No Good Options in North Korea?
Justice for Jahi
In California, Jahi McMath is legally dead. In New Jersey, she is legally alive. Now, the deceased—or profoundly disabled—teenager is the subject of litigation that could make history. A quick rundown: In 2013, the then thirteen-year-old girl suffered a cardiac arrest after undergoing throat surgery. Jahi’s brain was deprived of oxygen, and her doctors at the highly respected Children’s Hospital Read More ›
How the Media Promote (Some) Suicides
I began my work against assisted suicide in 1993. The emotional zeitgeist at the time focused intensely—and exclusively—on preventing all suicides. Since then, I have witnessed a very disturbing transition. Today’s society asks us to support suicide in circumstances involving serious illness, disability, and even advanced age. Meanwhile, despite an increase in suicide rates, the intensity of suicide prevention campaigns has declined. As Read More ›
AI Should Never Have “Rights”
Efforts to expand rights beyond the human realm are ubiquitous and reflect, in my view, a deep misanthropy and a threat to universal human rights. That includes the movement to declare sophisticated artificial intelligent machines (“strong AI,” not yet here) to be “persons,” entitled to entry into the moral community. Today, there is an extensive discussion of this meme in Religion & Read More ›
Repealing ObamaCare Is The Key To Restoring Economic Growth
For the last seven-plus years, Republicans ran on repealing and replacing ObamaCare. It was a winning platform, demonstrated by their gaining seats in Congress in almost every election since Obama was elected in 2008 — achieving a majority in the House in 2010, a majority in the Senate in 2014, and finally the White House in 2016. And with President Read More ›
Let’s Use Pigs as Organ “Donors”
There are approximately 120,000 Americans on the organ transplant waiting list, about as many people as live in Charleston, South Carolina and Hartford, Connecticut. Many of these people’s lives will ultimately be saved, after long and harrowing waits—as former Vice President Dick Cheney’s was. But others on the list will die before their turn comes up and a suitable donor Read More ›
The Young and the Vulnerable
When I was a small boy, polio terrified me. Each year, it would strike thousands of children like me — and you never knew when or where it would hit next. In the 1952 epidemic, a very bad year, there were nearly 60,000 reported cases in the United States and more than 3,000 deaths. Summer was the worst time, and Read More ›
Stop Assisted-Suicide Opioid Abuse
The opioid crisis is tragically real and requires a concerted national commitment to remediation policies such as those recommended by the President’s Commission. In such a crisis, we cannot warn people not to abuse these powerful drugs, while at the same time allowing doctors intentionally to prescribe overdoses. Combating opioid abuse must apply to all abuses — including the use of these pain-killing drugs in suicide.
Read More ›Putting Infants “Down Like Dogs”
The Charlie Gard tragedy has renewed public advocacy for legalizing infanticide. Writing in the New York Times earlier this month, Gary Comstock recounted the tragic death of his son, Sam, who was born with a terminal genetic condition. Many years later, Comstock believes that his son should have been killed instead of being taken off of life support: It seems the medical community has few options Read More ›