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Brandon Pharmacy, Other SD Businesses Helping Circulate New Petitions for Marijuana and Assisted Suicide

Attorney General Marty Jackley has said more than once that he could support medical marijuana under three conditions:

“What I have indicated as Attorney General from a matter of public safety and a matter of public health that in order for me to likely support a Marijuana piece of legislation I would need three major protections in place.” South Dakota Attorney General Marty Jackley tells KSFY News those three protections would allow for true medicinal use and not open the door to abuse. “One would be FDA approval, one would be a South Dakota physician prescribing the medication and the other would be a South Dakota pharmacist dispensing it” [“Medical Marijuana Supporters Hope to See Legislation in Pierre,” KSFY, 2017.01.13].

Tom Wullstein, Brandon Pharmacy
Tom Wullstein, Brandon Pharmacy

The medical marijuana initiative currently circulating would allow “dispensaries,” not just pharmacists, to distribute medical cannabis, so it doesn’t meet A.G. Jackley’s third standard. But the medical marijuana initiative, along with the other two initiative circulated by New Approach South Dakota on recreational marijuana and assisted suicide, does have Brandon pharmacist Tom Wullstein on board as a petition circulator:

Please welcome the Brandon Pharmacy to our team as a permanent signing location for the petitions. Located at 116 E Holly Blvd in Brandon, SD. Dr Tom & his family are excited to welcome you to their business in order to bring compassion to SD.

…Please support local businesses that support our cause. Together we can move mountains [New Approach South Dakota, Facebook post, 2017.07.12].

Brandon Pharmacy is just one of several South Dakota businesses that are willing to host circulation of these controversial petitions. The Spearfish Sears store hosted New Approach petitioners on July 4 and continues to have petitions available to sign. Nick’s Hamburger Shop in Brookings is letting New Approach collect signatures in its courtyard this evening during the Downtown at Sundown event this evening. Crow Peak Brewing Company in Spearfish and Beamers Pub in Lennox have also hosted New Approach SD petitions.

65 Comments

  1. Bradley Williams 2017-07-13 17:05

    Meanwhile:
    – [ ] CA report on assisted suicide is incomplete: How many self-administered as promised?
    What is missing in the CA report on assisted suicides?
    So after a year in CA how many self administered the poison as was promised when the concept was marketed? By omitting an ordinary witness all the flaunted safeguards are eviscerated and our choices are ignored and not honored allowing exploitation of us all.
    State Documents in Oregon indicate that 20% of their assisted suicide deaths were bullied by the corporate facilitators forcing the poison. I take exception to the push polls yes 60%, even the religious, favor the concept then 95% change to not-in-favor after they learn how easily the laws can be wrongly administered saying “I’m not for that”. Risking us all,all ages, to be exploited by predatory corporations and predatory new best friends or heirs.
    Read the language of the laws to decern the double speak, omissions and commissions to reveal the exploited, expended and euthanized.

  2. Chris 2017-07-13 22:06

    Compassion my butt you just want to make big bucks to help kill people. That’s murder. I do not agree with what you are doing and will be watching you

  3. Cory Allen Heidelberger Post author | 2017-07-14 07:11

    I find the accusation that anyone wants to help kill people hyperbolic, vitriolic, and unsubstantiable. No policymaker in this debate wants to kill people. That accusation is a cheap shot seeking to distract from the moral and policy questions at hand.

    I am also of the impression that no one in New Approach SD stands to make any money from the manufacture of life-ending drugs or from any other conceivable aspect of the assisted suicide process. However, Chris, if you can document a money trail, the floor is open.

