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  • Ezekiel Emanuel: Die At 75

    The 15 Most Shocking Statements in ObamaCare Architect's 'Die at 75'

    by John Nolte 22 Sep 2014 323
    Last week, esteemed doctor and one of our ObamaCare Architect Overlords penned a column for the Atlantic that should win a Pulitzer Prize for passive-aggressive shaming. Although Emanuel claims that *he* doesn't want to live past the age of 75, the article itself could have been a listicle titled, "Top 15 Reasons No One Over 75 Should Receive Healthcare."

    Emanuel even includes a monstrous but brightly colored graph that is meant to tell anyone over 75 that their "last contribution" to society likely occurred more than a decade ago.

    Good God.

    The phrase "the banality of evil" gets bandied about a lot. Emanuel's column, which in reality is a public service announcement meant to begin a debate about the way in which we prioritize healthcare, takes the prize in that department.

    And yes, Emanuel's article is an act of evil, written by a soulless bureaucrat with no respect or compassion for the individual. Emanuel's only concern is for the collective, the State. And he is exactly the kind of "medical professional" many feared would grab hold of our healthcare system if the Federal government got their hands on it -- which it now has.

    Thanks Obama!

    Leftists like Emanuel don’t see human life as anything more than utilitarian. They see nothing special or unique or inviolable about the Individual or life itself. For them, creating an orderly and structured Utopia takes precedent over the value and rights of the Individual. Abortion is a perfect example. Unwanted children mess up society. Unborn children with handicaps are imperfect and have no place in a society striving for perfection. So they are stripped of their rights, and as a result, by the millions, we break their spines and suck out their brains and call it "choice."

    Not everyone on the Left is as coldly robotic as Emanuel, but there's a strain of this thinking throughout the Democrat Party; the idea that individual liberty and the rights of the individual must be subjugated by the need to perfect society and the future. Fat-shaming is a perfect example. Instead of leaving people alone to live life how they want, the Left is shaming them with the busybody argument that their obesity is everyone's business because it costs society money through increased health care costs.

    And now Emanuel is hoping to use the Fed's grab of our healthcare system to create policies that will more quickly rid society of those "leeches and takers" you and I call Mom, Dad, Grandpa and Grandma.

    Emanuel's method is brilliantly sinister. Using figures and science and facts, he's just sayin'!

    I've broke Emanuel's madness down into a handy listicle and highlighted the real jaw-droppers:

    1. But over recent decades, increases in longevity seem to have been accompanied by increases in disability—not decreases.

    2. My father illustrates the situation well. About a decade ago, just shy of his 77th birthday, he began having pain in his abdomen. Like every good doctor, he kept denying that it was anything important. But after three weeks with no improvement, he was persuaded to see his physician. He had in fact had a heart attack, which led to a cardiac catheterization and ultimately a bypass. Since then, he has not been the same.

    3. The bad news is that many of the roughly 6.8 million Americans who have survived a stroke suffer from paralysis or an inability to speak.

    4. So American immortals may live longer than their parents, but they are likely to be more incapacitated. Does that sound very desirable? Not to me.

    5. Half of people 80 and older with functional limitations. A third of people 85 and older with Alzheimer’s. That still leaves many, many elderly people who have escaped physical and mental disability. If we are among the lucky ones, then why stop at 75? Why not live as long as possible?

    6. Even if we aren’t demented, our mental functioning deteriorates as we grow older. Age-associated declines in mental-processing speed, working and long-term memory, and problem-solving are well established.

    7. Conversely, distractibility increases. We cannot focus and stay with a project as well as we could when we were young. As we move slower with age, we also think slower.

    8. It is not just mental slowing. We literally lose our creativity.

    9. Living parents also occupy the role of head of the family. They make it hard for grown children to become the patriarch or matriarch.

    10. When parents routinely live to 95, children must caretake into their own retirement. That doesn’t leave them much time on their own—and it is all old age.

    11. How do we want to be remembered by our children and grandchildren? … We want to be remembered as independent, not experienced as burdens.

    12. But even if we manage not to become burdens to them, our shadowing them until their old age is also a loss. And leaving them—and our grandchildren—with memories framed not by our vivacity but by our frailty is the ultimate tragedy.

    13. This means colonoscopies and other cancer-screening tests are out—and before 75. If I were diagnosed with cancer now, at 57, I would probably be treated, unless the prognosis was very poor. But 65 will be my last colonoscopy.

