Life, Death,Obamacare and All That

Hooboy, The Anchoress is no fan of Obamacare.

Obamacare: Kennedy lives; Grandma dies
Tuesday, July 21, 2009, 12:27 PM
The_Anchoress

Is Euthanasia Included in National ‘Health Care’ Reform?

Not explicity, but you may well infer it.

Found at Red State via Glenn Reynolds.

Let’s back up for a minute. I noted some time ago Jay Rockefeller went on record to say that at some point the government has to decide whether or not you are allowed to receive any more medical benefits if the cost outweighs the potential benefits.

This is, of course, about Obama’s health care bill, which he is strenuously, if rather shrilly (“the time for talk is through!”) trying to shove down America’s throat before his poll numbers (and the trust and confidence of the nation) deteriorate much more. It’s about the health care bill, and the rationing that will occur as the government decides whose life (or “quality” of life) is worth spending tax dollars on, and which child, adult or senior’s life is simply “not worth the price.”

Rationing health care is such a sure bet that the NY Times has already begun telling you why it’s the correct thing; soon we will see profiles of heroic men and women who have chosen death. Once life has become difficult, and suffering enters in, the best sorts of citizens will not selfishly hang on and waste taxpayer money on hospice.

And never mind that fruity idea some put out, that those difficult days may bring about other sorts of healing to the dying and those they leave behind.

Living is not easy. Nor is dying. And the great paradox of love is that for all the joy it brings, it also brings pain. Love and pain cannot exist exclusive of each other, and joy fits itself, somehow, between the two.

It is said that God does not give us more than we can bear. That is not merely a pretty idea. It is, in fact, an answer to the paradox of love and a clue to how genuine indeed is the holiness of life and the limitlessness of human potential.

We have been trained in the secular world to disregard life as something holy and to understand that our human potential is inextricably tied to our personal freedoms and our domination over those uncontrollable matters of life: death, pain, and joy. This is a great deception. The truth is, just as human expansion upon the earth depended upon someone being willing to explore those uncharted waters marked, “Here be monsters,” our human potential can only grow when it is open to exploring the Unknowable. The vehicle for that exploration is faith. If the monsters of life are pain and suffering, fear and doubt, moving through them is what leads to discovery, growth, and — yes — holiness. God does not give us more than we can endure, but we cannot ascertain on our own precisely how much strength we have.

It is impossible to explore the depths of our potential, or its limits, if we steadfastly refuse to take the journey. But increasingly, that refusal is being regarded as wisdom.

That, of course, is sentimental church-talk dispensed by uptight, unsophisticated God-freaks who want to run your life, even unto death.

The government, on the other hand, simply wants you to be efficient. Hence, daring to stay alive – loving and being loved while walking through the fire – is a selfish thing, a foolish expenditure of time, funding and manpower when you are “dying anyway”; determining that you will kill yourself when your engine no longer performs at optimum capacity, well, that’s selfless, heroic and brave.

This mindset is evil, by the way. If you’re not sure, if you’re wondering about it, let’s be clear: assigning monetary value to life based on budgets and arbitrary assessments that disregard humanity’s (and life’s) “intangible assets” such as, you know…loving, being loved and oh yes, the basic human desire to continue living, is evil.

Deciding that some people have a greater effect on society than others, and therefore are more worthy of treatment than anothers? That’s evil, too.

Read the whole thing, but if your parents are getting older, if you’re 55 or so yourself, or if you love your Granny and want her to be around for a long time, even if her health is just so-so, well read this:

…be very troubled by Section 1233 of H.R. 3200. The section, titled “Advanced Care Planning Consultation” requires senior citizens to meet at least every 5 years with a doctor or nurse practitioner to discuss dying with dignity.

On the surface, it sounds so very sensible, doesn’t it – just “getting affairs in order, making living wills, thinking about things in advance.” Because life (and death) should never simply be allowed to happen; for the bureaucrats everything must be orderly, from your planned (and allowable) conception to your mandated death.

Ted Kennedy, who favors rewarding hospitals for testing less, is a senior citizen facing a rather frightening illness with a not-very-nice prognosis. Last year the word was he had, at best, two years to live, and that is a very sobering reality. Kennedy said he’d fight the illness, undergo treatment, and so forth. Everyone wished him the best and believed he should certainly have access to any such treatments that might help prolong his life.

The more one reads about the Obamacare Happy Death Club, the more one realizes that if Ted Kennedy were not the last coherent member of a rich and powerful political dynasty – if he were instead some 70 year-old guy named Ted, who worked with his hands, maybe drank too much and carried a bit of weight – his “last two years” would be very, very different.

For starters…they would only last a few weeks.

UPDATE: Over at Secondhand Smoke, Wesley J. Smith tries to determine what the bill really says:

Here’s the thing: I’m a lawyer and I couldn’t figure out what this section of the bill would actually require because it refers to existing laws, and to look up and cross reference those against the bill would require hours to figure out. That in itself should send up warning flares. From what I have seen, this bill is simply incomprehensible.

It is supposed to be incomprehensible. The “stimulus” bill is also incomprehensible. Incomprehensibility is what you get when you are – as Shrinkwrapped declares -constructing reality and the appearance of competence. Gobbledygook is the language you use when your strategy is absolute misdirection, and your method is chaos and cajolery.

Ethics and life issues aside, let us consider this question: can an administration that is either unable to produce public reviews and reports or just plain unwilling to do so for political purposes, be trusted with mandating and minding the health-care issues of 300 million people, plus immigrants and visitors? Given the realization that our government’s “bailouts” to banks and auto makers may end up costing in the neighborhood of 23 Trillion dollars, and the admission by bureaucrats at the FDA that they can’t even figure out their own budget, I suggest the answer is no.

I agree with Obama’s slip-of-the-truth: Obamacare will bring inefficiencies to the system, because outside of the military, government doesn’t run many things well, at all.

I completely concur with Smith:

It is urgent that our representatives slow down, figure out what these bills really contain, and let the people weigh in before the legislation is finally decided upon. That the President of the United States, the Speaker of the House of Representatives and others in political leadership want to deny us that opportunity tells me this bill is toxic–and on that basis alone, it should be rejected unless sufficient time is allowed to permit the democratic process to operate in a proper fashion.

This regime is a very controlling machine, but life itself is a very uncontrollable proposition, and thank God for that. Life throws us curveballs, when all we want is a slider. But if we don’t duck and dodge, if we decide to hang in and take our swings at the messy challenges life throws at us, we will generally look back and say, “it wasn’t what I’d planned or what I’d hoped for, but I’m glad that pitch came my way.”

Whether your swing was a strike out or a home run, at least you were in the game til the end, you were not scratched from the board with the neat, measured flick of a manager’s wrist.