A recent airing of Raymond Arroyo’s The World Over  presented an opportunity for me to discuss Catholic health care ethics with the president of the Catholic Health Association, Sister Carol Keehan, DC. I received a great deal of messages via e-mail, Facebook and the U.S. Postal Service after my appearance on that program.

I am grateful for every one of them. However, one in particular moved me to think seriously about what is really at stake in our struggle to keep the aborting of a child out of any type of health care reform legislation. It helped me realize what an expectant mother seeking to abort her baby really wants and really needs.

So, rather than tell you my opinion, which would not be based on actual hands-on experience, I prefer to share this letter, written to Sister Carol by Lorraine Curtin, who does know exactly what such a mother thinks, feels and needs:

Dear Sister Carol Keehan,

Thank you for taking a moment to read my e-mail.

I listened to your conversation last Friday evening with Raymond Arroyo and Judie Brown. There is one aspect of your argument regarding health care for pregnant women that I would like to address. It concerns an implied generalization that free prenatal care would greatly diminish abortions in our country.

I am a volunteer consultant at a crisis pregnancy center in Columbus, Ohio. Since 2001, I have talked with hundreds of abortion-minded women concerning their pregnancy and their options. It has been my experience that women do not choose to have an abortion because of lack of prenatal care. In our state, we have a generous, free health insurance program (called Healthy Start/Healthy Families) for women without insurance. The guidelines for eligibility are well above the Medicaid guidelines given by the federal government. In fact, any women in our state ineligible for state insurance can receive quality prenatal care for free (or at a substantially reduced rate) because there are other programs available to these women through grant money.

My experience has been that women choose abortion because they do not want to be pregnant. This might sound overly simplified, but let me explain. Many teens and adults are engaging in premarital sex. Most of them do not want children with that partner or at that moment in their life. Consequently, when they do get pregnant, they seek an abortion. Since abortion is legal and easy to acquire, it is a choice so often made. Many women choose to abort in the first trimester because they are not showing yet. Trust me, if all they needed were health care, we would have very few abortions in our state. (We have approximately 31,000 elective abortions each year.)

I can state at least 10 reasons that are given as to why they choose an abortion (notice that health care is not on the list):

 1. Birth control failed – pill, patch, shot, condom
 2. Wants to finish high school/college – baby messes up their future plans
 3. No longer in a relationship with the father of the baby
 4. Parents would be unsupportive – afraid of what they might think – doesn’t want 
     them to find out. 
 5. Has enough kids
 6. Pregnant through an extramarital affair
 7. Not ready to parent – no particular reason given
 8. Does not know who the father is – casual sex (hooking up) – multiple partners
 9. Pressure from someone else to abort (family, boyfriend, employer)
10. Sex is purely recreational – “I never thought I’d get pregnant!”

Women never tell us, “Gee, I wouldn’t have an abortion if I could get free health care.” They know they can get free health care. It’s not about health care – it’s about the devaluing of human life in our culture, and most of the responsibility lies in the fact that abortions have been legal since 1973 [emphasis added]. Please do not be duped into this lie about abortion and health care. The only way to stop it is to make it illegal and teach “abstinence-only” in our homes, our churches and our schools.

Now I must say that some of the poorest of the poor do not get abortions, because they cannot pay for them (a first-trimester abortion runs about $350 in our city). So, if health care passes that includes free abortions (a.k.a. family planning services), then even these women will succumb to the culture of death.

If you have any independent studies (not by Planned Parenthood) that corroborate your claim, please send them to me, so that I can read them.

If abortion were illegal, then the choice to abort would change to the choice of an adoption and occasionally to parenting. In our current climate, abortion is an “easy” option for now (or so they think!) because “no one will know that I was ever pregnant.”

If it were just as “simple” as giving them free health care, there would be no use for crisis pregnancy centers. I would happily give up my position here if it were all true, but I know better. I encourage you to visit a crisis center in your state and talk one-on-one with the consultants for more in-depth conversation.

There it is, from an expert. This woman has given us a window into the world of the expectant mother who does not wish to be the mother of a living child. I would hasten to add that most of these mothers do not consider themselves to be the mother of a preborn child, but prefer to think of themselves as a woman with a problem requiring a quick solution. I also believe that this counselor is correct to point out that if abortion is covered in any health care “reform” plan, abortion numbers will go through the roof. So why hasn’t this been made clear?

First and foremost, pro-life America is making the case, and we are not going to shut up. And it is my opinion that, after all these weeks of debate, perhaps the truth is sinking in. Perhaps Americans are finally beginning to think beyond the Obamacare marketing phrases, gobbledygook and false promises making their way through town-hall meetings and other such venues.

On this subject – the facts about abortion-minded mothers – it is my sincere hope that people across this nation will spread the words of this wise pro-life pregnancy counselor, and help their ministers, priests, bishops and others see that Obamacare is going to increase the killing of the preborn, not ameliorate the situation.

President Obama says abortion is “heart-wrenching,” and yet he advocates it. We say abortion is murder and it’s time for America to listen.

Please help us spread this word. 

Responses

Also unmentioned by Sister Carol Keehan is the fact that many misguided OB/GYN's who have determined a poor prenatal diagnosis for the baby actually push parents towards abortion as the "merciful" option. I hate to say it, but in the hands of a public option, government sponsored health care system this could become the mandated option.

Thanks and God bless you!

Catherine Lemek
Catherine Lemek | August 24, 2009

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I've been counseling English and Spanish speaking women for six years, and I would add one more reason for seeking an abortion. I have run across this reason dozens of times. The woman is here illegally and has to send money back home, usually to support her child or children. She has had an affair and is now pregnant, not in the plan. In my state of California, even she would receive free care throughout labor and delivery. Very few of the women I've counseled have availed themselves of this opportunity. The ones that have, have not had to pay any of the cost of prenatal, labor and delivery health care.
Maria Rugg | August 24, 2009

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How about this?
Your bc failed, read the labels, they are not 100% effective, if youre ready for sex... be resposible
You can do anything with a baby that you can do without one, I know I have 2 little boys and I'm only 23
No longer with the father doesn't mean squat, you know how many mothers are not with the babys daddy?
If you're parents knew you were having sex, doing drugs, drinking etc, they'd probably be unsupportive of that, but you didn't care to begin with.
You should've thought about having to many kids before hand, or go get your tubes tied!
Quit cheating on your husband, besides, what goes around comes around, the baby wasnt forcing you to have the affair.
Grow up and take responsiblity for your actions, if you're ready for sex, be ready to accept the concequences. What if you caught HIV? Nobodys fault but your own.
Men and women a like need to be more responsible for the things they do!

