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Haleigh Poutre, the center of one of the nation's most passionate end-of-life cases, has been at an acute rehabilitation hospital in Brighton 12 times longer than the typical patient, prompting some child advocates to question whether the state is allowing political and legal factors to delay placing her in a permanent home.
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Flatley said DSS cannot be entirely trusted to act in Haleigh's best interests, given its lengthy history of missing overt signs of the girl's repeated abuse in her Westfield home and then its aggressive effort to withdraw life support when she clearly, in hindsight, still had life in her. She said "it's allowing the fox to guard the henhouse."...................
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An Interview with the author of Walk Me to Midnight Walk Me to Midnight by Jane St. Clair is a new pro-life novel from Capstone Fiction. It is a chilling medical thriller guaranteed to keep you up reading all nightlong until you reach the horrifying conclusion. Available here and from Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Q. How did you come to write Walk Me to Midnight? First, I was with my mother, sister and father during their long deaths by cancer. I was with them when they died. They were very vulnerable, but the hospice nurses knew what to do and how to help us. That's why I dedicated Walk Me to Midnight to hospice nurses. ~Snip~
An old saying in law is that bad cases make bad law. When a situation is too complex, there is no way to write a good law that covers every situation. There are too many variables. Assisted suicide is like that. Do you treat a 21-year-old the same as a 95-year-old? How do you determine competence in someone all drugged up? How do you determine Terri Schiavo's desires when she left no written instructions?
Also, the Netherlands experience teaches us that even if you have two doctors to supervise each patient's "suicide," there is plenty of room for corruption. Insurance companies and often the person's relatives have personal stakes in having that person die quickly. It saves them money, allows them to inherit quicker, or allows them relief from the burden of the person's care. Often these are unconscious motives. Studies have shown that when there are assisted suicide laws, dying people feel obligated to end their lives prematurely. When given a choice, most people want to live as long as possible.
Q.Why do you think so many Americans believe in assisted suicide?
First, they are thinking only in terms of themselves and not in terms of society. They look at someone like Terri Schiavo and say, "I don't want to end up like her. I want control." You have to look beyond your fear and your desire to control your death to the implications of such laws for society.
Secondly, they want the sanction of society and doctors to do something that is traditionally a moral wrong. They want approval for committing suicide. If you don't think it's wrong and you want it for yourself, why do you have to involve society in your decision? Why indeed?
An Interview with the Author of Walk Me to Midnight
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