Eugenics in Europe: Euthanasia for minors and ‘accelerated death’ for the sick

AFP | DECEMBER 19, 2012

Belgium is considering a significant change to its decade-old euthanasia law that would allow minors and Alzheimer’s sufferers to seek permission to die.

The proposed changes to the law were submitted to parliament Tuesday by the Socialist party and are likely to be approved by other parties, although no date has yet been put forward for a parliamentary debate.

“The idea is to update the law to take better account of dramatic situations and extremely harrowing cases we must find a response to,” party leader Thierry Giet said.

The draft legislation calls for “the law to be extended to minors if they are capable of discernment or affected by an incurable illness or suffering that we cannot alleviate.”

Belgium was the second country in the world after the Netherlands to legalise euthanasia in 2002 but it applies only to people over the age of 18.

Socialist Senator Philippe Mahoux, who helped draft the proposed changes, said there had been cases of adolescents who “had the capacity to decide” their future.

He said parliamentarians would also consider extended mercy-killing to people suffering from Alzheiner’s-type illnesses.

Euthanasia was allowed to an Alzheimer’s patient for the first time in the Netherlands last year.

In Belgium, some 1,133 cases — mostly for terminal cancer — were recorded in 2011, about one percent of all deaths in the country, according to official figures.

A seriously ill prisoner serving a long jail sentence this year became the first inmate to die under Belgium’s euthanasia laws.

Accelerated Death

France should allow doctors to “accelerate the coming of death” for terminally ill patients, a report to President Francois Hollande recommended Tuesday.

Hollande referred the report to a national council on medical ethics which will examine the precise circumstances under which such steps could be authorised with a view to producing draft legislation by June 2013.

“The existing legislation does not meet the legitimate concerns expressed by people who are gravely and incurably ill,” Hollande said.

The report said physicians should be allowed to authorise interventions that ensure quicker deaths for terminal patients in three specific sets of circumstances.

In the first case, the patient involved would be capable of making an explicit request to that effect or have issued advance instructions in the event of him or her becoming incapable of expressing an opinion.

The second scenario envisages medical teams withdrawing treatment and/or nourishment on the basis of a request by the family of a dying patient who is no longer conscious and has not made any instructions.

The third would apply to cases where treatment is serving only to sustain life artificially.

The author of the report, Professor Didier Sicard, stressed that he did not support any measures which “suddenly and prematurely end life.”

“We are radically opposed to inscribing euthanasia in law,” Sicard told a press conference.

He also stressed that he was not advocating Swiss-style clinics where people are provided with lethal medication to enable them to end their own lives.

Instead, Sicard said he favoured amendments to a 2005 law which already authorises doctors to administer painkilling drugs at levels they know will, as a secondary effect, shorten a patient’s life.

Sicard’s report was drawn up after extensive consultation with the terminally ill and their families which revealed widespread dissatisfaction with a “cure at all costs” culture in the medical establishment.

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Climate Coup: The Politics

How the regulating class is using bogus claims about climate change to entrench and extend their economic privileges and political control.

By DR. DAVID EVANS | SPPI | APRIL 24, 2012

THE SCIENCE

The sister article Climate Coup—The Science contains the science foundation for this essay. It checks the track record of the climate models against our best and latest data, from impeccable sources. It details how you can download this data yourself. It finds that the climate models got all their major predictions wrong:

The latter two items are especially pertinent, because they show that the crucial amplification by water feedbacks (mainly humidity and clouds),1 assumed by the models, does not exist in reality. Modelers guessed that of the forces on temperature, only CO2 has changed significantly since 1750. The amplification by water feedbacks causes two-thirds of the warming predicted by the models, while carbon dioxide only directly causes one third. The presence of the amplification in the models, but not in reality, explains why the models overestimated recent warming.

WHO ARE YOU GOING TO BELIEVE — THE GOVERNMENT CLIMATE SCIENTISTS OR YOUR OWN LYING EYES?

