Posted on 01/17/2006 7:07:26 AM PST by SoFloFreeper
BREAKING ON THE AP WIRE:
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court has upheld Oregon's one-of-a-kind physician-assisted suicide law, rejecting a Bush administration attempt to punish doctors who help terminally ill patients die.
Although he didn't explicitly say it, I think part of the reason Thomas sorta goes along with Raich here is that a bad rule enforced arbitrarily is worse than a bad rule enforced consistently. Requiring that those who make rules must accept their consistent enforcement is something of a check against bad rules. Not that it works perfectly--or even close to it--but without that check rulemakers can produce so many rules that anybody can be prosecuted at any time for at least 'something', if such is the prosecutor's whim.
Guess I'll have to read Scalia's dissent to get the legal reasoning.
Thomas joined in Scalia's dissent, and so didn't feel any need to say in his own the things that were already said there.
Not in any institution I have practiced at. While most physicians are liberal with pain meds with dying patients, in 20 yrs I can say I know of no instances where extra medication was given with the intention of causing death.
Thank God I do not live in Oregon, because I hope never to see it. As this is not legal in my state, I would turn anyone who deliberately caused death (no matter what the circumstances) over to the ethics board of their institution and the state liscensing board, and I would do it without hesitation.
Although I detest this law, this is a really good ruling at first glance. It protects states rights and shows much judicial restraint.
I can't see judging this as assisted "murder."
You need to think about this some more, Pookie. How is it different than abortion aside from the fact that it is at the other end of life's spectrum? And when did God give His permission to relieve someone's pain by 'giving' them death? (Oh ye, of little faith!) Fuh shame.
P.S. I draw the line here.
Were they right in the Raich case?
Thomas' argument is that there is no reasonable basis for the Court to decide that states don't have the power to decide that something is a "legitimate medical use" for a plant the fedgov like like, but then decide that they do have the power to declare that inducing death is a "legitimate medical use" for drugs the Court does like.
It's a historical document. It has no legal standing whatsoever. And the legality (or rather the Constitutionality) of a SC decision is the subject of this thread.
"And when did God give His permission to relieve someone's pain by 'giving' them death?"
Technically Jesus was immortal...God gave, his son, Jesus his permission to die, thus relieving us all.
That's not what I meant.
Liberals on the court just destroyed the constitution today. The so-called INALIENABLE right to life is gone, it can now be given away according to these liberal activist idiot judges.
Not familiar with the Raich case.As far as I am concerned though I think each state should have their own authority about any drug issue.The USSC was established to uphold the constitution and make sure all sates adhered to it. So if it is not already addressed in the constitution then the feds need to back off and let state law prevail.
All joking aside.
Do you think God gives out painful deaths to people who deserve it and non-painful deaths to the faithful? Would you deny a faithful person a less painful death simply because they happened to have a rare bone cancer?
It's a question of whether every event in the universe has been designed by God down to every little detail as to produce the most just outcome. I, personally, do not believe that God intentionally kills certain people with a specific disease to prove a point, but I could be wrong.
It's kind of the Pat Robertson, Ariel Sharon comment question. Did Ariel Sharon have a stroke because he gave Gods land away, or does it have more to do with his lifestyle eating habits and the drugs he was taking. Now it could be both, but I prefer to view the latter as closer to the universe I live in.
"Congress did not have this far-reaching intent to alter the federal-state balance.".......Justice Anthony M. Kennedy
"....attempt to regulate general medical practices historically entrusted to state lawmakers"......9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
What article or amendment to the Constitution takes the regulation of medicine within in a state out of state hands and puts it in the hands of the Federal Government?
None.
That is exactly the reason why Roe v. Wade is a ruling without a constitutiuonal basis.
In the Raich case, some people in California argued that the production of canabis in California for the consumption of people in California, as authorized under California law, is not legitimately subject to federal jurisdiction. The Supreme Court, with Thomas dissenting, declared that it was.
Thomas' argument was that there's no legitimate basis for deciding that states do not have the authority to find that marijuana has "legitimate medical use", but do have the authority to declare that causing death is a "legitimate medical use".
In other words, if the Court is going to stomp upon state's authority, it should not then be allowed to claim such authority when doing so would bolster its own ideological position.
All of which is irrelevant to this case. The 6 killer judges were of the opinion that Congress had not granted John Ashcraft authority to do what he did when it came to controlled substances.
You can go jump off a cliff.
I can't stop you, and God Himself won't stop you.
But it's not alright for you to take America's fundamental commitment to the protection of life and liberty with you.
Murder, including self-murder, should remain against the law as it has always been in this country.
Suicidal thoughts are crazy thoughts...
The Left in America has lost its collective mind...and here, obviously, libertarians have joined in the lunacy.
Das vedanya and spasibo very much.<---so, do you hate me now? :o)
I think that is what I said.
That will teach me to post from work.
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