  4. Bradley Williams 2017-07-14 09:03

    South Dakota 2017-18 Initiative that does not provide witness to self administration
    This is not about people who are dying anyway all of us, all ages are at risk. Medical standard of care according to the Oregon state reports is poison for expressing feelings of concern about possible loss of autonomy.
    The deceptive marketing trick of mentioning the assurance of “self administration” 7 times then omitting an ordinary witness eviscerates the so called safeguards. The difference is a witness honors and secures our choice without a witness it allows exploitation of all of us all ages via stealth euthanasia. This nontransparent Oregonmodel assisted suicide initiative ignores our choice by empowering others including predatory corporations encouraging enabling and embracing filicide
    There is no transparent reason for falsifying the death certificate which serves to block investigations and public study.
    It provides Instant immunity for all involved even a predatory heir who can be a witness or a predatory corporation.
    The bill allows that a stranger who claims to know how we communicate can speak for us through out. One could be diagnosed and dead in 15 days with immunity for a predatory heir, all before the family knows. This bill is not the one if you want our choice to be honored.
    We trust our doctors and health care workers but there is no transparent reason to tempt them with this sword.
    South Dakota takes care of its own!
    Bradley Williams
    President
    MTaas org

  5. Bradley Williams 2017-07-14 09:06

    I cared for my wife as she lost autonomy during her last 18 months. I learned that you can work on 4 hours sleep. The corporate promoters, K Tucker, of assisted suicide now sell with feelings of fear of losing autonomy flying in the face of those living every day with loss of autonomy. This is why the secular left disability rights community is leading the resistance. They and libertarians know these laws do not assure individual choice. The law allows that one could be diagnosed and dead in 15 days with immunity for a predatory heir/new friend, all before the family knows.
    They used the concept of self-administration to sell the euthanasia policy, then omitted an ordinary witness to the administration which renders flaunted safeguards hollow. Likely 20% are forced euthanasia.
    The medical standard of care established by the non transparent OR/WA euthanasia policy is an application of poison for anyone with feelings of concern about losing autonomy. This is documented by the OR/WA state reports. Now they propose 1 day turn around from diagnosis to death by poison in Hawaii.
    That is the low bar of standard of care the corporate promoters of euthanasia want to establish for us all. That will put us all (all ages) at risk of exploitation by the medical industrial complex, human trafficking, predatory corporations, covert organ traffickers, predatory heirs and “new best friends” like Oregon’s Thomas Middleton killers via the Oregon policy. This public policy is neither reasonable nor prudent rather it is insidious at best.
    Respectfully
    Bradley Williams
    President MTaas org

  6. Porter Lansing 2017-07-14 09:20

    Bradley … Show some proof of your opinions. Show some evidence that exploitation of those six months from death have been exploited. Show some proof that predatory corporations are encouraging enabling and embracing filicide. (death of a family member) Show some proof that you’re not just a religious zealot trying to invent fear.
    Montana, where you are, has a Supreme Court that issued a ruling in late 2009 that broadened the state’s Rights of the Terminally Ill Act to include physician-assisted suicide.

  7. Bradley Williams 2017-07-14 11:27

    MTaas org is a single issue group that welcomes all supporters even as we may not agree on other issues. Early on we established over 5,000 supporters in Montana. These supporters represent the entire spectrum of the public, from atheists to eastern philosophy and libertarians to progressives including the disability rights community. We focus narrowly on the language of the assisted suicide bills/laws, the omissions , double speak, commissions and how it can be administered.

  8. Bradley Williams 2017-07-14 11:53

    Porter What else haven’t they told you for convenience of their promotion?
    Correction please: Like 44 other States no one in Montana has immunity from prosecution. No doctor, nurse, caregiver, heir, new best friend nor predatory corporation has immunity. Here is the rest of the story.
    Your source has done you a disservice. Their foundation is crumbling under the weight of non transparent pitfalls. The promoters of assisted suicide have worn out their thesaurus attempting to imply that it is legal in Montana. Physician Assisted Suicide is a homicide in Montana. Our MT Supreme Court did ruled that if a doctor is charged with a homicide they might have a potential defense based on consent. The MT Supreme Court acknowledged it is a homicide in the ruling.

    The Court did not address civil liabilities and they vacated the lower court’s claim that it was a constitutional right. Unlike Oregon no one in Montana has immunity from civil or criminal prosecution, death certificates are not legally falsified and investigations are not prohibited like in OR, WA and CA. Does that sound legal to you?

    Perhaps the promoters are frustrated that even though they were the largest lobbying spender in Montana their Oregon model legalizing assisted suicide bills have been rejected in Montana in 2011, 2013 and 2015. The predatory corporation abandoned their legislative bullying in 2017. Lives are saved every day by stopping exploitation and covert euthanasia.