elisabeth | August 26, 2009

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"They know they can get free health care"? Where?? Aren't you obligated to tell the truth? Tell the poor mother who cannot afford food, whose children are going to bed hungry, who is one of the 42 million uninsured Americans, that there is free health care What hypocrisy! How dare you. I noticed you did not add sexual abuse, rape, incest or the health of the woman to your trite list. Do you really think American women are that shallow?
Elizabeth | August 28, 2009

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I am sorry to say I did not see that episode of the World Over, although I wish I had!
Thank you so much for this article. I am also a pregnancy Counselor and have been doing Pro-Life work for over 6 years. I would like to say that I have heard all the above reasons for choosing abortion. A HUGE part of why women choose abortion is because they are afraid and in the moment. Women are feeling so helpless when they become pregnant without planning to.
I would like to comment on "Elizabeth's " coment on getting their tubes tied. This is not the solution. We do not need to make sexual sin without consequence any easier! We need to teach women to respect themselves and to make wise and healthy choices- Most of all to make choices that will help get them to heaven with God at the end of their life. Love is the answer. We need to love women who find themselves in an unplanned pregnancy.
Sara Moran | August 28, 2009

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Elisabeth

BRAVO! Thank you.

Judie
Judie Brown | August 29, 2009

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Dear Elizabeth

First of all, welcome to Catholic charity at work. Those in need have a place to turn, the local Catholic parish, which can help those in need without the government dole. There is no effort to deceive anyone; the fact is that the foundation of charity is not a government check, it is one human being sacrificing in order to help another.

No hypocrisy, just true love in Christ.

Judie Brown
Judie Brown | September 1, 2009

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Sara

You are, of course, totally correct. I think Elizabeth is angry though I cannot discern the reasons why since her communcation is words typed on a screen. But I do know that people like her need our witness, in word and deed.

People like you change hearts, Sara. thank you!

Judie Brown
Judie Brown | September 1, 2009

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Mary Poppins’ “A Spoonful of Sugar” was such a hit with my kids when they were little because it was fun to clean up toys while singing it. The line “A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down” makes a lot of sense when children are busy with an “I don’t wanna do this” task.

But when it comes to Obamacare, I’m afraid a 10-pound bag full of sugar isn’t really going to matter. As Launcelot said in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, “Truth will out!” It always does. And in this case, despite the denials and personal attacks on upstanding Americans such as Sarah Palin, the truth is getting out, and then some.

Obamacare’s Trojan horse, known in some circles, as the “death panel” provision, is Obama’s Achilles’ heel. Even though those pesky “death panel” discussions have taken a turn, not all of us are convinced. Some Americans actually think that just because the Senate has announced that the panels are coming out of its version of Obamacare, we should all heave a sigh of relief and go on about our business. After all, folks, they would argue, don’t we all know how sincerely these men and women in the U.S. Congress care about the views of average Americans like you and me and how they are always looking out for us? Well …

For those of us who live in the real world, the news out of Washington that those panels are allegedly gone is nothing to get excited about. What the Senate took out is a reference to “advance care planning consultations.” The Senate has not removed references to the Independent Medicare Advisory Commission, nor has it finalized any piece of legislation. As we have learned over the years, what was there yesterday and appears to be gone today could come back in a different form tomorrow. It’s sort of like a chameleon; the lizard changes color to adapt to its surroundings.

But there’s a little more to this story than a Sarah Palin versus Barack Obama debate. As Palin wrote on her Facebook page, 

The Democrats promise that a government health care system will reduce the cost of health care, but as the economist Thomas Sowell has pointed out, government health care will not reduce the cost; it will simply refuse to pay the cost. And who will suffer the most when they ration care? The sick, the elderly, and the disabled, of course. The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s “death panel” so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their “level of productivity in society,” whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil.

Sowell, to whom Palin refers, is a wise man who opined, 

 An old advertising slogan said, "Progress is our most important product." With politicians, confusion is their most important product. They confuse bringing down the price of medical care with bringing down the cost. And they confuse medical care with health care.

Nothing is easier than for governments to impose price controls. They have been doing this, off and on, for thousands of years – repeatedly resulting in (1) shortages, (2) quality deterioration and (3) black markets. Why would anyone want any of those things when it comes to medical care?

And this is precisely where Palin is going with her reference to “death panels” and the vulnerable. She had and still has every reason to bring this subject to the public’s attention. For those who doubt the veracity of it, just feast your doubting eyeballs on this little tidbit, which is reported on the Compassion & Choices (formerly the Hemlock Society) web site:  

Compassion & Choices has worked tirelessly with supportive members of congress [sic] to include in proposed reform legislation a provision requiring Medicare to cover patient consultation with their doctors about end-of-life choice. (emphasis added)

 It is clear that Compassion & Choices would approve “death panels,” as well as physician-assisted suicide or any other measure that would cut costs. Why not? Its business is helping people die.
So, was it a coincidence that the day after the Family Research Council pointed this out in a Washington Update segment appropriately entitled “Political Suicide?” the Senate Finance Committee removed the “death panel” provision? Or was it a ploy? While we are grateful to Tony Perkins and his wonderful staff at FRC, we are not convinced that the Senate, or for that matter, the White House, is sincere in any promise they make to the American public on the delicate subject of health care – whether the question at hand is abortion, euthanasia or anything else having to do with respect for the dignity of the human person.

But don’t take my word for it. Just yesterday, the Washington Times published an article written by attorney Robert W. Painter, who handles medical malpractice matters and testified before the Texas legislature on that state’s Advance Directives Act of 1999. In “’Death Panels’ exist already,” Painter writes about what has occurred as a direct result of the Act becoming law. And he warns that what has happened in Texas is a harbinger of what could happen nationwide if the Obama proposal moves forward. The results in Texas have been devastating for families.

The end-of-life provisions of the Obama health care plan would upset the balance of power in health care decision-making in favor of doctors and hospitals and against individuals and families. The federal legislation provides an economic incentive for doctors and hospital administrators to use Medicare funds to start hastening certain patient deaths a bit sooner under existing state laws. In Texas, that balance already is tipped in favor of the health care providers, and the proposed federal legislation would only make matters worse by placing more Medicare dollars on that side of the scale.

