We previously listened to Rick Santorum as he suggested to religious college students that a vote for him might keep them from being devoured. Now it appears it may also protect you from being snatched up by crazed euthanizing Dutch doctors who will send you to the Nether Regions unless you are wearing a bracelet. He also appears to relish the good old days when abortions in America were regulated to “the shadows.”
Santorum told voters that (1) ten percent of all deaths in the Netherlands were by euthanasia, (2) people have to wear bracelets now to be sure not to be euthanized at hospitals, and (3) 50 percent of euthanasia is performed “involuntarily.”
Before any of our statisticians demand to be euthanized, let’s correct a few of these facts.
The bling-bling of death is hard to figure out. Clearly people can wear bracelets with their blood type or other instructions like do not resuscitate — as they do in this country. However, such bracelets are not needed in the Netherlands and Santorum’s comments appear to come as a surprise to people in that country.
The ten percent figure is a bit bizarre. While growing, the number of people choosing euthanasia remains small and less than 3%. In 2010, 136058 people died in the Netherlands and only 3136 did so through euthanasia. That is roughly 2.3% of the total deaths.
In 2009, the annual report on euthanasia showed 2,636 cases of euthanasia — or 2 percent of all Dutch deaths. Over 80 percent were cancer patients and more than 80 percent of the deaths occurred in the patient’s home — not in those bureaucratic hospitals dispatching everyone who comes in with a slight fever without their bracelet.
As for those 50% of cases dispatched against their will, the Dutch law is extremely strict. It now only requires consent but a waiting period. If a doctor dispatches someone without their consent or satisfying the tight controls, he is charged with murder.
The doctor must document that he or she confirmed that the patient requesting euthanasia or assisted suicide is making a voluntary and informed request. The record must also show that the patient was suffering unbearably and was fully informed about the prospects. Then a second doctor must examine the patient and supply a second written opinion on the satisfaction of the criteria. The government found only nine cases in 2009 of a doctor failing to complying with the strict criteria. There was no mention of a bracelet.
As for the claim that abortions were once forced to occur “in the shadows,” the part is entirely correct. It is just unclear why that is a positive image even for those who oppose the right to choose.
Putting aside these tiny factual disagreements, it is good to finally see a politician willing to take on our greatest threat: the Dutch. Dutch propagandists like Rembrandt, Vermeer and Van Gogh have already infiltrated our schools and museums. Our leaders (except Santorum) are deaf to the growing sound of their wooden-shoe stomping, marzipan-eating hordes. I for one will be on the ramparts with Rick wearing my do not euthanize bracelet before I eat a single herring from the hands of our Dutch overlords.
Richard,
I understand your angst, but no violence please.
Being Dutch, and having gone through the hell of what all a family needs to go through to stand by the choice of my grandmother wishing to be euthanized, I can simply say one thing and one thing alone..
Please, please, please involuntarily euthanize this man with the biggest shotgun ever. Like so many Americans are involuntarily euthanized with other types of guns.
Mr. Santorum is a dangerous religious zealot, nothing more.
Santorum is obviously an ignorant man. However, he believes the stuff he spouts because it comes to him from sources he absolutely trusts and therefore refuses to question. While he is not smart, he does viscerally comprehend that by strewing fear of the “other”, whatever shape that may take, he can rally his base of Right Wing Authoritarians to follow his bleats and react with the appropriate fear. This is little more than a fervent variant of what has been the the strategy of Ultra-Conservatives since the loss of Goldwater in 1964. How do you get an electorate that doesn’t benefit from your political policies to vote for you? You scare them. It is a strategy that has worked time and again. The problem is that the stakes are becoming more desperate, since the fear level must continually be raised and the defined “other” must be demonized to an ever greater extent.
Idealist707,
The issue you raise is important and quite complex, but to get into a discussion of it here would disrupt this thread considerably and this specific issue will no doubt be raised in the near future, as it has frequently in the past: http://jonathanturley.org/2011/11/26/the-incarceration-of-black-men-in-america/#comments
Does the fact that Santorum apparently thought “Austin Powers in Goldmember” was a documentary make him dangerous? After all, although his errors in speech don’t stem from his being a native Dutch speaker but rather from the manure-rich content of his thought process, he himself speaks fluent Dunglish.
