Hurry up and die!

The BO Administration reacted with indignation to the suggestion that their medical takeover would include measures intended to steer people away from expensive life-prolonging treatments. After all, when someone obliges to die quickly they consume less of the limited medical resources. Because government will be controlling who gets health care, they can give more care to younger people who are still working, paying taxes, and voting, if they can get bothersome old people to die faster.

Sound crazy?

It is. But what part of the BO medical takeover is sane?

Last week BO told a bunch of rabbis that "We are God's partner in matters of life and death." There are far too many cases where the President prefers death, particularly if you are an unborn baby or an elderly burden to society.

BO wants us to believe that the government would *NEVER* try to save a buck by talking old people into dying quickly and inexpensively. But the fact is that he is already doing that right now with one sector of health care which is already under government control: Veterans Administration.

During the BJ Clinton Administration the VA developed a booklet with the Orwellian title "Your Life, Your Choice."

The 54-page booklet starts out well, encouraging spouses and families to talk about the care they want to receive and the lengths they would go to in the effort to keep them alive. This is a discussion that families ought to have, but when government sticks their nose into the matter, you find a coercive attempt to steer the result in favor of lower cost to the government rather than seeking the best interest of veterans who fought for our freedom.

Page 21 contains a worksheet titled "What makes life worth living", where veterans are asked to consider different medical conditions which they may find themselves in, and determine if "Life like this would be "Difficult but acceptable", "Worth living, but just barely", "Not worth living", or "Can't answer now". There are about 20 cases to rate, including "I can no longer walk, but get around in a wheelchair", "I can no longer contribute to my family's well being", "I need someone to take care of me all the time", "I can no longer control my bladder", "I live in a nursing home", "I am a severe financial burden on my family", "I cannot seem to shake the blues". The worksheet asks you to clarify your answers. If you checked "Can't answer now", in what cases would you rather just die? Are the combinations of factors which would make life not worth living?

The message is clear: hurry up and die, life is not worth living, you are just being a burden.

Within the VA Hospital system, employees don't call this book "Your Life, Your Choice". They call it "The Death Book".

When George W Bush became president, he suspended use of The Death Book by the VA. Barack Obama reinstated The Death Book.

Obama wants us to think that he would *never* let budgetary considerations railroad people to "hurry up and die". The fact is, he already does exactly that with veterans. If he thinks that people who fought for our nation are a burden, not worth keeping alive, he certainly won't hesitate to apply the same methods for the rest of us.