Sen. Charles E. Grassley, Iowa Republican, is rightly concerned that the end-of-life provisions in the proposed federal law could be "misinterpreted and implemented incorrectly." Federal lawmakers interested in protecting individual and patient rights need to study carefully the end-of-life provisions with the understanding that the law will be implemented in health care settings governed under 50 different sets of state law.

Admittedly, the warning of "death panels" is a shocking claim. But when I inform people of the effect of the Texas law and how it has trampled on individual rights, they are understandably shocked. If the Texas Advance Directives Act has shown us anything, it is that governments should leave end-of-life decisions to patients and their families.

It occurs to me that President Obama’s rush to impose his prescription for health care reform on the nation is riddled through and through with problems. But at the core of it all, the real question is why should the federal government be regulating medical practices as a way of cutting costs? 

If the entire purpose of health care reform is to save money, we’d better be more than vigilant. A spoon full of sugar is one thing, but Conium maculatum (poison hemlock) is quite another. 

In June, Terry O’Neill was elected president of the National Organization for Women at its annual conference. A discussion about conscience clauses then took center stage. The subject came up in the context of health care workers who refuse to provide contraceptive information or services based on moral or religious grounds. 

O'Neill said, "Conscience clauses, where pharmacists refuse birth control sales because it's against their conscience, must go. Guess what? Women have a constitutional right to birth control," adding, "There is no constitutional right to be a pharmacist" (Jacobs, Indianapolis Star, 6/21).

Perhaps O’Neill’s invective sounds a bit ridiculous to you. Upon closer scrutiny, the statement appears to reflect the overriding attitude of not only NOW’s current president, but perhaps entities as far-reaching as the White House itself. It is quite possible that what was once perceived to be protected by the Constitution of this nation may not be what is actually recognized by the current political power structure. 

A situation in North Carolina, which involves a constitutional right to religious freedom, provokes my opinion on this critical matter.

The news reports are quite clear on exactly what happened at Belmont Abbey, a Catholic college in North Carolina. The college has been warned by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that if the administration doesn’t stop discriminating against female employees by denying contraceptive benefits in the college’s health coverage plan, the EEOC will take them to court!

“Contraception, abortion and voluntary sterilization came off Belmont Abbey College’s faculty health care policy in December 2007 after a faculty member discovered that coverage, according to an e-mail Belmont Abbey College President Bill Thierfelder sent to school staff, students, alumni and friends of the college,” the Gaston Gazette reported. 

In a subsequent exclusive interview with Thierfelder, LifeSiteNews.com reported that “officials at the Charlotte division of the EEOC told him that a decision to close a discrimination complaint against the school for failing to offer contraception coverage was reversed after the matter went to the nation's capital.”

Sound like a strong-arm tactic? Well, read on!

"From a religious freedom standpoint, you don't have religious freedom," he said. Thierfelder stressed, however, that the college has "gotten a lot of support from people who are not Catholic, and who may not share our beliefs on abortion, sterilization, contraception…they see the principle and what they're saying is, 'Belmont Abbey College is not trying to tell anybody what they have to do, it's just saying what Belmont Abbey College will do.' And I think that's an important distinction." 

"To try to make us change [our beliefs], there's something very wrong with that," he continued. "And I think that's why this has garnered so much attention, and especially with the health care debates that are going on right now, and with all the things that are going on with Catholic hospitals ... what they are basically saying is, if you're Catholic, or if you are of any faith, it doesn't mean anything. You're going to do what the government tells you to do."

Thierfelder acknowledged that the fight could go to the courts, and emphasized that BAC officials were united in maintaining fidelity to Catholic Church teaching against pressure from the government.

"All of us need to have moral courage in today's world," he said. "We are so resolute in our commitment to the teachings of the Catholic Church that there is no possible way we would ever deviate from it, and if it came down to it ... we would close the school rather than give in. 

"So it is absolutely, unequivocally impossible for us to go against the teachings of the Catholic Church in any way. There is no form of compromise that is possible."

American Life League applauds BAC’s courageous defense of Catholic moral teaching and proper Catholic medical ethics. We also understand what is at stake if the Obama administration presses forward with this overt act of intimidation.

It is obvious to us, when one considers O’Neill’s version of the Constitution versus that of Catholic and other Christian pharmacists, health care workers and BAC officials, that something is incredibly askew. While it may be that the Constitution of the United States has a very large number of interpretations depending on whose ox is being gored, the Constitution is not an elastic document. 

Obama has said he will respect health care workers’ rights of conscience. But look at what is happening at BAC under his administration! Obama has also said that his health care reform proposals would not force anyone into a particular situation. But look at what is being attempted here.

NOW’s O’Neill may, in a very perverted sense, have hit the nail on the head, even though a careful reading of the Constitution would deny that this is so.

For those who need a refresher course, the First Amendment of the Constitution reads as follows:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Taken at face value, this amendment should protect not only the policies in force at BAC with regard to the removal of contraceptive coverage from the employee health insurance policy, but it should also protect the rights of those who are opposed to government policies that violate their religious beliefs or otherwise impose untenable requirements on their right of conscience.

As law professor Lynn D. Wardle pointed out in congressional testimony a few years ago, “Protection for rights of conscience underlie[s] and historically preceded the First Amendment. In June, 1776, even before the Declaration of Independence, the Virginia Declaration of Rights provided, inter alia, that 'all men are equally entitled to the free exercise of religion, according to the dictates of conscience.'"

By the same token, there is no place in the Constitution where one can legitimately find a right to contraception or to aborting a child. As constitutional expert Mark Levin has written, 

In order to strike down the Connecticut law prohibiting the sale of contraceptives, Douglas wrote that “specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights have penumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help give them life and substance.”

Don’t be embarrassed if you don’t know what emanations from penumbras are. Young lawyers across America had to pull out their dictionaries when reading Griswold for the first time. A penumbra is an astronomical term describing the partial shadow in an eclipse or the edge of a sunspot — and it is another way to describe something unclear or uncertain. “Emanation” is a scientific term for gas made from radioactive decay — it also means “an emission.”