Mr. Santorum is dangerous because he specializes in uninformed hysteria.
I’m Dutch and our queen says that in America people can trade kidneys for guns 🙂
The stuff that we know about America:
http://legal-forms-kit.com/legal-jokes/dumb-laws.html
Now without all the stupidity but come on people, it saddens me that you’ll probably have to choose between a superchristian racist liar and a moron.. uuhu mormon whe says that America should never apoligize for anything.
To be honest, I’m getting scared of the idiots going for the white house, sorry.
As is the case with all too many politicians, he’s either an ignorant fool, or a devious, lying sociopath. In either case…
Trebuchet: You forgot. There won’t be any pre-natal care in the Santorum era. Leads to abortions, doncha know.
Please permit a comment not following the blog’s subject.
It is about criminal justice; particularly the NC law called Racial Justice Act.
The act is being used for the first time to challenge, not conviction, but a death sentence, as a result of statistically proven racial bias.
My post, in particular, concerns the common method of jury selection which statistics show are utilized to the disadvantage of defendants of color.
Read the article, see link below, read as your search capabilities permit, and perhaps we can return to the subject: my particular concern, and that the law addresses.
My post in the News and Observer today.
I would even like to have investigated the method used to assign persons places on eventual jury service lists, seeking to expose eventual racial or economic bias.
I would then prefer a simple tombola function of mechanical sort to determine the order of consideration.
Then I would eliminate permemptory challenges, leaving “for cause” as the only means of excusing someone.
Then we would have a system of jury selection not racially biased, but representative as the Constitution and its amendments prescribe.
Racism, with all its Republican code words, since the time of Reagan, has raised its ugly head behind the shield of “states rights” all too long.
A healthy society awaits us when we can say: “My friend Sam” instead of “My (black, poor, jewish, arab, muslim, atheist, catholic, immigrant) friend Sam”.
If they are friends, then we trust them and any other qualifiers (if not pertinent just for the moment) are irrelevant.
It’s at least 150 years since we eliminated one such qualifier: SLAVE.
Isn’t it time for the white underdog in this society to realize who is kicking him, and join forces with the other underdogs regardless of their qualifiers.
Your fellow underdog suffers from the same or even more bias than you do.
Join forces, the enemy is well-defined by his obscene wealth and political power, which hinders this from being a democracy.
Thomas Jefferson believed in all of us——the common men, not the rich ones. Accept the responsibility of that trust.
Any takers?
Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/2012/02/19/1863480/identifying-bias.html#storylink=cpy
With Don Rickxote and Sanchorum on the prowl, no windmill will be safe.
Unless Santorum is elected, pregnant women will have to wear special bracelets to avoid militant Dutch Islamists from Cuba ( & paid out of church collections) performing involuntary abortions on them when they go for pre-natal.
I guess the Dutch are still pissed off at our forebearers stealing New York from them.
Give Santorum enough rhetorical rope and he’ll probably euthanize himself.
Who knew the Dutch Masters cigar box was really a line-up?
The hordes of jack booted clog wearing Dutch culture imperialists are soon to hit our shores passing out Dutch chocolates and tulips, so beware patriots. Beware of the oppressive Dutch economics of shared sacrifice descending on us in the form of Dutch Treat with a monetary system pegged to tulip bulbs. I heard Santorum’s speech in Ohio this past weekend. He had the audience on edge, frightened at the prospects of an invasion of windmills. Scary stuff coming out of the mouth of an adult. It confirmed for me that Obama is the only sane Republican.
Thank you for bringing us the true news.
can we euthanize anyone wearing braceletts that have the initials…. wwjd….. most of the bearers are worthy….
Don’t confuse Santorum with facts. He is too busy with the American Taliban matters to worry about the facts!
Great post, Johnathan. Thanks for calling Santorum on his waltz with the truth. I’m sure we’ll see much more.