 2003 successfully fused human cells with rabbit eggs. The embryos were reportedly the first human-animal chimeras successfully created. They were allowed to develop for several days in a laboratory dish before the scientists destroyed the embryos to harvest their stem cells.

In Minnesota last year researchers at the Mayo Clinic created pigs with human blood flowing through their bodies.

And at Stanford University in California an experiment might be done later this year to create mice with human brains.

Scientists feel that, the more humanlike the animal, the better research model it makes for testing drugs or possibly growing "spare parts," such as livers, to transplant into humans.

Watching how human cells mature and interact in a living creature may also lead to the discoveries of new medical treatments.

But creating human-animal chimeras—named after a monster in Greek mythology that had a lion's head, goat's body, and serpent's tail—has raised troubling questions: What new subhuman combination should be produced and for what purpose? At what point would it be considered human? And what rights, if any, should it have?

There are currently no U.S. federal laws that address these issues.

The article is over a year old but no less shocking a year later. Zaideh's commentary was spot on:

Welcome to the Island of Dr Moreau

Is there any discipline more plagued by hubris than science?
If something can be done, it will be done and damn the ethics or morality!
No one can convince me that, somewhere in the world, in a hidden lab, some miserable, semi-human, hybrid creature is being created or, even, being observed.

Just when you think modern science can't devalue human life any more...

New Direction

2006-04-17T07:43:00.000-05:00

In the year since Terri Schiavo was sentenced to death, what have we learned? Are we any more effective in confronting the Culture of Death? Are we fighting a rear-guard action against an inevitable Brave New World, or is there hope to turn back the tide in this country?

The more practical question to ask perhaps is do we understand what we are up against and are our tactics appropriate?

I've taken a little unplanned sabbatical from blogging, partly due to a heavy work schedule. I've also struggled with the events of the past year. The death of Terri Schiavo and my subsequent investigation into the the Culture of Death that caused it has been difficult to process. It's taken this long to formulate a response that wasn't merely personal. This doesn't exclude personal and emotional factors, in fact the only commentators who were able to understand what was happening in the struggle surrounding Terri Schiavo were those who were able to connect emotionally and empathetically with her. But my own efforts need a more positive proactive direction before I can air my emotions in this matter.

What I have tried to do is understand the nature of the Culture of Death, its origins, its goals, and hopefully its weaknesses as well.

Among the inhabitants of this netherworld I encountered medical serial killers, philosophers who muse about killing infants and bestiality, and acclaimed scientists turned conman. I sent a fair amount of time identifying some who I considered real villains, but perhaps even more dangerous is a larger group of activists among the right-to-die movement. I think I can fairly use the description of Comrade Lenin, who accurately if unkindly characterized them as "useful idiots". For a variety of reasons, these are people who genuinely believe their cause is the best for everyone involved without spending any time reflecting of the possible unintended consequences of their policies. Then there is an much larger group that are not activists, but find the cleverly crafted messages of the right-to-die movement difficult to resist in their utilitarian appeal to "reason". In their passive support of the movement they are in one sense the most dangerous of all, but also the most likely to be swayed by a better alternative.

At this point in time, I think I've spent enough (and possibly too much) time analyzing what is wrong with our culture and its attitude toward life. One chronic problem I've found with the pro-life movements is that we don't consistently present a positive vision of how things should and more importantly could be. This is always the difficult part. I'll like to hear from others as I try to articulate some of the possibilities, and see if there is a common interest to present a new vision of a United States of America that values life from its leadership to its grassroots.

Judge Rules In Favor of Baby MB

2006-03-15T14:40:00.000-05:00

Hat tip evariste at Discarded Lies

The parents of a severely disabled baby boy at the centre of a right-to-life case have thanked the judge for ruling that he should be kept alive.

They were fighting a hospital's bid to turn off the ventilator that keeps the child, known only as Baby MB, alive.

The 19-month-old boy has genetic condition spinal muscular atrophy - which leads to almost total paralysis.

The judge said he felt the child gained enough pleasure from life to outweigh the medical evidence of his condition.

In an exclusive BBC interview the child's mother said: "I really thank the judge for coming to that decision."

Although I'm a little leery of using something as subjective as "pleasure from life" as criteria for deciding life or death but this is good news.

Planned Parenthood's Spring Offensive Against World Populations

2006-03-13T08:20:00.000-05:00

Planned Parenthood has launched a new global campaign to counter the Bush administration's shift away from UN-style depopulation programs.

President George W. Bush's pro-life policy prohibiting the taxpayer funding of groups that perform or promote abortions in other nations is under fire again from abortion advocates. Now they have decided to create a new worldwide fund to promote supposedly "safe" abortions in nations where abortion is illegal.
On the first day President Bush took office in 2001, he reinstituted the Mexico City Policy first put in place by President Reagan and revoked by President Clinton. Bush later expanded the policy to ensure that no State Department monies were used to promote or perform abortions.

Since then, abortion advocates have bashed the policy because they have been denied the use of federal funds to lobby other nation's to change their pro-life laws.

Now, the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) has created a new fund meant to promote legalized abortion in countries, such as those in Africa and South America, where abortion is illegal.

I recently complained about our tax dollars funding depopulation but when I posted that I was unaware that a shake-up had already occurred.

It's good to see we've withdrawn our involvement on this insane policy when so many national populations are collapsing but the there is also legislation being introduced to return to the status quo:

Meanwhile, in the U.S., abortion advocates are also putting forward new legislation in Congress. Introduced by Democrat Rep. Betty McCollum and Republican Jim Ramstad, both Republicans, it would partially counteract Bush's executive order.

The bill, HR 4188, would spend $600 million next year on family planning efforts, including contraception and anti-AIDS activities, though the money could not be used to promote or perform abortions.

Members of the pro-abortion Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice support the effort and claim the money would reduce the number of abortions.

