Advocates for assisted suicide know that when their agenda is described accurately and descriptively—they lose. So, they are ever about the task of trying to come up with new gooey euphemisms to describe assisted suicide—to be, if you will, the sugar that helps the hemlock go down.
Latest case in point: AB 651 in CA. The assisted suicide legalization bill has been amended to use even more perfumed language than before to describe assisted suicide. The bill used to authorize terminally ill adults to “make a request for medication for the purpose of ending his or her life in a humane and dignified manner.”
But, apparently even that boilerplate of assisted suicide bills is too graphic. The bill now reads,”…make a request for medication prescribed pursuant to this bill to provide comfort with an assurance of peaceful dying if suffering becomes unbearable.” Of course, unbearable suffering isn’t defined so the term is rendered meaningless and becomes whatever the suicidal patient deemed it to be.
Why the change? Probably, the sponsors of this horrible bill are either trying to fool some harried legislators into believing they are just voting for improved comfort care, or they are providing cover for lawmakers who want to vote for the bill but don’t want to admit they are supporting assisted suicide. Either way, it is pathetic and a classic example of why the American people have such a low regard for the legislative process.
In any event, I am testifying in front of the California Senate Judiciary Committee tomorrow at an “informational” hearing on the bill. I can’t discuss the particulars of AB 651, but am supposed to get into how assisted suicide might impact our perception of the value of human life. I’ll post my testimony when a link becomes available.
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