Mike Huckabee Says Folks with Pre-Existing Conditions are Uninsurable, Just Like a Burnt-Out House

Readers might have noticed that some other groups and individuals who oppose legalization of assisted suicide and euthanasia spend a fair amount of time and energy warning about "pro-death" ideology on the left.  You don't have to search very far to find warnings about "Obamacare," impending rationing and "death panels."

While a lot of the rhetoric about "death panels" and rationing are overblown, it's obvious that many self-identified "progressives" can be very "pro-death" when it comes to disability.  What else explains the eager way in which the liberal Huffington Post, for example, has provided a home for the extreme (and often sloppy) polemics of self-described "bioethicist and medical historian" Jacob Appel, to offer up one example.

Where I - and other disability activists - part with politically Right-leaning opponents of assisted suicide is that we see cause for alarm on the Right as well.  A lot of radical conservative rhetoric right now - like from the Tea Party - sounds pretty pro-death if you're a person with a disability, chronic condition, etc.

If that sounds extreme and alarmist (as opposed to the "death panel" cries), please watch the video embedded below.  It's good old "Compassionate Conservative Christian Mike Huckabee" speaking at the "Values Voter Summit" - the site for the summit says the "values" they want to further are to: protect marriage, champion life, strengthen the military, limit government, control spending and defend our freedoms.  Guess which one of those "values" Huckabee throws under the bus?

Check it out - and for those who need captioning, I tried the automatic captioning on this video and it works well.  There are a couple of typos, but you get the full content of Huckabee's remarks:



To summarize - Huckabee blasts the idea of requiring insurance companies to cover those with pre-existing conditions.  He compares those individuals - which includes me and just about everyone I know and care about - to both a burnt-down house and a wrecked car.  And, of course, it would be ridiculous to expect an insurance company to insure a house that burned down yesterday.


This can be interpreted in no other way but as a blatantly utilitarian appeal to Tea Party folks who combine the scary traits of wanting as little government as possible, want to pay as little tax as possible, and resent "paying" for people on "entitlements."

I guess they should amend that "Champion Life" to read "Champion the lives of young, healthy, nondisabled people."

It's a chilling message, given the context.  Huckabee objectifies people like me, my loved ones and friends by comparing us to burnt buildings reduced to ashes.

He says we'll raise the cost of health care for everyone.  I'm guessing that he doesn't want to expand government programs like Medicaid and Medicare, since the only "program" on the agenda that is targeted for increases in funding is Military Defense.  Does he think that emergency room use by uninsured people won't continue to raise health care costs?

Radical libertarians would eliminate that practice and only grant medical treatment to the insured or those who can pay in some other way.  The rest of us can go find a publicly-owned bridge to crawl under and die quietly where we won't bother anyone.

I'm sure Rev. Huckabee would be glad to pray for our souls, though, since that won't cost him anything.

Well, speaking for myself, this burnt-out pile of ashes has a message for Huckabee and other "Values Voters" who agree with him.

I'll take care of my own soul; making sure I can get affordable health coverage is what I'd like help with.

Mike Huckabee and anyone else who doesn't like that can kiss my ash! --Stephen Drake

Scotland: Disability Community Protesting Assisted Suicide Bill

There's an effort in Scotland right now that is spearheaded by Margo MacDonald. She's been successful in getting the matter before the Scottish Parliament.  There has been an encouraging amount of opposition to the proposed bill from the medical community.  The disability community seems pretty united - and serious - about opposing this bill, which they think is badly timed, to say the least:

Members of Inclusion Scotland say Margo Macdonald's End of Life Bill discriminates against disabled people and contradicts the independent living agenda. They were protesting as evidence about the bill was being heard inside the parliament.

Disability support worker Catherine Garrod said: "I think it is offering assisted suicide to disabled people but a non-disabled person who was suicidal would be given counselling.

Dr Colin Cameron, a disability equality trainer, added:: "We need to provide support for disabled people to live on their own terms, not providing support for them to die."

More later on...

The bill would make it legal for doctors to assist those who wish to die. It is designed to help those with a terminal illness and those whose physical disability makes life intolerable.

The move has been proposed by Margo MacDonald - who herself suffers from Parkinsons disease.

She said: "The bill has nothing whatsoever to do with disabled people, and I think it is absolutely disgraceful that such vulnerable people should have been used here today." (Emphasis added.)

The row came as MSPs took detailed evidence on the bill.

Pam Duncan, a board member of Inclusion Scotland, said; "I genuinely believe that as a parliament we have a responsibility to make life a better choice than death."

MacDonald reveals a type of contemptuous dismissal common among pro-euthanasia advocates in her framing the people with disabilities who are protesting as people who "have been used."  On the one hand, she wants to respect individual choice and autonomy - but when disabled people come together and turn collective "thumbs down" to her "dignity" bill, she labels them as puppets "being used" by others (although she doesn't say who the puppeteers are in this article, anyway).