Rabbi Scott Sperling, director of the Union for Reform Judaism Mid-Atlantic Council, told the Cybercast News Service, "For over 40 years, the United States has included family planning services as part of the aid we provide in the developing world."

Earlier this year, Bush reduced the amount of money the U.S. spends on family planning by $79 million from the $436 million appropriated for 2006. His 2007 budget calls for only $357 million.

So did they not get the memo that the "population bomb" is a dud? Or do they see depopulation as a virtue in itself?

Is Euthanasia Being Positioned as a Fix for Healthcare Ills?

2006-03-09T08:57:00.000-05:00

Canada's healthcare system is on the verge of collapse and the British system is in the red. Wesley Smith had recently reported that healthcare was already being rationed in the UK. In this post from yesterday, he elaborates on his concern that physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia will become the solution to the financial crisis and that if national healthcare is instituted in the US, we could face the same dangers.

The timing is perfect for the recent media push by right-to-die advocates in both countries.

As usual, Wesley is a lone voice crying out in the bioethical wilderness.

Euthanasia News Items

2006-03-07T08:52:00.000-05:00

From the China Daily, an advisor to the Chinese government is calling for official permission to carry out "experiments" in euthanasia. Given their "One Child" policy and the numbers of older people this smaller generation would have to support, this was inevitable.

The American who ran a euthanasia website from Cambodia has now been arrested and deported, and will not be allowed back into the country.

There were also several reports yesterday that Holland offically announced it will implement the Groningen Protocols for euthanizing children. What struck me the citing of two cases of children with congential diseases in which the child was said to scream in pain at the touch of a caregiver. One had an unnamed metabolic bone disorder and the other had what was called Hallopeau-Siemens syndrome which is a form of Epidermolysis Bullosa, a condition were the skin becomes thin and fragile. The "screaming at the touch" theme caught my attention, because Wesley Smith cites an earlier case of a child with spinal bifida where the doctor used the same excuse for euthanizing a child. Wesley points out that the reason the child was in pain was there was an open lesion on her back that the doctor didn't treat. Had it been treated, she might have been disabled, but no more in constant pain than these folks.

While it's possible that all the cases mentioned above may have involved constant excruciating pain there is no mention of exploring other treatment options or palliative care, and it is unlikely that all of the infant deaths reported as euthanasia in Holland (8% according to a Lancet study that is cited in the article above) involve this kind of extreme pain. So if unbearable pain isn't the motive in these deaths, what is?

Haleigh Poutre Eating and Responding

2006-03-06T08:53:00.000-05:00

From Boston Globe HT: Dances With Typos

A nurse told the mother of Haleigh Poutre during a hospital visit on Tuesday that the severely beaten Westfield girl, whom officials once wanted to let die, has been able to eat scrambled eggs and cream of wheat, and has tapped out drum rhythms during physical therapy, according to the mother's lawyer.

But it is unclear when Poutre began eating solid food, and how often she does so. A Department of Social Services worker, who was monitoring the 15-minute visit, has told the nurse to stop talking to the mother about the girl's condition, said Wendy Murphy, a Boston lawyer who represents Allison Avrett, who is Poutre's biological mother.

''Silence and secrecy has been the most frustrating component of this case," Murphy said yesterday. ''It just seems inhumane that information about this child can be forbidden on the theory that it's somehow protecting her privacy, when you consider that this child almost died under the state's care."

The Department of Social Services gave Poutre's mother and grandmother permission to visit the hospital every two weeks starting last fall, after they signed a confidentiality agreement that bars them from asking about the girl's condition and making public statements on the subject.

Since the DSS ignored 17 allegations of abuse and neglect, perhaps a review of the case is in order. I doubt the birth mother is the best person to care for Haleigh, I recall she was in favor of removing life support for Haleigh at first and of course lost custody for abuse when she was four. But the Commonwealth has proved as bad a guardian, if not worse.

Canadian Media Again Re-casts Murderer as a Hero

2006-03-02T10:05:00.000-05:00

From LifeSite

Robert Latimer is appealing to the newly elected Conservative government and the Supreme Court to revisit his conviction for killing his disabled daughter in 1993 – with the CBC complicit in his quest.

The CBC revealed today that it is airing an exclusive Melissa Fung interview with the killer from his prison cell. The full interview will air on CBC’s The National tonight. Speaking to CBC radio this morning, Fung said that Latimer blames his prison sentence on religious fundamentalists such as right to life groups having influenced the Canadian Supreme Court.

The influence the of the media can be seen in the vastly different responses between uninformed public opinion and in court:

Meanwhile a Calgary Sun newspaper poll last year revealed that over 92% of 500 people said Latimer was justified in killing his disabled 12-year-old daughter, who had cerebral palsy. In that same month, 11 jurors on a Saskatchewan court unanimously found Latimer guilty of second degree murder. The probability of such a discrepancy is less than one in 10,000, according to University of Alberta professor Dick Sobsey.

Prof. Sobsey contends that the only explanation for such a discrepancy is that the Canadian media “systematically distorted the information from the trial that they provided to the public.”

Prof. Sobsey elaborates on this and highlights the deadly effect this bias will have on other disabled children.

The Canadian media clearly is more sympathetic to murderers than disabled children.

Haleigh Poutre Receiving Rehab Therapy

2006-02-28T09:59:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

Although she didn't receive any visitors on her birthday, this is probably the best present she could get.

Haleigh was admitted to the Franciscan Hospital for Children in Boston and Department of Social Services officials tell the Boston Globe she is in medically stable condition.

After making a partial recovery, Poutre has been receiving physical, speech, and occupational therapy.

DS Kids

2006-02-23T12:55:00.000-05:00

The Forced Abortion thread on Discarded Lies yesterday had me thinking about handicapped children. I've read that prenatal testing for Down's Syndrome can now be done in the first trimester, and I've seen figures as high as 90% for the detected Down's Syndrome pregnancies that are aborted.

