Free Republic

I am not a member of any organized political party," Will Rogers quipped in the last century, "I'm a Democrat." If today's Republican Party were organized, if its storied "establishment" were even a shadow of the leviathan its detractors claim, the world would look very different. Republican Party leaders would long since have organized an advertising campaign in the early caucus and primary states to show voters that Donald Trump is: 1) nothing resembling a conservative, 2) not a friend of the working class, 3) not a particularly successful businessman (despite inheriting a vast fortune, he's managed to clock four...

Brittany Maynard, a 29-year-old woman diagnosed with incurable brain cancer, committed assisted suicide at her home in Portland, Oregon on Saturday evening by swallowing a fatal dose of barbiturates. She had previously acquired the drugs legally by prescription under Oregon's controversial assisted suicide law. "Goodbye to all my dear friends and family that I love," she wrote on Facebook. "The world is a beautiful place, travel has been my greatest teacher, my close friends and folks are the greatest givers. I even have a ring of support around my bed as I type … Goodbye world. Spread good energy. Pay...

Hemlock Society Founder Pushes for Euthanasia of Mentally Ill People by Wesley J. Smith | LifeNews.com | 11/5/13 10:37 AM It really is astounding how the media continue to assume that assisted suicide/euthanasia is only for the terminally ill.HereÂ’s the latest example: Hemlock Society founder Derek Humphry was in Arizona advocating for assisted suicide for the mentally ill, and Arizona Star columnist Tim Steller is shocked!From the article: If you think the idea of assisted suicide is controversial, welcome to the farthest frontier in the debate. Announcing his visit to Tucson for two Nov. 23 presentations, Derek Humphry, a pioneer...

The Wall Street Journal just published a shocking editorial written by a respected University President, confirming the Obama Administration is now using VA hospitals to order doctors to pressure all military veterans to sign "pull the plug" do-not-resuscitate orders, hastening their premature deaths through mandatory "end of life" counseling. President Jim Towey of Saint Vincent's College, founder of the non-profit "Aging With Dignity" and former White House Director of faith based initiatives, wrote a blistering expose entitled "The Death Book For Veterans," revealing President Obama's new Veterans Administration (VA) directive, presumably signed by VA Secretary, General (ret.) Eric Shinseki, which...

Although President Obama and liberal Congressional Democrats have denounced claims that the health care reform establishes "death panels," it does not help reassure the American public that the nation's foremost pro-euthanasia group is actively pushing "end-of-life counseling" as a centerpiece of health-care reforms. Compassion & Choices, a rebranding of the former Hemlock Society, aggressively lobbies to legalize euthanasia as a "human right" by means of legislation and the judicial system. But the group has revealed that it is a major player behind incorporating a measure (sec. 1233) of the "American Affordable Choices Act of 2009" (HR 3200) that would pay...

Salem, OR (LifeNews.com) -- The number of assisted suicides in Oregon has increased 30 percent in the last two years and euthanasia activists themselves may have provided the reasons why. It appears members of Compassion & Choices have infiltrated the hospice system and are urging patients to kill themselves.LifeNews.com reported on the increase earlier this month, but a Compassion & Choice press release last week provided an interesting take on the report.The group said that "nearly 100% of terminally ill individuals using the law in 2008 were enrolled in hospice.""Hospice enrollment among those using the Act increased to 98%,...

OLYMPIA, Wash. – Terminally ill patients with less than six months to live will soon be able to ask their doctors to prescribe them lethal medication in Washington state. But even though the "Death with Dignity" law takes effect Thursday, people who might seek the life-ending prescriptions could find their doctors conflicted or not willing to write them. Many doctors are hesitant to talk publicly about where they stand on the issue, said Dr. Tom Preston, a retired cardiologist and board member of Compassion & Choices, the group that campaigned for and supports the law.

“Death has replaced sex as the taboo subject of our times,” said one of the world’s richest men and leading philanthropists, George Soros, when he launched the Project Death in America fund at Columbia University’s College of Physicians & Surgeons in 1994. It promotes euthanasia or assisted suicide, and has been succeeded by the Open Society Institute’s International Palliative Care Initiative . Soros’s mother committed suicide, as a member of the Hemlock Society . His father died a lingering death from cancer, and Soros was “disappointed” at the way the old man clung miserably to life.

Marcelle Jones has thought a lot about how her life might end. She has been treated for a serious medical problem for several years, and while it has not gotten worse, eventually "it's going to get me," said Jones, 82. Long before she moved to Lakeland in 1990, Jones had joined the Hemlock Society - now known as Compassion and Choices - an organization that provides information about how terminally ill people can end their lives, either through passive means or, if they choose, by suicide. Lacking family and wanting to spare her friends the burden of caring for her,...