In other coverage, disability advocates and activists harshly criticize the timing of this bill:

Catherine Garrod, of Lothian Centre for Inclusive Living, claimed that under the bill only disabled people would be eligible for assistance to die, suggesting their lives were of less value than those of non-disabled people.

She cited the case of 23-year-old Daniel James, who chose to die after being paralysed while playing rugby and added: “His wish to die was considered to be acceptable because he was a disabled man. The same desire to die in a non-disabled person of either sex or any age would be considered to be unreasonable and a sign of mental illness.”

Ms Garrod also called for a greater emphasis on tackling the social hurdles which can make life difficult for disabled people. Inclusion Scotland has criticised the timing of the bill, arguing that cuts to benefits and services might put some people in even more desperate situations, and make assisted dying appear “attractive”. 

“There is no mention throughout the End of Life bill of the barriers facing disabled people that may contribute to them finding life intolerable,” Ms Garrod said. “Barriers such as cuts to welfare benefits, cuts to social work services and other types of support, cuts to health services and the lack of accessible housing and being in poverty can all make life intolerable for disabled people.”

She added: “Disabled people are among the most disempowered in our society. This limits their choices. Some disabled people don’t even get to choose their own socks.

“The so-called safeguards in the bill would not prevent insidious and sometimes even unconscious pressure being brought to bear on disabled people by carers, health and care professionals. All research studies conducted on assisted dying show ‘not wanting to be a burden’ as the principal reason for seeking death.”

I invite Margo MacDonald to educate me.  Who, pray tell, is "using" Catherine Garrod?  She seems pretty clear on what she wants and why.  If you can't name someone who is "using" Garrod, you should consider apologizing to her and to all disabled people in Scotland.

But I won't hold my breath waiting for that apology or advise anyone else to, either. --Stephen Drake

Washington State: Grieving Relative Compares Legally Scheduled Suicide to Execution

To be honest, the letter from Katie Densley in the Spokesman-Review on Sunday didn't surprise me at all.  That is, the content of the letter didn't surprise me.  The fact that her letter was published did surprise me.  I suspect there are more stories like hers in Washington - and even more in Oregon.  But they don't have the well-funded Public Relations department of C & C (Conflation & Con Jobs) working to get those stories to the public by way of the media.

Here's the beginning of Densley's letter, titled "Suicide Like Execution":

It’s been a year since my uncle opted for assisted suicide. To me it’s an excruciating anniversary. He talked about this for a year before it became law. He’d had surgery for cancer which left him with a catheter. He was depressed at 94 but was home with assistance from friends and health givers. I thought this could never happen because he was just old and depressed.

When the law became reality, friends helped him with his quest. They took him to doctors that my uncle convinced this was what he wanted. His profession had been car salesman so he got the doctors to sign off on him. Friends who were his caretakers tried to talk him out of it, saying it wasn’t right because he wasn’t terminal.

The date was set for the final event. I loved him and wanted to be with him when he died. It felt like an execution.

And the execution went ahead as scheduled.  Not terminal, but able to talk doctors into giving him a lethal prescription.  Friends who didn't like it, but just went along with it.

In case you're wondering, there's nothing that this niece could do in terms of complaining about the doctor who gave a prescription to someone who wasn't terminally ill.  Unlike the "safeguards" that allegedly restrict assisted suicide to the "terminally ill," the physicians in question are protected against any sanctions as long as they acted "in good faith."

What that means is that even if the physician violates any of the guidelines, they are protected from professional sanction, along with civil and criminal liability.  All a physician needs to do is stick to the claim that they believed they were acting in accordance with the law.  It would take something like a public email from the physician admitting they knew they were breaking the law to pierce the "good faith" liability armor.

Please go and read the rest of the letter and check out the comments.  Right now, there aren't many  - just 2 at last count.  That says something.  What also indicates something about the Washington public is that both commentators ignore Densley's assertion that her uncle wasn't terminally ill.  Ignoring that piece of her message makes it easier for them to urge her to respect her uncle's values and get over it. 

Why fuss over details?  They just get in the way when you want to parrot platitudes about "death with dignity."

--Stephen Drake

NDY Applauds Appointment of AAPD CEO Andy Imparato to Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) Board of Governors

Great news coming out of Washington, DC last week.  Andrew Imparato, the President and CEO of the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), has been appointed to the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) Board of Governors.

Here's the relevant info from the AAPD press release:

WASHINGTON, DC – September 23, 2010 – The American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), the country’s largest cross-disability membership organization, is pleased to announce the appointment of Andrew Imparato, AAPD’s President and CEO to the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) Board of Governors.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 established PCORI as a non-profit organization to assist patients, clinicians, purchasers, and policy-makers in making informed health decisions by carrying out research projects that provide quality, relevant evidence on how diseases, disorders, and other health conditions can effectively and appropriately be prevented, diagnosed, treated, monitored, and managed.  The Patient Protection Act directs the Comptroller General to appoint 19 of the 21 members of the PCORI Board of Governors. Today, PCORI announced AAPD’s President and CEO, Andrew Imparato, is appointed as one of the inaugural PCORI Board Members. Imparato will be part of this team, charged with reviewing the research given to the government regarding healthcare reforms and implementation.