All the kids I went to school with were pre-Roe vs Wade, and it was a pretty solid Catholic area at the time. We had of course a "special class". I probably was aquainted with approximately 2 dozen kids with Down's or similar disabilities.

No one was politically correct in those days so the epithet "retard" was probably only second in popularity to "faggot". And there were the "short bus" jokes as well. But the special class kids were the brothers and sisters of our friends and classmates, and as such were part of a community of schoolkids who were for the most part only a little less "different".

And it's not that it was so hard to like the kids with Down's. Affable Kevin had eventually gone on to charm even the high school football jocks and was ensconced as coach's assistant. The vivacious Suzette was an outrageous flirt who prefered older men. And patient Owen, my frequent seatmate on the bus who also sat quietly in sunday school and came to resemble in character the Man of Sorrows the nuns taught us about. I've forgotten the names of the others, but I can't remember a single DS kid who wasn't somehow engaged socially and emotionally with the rest of us.

If the figures on abortions of Down's pregnancies are accurate, there are far fewer members of the special class these day. It seems that ADD and autism are now the focus of special needs programs. As we come in contact with fewer DS kids, this situation becomes worst as Down's Syndrome becomes even more of a spectre to pregnant women. DS kids will become increasing rare, like elves departing Middle Earth until they are finally just a legend.

This is an incalculable loss. Not only can DS kids approach "normal" development levels with aggressive occupational therapy, but more importantly, even if they lack intellectual prowess they retain a sweetness of character most of us can't hold onto into adult life. Emotionally they are archives of affection and ambassadors of innocence.

And maybe this is reason enough for our world's eagerness to be rid of them.

Cross-posted on Discarded Lies

USAID's Contribution to Collapsing Birthrates

2006-02-22T10:33:00.000-05:00

From Human Events

“Population stabilization” in developing countries is an official purpose of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), though in keeping with the zeitgeist, efforts to achieve that goal are today called family planning programs. In this time of massive deficits, American taxpayers pay over $400 million a year (conservatively estimated) to reduce the populations of Third World nations whose birthrates have already collapsed or are collapsing. In fact, if USAID wants to promote long-term population stabilization in the Third World, it should be encouraging women to have more children rather than less. Birthrates have been on a rapid downward trajectory in almost every country in the world.

Why are we spending millions in tax dollars to help our own extinction as a species?

This is a horrific scenario:

Over 50 developing countries are on USAID’s family planning list. These countries are in Latin America, the Caribbean, Europe, the Middle East, Asia, and Africa. Some of these countries have dangerously low birthrates and should not be targeted for contraception under any rational analysis.

Russia, not usually considered a developing country, is on the list.

Surely she can take care of herself when it comes to family planning? Actually, she can’t, as her population commits suicide. According to the United Nations Population Division, the Russian birthrate has dropped to 1.4 children per woman over her lifetime on average, disastrously lower than the minimum replacement rate of 2.1. This comes as Russians emigrate to other parts of the world in substantial numbers. Russia is already shrinking by over 500,000 people annually as the remaining population ages rapidly. If Americans are to be taxed to assist Russia in her population efforts, a questionable proposition at best, it should be to promote childbearing instead of the opposite.

Russia's is not an isolated case:

It is not only mighty former enemies to which USAID ships contraception by the boatload. Tiny little Armenia, already the victim of a massive genocide by the Turks in the 20th Century, has a birthrate of 1.4 also, and is also losing people though it has only 3 million to begin with. The UN conservatively projects that the proportion of retirees (people 65 or older) in the population will double to 24% by 2050. Can Armenia afford that? Why are we contributing to this problem?

Russia’s neighbor, Georgia, has the popular 1.4 birthrate and a shrinking population. Bulgaria has a dismal 1.2 rate and a shrinking population. Romania has a rate of 1.3 and a shrinking population. The united nation of Serbia and Montenegro has a rate of 1.6 and a shrinking population. Democratic Ukraine has a rate of 1.2 and a rapidly shrinking population. Yet all these nations, with populations already contracting and with birthrates that will lead to more rapid contractions in the future, get family planning money from USAID. Instead, the agency should be shipping badly-needed babies to these nations, whose social support systems are due to go bankrupt from lack of working-age people in the next few decades. These countries’ fiscal futures make the United States’ problems with Social Security and Medicare seem very minor indeed.

I can't help but think of Hitler's notion of lebensraum. His plan was to conquer and depopulate Eastern Europe and Russia to make room for his master race. It would seem that this failed dream of the Nazis is now being fulfilled by the "Sustainable Development" overlords of the UN and their ilk, and as always, funded with US tax dollars.

Forced Abortions and Contraception Proposed in Holland

2006-02-22T09:06:00.000-05:00

From LifeSite

Marianne van den Anker, an alderman in the Rotterdam city council in charge of public health and security has proposed forced abortion and forced contraception for teenage mothers whose origin is in the Antilles and on drug addicts and people with mental handicaps. The alderman suggested that such mothers are nearly always guilty of child abuse.

This is a new waypoint on The Netherland's slippery slope precipitated by its euthanasia policy

While several reports have referred to van den Anker and her Leefbaar Rotterdam party as "right wing", the alderman is the furthest thing from the right side of the social conservative spectrum. In addition to being pro-abortion, van den Anker has set up a program in the schools to counter intolerance of homosexuality.

Apparently for Dutch politicians and policy-makers, the practice of playing God is habit-forming:

Van den Anker told the NRC Handelsblad paper that children from these mothers run an "unacceptable risk" experiencing "violence, neglect, mistreatment and sexual abuse." She added, "The exceptions, and there are some, can be counted on a pair of hands."

Her announcement of her plan came during a workshop on child abuse where she pressed her case for forced abortion saying, "What do you think of a 24-year old Antillean mother who visits the doctor, is 19 weeks pregnant, has three existing children , then abuses one of her children in the hospital, before announcing to the doctor that she wishes to proceed with her pregnancy , even though she doesn't know who the father is, has no idea how she's going to raise another child, take care, feed and dress the child, and on top of that is HIV positive?"

