Posted on 07/04/2008 9:24:06 PM PDT by Coleus
A German politician who helped a woman to end her life and released a video of her death has caused outrage in Germany and prompted the authorities to try to tighten their rules on . Roger Kusch, a former senator in Hamburg and a prominent right-to-die campaigner, has said he advised Bettina Schardt, a healthy 79-year-old pensioner, on how to prepare a lethal cocktail of sedatives and anti-malaria drugs which would kill her. He said he then left her flat shortly before she died.
Mr Kusch filmed nine hours of conversations with the unmarried and childless woman, who said she dreaded being taken to a home for the elderly. However, she did not have a terminal illness and said: "I can't say that I am suffering." The subject of euthanasia is particularly sensitive in Germany due to the Nazis who some historians estimate killed more than 100,000 mentally handicapped or incurably ill people between 1940 and 1945.
It is illegal to help someone commit suicide in Germany but Mr Kusch sought to avoid prosecution as he did not personally administer the drugs. Details of the case, which prosecutors are investigating, emerged when Mr Kusch showed extracts of the video at a news conference.
"What Mr Kusch did was macabre propaganda which has nothing to do with politics," said Ulla Schmidt, the German health minister. Joerg-Dietrich Hoppe, president of the German Medical Association, also condemned Mr Kusch, who earlier this year came up with a "suicide machine" which patients could use to inject themselves with a cocktail of drugs. "It is abhorrent and deeply shocking how an egotistical cynic has exploited the loneliness of an old lady in his craving for recognition," Mr Hoppe told Bild newspaper.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
The “right to die” will soon become the “duty to die”.
Most folks in the seventies are completely aware of their surroundings and capable of making rational decisions....although I’d say 25 percent are naive and fragile in mental thinking. I’d suspect that this political figure took advantage of the fragile condition and simply talked her into this decision. There are more than enough books out there to tell an individual how to do themselves in....we don’t need some “snake-oil” salesman selling this kind of stuff on top of that.
Despicable scum that he is he will soon be judged by a Higher Authority.
I noted in your home page that you said:
“I once found myself voting for Mr. Perrot..”
In your post, you say regarding people in their 70’s:
“...although Id say 25 percent are naive and fragile in mental thinking.”
Pick your 100 seventy-five year old poll participants (any mall, any street, any city, any state)....less than ten will remember Ross and his significance in that one election year. Ask the 100 to name the three candidates who ran that year...and less than ten will remember all three. Ask who won that election year...and be prepared for only a quarter of the 100 to remember that. You’ve painted a great picture Rembrandt....and your confidence in our senior population is strongly appreciated...but reality doesn’t help your case.
Murder of lonely people.
Suicide, assisted suicide, right to die, murder of the lonely.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.