>Marta, I'm a Jewish person, and so keenly aware of the
>useful of the Nazi analogies to justify policies
>abhorrent to the left. I agree with Dwayne, who said
>that dragging in the Nazis is sign that the discussion
>has broken down. It sort of works like electromagnetic
>pulse, blowing out the circuits of all rational
>thought and discussion. There is no way it cannot be
>read as accusing your interlocutors of being complicit
>in genocide. Please avoid it unless you mean to do
>that.
I think that is over-reading my intent. I did not feel that I called anyone on this list a Nazi and I did not liken anyone to Kevorkian. I felt that I was illustrating a part of our history as disabled people. Sorry if I offended, it was not intended.
>
>I think it is probably fair to say that the number of
>people in America who would advocate or tolerate the
>extermination of the disabled is almost nil. There is
>no danger of a holocaust against Jews or disabled
>people. Put the Nazis back in the jar.
No not a holocaust in the way you are thinking of it. The state is looking for a way to get out from under a ballooning health care crisis. Will you please read Wesley Smith's book "Forced Exit" before making a fair judgement?
Dick Lamm, former gov. of Colorado said not too long ago that old people have a duty to die and get out of the way. Others echo his sentiment in their approach to running institutions that hold life or death over peoples's heads simply because they are patients. Alot is done behind the scenes.
>
>You assume that Schiavo is a disbled person when the
>evidence is that she is not a person at all any more
>-- I don't knwo this evidence in detail, but she has
>been examined by scores of Drs over 15 years, not all
>of whom are junior Megeles intent on exterminating the
>unfit. From what I understand their opinion is
>virtually unanimous.
We will have to agree to disagree on this. I agree with Ralph Nader and Wesley Smith. From Doug's post: Ralph Nader, in a news release, calls on the courts to save Schiavo's life. He and Wesley J. Smith wrote: "Benefits of doubts should be given to life, not hastened death. This case is rife with doubt. Justice demands that Terri be permitted to live."
>
>Likewise it is ludicrous to say that Schiavo has been
>put in a position where she has no rights. How many
>courts have heard this case over how long? How many
>legislative and executive bodies have attempted to
step in in her behalf?
I heard plenty of complaints about the courts when Bush pulled a fast one on Gore so we can have dissent on what the courts do, can we not? Judges do not like to over rule other judges just like doctors do not like to step onto other doctors turf.
>
>I don't think I am the only person who thinks -- at
>least now -- that facing the sort of thing my father
>went through, I would prefer to die without agaony and
>degradation through medical intervention -- an OD of
>morphine, say.
Then I suggest that you die at home with a morphine drip because the minute you enter the hospital you are under the rules of the state.
>
>Sorry to be blunt about this, but I've been facing a
>lot of mortality up close lately.
>
>jks
I too just went through the death of a parent. She had a living Will and I was next of kin making decisions for her because she wass unconscious. I did my best to honor her wishes.
marta --