Needless to say, just about every aspect of health care reform has been debated exhaustively - and the PCORI is no different.  The views on this board range from those who have suggestions about how they should do their work to those who put their concerns in terms of outright paranoia.

 Since PCORI will be looking at "effectiveness" in medical treatments, it does bear watching just how "effectiveness" is defined.  Is "effectiveness" to be defined in terms of how well a given treatment works?  Or will "effectiveness" rely in part on judging in certain treatments aren't merited for certain people because they are too old or too disabled to justify the expense?

Knowing that Andy Imparato is part of the process provides some comfort.  He was general counsel and director of policy for the National Council on Disability (NCD) during the time the Council published its paper opposing legalization of assisted suicide.  Since then, he - and AAPD - have been at the forefront of advocacy againts genetic bias in employment, "futile care" cases, medical discrimination against people with disabilities and many other areas that overlap with NDY.

We at NDY congratulate Andy Imparato and thank him for his long-term advocacy and commitment to safeguarding the rights of people with disabilities.  --Stephen Drake

Robert Latimer - Murderer of Daughter Tracy Latimer - In the News Again

I can't explain the feelings that go through me when Robert Latimer surfaces in the news again.  Robert Latimer's murder of his daughter Tracy was pivotal in getting my attention directed at the euthanasia movement and in providing a solid foundation for my opposition to the movement.

Even though it looks like I haven't written anything here on the blog about Tracy Latimer's murder, the role the public debate about her murder played in my turn to activism has long been a part of my official bio:

During his years at Syracuse, one key event turned his interests and passions toward assisted suicide and euthanasia. In the early 1990s, Robert Latimer, a Canadian farmer who murdered his disabled daughter, Tracy, became a "poster child" for the Canadian pro-assisted suicide groups. Tracy Latimer was not dying and she did not ask to die. In 1996, while growing increasingly alarmed over the "better dead than disabled" rhetoric of the pro-euthanasia movement, he learned of the formation of Not Dead Yet and dropped everything to join its first protest action.

How far did the euthanasia activists in Canada go in embracing the killer of a nonterminally ill child who never asked to die?  What did the champions of autonomy have to say?

Here's one example from a Canadian "right to die" leader, quoted in a 1994 NY Times article on Robert Latimer.  She is reacting to the imposition of a 10-year prison sentence:

Marilynne Seguin, executive director of Dying With Dignity, a Toronto-based group promoting freedom of choice for physician-assisted deaths, said that the Latimers had already lived under a sentence during the 12 years that Tracy was alive and that to add the 10-year punishment "is quite unconscionable."

It's not often that people you didn't know were your enemies declare themselves so openly.  When Seguin equated parenting Tracy Latimer to being under a prison sentence, it also meant that her murder was a release - but not for Tracy.  By her reckoning, it was Robert Latimer who engineered his own "release."

Alex Schadenberg has posted about the latest round in news coverage - which revolves around efforts to get Latimer's parole conditions loosened.  I recommend reading Alex's post on the subject.

No disrespect to Alex, but in all honesty, I found a blogger who has written two posts on this latest round of press coverage that seems to touch every single element in the complex mix churning in my own stomach every time Robert Latimer is in the news again.

On August 19, Trouble posted a blog entry titled "This post is about Tracy Latimer's Murderer":

OH YAY! Gentle reader, I'm here to inform you that once again Tracy Latimer's murderer is in the news, which means we can deal with another week or two or months or years of people wibbling on about how Tracy Latimer's murderer is such a sweet innocent man who only murdered his disabled daughter because Tracy wasn't really a person and deserved to be murdered, and how he's such a victim of the system, and woe is poor him, and how cripples really DO have no life and it's totally okay for people to murder disabled children, as long as they don't have a disability and murder their own non-disabled children. Those people are menaces and should be locked up forever!!!!!!!!!!!

That was just for beginners.

She followed up with the post "it has begun":

I'm sure this weekend and into next week will be full of these shit-tastic stories, and I'm going to spend the whole damned week in a state of rage, and people will tell me to calm down because, you know, it's okay, it's just some 12 year old girl whose been dead since 1993.

She also left a comment in that section on the second post that accurately describes how Tracy Latimer is treated in stories about her own murder.  And it's a treatment that I've seen repeated in countless stories involving the murders of both adults and children with disabilities:

It's also something it's really hard to talk about. I try to blog about it calmly and rationally and then I remember that these people think that Tracy should be a footnote in her own murder, and I lose it.

I confess to having many of these same thoughts and feelings churning inside on a regular basis.  Some days, it can be very difficult to write "calmly and rationally."