    14. After 75, if I develop cancer, I will refuse treatment. Similarly, no cardiac stress test. No pacemaker and certainly no implantable defibrillator. No heart-valve replacement or bypass surgery. If I develop emphysema or some similar disease that involves frequent exacerbations that would, normally, land me in the hospital, I will accept treatment to ameliorate the discomfort caused by the feeling of suffocation, but will refuse to be hauled off.

    15. Flu shots are out.

    This is what decent people would call the mission statement of a death cult.

    When you look at society as a whole, instead of people as individuals, wiping out everyone over 75 looks like a great idea. Moreover, so does aborting unwanted pregnancies and "imperfect" fetuses.

    Using a slide rule, all kinds of clinical madness sounds smart, even compassionate; The Greater Good, and all that.

    What's so unsettling is that Emanuel and his ilk aren't trying to save money or improve quality of life. The endgame with ObamaCare has nothing to do with that. ObamaCare is the vehicle and this "cost-saving" propaganda is nothing more than the roadmap to crafting the Left's twisted version of Utopia.

    My dad just turned 75 this year. Because he wasn't born with a silver spoon in his mouth like Mr. Emanuel, he couldn’t live the kind of life he's dreamed of until he turned 70. After 50-plus years of pumping our gas, fixing our cars, keeping our Air Force flying, remodeling our homes, and ensuring our nursing homes were up to code (oh the irony!), Dad finally had what he needed to retire only 5 years ago.

    Put aside the countless "contributions" my father offers me and the rest of his family and friends (contributions not considered worthy enough to rate on Ezekiel Emanuel's horror show of a slide rule) on a daily basis; for over a half-century my father did more than his part to keep our world turning. And now he deserves and has earned the right to enjoy his retirement, and the best medical care available to help him do just, for as long as he damn well pleases.

    My father is not a burden and never will be.

    He's my dad.

    So I guess that what I'm trying to say is that Ezekiel Emanuel and his ObamaCare death cultists can go straight to Hell.


    John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC


    Also:

    http://video.foxnews.com/v/3807823557001/dr-ezekiel-emanuel-75-is-the-ideal-age-to-die/#sp=show-clips

  • #2
    Go Ezekiel!

    Originally posted by vt View Post
    The 15 Most Shocking Statements in ObamaCare Architect's 'Die at 75'

    by John Nolte 22 Sep 2014 323
    Last week, esteemed doctor and one of our ObamaCare Architect Overlords penned a column for the Atlantic that should win a Pulitzer Prize for passive-aggressive shaming. Although Emanuel claims that *he* doesn't want to live past the age of 75, the article itself could have been a listicle titled, "Top 15 Reasons No One Over 75 Should Receive Healthcare."



    I like the article. It is very well reasoned. He says that people should have choice, and they should consider the possibility of refusing medical care after a certain point and accept death. For himself, he just chooses that point to be 75 years old. I am 53, and although I have not accomplished what I really wanted, I could accept death now more easily than 20 years ago.

    Nowhere does he say that the government should not provide medical care for people over 75. (Regardless of public policy, individuals are always free to spend as much of their own money on anything they want to. We are discussing how much the individual is entitled to from tax payers. )

    I think there is not a specific age, but a more of a level of decrepitude. That problem with that approach is that you might
    just keep pushing the boundary past where you want it.

    My 2nd girl friend's aunt was a very bright person. She ran a book club for years and even self published a history of philosophy. I went to a thanksgiving meal with the family and the woman could not even recognize her own son. When we were alone, my girl friend said "She would not have wanted to be like this."

    Comment


    • #3
      Re: Go Ezekiel!

      Originally posted by Polish_Silver View Post
      I like the article. It is very well reasoned. He says that people should have choice, and they should consider the possibility of refusing medical care after a certain point and accept death. For himself, he just chooses that point to be 75 years old. I am 53, and although I have not accomplished what I really wanted, I could accept death now more easily than 20 years ago.

      Nowhere does he say that the government should not provide medical care for people over 75. (Regardless of public policy, individuals are always free to spend as much of their own money on anything they want to. We are discussing how much the individual is entitled to from tax payers. )

      I think there is not a specific age, but a more of a level of decrepitude. That problem with that approach is that you might
      just keep pushing the boundary past where you want it.
      The reality is many people do not have a choice. Only 25-30% of Americans have a health care directive or living will. So no matter what age you are 25, 55, or 75 if you have a progressive life threatening disease, you will not have the autonomy to take responsibility for your decisions.

      Though I have not seen it yet, VT may be saying as our medical care system collapses within from the aging baby boomers and AHA, then those who are >75 may find themselves at the short end of the straw as it will be too expensive to provide various life sustaining therapies such as ventilator.