The politician noted that street gangs of Antillean youths were terrorizing the city.

Apparently even colleagues in her own party find this proposal "absurd and idiotic", but given the history of Hollands social programs, what kind of moral stand can they take now? This is simple an extension of their other "progressive" policies.

New Zealand Cracks Down on Nitschke

2006-02-21T14:11:00.000-05:00

From Australian Broadcasting Company

Darwin-based voluntary euthanasia campaigner Philip Nitschke has been referred to the New Zealand Ministry of Health for allegedly holding euthanasia workshops without being registered.

The Medical Council of New Zealand made the referral after Dr Nitschke held three workshops in January based on the book Killing Me Softly.

The council alleges Dr Nitschke held the workshops within council guidelines for practicing medicine and therefore should have been registered as a New Zealand doctor.

The council says Dr Nitschke has known of the council requirements since 2001.

Dr Nitschke says he was not practicing medicine and is disappointed with the council's decision.

According to a later report, Nitschke may face charges.

Korean Govt Says Hwang Never Cloned Stem Cells

2006-02-17T09:49:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

Government prosecutors investigating the faked embryonic stem cell research supposedly conducted by Hwang Woo-suk and his colleagues have confirmed that his team never created patient-specific embryonic stem cells that would supposedly overcome rejection issues.
Park Han-cheol of Seoul District Prosecutors' Office, who is leading the Hwang probe, told the Korean Herald newspaper, "there is no possibility that NT-1 is a cloned somatic stem cell."

"There is no doubt about this in the scientific field," he added.

What this means is that all the embryonic stem cell research being proposed is based on something that has yet to be attained. Wouldn't those billions of dollars being proposed in state legislatures across the country be better spent on research that has yielded more concrete results, such as adult stem cell research?

Euthanasia Cases Double in Belgium Over Four Years

2006-02-08T13:29:00.000-05:00

From Ireland Online

Some 400 cases of euthanasia were reported in Belgium last year, up from 200 cases four years ago, according to figures published today.

About one third of assisted suicides are the result of a surgical procedure.

In some cases, medical treatment is stopped or not started at all, said Wim Distelmans, chairman of Belgium’s euthanasia evaluation committee.

Some 80% of the mercy killings were performed in the northern region of Flanders, where there is a network of specialised doctors, Distelmans was quoted as saying.

Belgium legalised euthanasia in 2002, becoming the second European country after the Netherlands to do so.

The bill defines euthanasia as an act practised by a third party intentionally ending the life of a person at his or her request.

The number of cases is probably about five times higher, based on a previous statement by Distilmans admitting that only 20% of cases are even reported. More confirmation of the slippery slope.

South Korean Govt Charges Hwang Pocketed Research Funds

2006-02-07T09:59:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

Seoul, South Korea (LifeNews.com) -- Officials from the South Korean government who have been looking into the fraudulent embryonic stem cell research work of Hwang Woo-suk's team have found that he embezzled government funds and mismanaged public donations over the last few years.

The South Korean Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) release its report on Monday after a three week investigation.

"The cloning expert has been given a total of 24.6 billion won ($25.36 million U.S.) in state and private research donations so far," the report said. "It includes 18.6 billion won ($19.1 million U.S.) in government funds and 6 billion won (6.18 million dollars) in civilian funds."

However, just $16.9 million was spent over the past five years in compliance with BAI guidelines.

Investigators said Hwang embezzled as much as $2.57 million of both the taxpayer funds and private donations and can't account for $6.4 million of the money. They indicated he managed most of the money through various personal bank accounts and he could not account for where it all went.

From April 2004 to April 2005, Hwang transferred at least $206,000 in government funds from those accounts to a private account and put over $700,000 in private donations into a private account that he withdrew as cash last year, BAI reported

So Hwang is a fraud AND a thief. Sadly for the South Korean people, he may go down as one of the greatest con men of all time.

Wesley Smith on Haleigh Poutre

2006-02-03T11:56:00.000-05:00

From LifeSite

This terrific article from Wesley reminds me why I became a big fan in the first place. He applies the same passion and lucidity in defending Haleigh as he did as a voice in the bio-ethical wilderness denouncing Terri Schiavo's death sentence. Going behind the standard newswire account, he uncovers some chilling details of this case:

Within a week or so of the beating, her doctors had written her off. They apparently told Haleigh's court-appointed guardian, Harry Spence, that she was "virtually brain dead." Even though he had never visited her, Spence quickly went to court seeking permission to remove her respirator and feeding tube. The court agreed, a decision affirmed recently by the supreme court of Massachusetts.

And so, no doubt with the best of intentions, a little girl who had already suffered so much was stripped by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts of even the chance to fight to stay alive. If she didn't stop breathing when the respirator was removed, which doctors expected, she would slowly dehydrate to death.

Then came the unexpected: Before "pulling the plug" on Haleigh, Spence finally decided to visit her. He was stunned. Rather than finding a little girl with "not a chance" of recovery, as doctors had described Haleigh's condition to him (as reported by the Boston Globe), Haleigh was conscious. She was able to give Spence a yellow block when asked to by a social worker and respond to other simple requests.
Laudably, Spence immediately called off the dehydration. Haleigh is now off her respirator and breathing on her own. She has been transferred out of the hospital and is currently being treated in a rehabilitation center.

In explaining how public policy on healthcare brought about this sorry state of affairs, he reveals an insidious precedent that should be a source of national disgrace.

Lest anyone think that Haleigh's apparent consciousness protects her from suffering the fate of Terri Schiavo, who was ordered dehydrated by a Florida court based, in part, on a finding that she was unconscious, think again. In most states, exhibiting consciousness is not a defense against dehydration for profoundly impaired patients. Indeed, cognitively disabled people who are conscious are commonly dehydrated throughout the country. So long as no family member objects, the practice is deemed medically routine.