Please read both of Trouble's posts on Tracy Latimer's murder.  I only shared a small excerpt and her posts should be read in their entirety.  First go here and then here.  --Stephen Drake

ADAPT is in DC! How to Follow the Action(s)

I really should have posted this over the weekend, but got waylaid by the usual parade of mundane but demanding household tasks that tend to occupy that timeblock.

On Saturday, September 19, ADAPT activists from around the country converged on Washington, DC for several days of political advocacy and direct action.

Here's how ADAPT's September 16 press release described the days to come:

ADAPT Activists to Storm Washington DC; 
Vow to Fight State Cuts to Medicaid Home Services

Fighting dangerous state Medicaid budget cuts across the country, the 
national grassroots disability rights action group ADAPT is planning 
direct actions at several venues in Washington, DC between September 19 to 
22 to demand that states save Medicaid-funded home and community based 
services. These services support low income people with disabilities and 
who are aging to stay in their own homes instead of being forced into 
nursing facilities to obtain services. During this critical election 
season, ADAPT plans to make it clear that saving Medicaid services is key 
to winning the disability vote.

"During this time of fiscal panic, governors are looking for ways to save 
dollars," notes Mike Ervin of Chicago ADAPT. "Hundreds of us are coming to 
Washington because Congress and the White House need to step up efforts to 
protect Medicaid community services in the states. I use home services and 
without someone to assist me, I'd be waiting on some nursing home aide to 
change me or feed me whenever she was done with the other fifty people 
living in the same facility. With home services, I am in charge of my 
life."

Current Medicaid law mandates that states use their Medicaid programs to 
pay for nursing homes, but the law does not equally mandate that states 
pay for the same services in a person's own home. Today, most states 
recognize that providing home and community based services (HCBS) is a 
less expensive solution than institutions. However, in these tight fiscal 
times, Medicaid dollars funding "optional" services like HCBS are first on 
the budget chopping block, while the mandatory institutional budgets are 
rarely touched. ADAPT's current "Defending Our Freedom" campaign is a 
direct response to states' attacks against HCBS, services that allow 
people with disabilities to take care of themselves, raise their families 
and be part of society.

"Without the home services funded by Medicaid, hundreds, if not thousands, 
of people with disabilities in my state would be forced to live in nursing 
homes or institutions," said Joe Stramondo of Michigan ADAPT. "Some states 
are virtually on the edge of bankruptcy. It makes no sense to spend extra 
dollars on institutions when those same dollars could fund more people 
with disabilities to live in the communities of our choice."

To a lot of readers coming to this blog from outside of the disability community, this might seem like a departure from our usual focus. It's not. Not Dead Yet is a disability rights organization that engages in activism, including direct action. A majority of the disability activists who have marched, protested, chanted and even been arrested under the NDY banner were ADAPT activists (and still are) long before NDY was formed.

And make no mistake, the issues that ADAPT takes on are life and death issues for the millions of American with disabilities of all ages.  Check out this link and you'll find the blog entries on this blog that feature ADAPT - many of them in situations acting in support and solidarity over NDY issues.

I'm not sure if or when I'll be posting anything from the ADAPT action on the NDY blog this week.  There's a lot to catch up on in terms of NDY-specific issues.

Here are sites/links you can check for news, reports, information, etc. about ADAPT and this week's actions:

• National ADAPT Home Page
• ADAPT Press Release Archive (newest on top)
• ADAPT Action Report - (Sat and Sun are up), with links to Defending Our Freedom Blogspot, ADAPT action blog from the streets of DC, and Action Video.
• Tom Olin Photos.

In addition check out this coverage of yesterday's ADAPT action at CNN iReport.

Down But Not Out: Bill Peace (Bad Cripple Blog)

Hopefully, a lot of regular readers have become familiar with Bill Peace's Bad Cripple Blog.  I think I've excerpted, reacted to or just plain pointed to his blog more than anyone else's - check out this link for the NDY posts in which he's been featured in some way.

Bill's blog went silent for almost two weeks, which is unusual. On Wednesday, he announced that he's in the hospital with a major health problem - a pressure sore he describes as a "hole in his hip."  The next few months will be tough ones for Bill - physically and financially for sure.  My own experience of long hospital stays (my longest was about 6 weeks when I was ten years old) is that they kind of shrink your psyche (or at least that's how I think of it).  Staying in the same room for days and weeks with only the medical staff - for me, anyway  - shrinks my energy, my ability to assert myself, and other essential survival traits that aren't valued or nurtured in a hospital setting.

Bill says he plans on writing daily (I hope he manages to come close to that), chronicling his road to recovery, health and home.

Check out, in order:

• Disaster: Hole in the Hip
• Day One Report

And then check back on a regular basis at Bad Cripple.

I offer two excellent reasons for reading his blog - now more than ever.