  9. Porter Lansing 2017-07-14 12:07

    Mr. Williams …
    Paragraph 1. It’s a false narrative to assert that I implied immunity to anyone.
    Paragraph 2. The foundation is crumbling because … (wait for it …) because YOU say so?
    Paragraph 3. Yes, a Supreme Court decision sounds legal to me. The Montana ruling shields doctors from prosecution as long as they have the patient’s request in writing.
    Paragraph 4. Comparing Oregon to Montana to South Dakota is a false equivalency. It’s an emotionally motivated distortion to assert that someone whom a Doctor has certified will not live longer than six months has had her life saved.
    ~ God grants people free will. You however believe you have the right to remove a choice from the people because you don’t agree with it. That’s bullying and it’s selfish and it’s religiously oppressive to people’s “free will”.

  10. mike from iowa 2017-07-14 12:30

    Bradley Williams- this is what your article sez about Baxter- The Baxter decision

    Baxter found that there was no indication in Montana law that physician-assisted suicide, which the Court termed “aid in dying,” is against public policy. (354 Mont. at 240, ¶¶ 13, 49-50). Based on this finding, the Court held that a patient’s consent to aid in dying “constitutes a statutory defense to a charge of homicide against the aiding physician.” (Id. at 251, ¶ 50).

    Your article goes on to claim two attempts to rectify this were unsuccessful. You seem to be totally dependent on a lawyer’s OPINION of what the law should be.

  11. mike from iowa 2017-07-14 12:39

    Montana’s Rights of the Terminally Ill Act shields physicians from criminal liability for acting according to the patient’s end-of-life wishes, and the act should be extended to include physicians who provide aid in dying to consenting, mentally competent, terminally ill patients. (To read Montana’s Rights of the Terminally Ill Act, see Montana Code § § 50-9-101 and following.)

    (Baxter v. Montana, 354 Mont. 234.)

  12. Porter Lansing 2017-07-14 12:39

    Do Not Resuscitate, advance directives and living wills are assisted suicide, per se. A terminally ill patient has full rights in South Dakota to choose to stop their life from being saved. Euthenasia (Death With Dignity) is a wholly valid subset of those directives.

  13. Bradley Williams 2017-07-14 13:15

    Baxter Case Analysis

    Analysis of Implications of
    the Baxter Case on Potential Criminal Liability

    By Greg Jackson, Esq. & Matt Bowman, Esq.

    The Montana Supreme Court’s assisted suicide decision is remarkable for what it did not do. In Baxter v. State of Montana, 354 Mont. 234 (2009), the Court did not declare assisted suicide a constitutional right, and it imposed no duty on physicians or hospitals to assist suicides. In fact, the Court’s narrow decision didn’t even “legalize” assisted suicide. The Court merely allowed a possible consent defense if persons continue to be charged with murder for assisted suicide. Because the Court defined the practice of assisted suicide so benignly, it is an open question whether most assisted suicides would even qualify for the defense. And since Montana law already defines assisted suicide as murder, the legislature doesn’t have to make it “illegal”—it can simply declare that a consent defense for assisted suicide is not consistent with Montana public policy. After Baxter, assisted suicide continues to carry both criminal and civil liability risks for any doctor, institution, or lay person involved.

    Although the parties in Baxter focused their arguments on whether “physician aid in dying” is a right under the Montana Constitution, the Court declined to rule on the constitutional issue. Decision ¶ 10. By avoiding the constitution and focusing on mere statutory interpretation, the Court left the door open for the legislature to correct or clarify any of the Court’s holdings.

    The Court specifically focused on Montana’s statutes defining murder and defining when a victim’s consent can be used as a defense by someone charged with murder. The Court recognized that under Mont. Code Ann. § 45-5-102(1), “a person commits the offense of deliberate homicide if ‘the person purposely or knowingly causes the death of another human being.'” Decision ¶ 10. The Court then inquired whether a physician charged with murder for assisted suicide could use another statute, the consent of the victim under § 45-2-211(1), as a defense during his prosecution. The Court observed that the consent statute can be available when the action is a “statutory crime.” Decision ¶ 43.