How can this be? The simple answer is that tube-supplied food and water — often called "artificial nutrition and hydration" (ANH) — has been defined in law and in medical ethics as an ordinary medical treatment. This means that it can be refused or withdrawn just like, say, antibiotics, kidney dialysis, chemotherapy, surgery, blood pressure medicine, or any other form of medical care. Indeed, removing ANH has come to be seen widely in medicine and bioethics as an "ethical" way to end the lives of cognitively disabled "biologically tenacious" patients (as one prominent bioethicist once described disabled people like Terri Schiavo and Haleigh Poutre), without resorting to active euthanasia.

Note to self: Avoid healthcare professionals who use terms like "biologically tenacious".

As always, Wesley has done his homework. Here is the background on this policy:

It wasn't always so. It used to be thought of as unthinkable to remove a feeding tube. Then, as bioethicists and others among the medical intelligentsia began to worry about the cost of caring for dependent people and the growing number of our elderly — and as personal autonomy increasingly became a driving force in medical ethics — some looked for a way to shorten the lives of the most marginal people without violating the law or radically distorting traditional medical values. Removing tubes providing food and fluids was seen as the answer. After all, it was argued, use of a feeding tube requires a relatively minor medical procedure. Moreover, the nutrition provided the patient is not steak and potatoes, but a liquid formula prepared under medical auspices so as to ease digestion. There can also be complications such as diarrhea and infection.
Having reached consensus on the matter, the bioethics movement mounted a deliberate and energetic campaign during the 1980s to change the classification of ANH from humane care, which can't be withdrawn, to medical treatment, which can. The first people targeted for potential dehydration were the persistently unconscious or elderly with pronounced morbidity. Thus, bioethics pioneer Daniel Callahan wrote in the October 1983. Hastings Center Report, "Given the increasingly large pool of superannuated, chronically ill, physically marginalized elderly it [a denial of ANH] could well become the non treatment of choice."

In March 1986, the American Medical Association Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs, responsible for deliberating upon and issuing ethics opinions for the AMA, legitimized dehydration when it issued the following statement: Although a physician "should never intentionally cause death," it was ethical to terminate life-support treatment, even if:

...death is not imminent but a patient's coma is beyond doubt irreversible and there are adequate safeguards to confirm the accuracy of the diagnosis and with the concurrence of those who have responsibility for the care of the patient. . . . Life-prolonging medical treatment includes medication and artificially or technologically supplied respiration, nutrition and hydration.
There it was: Food and fluids provided by a feeding tube were officially deemed a medical treatment by the nation's foremost medical association, meaning that withdrawing them was deemed the same as turning off a respirator or stopping kidney dialysis.

As often happens in bioethics, once the medical intelligentsia reached consensus, their opinion quickly became law. Thus, in 1990, the Supreme Court of the United States issued its decision in Cruzan v. Director, Missouri Department of Health, which upheld Missouri's law allowing for the removal of life-sustaining treatment from a person, provided there was "clear and convincing evidence" that the person would not have wanted to live. Unfortunately, the Court also agreed that tube-supplied food and fluids is a form of medical treatment that can be withdrawn like any other form of treatment. (This is often erroneously called the "right to die.") With the seeming imprimatur of the Supreme Court, all 50 states soon passed statutes permitting the withholding and withdrawal of tube-supplied sustenance — even when the decision was made by a third party.

With that principle established, what did unconsciousness have to do with it? Not a thing. It didn't take long for the American Medical Association to broaden the categories of dehydratable people. Thus, in 1994, a brief eight years after its first ethics opinion classifying tube feeding as medical treatment that could be withdrawn only when the patient was "beyond doubt" permanently unconscious, the AMA proclaimed it "not unethical" to withdraw ANH "even if the patient is not terminally ill or permanently unconscious." And that's where the matter stands today.

So legally the Commonwealth of Massachusetts can dehydrate an 11 year old to death while she is still conscious and aware. And if we don't start reversing these policies that hold life so cheaply, this is just the beginning of the brave new world the experts and bureaucrats have in store for us.

Montreal Women Gets Probation for Euthanizing Son

2006-02-02T09:23:00.000-05:00

From LifeSite

A Montreal woman, Marielle Houle, who pleaded guilty to killing her some Charles Fariala using sleeping pills and a plastic bag, has been sentenced to three years probation. Houle had pleaded guilty to a charge of assisting the suicide of her son, a playwright and student suffering from multiple sclerosis and apparent depression. The maximum penalty for assisted suicide is 14 years.

Houle’s lawyer, Salvatore Mascia, described her crime as an act of “unconditional love.” The Crown, however, said that while Houle’s intentions may have been “compassionate,” Canada is not a society that tolerates euthanasia. The court’s leniency was likely due to Houle’s “fragile” mental and physical health.

Disability Rights Advocate Cheryl Eckstein had some comments:

I can't think of anything more hopeless than to have a mother help their son or daughter believe there is no hope and that it is better for them to be dead. I can not conceive in my mind how a mother - any mother could agree to such a crime. Just what could be worse?

Many question why the mother helped her son kill himself ... why she supported her son's decision to take his life and why neither seemed to have sought help. She worked in healthcare and must have known about the various groups who could help. How does a nurse's aide obtain enough drugs to kill? Such an act is not impulsive, it takes time to plan. I believe both bought into the lie, that all was hopeless.

I am a chronic pain patient. I am well acquainted with pain - suffering and disappointments. Many of my symptoms mimic MS - (spastic muscles, hearing and visual problems - at times I have difficulty walking without the aid of a cane). Over the years the symptoms have increased - I have experienced a lot of pain, cognitive problems - often called a "fog", (I sometimes wonder if maybe I am also in the first stages of Alzheimer's) and serious disabling fatigue. (Thankfully, with medication my pain is manageable) Every single night for over 3 years, my fever mysteriously rises to over 100 degrees. Every single morning I wake up in a drenched bed- including my pj's. One symptom that is very hard to bear is when I am in the sun I break out in hives all over my body ... the hives feel like they are burning into my skin and the itch is unbearable. This happens within a minute of exposure and no matter how well I am covered, it doesn't matter. Thus, my daytime outings have seriously diminished. One of my absolute favorite hobbies is gardening. I find it hard not to grieve the loss of being able to go out whenever I want. Also, physically I am no longer able to tend a garden.