Douglas’s decision not only found a right to privacy in a penumbra of an emanation, it manipulated the facts of the case: Estelle Griswold, the executive director of the Planned Parenthood League of Connecticut, and Dr. C. Lee Buxton, the group’s medical director, gave information and prescribed birth control to a married couple. Griswold and Buxton, not the married couple, were later convicted and fined $100 each. The relationship at issue, then, was doctor-patient, not husband-wife. Yet Douglas framed his opinion around a presumed right to marital privacy. He expounded at length about the sanctity of marriage but used vague phrasing to describe the rights at issue, never explicitly stating that married couples have a right to use contraceptives. He even raised the ugly specter of sex police, though no police had intruded into anyone’s bedroom. “Would we allow the police to search the sacred precincts of marital bedrooms for telltale signs of the use of contraceptives?” This little phrase has been used as holy writ by judicial activists ever since to further expand the right to privacy in a variety of areas, including abortion and sodomy…

The Constitution does, in clear and undeniably concise language, protect freedoms that you and I and millions of Americans hold dear and, until recently, took for granted. No longer!

This is indeed a grave situation. Clearly, the politics of constitutional rights have turned the founding document of this republic on its ear. What was once wrong is now a right, and what was always legitimately part of our national heritage is now under siege.

Such contradiction forces me to make but one assumption: If you don’t play ball with the Obama administration, there could be a price to pay, especially if you are a Catholic entity with every desire to serve Christ and His Church first and foremost.

Please write or call Belmont Abbey College President Bill Thierfelder and express your support for his courageous position:

William Thierfelder, President
Belmont Abbey College
100 Belmont-Mt. Holly Rd
Belmont, NC 28012
Call toll-free: (888) 222-0110

Please write or call the EEOC and express your concern over the bully tactics being used to intimidate BAC:

Stuart Ishimaru,
Chairman, U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
131 M Street, NE
Washington, DC 20507
Phone: (202) 663-4900
TTY: (202) 663-4494
info@eeoc.gov

Please spread the word: As Americans, let us strive to protect our constitutional rights and expose the strong-arming by some in government today.

Over this past weekend a good friend, Paul Byrne, M.D., sent an interesting comment my way. He pointed out that one of the root words of palliative is pall.

I checked it in my trusty Merriam-Webster's dictionary and found the following:

2b (1): a heavy cloth draped over a coffin (2): a coffin especially when holding a body
3a: something that covers or conceals; especially: an overspreading element that produces an effect of gloom <a pall of thick black smoke> <a pall of suspicion> b: a feeling of gloom <his absence cast a pall over the celebration>

In the context of the ongoing debate regarding whether or not a form of euthanasia may appear in the final version of the nationalized health care [insurance] reform bill, this word has a connotation which cannot be ignored. It has already been shown that palliative care can be used to either relieve pain or expedite a quick exit for the patient. It all depends on who is administering the medicine and whose orders are being followed.

The Pontifical Council for Pastoral Assistance for Health Care Workers wrote the following in the seminal document, Charter for Health Care Workers, in addressing “The use of painkillers for the terminally ill” in Chapter III, 246:

Sometimes the systematic use of narcotics which reduce the consciousness of the patient is a cloak for the frequently unconscious wish of the health care worker to discontinue relating to the dying person. In this case it is not so much the alleviation of the patient's suffering that is sought as the convenience of those in attendance. The dying person is deprived of the possibility of "living his own life", by reducing him to a state of unconsciousness unworthy of a human being. This is why the administration of narcotics for the sole purpose of depriving the dying person of a conscious end is "a truly deplorable practice."

It is a different matter when there is a serious clinical case for the administration of analgesics which suppress consciousness, as when there is violent and unbearable pain. In this case the anesthetic is said to be licit, provided certain conditions are fulfilled: that the dying person has fulfilled or could still fulfill his moral, family and religious obligations.
 

In other words, the very same medication that can bring relief can also be used to kill. It’s not that difficult to comprehend. This is but one reason to be concerned that current discussions relating to Obamacare could lead to some pretty unfathomable horrors.

All anyone has to do is pay close attention to the discussions regarding end-of-life care. It is not beyond the pale to imagine that in one form or another, euthanizing the older generation may become one of those cost-cutting activities that cannot be avoided.

Consider the recent comments of author-screenwriter Richard Dooling, who is clearly no health care expert. Be that as it may, he weighed in with these acrid words in a New York Times commentary: 

One thing’s for sure: Our health care system has failed. Generational spending wars loom on the horizon. Rationing of health care is imminent.

I am not, of course, talking about euthanasia. I’m just wondering why the nation continues incurring enormous debt to pay for bypass surgery and titanium-knee replacements for octogenarians and nonagenarians, when for just a small fraction of those costs we could provide children with preventive health care and nutrition. Eight million children have no health insurance, but their parents pay 3 percent of their salaries to Medicare to make sure that seniors get the very best money can buy in prescription drugs for everything from restless leg syndrome to erectile dysfunction, scooters and end-of-life intensive care.
 

Then there’s Ross Douthat, who wrote about the enormity of the "burden" created by overspending Medicare dollars:

And if you think reform is tough today, just wait. We’re already practically a gerontocracy: Americans over 50 cast over 40 percent of the votes in the 2008 elections, and half the votes in the ’06 midterms. As the population ages — by 2030, there will be more Americans over 65 than under 18 — the power of the elderly and nearly elderly may become almost absolute.

In this future, somebody will need to stand for the principle that Medicare can’t pay every bill and bless every procedure. Somebody will need to defend the younger generation’s promise (and its pocketbooks). Somebody will need to say “no” to retirees.

Both of these writers did not mention other citizens whose care can be very costly. For example, the extremely premature baby who is born with specific problems caused by early birth, or the newborn with critical problems requiring special attention, or the individual who suffers a severe disability due to accident or genetic anomaly. In each of these cases, large sums of money are required to treat them. What about their future under regulated health care spending? Based on the sensitivities being expressed toward spending too much on certain types of treatment, it isn’t difficult to imagine that those I have just mentioned could also be required to make sacrifices for the greater good of a culture committed to financial savings over life saving.

It’s all about “quality of life” after all, and some people are, well, expendable!