    By this analysis, the Court conceded that assisted suicide is already defined as murder, and therefore is a crime under Montana law. The Court did not strike down or reinterpret the murder statute to exclude the activity of assisted suicide. Assisted suicide remains an act that “knowingly causes the death of another human being” under the homicide statute. The consent defense itself confirms that assisted suicide qualifies as murder. Montana’s consent statute, § 45-2-211(1), says that only applies “to conduct charged to constitute an offense,” that is, to conduct that already meets the definition of a crime, in this case the crime of murder. A consent defense is only raised by a defendant who has already been charged with a crime and whose actions are defined as a crime. Therefore, persons committing assisted suicide in Montana are still committing an act defined by statute as homicide. They face being charged and prosecuted for murder, with only the hope that they can defeat the charge by raising and succeeding a consent defense.

    But just because a defendant can raise a consent defense doesn’t mean he will succeed. The Court only decided whether and when defendants “could” raise the defense, not whether it would actually work for them. Decision ¶ 11. The consent defense, like other statutory defenses, is dependent on the unique facts of each particular case. Thus, although consent may be a defense, it is not a definitive shield from criminal culpability. Indeed, by adopting the rhetoric of the pro-assisted-suicide Plaintiffs, the Baxter decision defines “aid in dying” so benignly that many if not most actual circumstances of assisted suicide might not even qualify to use the defense.

    The Court gave itself the job of deciding whether Montana’s undefined “public policy” would allow the consent defense for “aid in dying” criminal defendants. Decision ¶ 14. To qualify as “aid in dying” under this public policy analysis, the Court had to show that society is not offended by “aid in dying” or its “resulting harms.” Id. This required the Court to describe many details about what “aid in dying” does and does not involve. In this process, however, the Court effectively narrowed the very definition of “aid in dying,” leaving only the idealistic, peaceful dream envisioned by assisted suicide advocates. But this narrowed the holding of the entire case, because the consent defense is only available for “aid in dying” as the Court described it. If an act of assisted suicide exceeds the Court’s benign definition of “aid in dying,” a criminal defendant will not even be able to use Baxter to raise the consent defense, much less succeed on it.

    The Court’s narrow definition of “aid in dying” illustrates the difficulty of predicting which, if any, actual assisted suicides can even qualify for much less succeed with a consent defense. The Court initially defined “aid in dying” as occurring when, “with the patient’s consent,” “the physicians provide aid in dying,” “to terminally ill” “mentally competent” “adult patients.” Decision ¶ 12. The Court went on to point out that under the consent statute, consent must be “given by a person who is legally competent to authorize the conduct,” not by someone “who by reason of youth, mental disease or defect, intoxication is unable to make a reasonable judgment as to the nature or harmfulness of the conduct,” and not by someone who is “induced by force, duress, or deception.” Courts, and more importantly, juries, are “required” to examine, “case by case,” whether these determinations “render[] consent ineffective.” Decision ¶ 14.

    The Court went even further to narrow the scope of what kind of “aid in dying” qualifies for a consent defense. The Court emphasized the minimalism of a physician’s involvement, by declaring that the doctor merely “makes medication available,” and that “the physician’s involvement in aid in dying consists solely of making the instrument of the ‘act’ available to the terminally ill patient” Decision ¶ 26, 32. The patient has to “affirmatively seek[] a lethal dose of medicine,” when he “himself seeks out a physician and asks the physician to provide him the means to end his own life . . . . [T]he and carry out the decision himself with self-administered medicine with no immediate or solicitation comes from the patient himself, not a third party physician.” Decision ¶ 40, 44. “[A] physician who aids a terminally ill patient in dying is not directly involved in the final decision or the final act.” Decision ¶ 23. The patient is to make a “intervening,” “subsequent private” decision “whether to take the medication” “without any direct assistance.” Decision ¶ 23, 24, 28, 32, 40. The Court stressed that it was only applying the public policy exception in cases “when the patient is conscious and able to vocalize direct physician assistance.” Decision ¶ 30.