      This is a train wreck ready to happen as poor Grandma and Grandpa are struggling thru their final weeks/days, family is fighting over what to do and hospitals are making economic over "do no harm" decisions.

      One of the workshops that I am preparing for a senior care assisted living facility is around health care directives. The book that I am basing my work on is titled Planning for Uncertainty by Doukas. It gives the reader (age does not matter) how to maintain autonomy before disease or end of life strikes. One of the key elements that the author suggests is a Values History that can be attached to a health care directive so that the doctor and family can use the appropriate therapies to minimize pain, extend quality of life or simply prepare one to meet their Maker. He even mentions the use of trialing a therapy and if it does not work, then you withdraw.

      Age is irrelevant. None of us knows the end of our life and as Psalm 103:15-16 says "our days are like a flower that flourishes in the field, the wind passes over it, and it is gone and its place knows it no more."

      Comment


      • #4
        Re: Go Ezekiel!

        Originally posted by jpetr48 View Post
        The reality is many people do not have a choice. Only 25-30% of Americans have a health care directive or living will. "
        Perhaps we could say "many people don't make a choice". But the 25%, aren't they the ones over 60, who need to have one?

        Comment


        • #5
          Re: Go Ezekiel!

          Originally posted by Polish_Silver View Post
          Perhaps we could say "many people don't make a choice". But the 25%, aren't they the ones over 60, who need to have one?
          Thanks for the rewording. That is what i meant

          on the 25% and being over 60 needing one definitely. The mortality tables show this fact

          however what i am saying is none of us knows the boundary on end of their life. i have seen one to many people in their 20s 30s 40s and even younger face life threatening illness.

          i volunteered for the Make a Wish Foundation and was one of their wish grantors. this was a humbling experience as i saw what you and i would consider unnatural happen too frequently- too many children with fatal diseases- we called them life threatening which i still do today. Doing wishes for 10, 12 14 year olds and visiting hospitals where the entire occupancy is children such as a children's hospital, all these experiences cause one to pause, continue to reach out and give and take stock of our and our family - live each day like it is your last and be thankful for what has been provided for you

          Comment


          • #6
            Re: Go Ezekiel!

            Gene Simmons, the Kiss drummer was interviewed on NPR years ago. Over all, he seemed like an arrogant AH, flaunting his income relative to the radio interviewer. But he said one thing that really stuck with me. His mother was a concentration camp survivor. She told Gene "Every day above ground is a good day."

            Comment


            • #7
              Re: Go Ezekiel!

              Originally posted by Polish_Silver View Post
              Gene Simmons, the Kiss drummer was interviewed on NPR years ago. ... His mother told Gene "Every day above ground is a good day."
              typing as one who watched as his mother slipped away - at 75 (quite literally, after going back into a hospital, back on the antibiotics and for want of an assist to get out of bed to goto the toilet, slipped/wiped-out on her own s__t on the way down off the bed to the floor = so much for medicare/caid 'being there' for ya when ya need it) due to 'complications from pneumonia' (mostly 50years of smoking and quitting just a little too late...) - where upon being relegated to a nursing home, decided for herself (apparently, or so we think) to yank the O2 from her nostrils and took herself out, rather than be confined in 'one of those places' (as she put it) - along with not getting to see my ole man 1 last time before he checked-out - at 77 (read: 'let himself go' mostly due to bad diet aka 'meat n taters' & no exercise, smoking almost to the end...)

              these 'personal anecdotes' do more communicating than reading volumes of other stuff...

              but we should have THE ABSOLUTE RIGHT to decide for ourselves when its time to go = why i didnt argue much with my S.O. when she 'forced me' to get one of them 'living will/directive' things drawn up

              not sure why i'm putting this out here, but i just wanted to thank joe once again for his service (on all fronts)

              Comment


              • #8
                Re: Go Ezekiel!