When Obama spoke to a gathering of 50+ Americans at an AARP gathering, he recommended that they consider his suggested reforms to the Medicare program as fiscally responsible and necessary in today’s economy. Among Obama’s preferences is the Independent Medicare Advisory Committee. IMAC has been defined as a group of individuals who would oversee how Medicare is administered and would recommend ways to make it more efficient. Some have suggested that such a committee could recommend health care rationing based on cost cutting. Washington Post political commentator David Broder wrote, 

Obama's proposal almost certainly would accelerate change in the way health care is delivered -- and it might actually save money in the long run.

But Congress will have to decide if it is willing to yield that degree of control to five unelected IMAC commissioners. And Americans will have to decide if they are comfortable having those commissioners determine how they will be treated when they are ill.

Without belaboring this point, it is wise and prudent to step back and examine the ramifications of any proposal in view of the groups of citizens for whom the proposal could have life-altering effects. For as Mark Steyn wrote recently,

The problem with government health systems is not that they pull the plug on Grandma. It's that Grandma has a hell of a time getting plugged in in the first place.…This ought to be of particular concern to Americans. As is often pointed out, U.S. life expectancy (78.06 years) lags behind other developed nations with government health care (United Kingdom 78.7, Germany 78.95, Sweden 80.63). So proponents of Obamacare are all but offering an extra "full year" of Euro-Canadian geriatric leisure as a signing bonus.

While some might think that Steyn is flippant about the problem that is confronting our nation, I would counter by suggesting that at least Steyn is talking about it! It is a provocative subject, and the more that is said about it, the better. There is still time, at this point, to stop such madness, but first the electorate has to realize that the White House smoke-and-mirrors show has another agenda, and it’s not a pretty one.

Leave it to Pat Boone, a dear friend and outspoken critic of Obamacare, to set the tone. He explains it is not just the "radicals" who are beginning to tell the truth about Obamacare:

•    Congress plans to pay for this "reform" by cutting $500 billion from Medicare. –Washington Post (July 16)
•    There will be long waits for care. –USA Today (July 17)
•    There will be cuts to MRIs, CAT scans and other vital tests. –Associated Press (June 24)
•    Seniors will lose their choice of doctors. –New York Times (April 2)
•    Government bureaucrats – not doctors – will decide if older patients are worth the costs of care. –Los Angeles Times (June 25)

Friends, these are not "right-wing" talk-show hosts holding the president's feet to the fire – these are some of the most liberal media outlets in the country! Even they are realizing that this bloated, misleading and outrageous scheme will set the stage, in actual practice and predictable bureaucratic perversion, for Orwellian governmental control over who gets care and what kind. They factually have to report that it's IMPOSSIBLE to cut Medicare by $500 billion and still provide for the 40 million more baby boomers who are coming into eligibility! The president's analysts say they can – but ordinary citizens know it's IMPOSSIBLE.

Obamacare is having the expected effect on the general population. The pall has been placed over the truth, and the unsuspecting will go forth believing that Obama is providing them hope and change! 

Pallbearers will soon be the next change agents unless we stop this current rush to reform, bury it and start over.

This guest commentary was published on the Lead Us Not into Temptation blog site on August 3, 2009 and is used with its kind permission.

By Carol McKinley

It’s been a tough few weeks for President Obama. The urban legends he has told to garner support for the march towards socialism are finally losing their traction.

You could hear the sound of screeching brakes all over America at the collision between an elite Harvard professor and a president making a racial incident out of a police officer’s response to a 911 call – and the government takeover of health care. America is coming out of the trance.

As a warrior in the trenches, I couldn’t count the number of times prayer mercenaries have transformed a blunder into a period of grace. Catholics had better take full advantage of the reprieve. We have a lot to lose in the ethical conundrums of rationing treatment and mercy in a government-controlled HMO.

The mission of providing ethical, compassionate, quality health care to the sick and poor is about to be “reformed” into setting criteria that determine the value of the patient’s life measured against the cost of treating their illness.

The Church’s teachings

Denying medical care to the poor, elderly and catastrophically ill to benefit the government is diametrically opposed to Catholic ethics and the Catholic animus. Pope Benedict XVI expounded on “[t]he inalienable right to life of every innocent human individual” as a “constitutive element of a civil society and its legislation” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, Section 2273, emphasis in original) in his recently published encyclical, Caritas in Veritate:

Openness to life is at the centre of true development. When a society moves towards the denial or suppression of life, it ends up no longer finding the necessary motivation and energy to strive for man’s true good… (Section 28, emphasis in original)

In order to protect nature, it is not enough to intervene with economic incentives or deterrents; not even an apposite education is sufficient. These are important steps, but the decisive issue is the overall moral tenor of society. If there is a lack of respect for the right to life and to a natural death, if human conception, gestation and birth are made artificial, if human embryos are sacrificed to research, the conscience of society ends up losing the concept of human ecology… (Section 51, emphasis in original)

To the tragic and widespread scourge of abortion we may well have to add in the future – indeed it is already surreptitiously present – the systematic eugenic programming of births. At the other end of the spectrum, a pro-euthanasia mindset is making inroads as an equally damaging assertion of control over life that under certain circumstances is deemed no longer worth living. Underlying these scenarios are cultural viewpoints that deny human dignity. These practices in turn foster a materialistic and mechanistic understanding of human life. Who could measure the negative effects of this kind of mentality for development?... While the poor of the world continue knocking on the doors of the rich, the world of affluence runs the risk of no longer hearing those knocks, on account of a conscience that can no longer distinguish what is human. (Section 75)

Obama projects that giving access to our health care system to 50 million more people will cost Americans less money than it does now. In fact, at the breaking point, Obama claims his health care program will start paying for itself. Like his projections about the economy, writing off the debt of irresponsible people who caused the mortgage crisis, cash for clunkers and “racial profiling,” Obama is, once again, way off the mark.

You don’t have to be a mathematician to figure out that giving access to 50 million more people in an already burdened health care system and spending less means the patients currently in the system will be sacrificing their present level of care and services. There have been negative impacts on health care access, cancer survival rates, and the quality of life for the elderly, learning disabled and sick in every country where there has been a government takeover of health care. Obama can’t escape the laws of supply and demand. Supporting laws destined to place life-threatening hardships upon the disadvantaged and suffering is fundamentally immoral.

We’ve got to digest the threats to the sanctity of life and Catholic conscience protections, educate grassroots Catholics and make a lot of noise in the public square in the next several weeks. We’re going to see Obama infomercials pushing overhaul in the mainstream media in the month of August, ad nauseam. The theologically fallacious Catholics United is firing salvos. Catholic Charities USA, the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul and the Catholic Health Association are banding together to advance the taxpayer-funded abortions and euthanasia assistance crafted into the legislation.