    The Court’s holding therefore leaves most actual assisted suicides with little or no protection. Since a patient’s “consent” is required, the consent defense might fail or be unavailable due to flaws or obstacle in the patient’s full and informed consent. The statute itself thoroughly lists factors that can weaken consent, such as “mental defect, intoxication, force, duress, or deception.” These and other factors are especially present in assisted suicide situations due to medications, the effects of disease, depression and other psychological disorders often untreated, and pressure from family members or even from the medical staff. The frequent occurrence of elder abuse also inherently weakens the case for a true act of patient consent.

    The Court’s other comments restrict the consent defense even further. If a doctor does anything at all more than making the medication available for the patient‟s later (“subsequent”) use, his proactive involvement in the process would exceed what Baxter said counted as “aid in dying” that can trigger the consent defense. If the idea of suicide itself is suggested to the patient first by the doctor or even by the family, instead of being on the patient’s sole initiative, the situation exceeds “aid in dying” as conceived by the Court. If a particular suicide decision process is anything but “private, civil, and compassionate,” Decision ¶ 23, the Court’s decision wouldn’t guarantee a consent defense. If the patient is less than “conscious,” is unable to “vocalize” his decision, or gets help because he is unable to “self-administer,” or the drug fails and someone helps complete the killing, Baxter would not apply. If the patient is not “terminally ill,” which the Court left undefined, the act isn’t “aid in dying.”

    All of these circumstances and more serve to threaten absolute autonomy and are frequent in real-life assisted suicide situations. No doctor can prevent these human contingencies from occurring in a given case, even without his knowledge, in order to make sure that he can later use the consent defense if he is charged with murder. All of these factual issues are open to the prosecutor’s, judge’s, and jury’s interpretation in each given case, by which the consent defense might fail or not be available to the homicide defendant at all.

    Nothing shields a physician from being investigated and prosecuted for homicide if he decides to commit “aid in dying. The mere availability of a consent defense is not even certain for him, much less is its success. And although the legislature shielded doctors from civil lawsuit liability for merely withdrawing medical treatment from patients who desire it, Mont. Code Ann § 50-9-204, nothing in Baxter shields doctors, institutions, or any suicide assistant from being civilly liable for death or injury resulting from assisted suicide actions, especially the circumstances of an attempted death that are less than perfect.

    Because Baxter framed its decision as a pure issue of interpreting the consent defense, the Montana Legislature is free to change the result. The Legislature is not even bound by the Court’s determination that “aid in dying” is not against Montana “public policy.” This is because the Court’s interpretation of “public policy” was derived wholly from the Legislature’s own directive in the consent statute that the defense is available if not against public policy. Mont. Code Ann. § 45-2-211(2)(d). The Court was left to interpret the scope of “public policy” only because the Legislature had not spoken on assisted suicide and consent specifically, and the Court’s guide for deciding what public policy is was the Legislature’s other statutes. The Montana Legislature does not even need to make assisted suicide “illegal.” The activity is already homicide. The Legislature can merely specify that the public policy of Montana, with respect to the already-illegal act of assisted suicide, precludes the consent defense. The autonomy-weakening dangers referenced above are ample reasons for the Legislature to find that the consent defense should not apply to this type of homicide.

    Greg Jackson received his J.D. from the University of Montana Law School in 1973. As one of Montana’s most accomplished defense attorneys he’s handled over 20 homicide cases, and 14 homicide trials, including such high profile cases as the Montana prison riot (5 homicides) and the trial of Nathaniel Bar Jonah . He is admitted to the bar in the Montana Supreme Court, U.S. District Court, Montana District and the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

    Matt Bowman serves as legal counsel with the Alliance Defense Fund at its Washington, D.C., Regional Service Center. He is admitted to the bar in Michigan, the U.S. Supreme Court, the District of Columbia, the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 2nd, 3rd, and 9th Circuits, and several federal district courts

  14. mike from iowa 2017-07-14 13:16

    Our MT Supreme Court did ruled that if a doctor is charged with a homicide they might have a potential defense based on consent. The MT Supreme Court acknowledged it is a homicide in the ruling

    You misrepresent what Montana’s Supreme Court said about defense based on consent. I will reprint it for you.

    . Based on this finding, the Court held that a patient’s consent to aid in dying “constitutes a statutory defense to a charge of homicide against the aiding physician.” (Id. at 251, ¶ 50).

    Constitutes a statutory defense is a trifle more certain than might have.