                Originally posted by lektrode View Post
                typing as one who watched as his mother slipped away - at 75 (quite literally, after going back into a hospital, back on the antibiotics and for want of an assist to get out of bed to goto the toilet, slipped/wiped-out on her own s__t on the way down off the bed to the floor = so much for medicare/caid 'being there' for ya when ya need it) due to 'complications from pneumonia' (mostly 50years of smoking and quitting just a little too late...) - where upon being relegated to a nursing home, decided for herself (apparently, or so we think) to yank the O2 from her nostrils and took herself out, rather than be confined in 'one of those places' (as she put it) - along with not getting to see my ole man 1 last time before he checked-out - at 77 (read: 'let himself go' mostly due to bad diet aka 'meat n taters' & no exercise, smoking almost to the end...)

                these 'personal anecdotes' do more communicating than reading volumes of other stuff...

                but we should have THE ABSOLUTE RIGHT to decide for ourselves when its time to go = why i didnt argue much with my S.O. when she 'forced me' to get one of them 'living will/directive' things drawn up

                not sure why i'm putting this out here, but i just wanted to thank joe once again for his service (on all fronts)
                Lektrode, I think those are touching, and instructive stories. The atlantic article actually mentiones pnemonia as the "old man's friend". JRR Tolkien died of pnemonia in his early 70's, and otherwise he was still in very good health.

                My mother's death was a relief to everyone. Constant pain from terminal throat cancer. My father was quite different. He had chronic, treatable lymphatic cancer. He could take care of himself until the end, and even seemed to be gaining more friends in the neighborhood. The only help he needed on a regular basis was car trips to the grocery store. However, he caught an untreatable bacterial infection due to the chemotherapy. It was a relatively quick death.

                My best high school friend had one of the most pioneering fathers in the neighborhood. A veteran of the 82nd airborne division, he went on many bow and gun hunting trips, was the first in the neighborhood to scuba dive, read all of Solzhenitsyn's novels, and was always trying to invent something. The last time I saw him, he couldn't recognize me. I really don't think he would have wanted to be like that.
                Last edited by Polish_Silver; September 27, 2014, 04:33 PM.

                Comment


                • #9
                  Re: Go Ezekiel!

                  Swiss soundly defeat state run health insurance:

                  http://news.yahoo.com/public-versus-...hUJXUA8YHQtDMD

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Re: Go Ezekiel!

                    Originally posted by vt View Post
                    Swiss soundly defeat state run health insurance:

                    http://news.yahoo.com/public-versus-...hUJXUA8YHQtDMD

                    The article did not give info info to decide how efficient the swiss system is. 400 euro premium compared to 4800 take home would make it much more efficient than the US system.

                    HOwever, they could still have an equity problem for the low wage earners.

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Re: Go Ezekiel!

                      PS:

                      It's not 400 Euro. It's 400 Swiss Francs. That's about $250. It also puts the annual max deductible at about $1,500. Far cheaper than you think if you're thinking in Euros. And it's mandatory for everybody. But you only have to pay up to 8% of your income. Once you pay 8% of your income, the government picks up the rest of the tab. That's how they got everybody insured in Switzerland.

                      Insurers also aren't allowed to profit off basic health coverage (they can on dental and vision and stuff). They also regulate max drug prices and lab fees. And somewhat like Obamacare, they mandate community ratings so that all adults are charged the same price per policy in a given region. That's a big part of how they keep it cheaper.

                      Anyways, I just wanted to clear that stuff up FWIW.

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        Re: Go Ezekiel!

                        Originally posted by dcarrigg View Post
                        It's not 400 Euro. It's 400 Swiss Francs. That's about $250.
                        I'm not nitpicking here, I'm just b*tching about the Federal Reserve.

                        400 Swiss francs was worth approximately 250 US dollars ten years ago. [Even at those exchange rates, I found Switzerland astonishingly expensive compared to the U.S.] Today, thanks to the Federal Reserve's extraordinary management of the U.S. economy and currency, 400 Swiss francs is about 420 US dollars.

                        Yes, we went from needing $0.75 to buy a Swiss franc to needing $1.05 to buy a Swiss franc.

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Re: Go Ezekiel!

                          Whelp. I'm way off. You're right. I do this sometimes. Last time I was around there was Lake Constance in 2002. I need to get out more - of the country I mean...

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Re: Go Ezekiel!

                            Originally posted by dcarrigg View Post
                            Whelp. I'm way off. You're right. I do this sometimes. Last time I was around there was Lake Constance in 2002. I need to get out more - of the country I mean...
                            I do too. I was on a business trip in Geneva in 2004 and thought that if I saved up enough money over the following years, I'd be able to return for a proper vacation. In light of what has happened to currency exchange rates since then, it doesn't seem likely that I'll ever be able to afford to vacation in Switzerland.

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Re: Go Ezekiel!

                              Just left Switzerland (spent 5 days in Germany, 1.5 in Switzerland) and am now back in Germany. We'll go to Austria for a day and night then to Germany for two more days before back to the states.

                              Europe is expensive, not just Switzerland; they just take it up another notch.

                              We really like Germany though. A country that works!

                              Comment

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