Find the original article: http://www.brsq.org/article.php?r=199

A year into his presidency, tearing into Barack Obama about his failures to promote government transparency and his watered-down shot at healthcare reform puts food on the table for hordes of media pundits.

It’s easy.

“Against overwhelming public opposition, the only things keeping ObamaCare alive at this point are power politics and the misguided corporate cease-fire that Democrats have either coerced or bought―or is homegrown at companies like Pfizer that are deeply invested in more government control of the economy,” wrote the Wall Street Journal.

And Ruben Navarrette Jr. of CNN.com recently questioned Obama’s leadership on standing up to blatant racism – most recently in the form of Sen. Harry Reid’s comments on Obama’s electability.

It’s easy to criticize Obama because the United States has been failing for so long, and he is the latest manifestation of that failure.

As The Economist put it, “Americans have not suddenly fallen in love with Republicans, who seem keener to obstruct Mr Obama than to offer a coherent alternative. Rather, they are fed up with the recession and government in general. Since Mr Obama is the public face of power, he gets the blame.”

For sure, he deserves the blame as much as anyone. He inherited two failed wars and is now accelerating the conflict in Afghanistan while doing nothing to withdraw from Iraq. For this, he deserves the frustrated ire of military families whose lives are caught in the quagmires.

But bad governance started long before Obama. Twenty plus years of scaling back the government’s role in watching over the economy blew up into the worst economic crisis in three generations. The administration’s sweetheart deal with the banks drew still more criticism, this time from everyone but the CEO class.

Amidst all the criticism we find the Tea Partiers⁴, boiling angry about the government but tragically blind to history. They don’t much care about financial deregulation, only that the end result was a government bailout. They contend that the banks should have failed, no matter how disastrous such economic collapse would have been, particularly for low- and middle-income families.

They fear socialism, personified, so they say, by President Obama. From socialized medicine to “czars” in the White House, they claim to be defending our “freedom” from “commies” and “the anti-Christ” Obama

The Tea Partiers, obviously, are very confused people. Part of the reason is the simplistic demonization of government involvement espoused by Tea Party doctrinaires. Glenn Beck, for one, took the moral position that the banks should have been left to fail last year because they took risks with investor’s money. On the surface, this is a very logical position.

But it’s not so logical if we consider that the Great Depression served as proof that banks and other industries simply sought profit, often ignoring risks – proof enough that the government began the arduous task of regulating the economy. The Securities and Exchange Commission was born.

Then, under President Ronald Reagan, it was gutted in the name of the free market. Financial deregulation in the 1980s was part of an attempt to remove most government involvement in the economy and let capitalism do what it does. And it led to the current crisis.

The overarching theme of President Obama’s first year in office was political pushback. Pushback from the Tea Partiers painted many of his center-left policies as dangerous communist decrees. Pushback in Congress idled any progress on major parts of the president’s plan, even when his party held an unstoppable majority.

Such pushback has shifted the political environment toward a deeper conservatism in both parties. But conservatism is the wrong response following economic crisis. Hands-off, free-market dogma is the cornerstone of conservatism, and it failed us.

So, let’s pause a moment from criticizing President Obama and take a broader look at the United States and its problems. We are not out of work because Obama fired us. We are not homeless because he foreclosed on our houses. We are not victims of racism, sexism or homophobia because he promotes it. He does none of this.

The problems are broader than President Obama or any individual. That’s what makes fixing them so challenging. But as long as we spin our wheels, flinging mud at President Obama, hoping the next president will be better, we will not find our way out of this mess.

Through the next year, at least, we can expect to see even less progress on the president’s agenda now that the Democrats have lost their super-majority in Congress. We cannot afford to let political wrangling limit our potential. We must advocate for a more socially just society and stand firm against the politics of doing nothing. Otherwise, criticism will lead only to frustration.

Find the original article: http://www.brsq.org/article.php?r=178

I have never been able to walk independently, and for much of my life, I lived in a two-story house, separated by sixteen steps. (I counted each time I climbed the stairs to use the bathroom or go to bed.) My family’s house was not accessible, but I made do and got around by crawling on my knees.

When I was younger – when my joints did not tell the weather, when all that mattered was throwing a baseball like Charles Nagy and fielding like Omar Vizquel – I ignored my father’s advice not to jump around as much when I played.

Now, I regret my carelessness. I have little cartilage left in my knees, and the sound of extending my legs is the quiet grind of bone against bone. I have the joints of someone at least twice my age. Indeed, I am the youngest person I know who complains about arthritis. And the pain is likely to grow worse as I grow older.

Right now, my joint pain is manageable, but it does affect my quality of life. I foresee a point in the (I hope, distant) future at which the pain could overwhelm my desire to live.

As it is, my joint pain pales in comparison with the pain of other disabled people or ill people. Some impairments can cause intense pain over long periods of time. Beyond physical pain, impairments can limit people to their homes or nursing homes and cause the emotional pain of isolation. In such circumstances, some people would find solace in their right to die.

While most people can end their lives without help, some cannot. People with severe physical impairments simply do not have the ability. A person’s ability should not determine whether he or she can end a painful life.

Simply, if someone wants to die, he or she should be able to have another person help in ending his or her life.