First, anything Bill Peace writes is worth reading.
Second, I'm sure he'll enjoy seeing people coming and reading the blog - especially if you leave comments.  --Stephen Drake

George Exoo Resurfaces - Plans for Swiss-like "suicide tourism" at death house in North Carolina?

Remember George Exoo?

Check out the link above for a reminder.  He's the founder of the "Compassionate Chaplaincy" and claims to have aided in over 100 suicides.  According to the documentary by Jon Ronson, "Reverend Death," Exoo's phone number was given out by other so-called "right to die" groups - if the caller was someone who wanted help killing themselves but wasn't terminally ill - or physically ill at all.  Obviously, this was before the establishment of the Final Exit Network (FEN) - an organization that defines "eligibility" for suicide assistance as broadly and "generously" as Exoo did.

There's no evidence that he requested any payments for his "services," but - at least in the case of his Irish client, he received ample reimbursement and assistance for European travel that he and his partner were already planning.  Hence the poster below:

We'll have to redo the poster.  Ditch the mustache and ditch the travel pitch.  Seems Exoo is no longer a travellin' man.

The story now - breaking first in the Irish press and later in North Carolina - is that Exoo wants to open up a "right to die" facility in Gastonia, a suburb of Charlotte, North Carolina.

The most detailed article from North Carolina so far was written by Diane Turbyfill in the Gaston Gazette:

A West Virginia man hopes to turn a run-down house in the Smyre Mill Village into a center to assist people with suicide.

The Rev. George Exoo, a Unitarian minister, has attended and sometimes assisted with more than 100 suicides.

He bought a Gastonia property three years ago with the intent of renovating and selling it. The quarter-of-an-acre lot has been trouble, according to Exoo. The improvements he planned have not been completed. Exoo still owns the two structures and now thinks they might be the landscape for an idea he’s considered for years — a facility to help people end their lives.

“It just seems to me that there’s a real need, particularly for people in states where this is outlawed, where people can die with dignity,” said Exoo.

The property in Gastonia would be ideal for Exoo’s vision because of its close proximity to the airport in Charlotte, he said. His primary customers would be the sick and hopeless from areas like Florida, New York and Maryland, Exoo said.

If you read the whole article, one gets the feeling this is probably just one of Exoo's flights of fancy.  He's got a picture in his head of what this little death house would look like that bears no resemblance to the small piece of property with a small house and adjoining shack.  A dream that would turn this little suburb into the "Suicide Tourist" mecca that Dignitas has made out of Switzerland.  I doubt that even supporters of assisted suicide would want any death house run by Exoo in their neighborhood.  In Switzerland - Dignitas gets booted from one building/location to another.

Who knows? Maybe Exoo just finished rewatching "Field of Dreams" and thought "If I build it, they will come" (which might not be a bad caption for the new poster caption).

Stay tuned, though.  Where Exoo goes, death or serious weirdness follow.  Sometimes both.  And it's not a good kind of weirdness.  --Stephen Drake

Satire Alert: "The Spoof" Says Alan Simpson Wants to Eliminate Suicide Prevention for Seniors and Veterans

Time for a little humor.  I'm ready for it, even if no one else is.

It happens that today is World Suicide Prevention Day.  Big Deal.  If anyone reading this wonders why there's no excitement or enthusiasm about the day here, check out the blog entry for last year's suicide prevention day.  Wesley Smith has written something along the same lines for this year's non-event.

There's not much I could write about the suicide prevention folks that's not already been said in last year's post.

So I was glad to see this show up in my news feed. 

And - before anyone blows a gasket - please remember it's a satire piece, not real news.

Deficit Reduction Co-Chair Alan Simpson Wants to Eliminate Suicide Prevention for Elderly and Veterans

WASHINGTON,DC - Ex-Senator Alan Simpson (R-WY) raised eyebrows again today in comments he made at an event to publicize "World Suicide Prevention Day." On September 10th, events are put on to explain that suicide is a preventable tragedy and to put the focus on the need for more suicide prevention resources.

Simpson's comments were made in response to a reporter's request for a reaction after Simpson abruptly left a presentation in a large meeting room of the Dirksen Senate Office Building. Experts from the National Institute of Mental Health and the Department of Veteran Affairs were sharing the latest research and strategies in regard to the problem of suicide in the elderly and returning veterans, respectively.

Simpson, known for his no-nonsense approach to public policy issues, appeared eager to give his opinion on the matter.

"As the co-chair of the President's deficit reduction committee, I have to look at these issues without sentimentality," the ex-Senator explained. "Frankly, from a budgetary perspective, it's counterproductive to try to prevent the suicides of elderly people and veterans.

"The suicide of a senior who could live 10-20 years represents a huge cost-savings to the government and the taxpayers. That suicide means that tens of thousands in Social Security payments that don't have to get paid out - and there's an unknown savings in Medicare payments for medical care - but that could easily add up to hundreds of thousands of dollars."