The combination of symptoms led to depression. I kept hoping the diagnosis was wrong and that it was just a flu - I was in deep denial. I was certain that I would wake up the next day and have my old life back. It took some time for me to finally accept that I was very ill. I also knew that without help, depression will keep me in an utter state of hopelessness.

I have had to learn how to let go of many of the things I was able to do in the past. One major loss is my ability to practice my favorite pieces on my grand piano. Before I founded The Compassionate Healthcare Network, I was a classical concert pianist and teacher. Now when and if I am able to sit and play, it is only for a short time, and I must choose more simple compositions. Yes, I've done my fair share of grieving. I cannot stress enough how important it is to have help from compassionate and positive people. Compassion literally means "to suffer with." I am blessed to be loved and cared for by a most compassionate husband.

According to Cheryl the support from loved ones is critical and she seems to think this was the missing factor that could have averted this tragedy:

When one is struck with illness it is also critical to have positive family and friends supporting you. I have learned from those who love me, that it is okay that I am a burden at times to them. When we open our hearts to others and express our need, we will find burden-bearers who are willing to help. No one is assured of living in great health ... none of us know when illness or accident could come upon us and alter our lives forever. MS is not a death sentence! It is not fatal disease.

Cheryl has made the case to the Canadian Senate that euthanasia and assisted suicide puts the depressed and unwanted at risk. Let's hope the political shift in Canada will take her warning to heart.

Haleigh Safe for Now

2006-01-27T15:04:00.000-05:00

From The Boston Globe

The 11-year-old Westfield girl who was close to being removed from life support after allegedly being beaten into a coma by her adoptive mother and stepfather has been moved to a rehabilitation hospital in Boston.

Haleigh Poutre was discharged Thursday from Baystate Medical Center in Springfield and admitted to the Franciscan Hospital for Children. She has been hospitalized since September, when authorities say she was beaten into a coma.

A statement issued by the Franciscan Hospital said: "It is our hope that her stay at Franciscan will afford her the opportunity to maximize her potential for gains in her recovery."

The hospital advertises itself as the largest pediatric rehabilitation facility in New England.

Hospital officials and officials from the Department of Social Services, which has custody of Haleigh, refused to discuss her medical condition because of privacy laws.

Michelle Malkin Speaks Out for Haleigh

2006-01-26T09:13:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

Steve Ertelt has been getting some great guest columnists lately such as Jill Stanek and Wesley Smith. Today Michelle Malkin has called for the same celebrities who wrung their hands over the execution of convicted murderer Tookie Williams to come out in support of another person currently under a death sentence. However, Haleigh Poutre never harmed a soul.

I have a question for the hordes of bleeding-heart Hollywood stars who joined the "Save Tookie" brigade, who bowed their heads in prayer with ex-Crip gangster Snoop Dogg and the Rev. Jesse Jackson and pleaded to protect convicted Death Row murderer Stanley "Tookie" Williams, and who lobbied so hard for the government to err on the side of life.
Where are you now?

In Boston, an innocent girl was sentenced to death by the state. Her name is Haleigh Poutre. Last fall, she was hospitalized after her stepfather allegedly burned her and beat her unconscious with a baseball bat. Haleigh was kept alive by a feeding tube and ventilator. Doctors said she was "virtually brain dead." They said she was in a "persistent vegetative state." The medical professionals pronounced her "hopeless."

Less than three weeks after Haleigh's hospitalization, the Massachusetts Department of Social Services was raring to remove Haleigh's feeding and breathing tubes. Even her biological mother (who had been deemed unfit to care for Haleigh and whose former boyfriend was accused of sexually abusing the child) wanted her to be put to death. The only person who wanted Haleigh alive was her stepfather, who will likely be charged with murder if Haleigh dies.

Earlier this month, the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled in favor of killing Haleigh, saying it was "unthinkable" to give the power to make a life-and-death decision to the man accused of putting Haleigh in a coma. Instead, the court did something just as unthinkable: It handed that power over life and death to the same child welfare agency that had failed time and time and time again to protect Haleigh from her abusers in the first place. According to the Boston Herald, a report by her court-appointed guardian showed that the Department of Social Services had received 17 reports of abuse or neglect involving Haleigh in the three years before her adoptive mother and stepfather were charged with pummeling her into a coma.

After failing to protect her from her abusive step-parents, the Commonwealth also failed to present her medical case properly:

As state officials prepared to remove Haleigh's life support, the supposedly impossible happened. She began breathing on her own, responding to stimuli and showing signs of emerging from what the medical establishment had deemed her hopeless condition. Everyone had given up on Haleigh -- except Haleigh. ''There has been a change in her condition," announced a DSS spokeswoman, Denise Monteiro. ''The vegetative state may not be a total vegetative state."

Unbelievably, the state had weaned Haleigh off her breathing tube before the state Supreme Court had made its ruling -- but the government failed to inform the court of the development. Haleigh's medical records and the social service agency's brief remain sealed.

Politicians in Massachusetts are vowing full-scale investigations of the state's incompetent child welfare bureaucrats. But where's the accountability for the medical experts whose faulty diagnosis led to Haleigh's court-approved death sentence? Will they step forward and reveal themselves? Will they explain how they erred? Will they apologize?

It was The Experts' unequivocal assessments that led the court to declare Haleigh in "an irreversible vegetative state" and to assert that "the child could not see, hear, feel or respond." Now, they admit they were wrong. And now, Haleigh's life depends on the whims of a hopeless government agency that didn't think the court needed to know that the child was breathing on her own.

