I guess I don't see a practical difference. If you withdraw needed life support, I die. Arguing that you didn't cause my death seems inaccurate.

If I'm permanently incapacitated, I don't much care if my wife decides to let me die by starvation or with morphine; whatever decision makes sense to her. But it's *her* decision, not the doctor's, or the state's, or Force's.

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Man up.

Take the case in another thread of the little girl who appears to be recovering (somewhat) from a vegetative state. Imagine if the DSS had attempted to get a court order for a barbiturate overdose rather than simply removing her breathing and feeding tubes. I amazed that you don't see the difference. Terri Schiavo died a natural death, IMO. You may argue that in her case, with her death being inevitably within mere days, a morphine overdose would have lessened her family's agony. You cannot argue that a morphine overdose would have been a natural death.

IMO, assisted suicide is only for very clear cases in which the victim wishes to avoid a prolonged (but inevitable) death. A person may wish to do this not only to avoid their own suffering but also that of their family.

This law apparently requires two doctors to agree. I'm not sure about this being enough of a safeguard. My husband's mother died a few years ago of brain cancer (in Oregon, oddly enough). She needed a prognosis of 6 months in order to sign up for hospice. Though there was not much change in her condition, she was taken on and off hospice 3 times in the last 6 months of her life. She ultimately died 8 days after being removed from hospice. She was not asking to die, I'm just making the point that doctors are fallible.

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Do you know what it's like to fall in the mud and get kicked... in the head... with an iron boot? Of course you don't, no one does. It never happens. It's a dumb question... skip it.

By the way, if I were married and my wife made a living will, I would honor it even if the law did not require me to do so. That would be between her and God. I can't imagine being a doctor who profited from such tragedies, however.

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"I am a Tory Anarchist. I should like every one to go about doing just as he pleased- short of altering any of the things to which I have grown accustomed." (Max Beerbohm)

I think this pretty much sums it up for me:


"My thinking tends to be libertarian. That is, I oppose intrusions of the state into the private realm - as in abortion, sodomy, prostitution, pornography, drug use, or suicide, all of which I would strongly defend as matters of free choice in a representative democracy." - Camille Paglia

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WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

Again, I think care decisions such as this belong with the patient or, if the patient is incapacitated, with the family. I don't think it matters *what* the issue under discussion is. The patient or their family decides. Anything else is just unnecessarily intrusive.

I won't argue if you want to make a distinction between "natural" death and hastening death with morphine. But like I said, I don't really see a practical difference. If I was kidnapped and the kidnapper let me starve to death, he'd still be charged with murder. Semantics aside, someone is choosing to let you die.

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Man up.

I'm with you on these except for one, the bold one. The person who is most affected by it didn't get to make any choices. In the other cases, they did.

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Society is produced by our wants and government by our wickedness ~Thomas Paine