The climate models are incompatible with the data. You cannot believe both the theory of dangerous manmade global warming and the data, because they cannot both be right.
In science, data trumps theory. If data and theory disagree, as they do here, people of a more scientific bent go with the data and scrap the theory.

But in politics we usually go with authority figures, who in this case are the government climate scientists and the western governments—and they strongly support the theory. Many people simply cannot get past the fact that nearly all the authority figures believe the theory. To these people the data is simply irrelevant. Society needs most people to follow authority most of the time, just like an army needs soldiers who do not question orders.

The world’s climate scientists are almost all employed by western governments. They usually don’t pay you to do climate research unless you say you believe manmade global warming is dangerous, and it has been that way for more than 20 years.2 The result is a near-unanimity that is unusual for a theory in such an immature science.

SIDESHOWS INSTEAD OF THE WHOLE TRUTH

The government climate scientists and mainstream media have kept at least two important truths from the public and the politicians:

1. Two thirds of the warming predicted by the climate models is due to amplification by the water feedbacks, and only one third is directly due to CO2.

2. The dispute among scientists is about the water feedbacks. There is no dispute among serious scientists about the direct effect of CO2.

They seek to persuade with partial truths and omissions, not telling the truth in a disinterested manner. Instead, we are treated to endless sideshows. Issues such as Arctic ice, polar bears, bad weather , or the supposed psychological sickness of those opposing the authorities, tell us nothing about the causes of global warming. They divert public attention and the water feedbacks escapes scrutiny—hidden in plain sight, but never under public discussion.

THE SILENCE OF THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA

The data presented in Climate Coup—The Science is plainly relevant, publicly available, and impeccably sourced from our best instruments—satellites, Argo, and the weather balloons. Yet it never appears in the mainstream media. Have you ever seen it?

If the mainstream media were interested in the truth, they would seek out the best and latest data and check the predictions against the data. They don’t.

The newspapers are happy to devote acres of newsprint to the climate sideshows or to demonizing anyone who criticizes the theory. So why are they unwilling to publish the most relevant data?
Global warning has been a big issue for years. Yet all of the world’s investigative journalists—those cynical, hard-bitten, clever, incorruptible, scandal-sniffing reporters of the vital truths who are celebrated in their own press—all of them just happen not to notice

that the climate models get all their major predictions wrong? Really? Even though we point it out to them?

Good detectives do not overlook clues. The presented data contains half a dozen clues of brick-in-your-face subtlety. How could anyone miss them? Will the journalists who read this paragraph now follow the instructions on downloading the data, and report on what they find? No.

Perhaps they think it’s all too complicated, that it will make our brains hurt? A story with two numbers is too hard? No, we all understand a graph of temperature over time and can spot trends. Judging by the huge response on the Internet, the public want well-explained technical details about the climate.

The government climate scientists and their climate models said it would warm like this and heat up the atmosphere like that. But it didn’t, just download the data and check.

The media are withholding this data, so the “climate debate” is obviously not about science or truth. It must be about politics and power. Reluctantly, uncomfortably, the only possible conclusion is that the media don’t want to investigate the claims of the government climate scientists. Why? Who benefits?

Read Full Article →

Despite fraud, Ron Paul Owns the GOP Election

by Grace Wyler
Business Insider
February 16, 2012

By now, it is clear that the Maine caucuses were a complete mess.

Evidence is mounting that Mitt Romney’s 194-vote victory over Ron Paul was prematurely announced, if not totally wrong. Washington County canceled their caucus on Saturday on account of three inches of snow (hardly a blizzard by Maine standards), and other towns that scheduled their caucuses for this week have been left out of the vote count. Now, it looks like caucuses that did take place before Feb. 11 have also been left out of final tally.

 As the full extent of the chaos unfolds, sources close to the Paul campaign tell Business Insider that it is looking increasingly like Romney’s team might have a hand in denying Paul votes, noting that Romney has some admirably ruthless operatives on his side and a powerful incentive to avoid a fifth caucus loss this month.