Stand up and fight.

The threat to the elderly

Reading the proposals, there is no doubt that seniors would pay a heavy price. The White House has proposed the creation of an independent panel to recommend Medicare and Medicaid cuts. Seniors would not only be losing benefits. From all indications, it appears that they would be losing control over life-and-death decisions and care. This is inhumane.

Last week, EWTN’s Raymond Arroyo put up a must-read post on his blog, raising the same concerns many have over disturbing references in the bill:

The elderly or people with catastrophic diseases are clearly in the sights of the administration and the congressional leadership for the simple reason that they cost too much. A quarter of all Medicare payments occur in the last year of life, costing the government more than 100 billion dollars a year, according to Forbes Magazine.

“One troubling provision of the House bill compels seniors to submit to a counseling session every five years (and more often if they become sick or go into a nursing home) about alternatives for end-of-life care (House bill, p. 425-430). The sessions cover highly sensitive matters such as whether to receive antibiotics and ‘the use of artificially administered nutrition and hydration.’ This mandate invites abuse, and seniors could easily be pushed to refuse care.” [interview with Betsy McCaughey, patient advocate and former lieutenant governor of New York]

This “Advance Care Planning Consultation” would encourage all of us, but especially those with severe illnesses to submit to hospices rather than pursue expensive therapies that might extend life (and cost a bundle). The bill also establishes a tracking system to insure that doctors are advocating “advance care directives” where you predetermine what type of care you would accept or refuse at the end of life. The problem with all of this is it assigns a utilitarian value to human life. If you are too old or disabled, there will be a built-in incentive to push you into hospice and palliative care rather than work to beat the disease.

This isn’t hype and hysteria from the fringe. Calm, credible people reading the bills are drawing these same conclusions across the board. Arm yourself with citations from the bill, go to senior centers in your hometown and educate them about the contents of the “reforms.” The mainstream media is not going to publish the truth, but there is nothing holding us back from doing a little “community organizing” of our own.

‘By their fruits, you will know them’

Seniors and, in fact, most people in this country, are unaware that Obama recently appointed a science czar (John Holdren) who co-authored a book entitled Ecoscience: Population, Resources, Environment. Among Holdren's philosophies are the following: 

• Women could be forced to abort their pregnancies, whether they wanted to or not;
• The population at large could be sterilized by infertility drugs intentionally put into the nation’s drinking water or in food;
• Single mothers and teen mothers should have their babies seized from them against their will and given away to other couples to raise;
• People who “contribute to social deterioration” (i.e. undesirables) “can be required by law to exercise reproductive responsibility.”

This correlates with Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s recent, breathtaking admission that Roe was to rid us of undesirables, i.e. “growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of.”

The president has surrounded himself with radical pro-abortionists, including Secretary of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who will have a heavy hand of influence in shaping and executing policies. Catholics, other Christians and other decent people can’t ignore the dangers of giving such people power over life, death and health. Educate your priests and those in your parish. With enlightenment on Obama’s trajectory, the health care bill will take on a new patina.

The Massachusetts experience

Catholics should be outraged that the poor are being used and exploited by the White House to swindle them out of benefits and life itself. Catholics United, Catholic Charities and other social pirates who are propagating the myth that this type of health care “reform” is about service to the poor should be vigorously castigated. The poor already have health coverage in combined federal- and state- subsidized programs. (For example, in Massachusetts, there is MassHealth – Medicaid and SCHIP.)

In Massachusetts, where health care “reform” was instituted in 2007, benefits have been siphoned off from the indigent and transferred to households earning $77,400 for a family of five. For a family of eight, the household income can be up to $111,080. But families earning $30,000, previously eligible for free health care, are burdened with premiums and co-payments costing nearly $10,000 for the least expensive plan.

In fact, in early July, Boston Medical Center (formerly known as Boston City Hospital, serving the poorest of the poor in Boston) filed a lawsuit against the Commonwealth of Massachusetts:

The suit says the hospital will lose more than $100 million next year because the state has lowered Medicaid reimbursement rates and stopped paying Boston Medical “reasonable costs” for treating other poor patients.

“We filed this suit more in sorrow than in anger,” said Elaine Ullian, the hospital’s chief executive. “We believe in health care reform to the bottom of our toes, but it was never, ever supposed to be financed on the backs of the poor, and that’s what has happened in Massachusetts.”

The central charge in the suit is that the state has siphoned money away from Boston Medical to help pay the considerable cost of insuring all but a small percentage of residents…

According to the suit, Massachusetts is now reimbursing Boston Medical only 64 cents for every dollar it spends treating the poor. About 10 percent of the hospital’s patients are uninsured – down from about 20 percent before the law’s passage in 2006. But many more are on Medicaid or Commonwealth Care, the state-subsidized insurance program for low-income residents.

Astoundingly, with all the rancor and rhetoric from Democrats about the compassionate immigration policies absent in the Republican agenda, when the cost of operating “health care reform” produced an ever-growing deficit, 30,000 legal immigrants were the first people thrown under the bus by the Democrat-controlled Massachusetts legislature: 30,000 of them received letters of health care termination.

The cost of providing health care to the 30,000 immigrants is approximately $130 million a year. A vote on July 29 restored $40 million of the budget, leaving uncertainty about the effect of eliminating $90 million in coverage for permanent residents who have had green cards for less than five years.

Karl Rove, President George W. Bush’s former senior adviser, provided an informed analysis of the siphoning off of funds from the poor:

Mr. Obama’s problem is that nine out of 10 Americans would likely get worse health care if ObamaCare goes through. Of those who do not have insurance – and who therefore might be better off – approximately one-fifth are illegal aliens, nearly three-fifths make $50,000 or more a year and can afford insurance, and just under a third are probably eligible for Medicaid or other government programs already.

For the slice of the uninsured that is left – perhaps about 2% of all American citizens –Team Obama would dismantle the world’s greatest health-care system.

Don’t wait for clerical leadership

There are valuable lessons to be learned from the Catholic trenches in Boston in terms of what lies ahead nationally. In late February of this year, the Caritas Christi health care delivery network sought and was awarded a contract that includes providing abortions, family planning services and other moral evils to the uncatechized, the unsuspecting poor and women emotionally distraught due to an unplanned pregnancy.