<p>WASHINGTON – Now that she's left the Supreme Court, Sandra Day O'Connor has a few things to get off her chest. One of the first was to warn that the nation could slide into dictatorship if harsh critiques of the judiciary – from the likes of Texas Sen. John Cornyn and Rep. Tom DeLay – go unanswered.</p>

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor used a speech at Georgetown University to attack pro-life lawmakers who sided with Terri Schiavo's parents in their efforts to prevent their daughter's euthanasia death. She claimed a Congressional effort to have federal courts review the case was a first step towards a dictatorship. O'Connor, who backs abortion, announced her retirement last year and was recently replaced by federal appeals court judge Samuel Alito, who pro-life advocates hope will be more open to upholding laws that protect the right to life. "We must be ever-vigilant against those who would...

The terrible deaths made possible by modern medical advances necessitate a change in thinking about the ethics of assisted suicide. These days, despite my conservative nature and my firm support for him on most matters, I seem to be disagreeing with President Bush on several fronts: the Terry Schiavo case, illegal immigration, the pouring of money down the drain in New Orleans, and now, assisted suicide. Over 15 years ago, as I watched my mother’s health and body deteriorate and the likelihood of a very painful death process looming, I turned to the Hemlock Society and purchased the book, “Final...

CALLER: Hi, Rush! RUSH: Hi. CALLER: I just wanted to know if you happened to catch George Felos on Fox & Friends this morning. RUSH: Yes. CALLER: What did you think? RUSH: Well, there's a number of things that we have from Felos. One of the things -- what did you want to ask me about regarding Felos? CALLER: Well, when they got to the last question I thought he looked, like, totally stunned. I think he thought that he did really, really good throughout the whole thing looking real calm. RUSH: For people that don't know, what was the...

Serendipitously, the Florida law governing end-of-life care was revised, effective Oct. 1, 1999, to the benefit of Michael Schiavo's petition to remove Terri Schiavo's feeding tube. Prior to this date, it was necessary for two physicians to determine the patient had a "terminal condition" The Schindlers' contention of Schiavo's conflict of interest as Terri's guardian is medical evidence suggesting Terri may have been the victim of physical abuse. The report of a total-body bone scan done on Terri Schiavo while she was in a rehabilitation facility in March 1991 – 13 months after her collapse – describes what are known...

AMSTERDAM, March 28 (Reuters) - The fight in the United States over the life of the severely brain damaged women Terri Schiavo has sparked intense interest in the Netherlands where euthanasia has been legal for three decades. The case that has pitted the woman's husband against her parents has repeatedly been on the front of Dutch newspapers in recent weeks and is leading television news bulletins. Everyone seems to have an opinion on the case and most people stopped in the streets of Amsterdam on Monday seemed to support Schiavo's husband's right to choose to end her life. Before 1973...

Friday, March 25, 2005 10:57 p.m. EST Greer Got Donation From Mike Schiavo's Lawyer Reclaiming America, an organization backed by Rev. D. James Kennedy, reported that a serious conflict of interest may exist for the Fla. State Judge who is ruling on the Terri Schiavo case. The report from Reclaiming America follows: As if the circumstances surrounding Terri Schiavo could not get any more suspicious, the Center for Reclaiming America has uncovered evidence that Pinellas-Pasco County Circuit Judge George W. Greer accepted a campaign contribution from the law firm of Michael Schiavo’s attorney only one day after "Terri’s Law” was...

TAMPA, Fla. - Warning that Terri Schiavo is "fading quickly," her parents begged a federal appeals court Tuesday to order the severely brain-damaged woman's feeding tube reinserted while they pursue claims that her rights are being violated. advertisement David Gibbs III, attorney for parents Bob and Mary Schindler, told the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta that their 41-year-old daughter might die before they get a chance to fully argue their case. The appeal came after a federal judge in Tampa rejected the parents' emergency request earlier Tuesday. "Where, as here, death is imminent, it is hard to...

Attorneys argue over questioning of witnesses in Schiavo case By VICKIE CHACHERE Associated Press Writer CLEARWATER, Fla. -- The attorney for a man seeking to end his severely brain-damaged wife's life argued Monday that Gov. Jeb Bush shouldn't be allowed to gather new evidence in the case because the judge has all the information he needs to decide if the law keeping Terri Schiavo alive is unconstitutional. The governor's attorney countered that questioning is needed because lawmakers were uncomfortable with Michael Schiavo's motives in wanting to withdraw food and hydration from his wife. Those questions are central to determining whether...

Infanticide promoter: Bush morally stunted Ethicist says president should have 'turned the other cheek' after 9-11 ----------------------- © 2004 WorldNetDaily.com A controversial college professor who thinks parents should be able to kill disabled children says though President Bush makes himself out to be a good Christian leader, he has the moral development of a 13-year-old boy. Princeton's Peter Singer Peter Singer, professor of bioethics at Princeton University,(A useless over paid job) said in an interview with an Australian newspaper Bush sees the world "very simply, in black and white, as good versus evil, and he thinks that America is the...

<p>In a basement of the University of Maryland School of Medicine, in an office near the morgue, Ronn Wade's phone rings with yet another request for body parts.</p> <p>Colette Dugan, 43, had specialized knee surgery after her doctor learned the procedure on cadavers first.</p>