According to the Paul campaign, the Maine Republican Party is severely under-reporting Paul’s results — and Romney isn’t getting the same treatment. For example, nearly all the towns in Waldo County — a Ron Paul stronghold – held their caucuses on Feb. 4, but the state GOP reported no results for those towns. In Waterville, a college town in Central Maine, results were reported but not included in the party vote count. Paul beat Romney 21-5 there, according to the Kennebec County GOP.

“It’s too common,” senior advisor Doug Wead told Business Insider. “If it was chaos, we would expect strong Romney counties to be unreported, and that’s not what’s happening.”

The Maine Republican Party won’t decide which votes it will count until the executive committee meets next month. But Wead points out that even if Mitt Romney holds on to his slim lead, it will be a Pyrrhic victory.

“He will have disenfranchised all of these people,” Wead said. “It could be a costly victory — it is a mistake.”

The (alleged) bias against Paul may also be the product of an organic opposition to the libertarian Congressman and his army of ardent fans. Paul volunteers tend to be young and relatively new to party politics, and their presence has many state GOP stalwarts feeling territorial.

Read Full Article…

Ron Paul tied with Obama in General Election Poll

by Luis R. Miranda
The Real Agenda
January 17, 2012

U.S. president Barack Obama has managed to remain in the mid forties in the latest  CNN/ORC International Poll released Monday. Both Republican presidential candidates Ron Paul and Mitt Romney are tied with the president, with Paul making the most gains since this type of polls began to be conducted and published. While Mitt Romney is just a point above Obama, 48 to 47, within the margin of error, Mr. Paul trails Obama by two points, 48-46, also within the margin of error.

With Ron Paul gaining more and more ground among independent voters in the last few polls, the most recent poll results would be good news for the Paul campaign as the number of independent voters grows larger by the week, and many of those voters show their preference for Mr, Paul over president Obama.

According to the poll, interviews were conducted with 1,021 adult Americans, who were contacted conducted by telephone by ORC International on January 11-12, 2012. The margin of sampling error for results based on the total sample is plus or minus 3 percentage points. Polled voters include 928 interviews among registered voters.

When it comes to registered voters, in a direct match between Paul and Obama, the republican candidate has gained one percentage point from an earlier poll conducted by ORC on December 16-18, while Obama has lost 4 percentage points against the Congressman from Texas. Meanwhile Mitt Romney has gained 3 points against Obama, who has lost 5 points. The rest of the candidates lose to Obama by margins that go beyond the margin of error, with differences between 8 and 12 points.

The poll becomes biased when it comes to comparing Obama’s characteristics and qualities with the two candidates, because it only asks about Obama’s and Romney’s leaving out the opinion of the voters with respect to Ron Paul. This is a common trend in polls conducted by main stream media, where only the incumbent and the establishment candidates are fully evaluated, while marginalizing others. Aspects addressed by this section of the poll include values, leadership, personality, the candidate’s skill set to deal with the economic depression as well as a candidate’s changing positions on the issues. This last two aspects are key, because Ron Paul’s record on the issues throughout the past 30 years would easily beat Obama’s and Romney’s combined. Ron Paul is also the only candidate with full understanding of the causes of the current financial meltdown and what measures need to be taken to reverse it.

It is not wise for CNN or any other mass dinosaur medium to include Ron Paul in that part of the poll, because the results would be devastating for both the president and Romney.

Another interesting caveat that comes out of the poll is that when asked whether voters see either Romney or Obama as agreeing with their concerns, being able to fix the economy or caring about the issues the voters care about, neither Obama nor Romney poll much higher that 53%. This number would probably be much lower had they included Ron Paul in the questionnaire.

When asked whether Mitt Romney is in touch with the problems of ordinary Americans, the leading presidential candidate barely hits 41%, while Obama gets 53%. Another aspect in which Obama polled high was when voters responded if they felt that Obama changed positions for political gain. There Obama polled the highest with 56%. But Romney polled even higher here with 61%. In other words, people are clear that both Obama and Romney will say and do whatever it takes to get the votes of Americans next November.

