Sometimes Christians say that allowing abortion and euthanasia for the terminally ill will lead to a further erosion of the sanctity of life and horrific treatment of the most vulnerable members of society. If we cannot view life as sacred for the very young and very sick, how can we have any life-based morality at all?
These Christians are told that they are using a “slippery slope” argument, and they are further told that this is a fallacy and a symptom of Christian paranoia.
And now we learn that Oregon’s supposedly humane doctor-assisted suicide law has been used as a cheap alternative to actual treatment. When a state-run health plan (or any health plan for that manner) is offering to pay for the killing of someone to avoid paying for regular treatment, I think it’s a pretty safe indication that something’s gone horribly wrong in our culture. And that abandoning the sanctity of life leads toward moral breakdown of society.
PS: Guess what news agency investigated the story? If you guessed FOX, you win ten Mitchell points!
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To be fair, however, this is a book coming out which has the story.
Reading more about it, the citizens of Oregon voted this garbage in. I wonder how that man voted?
Here in WV, if a woman gets ‘feminine’ cancer, she automatically gets public health insurance from the State, if she needs it, whether terminal or not. As a matter of fact, having been on public insurance, and have private insurance through a business of sorts and from my state position, I would rather have State insurance.
And I’ll leave the Fox News bit alone
I think it’s excellent someone’s writing a book about this. People need to realize what’s going on.
Since you brought up the voting issue, this is one more in a string of decisions which prove vox populi, vox dei to be a load of nonsense.
And, I will return the FOX favor and leave the State insurance bit along
If it wasn’t for State insurance, my children wouldn’t have been able to see a doctrine, and a person that I know wouldn’t have gotten the medical treatment he did get before he died.
No, you are correct about the western States and their idea of democracy. It is the reason we have a Republic and not a pure democracy.
Joel, you are currently ranking #1 of the biblioblogging rankings. So I have no doubt that you would be able to help your children see many doctrines without the help of State insurance.
But all kidding being set aside, one of the problems with anecdotal evidence concerning insurance, or Walmart, or whatever, is that people, even honest people, tend to have stories which confirm their policy choices.
I was a kid who was raised as the oldest of nine, in a family where, had we elected, we could easily have qualified for food stamps. Not only was I raised in a lower-class home, we were also uninsured.
And yet we were never turned away from a hospital, nor are we saddled with medical debts. When we needed the dentist, we went. When my second-to-youngest sibling was eighteen months old and developed a life-threatening respiratory infection, we took him to the hospital and he was treated quickly and well.
Even now, I am a full-time college student, and I have growing into my gums wisdom teeth which I have been told must be eventually removed or they will twist my teeth silly. And despite the State insurance that my college forces me to buy at what I consider a very unreasonable price, wisdom tooth removal isn’t covered.
And so it’s my responsibility to make sure that gets taken care of. And I will have it taken care of.
So despite what people may say about the U.S. being a frightening and horrible place for those who aren’t insured, I don’t buy it.
You might not, Mitchell, but I invite you to Appalachia some time.
Further, I want to congratulate you on having excellent parents. Not all of us did.
You are right about parents. They are incredible people, and I shudder to think of what my life might have been like in other hands.
You know, the area of childhood is one area where I might lean toward some sort of automatic insurance back-up, because children are so unable to influence their living situations. When it comes to adults, I’m far more skeptical.
Mitchell, for me, we are judged as a society in how we treat the old and the young. I do want a national health insurance, but in a different way than most.
I want the Gov’t to insure competition – something we simply do not have right now, and for those meeting certain requirements, a subsidiary of sorts.
I mean it, I invite you Appalachia sometime, to show you why I went from arch-conservative to something else.
I agree that our treatment of the old and young as a society is vitally important. I’ve not found much to agree with in the health insurance plans I’ve seen so far. But you say you want health insurance in a different way than most, and so I’d be happy to hear how you want it to be.
I’ve yet to figure out how the government can insure competition.
And while we’re trading anecdotal arguments over politics, I’ve got two grandmothers from Appalachia, both of whom were raised by fathers who lost just about everything health-related problems (one through a broken back, and one through cancer). It is stories I have heard from them (and my coal miner great-grandfather) that have confirmed my generally classic liberal positions on collective actions supposedly in the interests of the people. And I come from a town impoverished by the ridiculous actions of unions which have chased off all the manufacturing which once made us more prosperous.
And besides, I’ve heard bad things about going on trips to Appalachia with people from the internet . . .
That said, there always does exist the possibility that I’m wrong about state involvement. I just haven’t seen arguments I find convincing for it.