  15. mike from iowa 2017-07-14 13:19

    Still relying on an attorney’s opinion/interpretation. You keep neglecting what the court actually said.

  16. Cory Allen Heidelberger Post author | 2017-07-14 18:07

    Maybe I missed this, but clear this up, gentlemen: does the Montana statute use the same language as the Oregon and Washington statutes and the South Dakota initiative?

  17. mike from iowa 2017-07-14 18:48

    Montana

    The State of Montana has a legalized medical marijuana program, which allows legal medical marijuana patients to receive a marijuana recommendation from a certified physician, apply for a State-issued Montana Medical Marijuana ID Card, and grow and/or purchase marijuana for medicinal use per state guidelines. We have compiled the following index of medical marijuana information in Montana to serve as a legal library to our users for legal reference of Montana’s laws and guidelines regarding Medical Cannabis.

  18. Bradley Williams 2017-07-14 18:51

    The corporate proponent has attempted 3 times in Montana to pass Oregon model laws like your initiative and were rejected dispite record lobbying spending from untraceable sources. There is no Montana statute like your initiative. Even CA deleted some of the language that you have. In my expierence during 60 days of polling at fairs about 60% favor the concept (including religious) but have second-thoughts.com after learning of the pitfalls in the language of the initiative, omissions, commissions and double-speak.
    I am not familiar with the pot laws in Montana. It seems limited and always changing.

  19. mike from iowa 2017-07-14 18:52

    Montana had a bill like Oregon’s in the lege but ran out of time, so Baxter is still the law in Montana on death with dignity.

  20. mike from iowa 2017-07-14 19:05

    Bradley was your organization the one that tried to get doctors imprisoned back in 2013 in Montana.

    I just saw where supporters of death with dignity claim 82% are in favor of death with dignity.

  21. Porter Lansing 2017-07-14 19:12

    Mr, Williams … You denounce double-speak but from what I’ve read from you it’s your biggest tool. People at the fair may have second thoughts because they’re being lied to.
    Advocating against a ballot measure is just politics. Advocating against a petition is denying the voters their right to choose. You’re off base in your motivation. People have free will no matter if it contradicts your religion or not!!!

  22. Mel 2017-07-14 19:16

    I was excited to come see all the comments about how amazing it is that we have made significant jumps ahead in support for our initiatives….I am disappointed. Bradley hijacked the story and turned it into a one man crusade against DWD. I am going to back away and close the door on this spot of crazy. Personally I suggest everyone read the initiative because much of what Bradley is preaching about isn’t in the language. He is muddying the issue. It’s really simple to me. We do not allow our beloved animals to suffer when the end is near….why should I have to suffer when my end is near? Why is it any one else’s business how and when I chose to die? Who the hell do you think you are to even speak about a choice that does not affect you in any way? Go worry about your own state.

  23. Bradley Williams 2017-07-14 19:20

    People of the entire spectrum of humanity stand against a law that allows a predatory heir or corporation to guide the sign up and force the poison till dead all within 15 days before the rest of the family knows. Read the initiative and you will agree that this language is below par public policy, this is not the one.

  24. mike from iowa 2017-07-14 19:40

    Oregon claims there has been no abuse. Do you know better? Seriously, you are sounding like an automaton or a programmed robot.

  25. Bradley Williams 2017-07-14 19:54

    There has been abuses documented. The Oregon law requires the death certificate to be falsified (no mention of poison applied), provides cover via immunity for all involved, prohibits any investigations and then they destroy the records in 2 years. It provides no witness to the self administration so anything goes. It took the Feds to prosecute the “new best friends” of Oregon’s Thomas Middleton for fraud after Thomas was dispatched via the non transparent Oregon policy. So when they say there has never been a problem you should shake your head at their deception.

