I have a bit of senior anxiety

We senior citizens are a bit nervous about the new health care proposals. We have been assured that "death panels" and the like are simply the rabid venom of the radical right. Maybe so, but I think it may be working for I still feel uneasy. Maybe as we grow older we grow more neurotic, but still....

Just when I was about to say "yes we can" to the wonderful new world of life and freedom from anxiety, I read Jim Towey's article on "The Death Book for Veterans" which appears on the online web-site of the Wall Street Journal. He writes that President Bush was forced to intercede and discontinue the publication of a Veterans Administration workbook entitled "Your Life, Your Choices" which was first published in 1997. The book was authored by Dr. Robert Pearlman, Chief of Ethics Evaluation for the VA's National Center for Ethics in Health Care. The workbook leads veterans to ask and answer for themselves various questions such as " would life be worth living if "you can't shake the blues" or if you're a severe financial burden on your family?". Pearlman in 1996 advocated for physician-assisted suicide in Vacco v Quill before the Supreme Court and is known for his support of health-care rationing.

In July of this year, under the Obama Administration, the VA re-introduced a revised version of "Your Life, Your Choices". The Care Providers are encouraged to point not only the older veterans to the publication, but all 24 million veterans. The publication is to be used in discussion of "advanced directives". Only one organization is referred to as a resource for such end of life planning and that is the notorious "Hemlock Society" (now known as "Compassion and Choices").

Mr Towey is President of Saint Vincent College and is also founder of "Aging with Dignity". I and some of my friends are very much in favor of being allowed to "age with dignity" and as a result, we get a bit nervous when healthy, wealthy middle aged folks, whom we have never met may be deciding whether its feasible to treat our cancer or provide a life prolonging heart surgery. Maybe for the sake of the economy and more deserving middle aged folks, we should decide to die. Maybe morphine can be sold over the counter and nitro glycerin provided in our cereal. Such would surely be a social benefit and more cost effective. Maybe those birthers can find me a new birth certificate, showing my age as 40. Or maybe the State could just lose my birth certificate and the government couldn't prove me to be ----. You didn't really expect me to give my age, did you?