Given the fact the poll excludes Ron Paul from this important part of the questionnaire, the detailed results of the poll simply reflect what we all know. Both Obama and Romney are seen as dishonest candidates who the public not only do not trust, but also who would be incapable to bring confidence to the Americans, help fix the economy or create jobs for the millions of Americans who have lost it.

Ron Paul: ‘Kooky’ is to Invade Iraq, Kill Millions and Hand it to the Iranians

by Luis R. Miranda
The Real Agenda
January 11, 2012

Presidential candidate Ron Paul came out to defend his record against those who call his foreign policy ‘kooky’. During an interview on Fox News this morning, Mr. Paul said that those who call him and his policy ‘kooky’ simply cannot defend themselves intellectually. The Congressman is talking about those pundits that the main stream dinosaur media often consult on air regarding a candidate’s points of view and plans for an eventual government.

After finishing third in Iowa and second in New Hampshire, Ron Paul has been making the rounds on the same main stream media shows that used to sideline him back in 2008 and who laughed at him just a few months ago. The very same pundits who support the Republican establishment candidates used to say that Mr. Paul was unimportant and that even a victory in Iowa would not mean anything.

While other candidates such as Newt Gingrich have to apologize for their unfortunate baseless attacks on fellow candidates as they retreat into their dark holes, Mr. Paul has gone around explaining to talking heads and the rest of the public why he’s been so successful with the young vote, that is, people with ages between 18 and 30, of whom Paul has garnered some 50 percent in Iowa and New Hampshire.

“If they say my foreign policy is kooky, maybe they ought to look at what is happening.” said Mr. Paul. “…invading a country like Iraq, who never did a thing to us, killing a lot of people and turning it over to the shiites who are allies with the Iranians, I call that kooky. I call it kooky allowing our president now to go into numerous countries, even today he went into another African country without permission of the Congress. Fighting undeclared wars, that is kooky, and that is why the American people are sick and tired of what we have.” Then he emphasized: “They choose that term to discredit me because I’m the consistent one.” Paul said alluding those who criticise him.

See the full video interview below:

But not even Paul’s meteoric success has prevented the main stream media from attacking him, using loaded questions during exclusive interviews, making straw man arguments about debunked accusations and so on. Mr. Paul has successfully explained the infamous issue of the newsletters and now, they have ran out of questions to ask. Do not expect the pundits and talking heads to stop asking him about it, though.

What you will not see the main stream media doing is questioning how Rick Santorum made it from single digits to tying Mitt Romney for first place in Iowa in just a week. That would be too much to ask. Neither the rest of the candidates asked for a public verification of the voting even though the Republican Party had announced they would take the counting to an undisclosed location.

“All I can do is do my best at the speaking rallies” said Paul later on an interview on MSNBC.

Since the mains stream media refuses to carry out their work, Mr. Paul has also had to come to their aid, rightfully identifying Mitt Romney as a Big Government Conservative. While on Morning Joe, Paul affirmed that someone who supports TARP and single mandate healthcare programs cannot be called a real conservative. “There is a large base in the Republican party who are saying We’ve been stomped too many times with people who are not convincingly enough good conservatives. That is the group of people who Mr. Paul hopes to attract with his long time record of conservative policies in economics, monetary, fiscal and social matters.”

When asked about whether he could maintain and increase the support of more voters, Mr. Paul reminded the audience that many people used to ignore him because they thought he couldn’t get out of the single digits and now those same people are questioning whether he can keep up with other candidates numbers. To this, Mr. Paul said: “But another thing is that people in this country are really afraid about the economy. Despite the fact there is a lot of wealth in this country, they realized it is all based on debt, and that is very unsteady.” Paul has been one of a handful of people who accurately predicted the current economic collapse, and the only candidate who has been warning about the impending economic depression for the past 30 years. That alone gives him a monumental edge against his opponents who have all been proponents of the same debt-based system that has brought the United States and the world down to shambles.

“That is why the message of liberty and sound financing, the message that I’ve been talking about is going to continue to grow,” said Paul.