Doctors are perhaps most qualified to assist someone in euthanasia, having gone through med school and received instruction on various medications. But because some doctors view themselves as healers and interpret the Hippocratic oath in different ways, they may be hesitant to perform euthanasia.

Like euthanasia itself, the doctors’ decisions about what it means to “do no harm” are personal. Forcing doctors to go against their conceptions of self in order to allow people to end their lives would be unfair.

Still, other doctors view euthanasia as a legitimate medical procedure intended to reduce suffering. Were active euthanasia legal, these doctors would give ill and disabled people an option when they find their lives not worth living. Further, some of these doctors could specialize in providing euthanasia, finding ways to make passing away more comfortable.

Active euthanasia is a murky issue that has been associated with the forced eradication of people who possess “undesirable” traits. The prevailing argument against active euthanasia contends that helping people die has strong parallels with eugenicist practices, which culminated in the Holocaust.

In fascist Germany, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, at least 200,000 disabled people were killed by the government. Some people in German infirmaries were killed with injections of kerosene.

If society allows doctors to help people die, the argument goes, the rights of ill and disabled people could begin a dangerous slide down a slippery slope. At the bottom of the slope lies a dystopian society that has returned to its eugenicist past, justifying forced euthanasia as a way to reduce suffering.

In 1993, the Canadian Supreme Court,  using a similar argument, ruled that active euthanasia should remain illegal. Sue Rodriguez claimed before the Court her constitutional right to assistance in committing suicide.

With her worsening amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Rodriguez foresaw her inability to end her life when she wanted to die. In a five-four split, the Court rejected her claim because legalizing assisted suicide could create the potential for abuse and lead to the killing of vulnerable people.

This view, however, dismisses the growth of the disability rights movement between the 1950s and 1990s. It is an offshoot of the idea that ill and disabled people cannot advocate for themselves.

Prior to deinstitutionalization, most ill and disabled people were kept from participating in society, locked away in hospitals or prison-like institutions. Once we were allowed the opportunity, the disability rights movement began pressing for equality.

Because of our movement, ill and disabled people today enjoy more protections than earlier generations. We are protected from discrimination under federal law.

But, perhaps more importantly, we have formed a political entity and we demand respect. Past generations did not have the foothold we have earned, so they were in no position to respond to the Holocaust.

The mass murder of a politically empowered group in a stable democracy like the United States seems unlikely, but politicians still have no place in discussions about someone’s right to die. The role of the government in active euthanasia should be minimal. Federal or state legislatures should legalize the practice, require documentation of patients’ wishes, then step back, leaving it as a personal decision.  Documentation would ensure an ill or disabled person truly had wanted to die and protect the doctor from lawsuits or criminal prosecution at the same time.

In substance, the choice to die impacts only the person wishing to die and the person who assists that person. No one is harmed by the choice. The choice has no implications on broader society.

It is personal, and one person’s choice is not applicable to all similar cases. It will not lead to another Holocaust. And safeguards can protect against abuse. The right for severely impaired people to choose to die is a way of empowering them to make decisions about how and if they want to live.

Allen Michael Hines will read from his book, Screaming Freedom, at Jupiter Studios in Alliance, Ohio, on Dec. 1.

The show will begin at 7 p.m. Aaron Brooks, front man for the band Simeon Soul Charger, will play a solo set. Bill Solomon and Richie Kindler, two local artists, will also perform.

Hines, who grew up in Stark County, will sign copies of the book at the end of the night.

Find directions below, courtesy of Google Maps.

Traveling from Kent, OH:
1. Head west on Kent Ravenna Rd/E Main St toward N Water St – 82 ft
2. Take the 1st left onto S Water St – 1.5 mi
3. Continue onto OH-43 S – 1.9 mi
4. Turn left to merge onto I-76 E toward Youngstown – 9.7 mi
5. Take exit 43 for OH-14 toward Alliance – 0.4 mi
6. Turn right at Cleveland East Liverpool Rd/OH-14 S – 0.7 mi
7. Slight right at Limaville South Rd/OH-183 W Continue to follow OH-183 W – 7.1 mi
8. Slight left to stay on OH-183 W – 5.2 mi
9. Slight right at N Union Ave – 0.5 mi
10. Turn left at 49/E Main St Destination will be on the left – 0.3 mi
Arrive at: Jupiter Studios 346 E Main St Alliance, OH 44601

Traveling from Canton, OH:
1. Head west on 1490/Wellman Ave SE toward 1252/4th St SE -131 ft
2. Take the 1st right onto 1252/4th St SE - 417 ft
3. Take the 2nd right onto Lincoln Way E/OH-172 E. Continue to follow OH-172 E – 6.8 mi
4. Turn right to merge onto I-77 N/US-62 E toward Akron – 2.2 mi
5. Take exit 107B to merge onto Atlantic Blvd NE/US-62 E toward Alliance – 13.2 mi
6. Take the US-62/OH-173/State St exit toward Alliance – 0.4 mi
7. Turn right at OH-173 E/W State St/US-62 E – 3.3 mi
8. Turn left at S Union Ave – 1.4 mi
9. Turn right at 49/E Main St. Destination will be on the left – 0.3 mi