Read the rest of the article here.


Really.  We can all use a chuckle.

Tales of the Weird - A Vet Weighs in On Katrina Hospital Killings

You can't make up stuff like this.

Having been on the "assisted suicide/euthanasia/better dead than disabled" beat for more years than I want to recall, I get to the point where I figure I've seen just about every ridiculous thing that could possibly be thrown into the pro-euthanasia mix.

Boy, was I wrong.

Meet Dr. Patrick Mahaney, veterinarian and "certified veterinarian acupuncturist." (BTW, I'd urge anyone considering an acupuncturist for their pet read this article at "Science-Based Medicine" first.

Acupuncture isn't what drew my attention to Mahaney, though.  It was a post he published on August 28 titled "Veterinarian Perspective on Human Euthanasia During Hurricane Katrina".

(Not Dead Yet weighed in on the Katrina killings at Memorial - see this post about the botched presentation to the Grand Jury with links to other information.)

I can't excerpt any of the piece since the good doctor has a very strict copyright policy in terms of reproducing any part of his essays without written permission.  So I'll summarize and y'all can go check out the essay to see how accurate I was.

Like many commentators, Mahaney says shouldn't attempt to judge the doctors.  He gets to that point by affirming his support for both animal and human euthanasia, followed by an almost accurate description of the situations faced by the medical staff at Memorial Medical Center. 

When I say Mahaney was "almost accurate" I am referring to a major misrepresentation - he characterizes them all as being near the "brink of death."

Mahaney says he based his essay on the content in the 2009 NY Times article "The Deadly Choices at Memorial" by Sheri Fink.

How, then, did he forget about Emmet Everett?  From the NY Times story:

Robichaux remembered Pou saying that the LifeCare patients were “not aware or not alert or something along those lines.” Robichaux recounted to investigators that she told Pou that that wasn’t true and said that one of LifeCare’s patients — Emmett Everett, a 380-pound man — was “very aware” of his surroundings. He had fed himself breakfast that morning and asked Robichaux, “So are we ready to rock and roll?”

The 61-year-old Honduran-born manual laborer was at LifeCare awaiting colostomy surgery to ease chronic bowel obstruction, according to his medical records. Despite a freakish spinal-cord stroke that left him a paraplegic at age 50, his wife and nurses who worked with him say he maintained a good sense of humor and a rich family life, and he rarely complained. He, along with three of the other LifeCare patients on the floor, had no D.N.R. order.

Everett’s roommates had already been taken downstairs on their way to the helicopters, whose loud propellers sent a breeze through the windows on his side of the LifeCare floor. Several times he appealed to his nurse, “Don’t let them leave me behind.” His only complaint that morning was dizziness, a LifeCare worker told Pou. 

 And this...

Several medical staff members who helped lead boat and helicopter transport that day say they would certainly have found a way to evacuate Everett. They say they were never made aware of his presence.

Dr. Anna Pou was the last person to see Everett.  He never left the room and he was reported dead.  It's reasonable to conclude that Pou killed him.

Weirdly enough, the nonsense, inaccuracy and general pro-euthanasia prattle in Mahaney's August 28 essay isn't what spurred me to call attention to it and to him.  His piece is hardly unique in that regard.

You see, the good doctor did a follow-up essay on Katrina and euthanasia.  For an essay that turns out to be a punch line, it's got a real pompous title: Ethics of  Human Doctors Performing Feline Intracardiac Euthanasia During Hurricane Katrina.

A small part of Fink's article in the NY Times mentioned two cats that were killed after their owners brought them and requested euthanasia for them since they couldn't take the animals with them.

Dr. Mahaney - who doesn't think anyone should judge or question the killings of humans at Memorial does feel free to criticize the means used to kill the cats and questions whether it was necessary.  Apparently his nonjudgmentalist attitude applies to the killing of humans only.


Good grief - On the one hand it's incredible that someone would be more OK with the "putting to sleep" of humans than animals in this scenario.  What's really incredible is that Mahaney doesn't seem to think there is anything contradictory or hypocritical here. The idea that the two pieces could open him to ridicule probably didn't occur to him.

Wrong.  Part of me wonders if Mahaney is a real person or if it's a new character that Tracey Ullman is field testing:



The video embedded above is a classic bit by the Tracey Ullman character Penny Landers - Dr. Mahaney wouldn't be a stretch at all. I guess I'm grateful Mahaney isn't treating humans since his standards for killing them seem to be lower than they are for cats. --Stephen Drake

Addendum: As an aside, I personally don't take the killing of animals lightly.  At this point in time, our household is shared with two cats - one in his senior years and the other a kitten.  Both are disabled.  As a lifelong indoor cat, I doubt my three-legged senior cat's ability to survive long on the outside, let alone a disaster area like Katrina.  The kitten might be more adaptable, but he's got those neuromotor issues.  I would not want to be in a position of having to decide what to do with them if I had to evacuate due to disaster and couldn't take them with me. But, honestly, my human partner is a much higher priority than either one of the felines.