With the advice and public consent of Boston’s Cardinal Sean O’Malley, Caritas gave the Commonwealth written assurances that Catholic medical staff would inform women of health care options, including abortions. They appointed NARAL members to serve as advisors and agreed to give them access to monitor Catholic health care workers to ensure compliance.

Caritas set up a corporation, sought out and signed contracts with abortionists, set up a 24-hour family planning/abortion hotline number and hired employees to direct women to the abortionists with whom it contracted and took a 49-percent interest in the operation. A handful of Catholics relentlessly exposed the arrangement and, with some assistance from American Life League, we were able to get Cardinal O'Malley to retreat from ownership in the operation. However, the arrangement marched forward with all the abortion contracts, the 24-hour hotline, written assurances and NARAL oversight of Caritas employees intact.

It should be noted that Cardinal O’Malley tried to generate support for the arrangement by purporting that Catholic theology permitted entering into a contract that binds a Catholic in the performance of moral evils; in effect, he claimed that even though we realize the sinful nature of performing those moral evils, so long as we recruit others to perform the evils, it does not violate Catholic ethics. Theologically, spiritually and ethically, nothing could be more unsound. Knowing something is wrong and sinful, and then baiting somebody else into doing it who doesn’t know, compounds the sin. The Caritas arrangement is as ethical as hiring Kevorkian to kill your elderly parents when they become a personal and financial burden.

The cardinal outsourced his conscience to the National Catholic Bioethics Center, which reportedly gave him a formal opinion stating the current arrangement is ethically sound. Repeated requests to the cardinal to release the opinion of the NCBC have been rebuffed.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church is clear about those who give scandal by becoming their “neighbor’s tempter” (Sections 2284–2287). Leading others to do evil “takes on a particular gravity” for those in authority who cause it:

Anyone who uses the power at his disposal in such a way that it leads others to do wrong becomes guilty of scandal and responsible for the evil that he has directly or indirectly encouraged. “Temptations to sin are sure to come; but woe to him by whom they come!” (Section 2287)

The fight for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness for the next generation of Catholics is in the hands of lay leaders. Every one of us must raise our voices in the public square.

Carol McKinley is a pro-life activist, a paralegal working in the affordable housing industry and the creator of the Lead Us Not into Temptation blog site. Her activism was inspired by a desire to preserve her three children’s faith from the influence of Planned Parenthood’s ever-growing sexual promiscuity and abortion agenda in both public and Catholic academia. She resides in the challenging city of Boston.

This guest commentary was originally published by www.StumpReport.com and is used with its kind permission.

By Phil Kammer

I have always believed that our Creator has made His laws and precepts clear for all of His creation. So this thought came to mind one day …
 
A young woman finds herself living the typical college life: excited about her life to come and fearful of things that can go wrong. In school, she unexpectedly finds the man of her dreams and, although much in love, is panicked and fearful when she finds herself with child. She consults one of the many “family planning” businesses, and its advice seems reasonable: Protect your college education; protect your future: Have an abortion.
 
The young woman pauses and again her “family planning” counselor says, “It’s in your best interest; it’s merely a fetus and of no consequence.” As she ponders such assurances from a counselor who seems so caring, a date is set. And then the “procedure” is performed.
 
Years have now passed, guilt has faded and love has blossomed. The woman now finds herself in the deepest of love with the man of her dreams. They have a beautiful wedding with everyone there, their careers couldn’t be better and their life is grand. A great surprise has come to the newly married couple: They have now conceived a child. The young married couple could never have guessed what joy there would be in planning for a first child. A room is chosen and furnished with love. An ultrasound suggests a blue room, and joy is the order of the day.

One day, the couple decides that a slow walk in the park would be nice. But a thief lurks there in the shadows, waiting to carry out a robbery. Under a shady elm tree, he strikes. At gunpoint, he shouts, “Give me your money!” They pause; he becomes angry. Her young husband is heroic at heart, but is thrown to the ground. His young bride, still standing, bears the brunt of the thief’s anger as a single, surreal “pop” sounds under the elm tree. The young bride stands there, desperately clutching her stomach …
 
I end this short story here because here is where humanity takes control of the abortion debate. In life, a person chooses to be honest or not. They choose to follow the natural law – or not.

Are you an honest person?

When the young woman was in college, she was told that what was growing inside of her was just a piece of flesh – a fetus of no consequence.
 
When she was struck by the thief’s bullet, did she cry out, “My fetus, my fetus!” or “My baby, my baby!”?
 
Our Creator has endowed us with certain undeniable attributes, chief of which is that the truth is written in every human heart.

The vast majority of women will immediately respond that this woman cried out, “My baby, my baby!” Due to political conditioning, some will hesitate to answer this question. However, the truth remains: Our God-given nature tells all of us that what grows within a woman, regardless of her economic, social or political condition, is simply a baby.
 
I have not told this tale to play a trick, but rather to shed light on the use of the word “fetus” and how callously it is used by abortion profiteers. Many have written in defense of abortion. Most of these writings are lengthy and complicated – as intended.

Remember: The truth is simple.

Phil Kammer is an independent freelance writer, public speaker, and avid proponent of the U.S. Constitution and life’s simple truths. He earned a degree in public policy from California State University and an M.B.A. from Pepperdine University. He is also the creator and owner of www.StumpReport.com, a conservative web site dedicated to simple truths in American politics.

Responses

Thank you Judie for posting Phil Kammer's column "My Baby". I have sent this to as many people I can think of & Mr. Kammer's message really gives one something to think about. I abhor abortion & am reassured only by knowing that God will stop this barbarism at his chosen time & that those whose lives were taken by abortion will have their say in the matter on the day of the Judgement. Thank you again & may God bless you always!
Yours In Christ,
Kenneth E. MacAlister Jr.
Langhorne, Pennsylvania
Kenneth E. MacAlister Jr. | August 15, 2009

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I agree. The truth is simple. The truth will set us free (from sin). Jesus is the Truth. In His Will is our Peace.

I watched you on EWTN with Raymond Arroyo. Thank you for defending life. You were kind and respectful. You spoke the Truth and in a no-nonsense, clearly non-negotiable, and factual way.

As the above story illustrates, the truth is simple; a lie requires a bunch of baloney. Unfortuantely, only those who love the truth, will hear the Truth.

