Well, I guess that I am not surprised that the citizens of Massachusetts voted 51 to 49% to kill the assisted suicide measure.
Death With Dignity, the group that supported the measure, was outspent 5 to 1 by the opposition. But it was very close and I’d imagine that it will be back on the ballot soon.
One of the more effective anti assisted suicide messages offered by the opposition was that grandma could be offed by a greedy relative who would be one of the two people needed to witness a person’s request. So, if you are terminal, in great pain and want out… too bad. You can’t do it in MA because the opposition invoked granny. As I have asked on this blog and in the book “Boomercide”, don’t I have the right to control my destiny? Why is the Catholic Church involved in my personal decisions?
From the Boston Globe:
A Massachusetts ballot question that would have legalized physician-assisted suicide for the terminally ill has been defeated by a narrow margin.
The measure voted on Tuesday was defeated 51 percent to 49 percent with 96 percent of precincts counted, and was the closest of the three questions on the Massachusetts ballot.
‘‘We believe the voters came to see this as a flawed approach to end of life care, lacking in the most basic safeguards,’’ Rosanne Bacon Meade, chairwoman of the Committee Against Assisted Suicide, said in a statement.
Religious, medical and disability rights groups fought the measure, saying it’s open to manipulation and relies on diagnoses that could be wrong.
Cardinal Sean O’Malley, leaders of millions of Roman Catholics in the state, called the defeat the best outcome for the ‘‘common good.’’
‘‘It is my hope and prayer that the defeat of Question 2 will help all people to understand that for our brothers and sisters confronted with terminal illness we can do better than offering them the means to end their lives,’’ O’Malley said in a statement.