Assisted Suicide Advocates Advance Exploitation of Elderly Murder/Suicides for Political Gain

On September 1, the Missoulian published a story that is becoming all-too-familiar, titled "Fire investigation reveals 'mercy killing in Libby":

An investigation into a house fire in northwestern Montana took a grisly turn when authorities discovered the elderly couple living there were involved in a murder-suicide that police say was meant to be a mercy killing.

Authorities originally believed that Ted and Swanie Hardgrove, both 81, died in the Saturday morning fire that burned down their home in a rural area of Lincoln County north of Libby, where they had been longtime residents.

The bodies were taken to the state crime lab, where it was discovered that both Hardgroves had single gunshot wounds to their heads, Lincoln County Sheriff's Capt. Roby Bowe said Wednesday.

Amid the charred wreckage, a gun was discovered near Ted Hardgrove's body and a letter in which he explained his actions.

Authorities concluded that Ted Hardgrove shot his wife, set fire to the house and then shot himself, Bowe said.

"It was more an act of despair out of love. They both had medical issues. She was in a huge amount of pain," Bowe said. "He could not take it anymore. He could not see her in that amount of pain anymore."

Swanie Hardgrove had cerebral palsy and her suffering had grown intense in the days leading up to the shooting, Bowe said. She had been in and out of hospitals for some time and her treatment was not easing the pain.

Ted Hardgrove also had medical issues, although Bowe declined to elaborate.

As I've seen in other cases, part of the problem in how this article - and subsequent coverage - gets framed is a result of the careless and even irresponsible comments from a law officer, in this case Sheriff's Captain Roby  Rowe.  His own account - sympathetic to the man who killed his wife and burned down his house - gives permission to everyone to refer to Swanie Hardgrove's murder as a "mercy killing."

It gets worse, though.

On September 4, a follow-up story appeared in the newspaper.  It begins with yet another sheriff describing Ted Hardrove's murder of his wife as an act of mercy.  Then the tone and message changes.  The title of the article might give you a clue - "Libby shooting, arson tragedy puts focus on 'aid in dying'":

"What we want people to know," said Steve Hopcraft, "is there is help and information out there."

Hopcraft works with a nonprofit called Compassion and Choices, a group that offers free end-of-life planning, counseling and options.

"We believe that these tragic and violent deaths are 100 percent preventable," Hopcraft said. "It's a matter, really, of getting the information out."

Information such as the fact that Montana is among three states - Oregon and Washington are the other two - where doctors are allowed to provide what's known as "aid in dying." They can prescribe lethal drugs to terminally ill patients, who can then choose whether and when to use the pills.

Voters in Oregon and Washington approved such measures, which come with safeguards and careful case reporting. In Montana, no such structure exists. Instead, the state Supreme Court ruled last New Year's Eve that no public policy here prohibits aid in dying, so it's legal but largely unregulated.

It's also largely unknown, which is what Hopcraft hopes to change.

"Talking about death can't kill you," he said, "but it can help you have the peaceful death that everyone wants."

His group provides counseling, and help with wills and advance directives. They lay out options, such as hospice, and involve entire families. And they do it for free.

"It's just a phone call," Hopcraft said. A toll-free call to 1-800-247-7421. "You can call any time, at each step along the way. Most of us are total amateurs when it comes to approaching death. We don't know what the options are, or where to get information. Call us; we'll help you understand what's available, so you can make choices."

Most of all, he said, Compassion and Choices helps people communicate. Doctors and patients, patients and family, family and physicians. "Because too often," he said, "failure to communicate ends in less than optimal care."

Or, more tragically, in an anguished couple choosing the only option they think is available.

Time for another Bullshit Alert.  Technically, there is no statute in Montana authorizing doctors to hand out lethal prescriptions to "terminally ill" patients.  But that is the least of the problems here:

• There is no indication in either of the articles that this was something "the couple" decided, but was something that Ted Hardgrove planned on his own.
• There is no indication that Swanie Hardgrove wanted to die or even knew that he planned to kill her.
• Neither individual was 'terminally ill.'

This looks a lot like other elderly homicides/suicides in which the husband is the perpetrator.  Some of the research on these killings was shared in an earlier blog entry (quoting researcher Donna Cohen):

“These are not acts of love. They are not compassionate homicides. They are acts of desperation and depression, other forms of psychopathology, or domestic violence.”

Dr Cohen’s research indicates that older men – who almost always initiate the acts – routinely proceed without their wife’s knowledge or consent. She says true pacts occur in perhaps one half of 1 per cent of elder homicide-suicides.

Of the hundreds of homicide-suicide deaths in the US each year, the rate amongst over 55s is twice that of under 55s. Homicide-suicides now account for about three per cent of all suicides, and about 12 per cent of homicides in the older population.