Haleigh's story is a wake-up call to "right-to-die" ideologues who recklessly put such unlimited trust in the medical profession and Nanny State. With such uncertainty surrounding persistent vegetative state diagnoses, the presumption must be in favor of life. Yet, the "right-to-die" lobby's mantra seems to be: When in doubt, pull it out.

Ms Malkin makes an excellent point. If the authorities can't properly protect children in their care, why should we trust them with any other life-or-death decisions?

Romney Orders Investigation of MA Girl Targeted for Euthanasia

2006-01-25T11:44:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

Governor Mitt Romney yesterday announced that he will put together an independent panel to investigate the case of Haleigh Poutre, an 11 year-old Massachusetts girl who is at the center of a euthanasia battle similar to that of Terri Schiavo.
Poutre was beaten into a coma by her adoptive parents and was placed into state custody. State officials pressed for and won a case, over her stepfather's objections, to have Poutre euthanized.

The state Supreme Court sided with Massachusetts officials last week.

Then, Poutre started breathing on her own and efforts to remove her feeding tube and disconnect her from life support were halted

Hopefully this will be enough to save Haleigh from another judiciary that is playing God.

Australian Study Claims Nearly 2 Out of 3 Hospital Deaths Involve Euthanasia

2006-01-24T09:45:00.000-05:00

From The Herald Sun

Doctors play a part in almost two in three patient deaths in Victorian hospitals, a study into the ethics of euthanasia has found.

About 10,000 Victorians die in hospital each year after doctors withdraw treatment or give pain relief to end the lives of terminally ill patients, the study found.
Conducted by Monash and Melbourne university bioethicists, the soon-to-be-released report found about 40 per cent of Victorian doctors were willing to help patients die.

And it turned up cases of sick and dying elderly people whose families agree with doctors that lives should not be prolonged with drugs.

Victorian euthanasia researcher and Monash bioethicist Dr Helga Kuhse said her research mirrored a study by Britain's Brunel University released this week that revealed two out of three hospital deaths in the UK were assisted by a doctor.

Dr Kuhse has undertaken research into Australian doctors' attitudes towards euthanasia in 1988, 1997 and last year.

Her latest study, with Melbourne University researchers, shows many doctors support voluntary euthanasia and assisted suicide of incurable patients.

"It is going on everywhere in Australia," Dr Kuhse said.

"But in Victoria we might have more cases of active voluntary euthanasia. Some doctors are prepared to breach the law in order to respond to patients' requests.

"Australian law has not prevented doctors from practising euthanasia."

Bill Muehlenberg, a conservative Melbourne ethicist, said doctors should not even contemplate euthanasia.

"The practice is illegal in Australia and there's a real danger in this of doctors playing God," he said.

"Who's to say a family member doesn't have a less than good reason to say to the doctor `go ahead and withdraw treatment'?"

Dr Kuhse said patients had the legal right to refuse treatment.

"And every hospital in Victoria will withdraw treatment if a patient requests it or doctors deem it futile to continue."

Typical of most of the media coverage of euthanasia there is a good deal of confusion of terms. Withholding treatment is different from physical assisted suicide and euthanasia. But I don't think many of these recent articles that overstate the case are doing so out of a kind of outrage. As I've stated before, I think that what we have here is actually a pro-euthanasia strategy in collaboration with a compliant press. The recurring theme is that since it is happening anyway we might as well legalize it. However the track record of legal euthanasia in Holland and Oregon shows that abuses continue to occur and the the practice expands into new ethical territory.

End-of-Life Anarchy in the UK

2006-01-18T10:42:00.000-05:00

This latest interpretation of a euthanasia study by the British Voluntary Euthanasia Society is a stroke of Machiavellian genius.

I saw a slightly different version of this story yesterday. The spin was similar, basically the gist of it was that euthanasia only represents less than 1% of all deaths in the UK.

Now look at the same story in the left-wing Guardian. Euthanasia: Doctors aid in 3000 deaths

Doctors in the UK were responsible for the deaths, through euthanasia, of nearly 3,000 people last year, it was revealed yesterday in the first authoritative study of the decisions they take when faced with terminally-ill patients. More than 170,000 patients, almost a third of all deaths, had treatment withdrawn or withheld which would have hastened their demise.
The figures, extrapolated from the study, show rates of euthanasia and doctor-assisted suicide which are significantly lower than anywhere else in Europe, Australia and New Zealand, where similar studies have been done. The numbers immediately provoked controversy.

"This research proves that some doctors break the law and deliberately help patients die," said Deborah Annetts, chief executive of the Voluntary Euthanasia Society. "This is all done in secret and denied in public. Some of these doctors are acting compassionately on their patients' wishes, but some clearly act without consent. This cannot be safe."

Isn't this interesting? It's not the pro-life advocates that are reported as being outraged, it's the right-to-die proponents. The pitch is that abuses are probably happening now and that by legalizing euthanasia and putting guidelines in place, this will prevent abuses.

Nowhere that euthanasia as been legalized has proved to be a good study in the effectiveness of any guidelines. Universally the guidelines have no teeth and leave interpretation and compliance up to the doctors themselves. With no independent oversight, does anyone really believe that guidelines mean anything?

Over Half of Euthanasia Patients in Holland Clinically Depressed

2006-01-17T08:56:00.000-05:00

From LifeSite

A study published by Dutch researchers in the September 20, 2005 edition of the Journal of Clinical Oncology (JCO) has shown that at least 50% of patients killed under the Dutch euthanasia programme were suffering from depression. In addition, 44% of those suffering from cancer showed clinical signs of depression when they asked for euthanasia.

Titled, Euthanasia and Depression: A Prospective Cohort Study Among Terminally Ill Cancer Patients, the study reports that the risk to request euthanasia for patients with depressed mood was 4 times higher than that of patients without a depressed mood. The significance of the study is sharpened since the researchers themselves admitted to a strong bias against their own findings.