Thank you for all that you do in the defense of life. May God bless you and keep you safe.

Julie
Julianna Konkol | August 16, 2009

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This is very beautiful, and yet so true. We only call it a "fetus" when its "unwanted" we never call it a fetus or an embryo when we are glad we're pregnant! Thats sad!
elisabeth | August 16, 2009

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This article was published in the August 9-22, 2009 issue of the National Catholic Register and is presented as a guest commentary, with the Register’s kind permission.

By Robin Rohr

As the pro-life movement fights to keep abortion out of the health-care reform bill, an undercover attack on the elderly may be taking place unnoticed.

At issue is a provision that calls for end-of-life counseling of senior citizens every five years. That counseling can include topics such as how to decline nutrition and hydration, antibiotics and basic care treatments for specific conditions such as flu or pneumonia, and how to choose palliative and hospice care for the terminally ill.

“I’ve read about a third of HR 3200 and the counseling parts are designed to encourage euthanasia,” claimed Dr. Katherine Schlaerth, an associate professor of family medicine at Loma Linda University School of Medicine. “Seniors will be counseled every five years, and more often if they get sicker.”

Schlaerth, who emphasized that she does not speak for Loma Linda University, said that a frail, elderly, ill and depressed patient or that patient’s family “may easily agree to withhold antibiotics or fluid without realizing the full implication.”

“Patients who have a worsening of their chronic condition, but who may not even be pre-terminal, are included in this strong-arm counseling, and their respect for authority figures could pave the way for agreement with cessation of care not in their interest at all,” Schlaerth said. “Health-care providers, meanwhile, may be forced to give counseling directly opposed to their religious or moral beliefs.”

Key lawmakers are in agreement with Schlaerth. “Section 1233 encourages health-care providers to provide their Medicare patients with counseling on ‘the use of artificially administered nutrition and hydration’ and other end-of-life treatments and may place seniors in situations where they feel pressure to sign an end-of-life directive they would not otherwise sign,” said the House Republican leader, John Boehner, R-Ohio, and the Republican Policy Committee chairman, Thaddeus McCotter, R-Mich., in a July 23 statement. “This provision may start us down a treacherous path toward government-encouraged euthanasia.”

Death as Cost Savings
At first glance, the counseling of elders for care options seems like an innocuous requirement. But Schlaerth says the purpose of the counseling has darker roots.

“The real reason for these draconian provisions directed against elders who are not terminal, I believe, is to save on Social Security payments as well as Medicare payments,” Schlaerth said. “The math is obvious. If you kill the disabled and give ‘quality preventive care’ to the well, your health-care statistics will look excellent.”

Bill May, chairman of Catholics for the Common Good, also views the mandatory counseling sessions as an outrageous cover to introduce assisted suicide.

“We need to pay attention to issues related to shortening the lives and hastening death for the elderly, infirm and disabled – another way of getting rid of undesirable, non-useful and costly people,” he said. “This bill creates a platform for assisted suicide for the elderly, infirm and disabled at times they are most vulnerable, depressed and open to suggestions of ending their lives early. Compassion & Choices, the former Hemlock Society, wants to get into the end-of-life counseling business, and it looks like the health-care bill will open the door for them to become government contractors as purveyors of the culture of death.”

The legislative language of the bill regarding counseling is vague and open to interpretation. “I’m a lawyer, and I find this language incomprehensible,” stated Wesley J. Smith, associate director of the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide. “I believe it is done maliciously. What is clear is that seniors will receive counseling – read ‘re-education’– every five years or whenever their health status changes. The point is to reduce cost. While the language doesn’t require it, these mandatory sessions will often be directed towards not wanting care, in much the same way that genetic counseling of a mother carrying a Down [syndrome] fetus often is directed toward abortion.”

Smith said patients could be referred to organizations like the assisted suicide advocacy group Compassion & Choices to help sort out their choices. “In practice, if not in law, ‘counseling’ will usually be a one-way street,” he said.

Compassion & Choices is an organization that describes itself as working to improve care and expand choice at the end of life. “Wesley J. Smith says the bill is ‘incomprehensible,’ which may explain why he repeatedly misstates what the bill does,” said Steve Hopcraft, a spokesman for Compassion & Choices. “It’s a myth that C&C or any organization [would] be the counselor. The bill specifically says M.D. or nurse practitioner.”

Section 1233 does state the consultation will be performed by a medical provider; however, included in the topics to be discussed is direction to provide “suggested people to talk to” and “a list of national and state-specific resources.”

Rationed Care
Concerns about Obama’s health-care reform adversely affecting older Americans are not new. Earlier this year, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (the “Stimulus Bill”) appropriated $1.1 billion for research into “comparative effectiveness,” which compares clinical effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of medical treatments, procedures and strategies. One aspect of this comparison is a concept called “Quality Adjusted Life Years,” where the value assigned to life varies with the health state of the person. This method is controversial because it means that some people will not receive treatment if the calculated cost is not warranted by the benefit to their quality of life.

Burke Balch, director of the Robert Powell Center for Medical Ethics at the National Right to Life Committee, explained that a person’s Quality of Adjusted Life Years determines if a procedure is allowed. “Of significant concern is the phrase ‘comparative effectiveness,’” he said. “This becomes [how] you end up discriminating against a disability. The language in the health-care bills being considered by the House and reported out of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee can be used for wide-open interpretation of cost-effectiveness leading to denial of treatment based on quality of life. The funding for the promises made in these bills cannot be sustained, and that will create the atmosphere for rationing.”

May agrees and says that health-care rationing takes place in Oregon, one of two states where physician-assisted suicide is legal. People fighting life-threatening illnesses there regularly receive letters saying that the state insurance plan would not cover their medication but would pay for a lethal prescription to end their lives, he said.

Boehner and McCotter also warn that with Oregon and Washington having legalized assisted suicide, “Section 1233 could create a slippery slope for a more permissive environment for euthanasia, mercy killing and physician-assisted suicide because it does not clearly exclude counseling about the supposed benefits of killing oneself.”

Robin Rohr is a National Catholic Register correspondent and writes from Willits, California.

Responses

Its sad that its always about money! Now life is less important then a couple bucks. No one should be able to tell someone when to die, just because they are ill! Its disgusting
elisabeth | August 14, 2009

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