DROP DEAD
by George Neumayr

The party of abortion and euthanasia says that the absence of meaningful mental activity justifies starving and dehydrating a human being to death -- a criterion for killing that should give Democrats not known for their lucidity considerable pause. Not much meaningful mental activity is coursing
through a party that considers it prudent to weep for tortured terrorists at Abu Ghraib while approving the torture of starvation for the disabled back home.

Were Terri Schiavo a dog or a terrorist, she would have received a more vigorous defense from Democrats on Sunday night. Even vegetation in Florida's wetlands inspires more concern from Democrats than a human being dismissed as "being in a vegetative state."......

The Democrats had faked up an interest in federalism for almost three hours, then Steny Hoyer stands up and exposes it all as a sham by saying, "If I thought that Florida courts had dealt with this in a careless or superficial way, I might think we should intervene." In other words: we agree with the judicial activists in Florida who overturned the people of Florida's law protecting Schiavo, so we won't
meddle this time......

Just as the Democrats speak of "human rights" while basing their platform on the human rights abuse of abortion, so they speak of the value of the disabled while putting pressure on the disabled to die. Woe to the old and disabled under a Democratic ethos of "meaningful life." The Democrats will pal around with the disabled at Special Olympics events, but whenever it comes down to crunch time they
support a culture which essentially says that the inconveniently disabled should commit suicide or be killed. Contempt for the disabled is even seen in the Democrats' choice of political put-downs: Dr. Howard Dean, sounding ready to cut off food and water to Republicans, calls them "brain dead" - and recall Al Gore calling Republicans "extrachromosome" freaks.

So much of what the Democrats call progress is just paganism, not progress into a more civilized future but regression into the barbarism of the past in which the first people to be mistreated were the enfeebled. The Democrats' "right to die" is a euphemism for a duty to die. Like the pagans of old, the Democrats tell those deemed useless or inconvenient: Do everybody a favor and fall on your sword or float off on an iceberg.

What they call "compassion" is jaw-dropping crassness toward the most helpless humans. The self-described party of the "little guy" is his greatest enemy, aborting him at the beginning of life or dehydrating him to death at the end of life, all the while insisting that it is for his "own good."

Think of all the phony rights the Democrats will devise at the drop of a hat, yet they won't lift a finger to protect the most obvious and real right, the right to life that belongs to man by virtue of his human nature (not by virtue of his "meaningful activity"), and without which all other rights lose meaning and occasion for government protection.

Who is safe under a government that assigns to itself the power to determine whose life is meaningful enough to be protected? The Democrats' logic for both abortion and euthanasia can be used to kill anyone. Why don't the American people trust us with power? the Democrats wonder. The answer is, look at your political philosophy: it is utterly corrupt, placing government not on the side of protecting innocent life but taking life, colluding with run-amok judges to separate citizens from their most basic rights.

Whatever humanist glow the word "mercy" projected from the mouths of Democrats has vanished with the inhumane practices they routinely rationalize. Once the party of the weak, it has become the party of the selfish who can snuff out the lives of unborn children and disabled women simply because they are stronger.

George Neumayr is executive editor of The American Spectator.

 

AUSTRALIAN ARCHBISHOP WARNS ON EUTHANASIA BILL
Even if some people are in favour of euthanasia, that still does not make it right, said Archbishop Adrian Doyle of Hobart and Tasmania. “As a society, we must be respectful of the sacred nature of human life and having this mistaken sense of compassion isn’t certainly respectful of human dignity,”
he explained.

Concerns have been raised in Tasmania about the Green Party’s influence on the state government’s policy on euthanasia. What is supposedly a private member’s bill on the issue has been raised in the Attorney-General’s Budget reply speech—giving the appearance of government approval for legalising euthanasia. Greens leader Nick McKim’s ‘Dying with Dignity Bill’ was resoundingly defeated in the Lower House last November.

“I am concerned by the fact that despite being rejected less than a year ago by the Parliament of Tasmania, the Attorney-General (Lara Giddings) has chosen to raise this issue again in conjunction with Mr McKim,” said Archbishop Doyle. “There are many consequences for all Tasmanians, especially those working in health and aged care, with the previous Private Member’s Bill failing to adequately address these wider concerns. It is concerning that there is a perception in our community which claims that euthanasia is a dignified death, promoting the premise that any other avenue of death is “undignified” and euthanasia (or medical assisted suicide) as the only method of a dignified death.

“I am equally concerned that the Attorney General will use the resources of her office to push this Bill when there are so many more issues which are a higher priority, such as mental health, welfare, hospital and housing waiting lists and education.”