“One of our most distressing findings is evidence that older women who are killed are not knowing or willing participants,” says Dr Cohen. “Often they are killed in their sleep or shot in the back of the head or chest.”

Her research indicates that about a third of elder homicide-suicides occur in a context of domestic violence, an ugly contrast to the Norman Rockwell image of loving clan matriarch and patriarch.

The picture of the male perps isn't exactly one of someone who would want to go to his physician and discuss how and why he wants to kill his nonterminally ill spouse.

But this coverage - and the slant that Conflation & Con jobs (aka "Compassion & Choices) has put on it shouldn't come as a surprise.  I predicted as much earlier this year when the organization issued a press release exploiting a murder/suicide in Connecticut that uses the same themes, even some of the same phrasing.  In that case, the murdered wife had dementia.  Other than that, what I wrote at the time applies to this latest exploitation of a tragedy as well:

There are only two ways I can think of right now to interpret this cynical exploitation of a tragic situation:

1. C&C is testing the limits of the public's gullibility.  They might be emboldened right now, seeing how the Final Exit Network - with its "open door" policy of suicide assistance to nonterminal old, ill and disabled people have gotten a sympathetic free ride in the press - and in many cases misreport the group as "aiding" people with "terminal illnesses."  They might also have been pleasantly surprised at how the combined marketing efforts of HBO and CNN have repackaged Jack Kevorkian - from a lawless creepy ghoul to an eccentric champion for the terminally ill.  So maybe they're keeping they're fingers crossed that maybe the public really is too stupid to notice that the person who was killed wasn't dying and didn't ask to die.

2. It's also possible that C&C is testing the waters with this release.  Anyone familiar with the passions of assisted suicide/euthanasia activists knows that the "terminally ill" limitation being promoted at present is just the first step in an incrementalist strategy.  Most of the supporters of assisted suicide and euthanasia want much broader "elegibility" - similar to the expansive eligibility in the Netherlands and Switzerland.

For another take on this situation, check this post by Wesley Smith at Secondhand Smoke.  --Stephen Drake

Important Legal Victory for People Under Guardianship in Pennsylvania

Last month, there was an important legal victory for people under guardianship in Pennsylvania.  The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania issued its ruling in the matter of D.L.H.  This appeal was made by the guardians of a man with developmental disabilities.  As reported in this 2009 blog entry, a lower court severely limited a guardian's power to refuse life-sustaining treatment for someone who was neither in an "end-stage" condition related to disease or permanently unconscious.  The ruling applies to individuals who never had the decisionmaking capacity to have made choices to refuse treatments such as temporary use of a ventilator (to use one example).  But go back and read the original post for the full summary by Mark Murphy, Legal Director of the Disability Rights Network of Pennsylvania (DRNPA).

DRNPA filed an amicus brief in the Supreme Court case, and was joined by NDY, the Arc  of Pennsylvania, Achieva, Vision for Equality, Liberty Resources, Inc. and Pennsylvania Developmental Disabilities Council. 

Here is the brief victory message sent out to disability advocates from Mark Murphy:

The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania has issued its decision in In re D.L.H., which involved the issue of whether guardians may refuse to authorize life-preserving treatment to persons who 1) lack, and who may always have lacked, capacity to make personal health care decisions; and 2) are not in an end-of-life situation or permanently unconscious.

I am pleased to say that the Supreme Court has agreed with the arguments put forth by the Department of Public Welfare and supported by the amicus brief DRN filed on your groups’ behalf.  The holding of the court is as follows:

“We hold that where, as here, life-preserving treatment is at issue for an incompetent person who is not suffering from an end-stage condition or permanent unconsciousness, and that person has no health care agent, the Act [Act 169] mandates that the care must be provided.”

An easily accessible web-based copy of the decision has been posted at Leagle.com here.
The Court's pdf version of the decision is here.

It looks like - for now, anyway, that's one state that may provide relative safety for people under guardianship in regard to getting appropriate life-preserving medical treatment.  Unfortunately, that leaves a lot of states in which the status of people under guardianship status may be less protected - specifically in Connecticut and Wisconsin, where individual battles have been fought to protect the lives of people under guardianship.  Those are just the ones that we know of.  I suspect that there are problems in many other states.

Interestingly, this major court decision has gotten no mainstream press coverage.  There hasn't been any comment or reaction from UPenn's Art Caplan - a prominent bioethicist who writes on court decisions that relate to bioethics.  In fact, he published a column regarding the Betancourt decision in New Jersey.  In that column, he lists a lot of players that should be at the table hammering out sensible and transparent guidelines regarding the absolute limits of medical care (in other words, futile care policy).  Missing from the list is any mention of disability advocates - in this case the omission is especially interesting considering the number of disability advocacy organizations that got involved in the futile care case as co-amici.

I'll be interested to see if he gets around to writing on important court decisions in his own state - Pennsylvania.  --Stephen Drake