The researchers at the Department of Clinical Epidemiology, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, the Netherlands, wrote that they were “uncomfortable” with the idea that a request for euthanasia is a symptom of depression and that the patient’s request for suicide should be deferred until his depression was treated.

Why would they be uncomfortable with this idea? Doesn't it make sense to defer a decision with an irreversible outcome when there is a good possibility it is motivated by a transient and treatable emotional problem?

Would Martin Luther King Jr Have Opposed Roe vs Wade?

2006-01-16T10:01:00.000-05:00

What stand would Martin Luther King Jr have taken on the current abortion debate?

Both pro-aborts and pro-lifers have claimed Dr King for their side, but based on the facts of Dr King's life, who has the stronger case?

Before Roe vs Wade Dr King did accept the Margaret Sanger Award in 1966 and voice support for the idea of "voluntary family planning".

As Chuck Colson noted in a column on Dr King a few years ago, groups like NARAL and the elected officials like Donna Brazile who support them have have co-opted Dr King's legacy for the abortion camp.

Colson goes on to argue King's defense of natural law which would prohibit his support of Roe vs Wade:

While in jail, King received a letter from eight ministers. They agreed with King's goals, but they thought he should call off the demonstrations and obey the law. King disagreed, and his famous Letter from a Birmingham Jail explains why. "One may well ask," he wrote, "how can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?" The answer, he said, "is found in the fact that there are two kinds of laws: just laws . . . and unjust laws."

"One has not only a legal, but a moral responsibility to obey just laws," King affirmed, "but conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws."

A just law, King wrote, "squares with the moral law of the law of God. An unjust law . . . is out of harmony with the moral law."

This is a strong case, but Dr. King's position wouldn't necessarily prevent at least a limited support for abortion.

The truth is we can't really say either way what position Dr. King would have taken. It would seem that there were two Dr Kings whose views were never reconciled. One was the "whole Gospel" Dr King who was rooted in a strong Christian tradition, and then there was the "social justice Gospel" Dr King that opposed the Vietnam war and accepted an award named of after a notorious racist and eugenicist. Richard John Neuhaus has a fascinating portrait of the two Dr Kings and in it we see two possible directions the historical Dr King may have taken. They are represented by two of his colleagues Rev Jesse Jackson and Ralph Abernathy. Jesse Jackson's career is well known, and it is fair to say that had King's views aligned more closely with the liberal theology of social justice embraced by Jackson and most of the mainline churches in America he too would be squarely in the liberal progressive camp and would no doubt be a supporter of Roe vs Wade. Rev Jackson's own opposition to abortion (which he at one point called a "war on the poor and the most defenseless") didn't survive his ambitions as a presidential candidate.

Ralph Abernathy on the other hand has been roundly criticized for his more Biblically-based views on the issues of the day:

Abernathy was beyond doubt closer to King than anyone else. After the assassination, he took King’s place as head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), although he knew as well as anyone that he was no Martin Luther King. His book was harshly criticized for its candor about King’s sexual vagaries, but other published accounts had been more explicit on that score. What I think got to many reviewers is that Abernathy refused to toe the line on the leftist ideology of the movement and even, in the early eighties, took a conservative turn, offering some favorable words on, of all people, Ronald Reagan.

I'll challenge the reader to take a look at the article and decide which Dr. King would have won out in the end. But one indisputable fact is that Dr King had a presentiment of the price he would pay for his ministry to this country, and he demonstrated the love he had by laying down his life, and we honor him for the healing his sacrifice brought.

Belgian Euthanasia Doctor Arrested in France

2006-01-10T09:03:00.000-05:00

From Expatica

A Belgian surgeon who has admitted to several previous "mercy killings" has been charged with killing a patient in France.

The news agency AFP reported on Monday that a female doctor had been held in custody since Saturday for giving a 74-year-old patient an insulin overdose.

Lest you think this is a selfless crusader who's only concern is her patients, the article takes a closer look at the unnamed doctor:

The surgeon treating her at Belley Hospital had admitted injecting 200 units of insulin into the woman's drip.

[Public Prosecutor Cedric] Cabut said it was not certain that the insulin had killed the patient, since she died two days after the overdose, on 23 December.

However, Cabut said the intention to kill her had been established.

He added that, during interviews with the police, the doctor had admitted being imprisoned for four months in Belgium for fraudulently using a patient's blue health card.

She also claimed responsibility for several acts of euthanasia, including that of her own grandmother, before the Belgian law legalising some forms of "mercy killing" was introduced in 2002. She moved to France to work in 2001.

Cabut said the doctor suffered from depression and alcoholism.

The French authorities intend to ask for Belgium's legal records about the doctor.

This is not the same Belgian doctor mentioned in this earlier post.

China to Continue "One Child" Policy

2006-01-09T10:04:00.000-05:00

From LifeNews

An official in the Chinese government delivered news on Friday that's a concern to pro-life and human rights activists across the globe: China will not abandon it's coercive one-child population control policy in the coming years.

Zhang Weiqing, minister of the State Commission of Population and Family Planning, said the one-child policy is a long-term government program to curb China's growing population. He said the population control policy will appear in the nation's 11th Five-Year Plan, covering 2006-2010, and beyond.

The policy has been attacked by pro-life and human rights groups because of the numerous abuses that have developed under it. Women have been subjected to forced abortions and husband and wives to forced sterilizations.

Those who violate the policy have been forced to pay fines totaling months or years worth of salary, have been imprisoned, lost their jobs, and have seen family members assaulted or abducted who are hiding couples with more than one child.

This disastrous policy combined with a cultural gender preference for males has reportedly produced a "surplus" of 20 million boys over and and above the female population. The social effects on China will be devastating, but the corrupt Communist system still prefers to have less people to manage despite the inevitable problems this will create.