  26. Porter Lansing 2017-07-14 20:09

    Colorado Told Williams To Hit The Road … As you note Mike, this fellow is an automaton and a programmed robot. He probably can’t find Pierre on a map, let alone pronounce it. His spiel in CO was identical to what he’s asserted on this blog, today. A sham full of unsubstantiated opinion with NO empirical evidence. Colorado voters gave the “nearly dead” the choice, the power and the dignity to self-administer and relieve their families and friends of the unnecessary burden that the dying are imposing on them. Death is personal. Guilt is religious fraud. Read it here in the extremist newspaper …
    https://www.csindy.com/coloradosprings/bradley-williams/Profile?oid=3586969

  27. Bradley Williams 2017-07-14 20:17

    There you go promising “self administration” without an ordinary witness. Meanwhile: In OR, WA, CO and
    – [ ] CA report on assisted suicide is incomplete: How many self-administered as promised?
    What is missing in the CA report on assisted suicides?
    So after a year in CA how many self administered the poison as was promised when the concept was marketed? By omitting an ordinary witness all the flaunted safeguards are eviscerated and our choices are ignored and not honored allowing exploitation of us all.

  28. mike from iowa 2017-07-14 20:21

    You listed one possible abuse and the record isn’t clear that Middleton’s death was because of abuse or was even abuse. The lady real estate agent was properly charged with criminal acts and prosecuted.

    With that I am out of here for the rest of the evening.

  29. Porter Lansing 2017-07-14 20:28

    Wrong!! By omitting an ordinary witness all the flaunted safeguards are eviscerated and our choices are ignored and not honored allowing exploitation of us all?
    Once again, provide proof that we’re all being exploited by your invented situations designed to instill fear.
    All of the patients safeguards and choices in the law are addressed and not ignored. Have you statements by family members denouncing the law after their loved ones died with dignity?
    Have you statements from family members whose loved one was forced to make this end of suffering choice?
    Have you anything except opinions formed to supplicate your extremist religious oppression of the dying?

  30. Porter Lansing 2017-07-14 20:52

    Well said today, MFI. I’ll join you. Last word for the day …..
    No one knows when it’s over except the dying and their doctors. Others are just busy bodies.
    Ecclesiastes 3:1-3
    For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up …

  31. Bradley Williams 2017-07-14 21:06

    Thank you for asking for stories. Moving quickly along find a letter revealing how the Oregon expierence has its underbelly.
    “Dear Editor,
    Hello from Oregon.
    When my husband was seriously ill several years ago, I collapsed in a half-exhausted heap in a chair once I got him into the doctor’s office, relieved that we were going to get badly needed help (or so I thought).
    To my surprise and horror, during the exam I overheard the doctor giving my husband a sales pitch for assisted suicide. ‘Think of what it will spare your wife, we need to think of her’ he said, as a clincher.
    Now, if the doctor had wanted to say ‘I don’t see any way I can help you, knowing what I know, and having the skills I have’ that would have been one thing. If he’d wanted to opine that certain treatments weren’t worth it as far as he could see, that would be one thing. But he was tempting my husband to commit suicide. And that is something different.
    I was indignant that the doctor was not only trying to decide what was best for David, but also what was supposedly best for me (without even consulting me, no less).
    We got a different doctor, and David lived another five years or so. But after that nightmare in the first doctor’s office, and encounters with a ‘death with dignity’ inclined nurse, I was afraid to leave my husband alone again with doctors and nurses, for fear they’d morph from care providers to enemies, with no one around to stop them.
    It’s not a good thing, wondering who you can trust in a hospital or clinic. I hope you are spared this in Hawaii.
    Sincerely,
    Kathryn Judson, Oregon”

  32. Cory Allen Heidelberger Post author | 2017-07-15 07:24

    As Mel notes, there’s a little topic-hijacking going on here. The main point of this post is that we have local businesses sticking their necks out and engaging in controversial political issues. Pharmacist Wullenstein knows that some of his customers will react as strongly against the petitions his shop is circulating as Bradley here reacts to DWD, yet he’s still willing to take the risk of alienating some customers on this issue. Well-known businesses Crow Peak Brewing and Nick’s are taking the same risk. And note that these aren’t big businesses or corporate franchises. (The Spearfish Sears has larger corporate connections, but it’s the individual store owner, not Sears execs, petitioning.) My assumption is that small-town businesses like these usually keep out of politics, because they can’t afford to alienate any customers.

    Mel, have you heard yet from any of the circulating stores about any customer backlash or boycott? In the other directions, are the petitions helping any of these businesses draw new customers?

  33. Cory Allen Heidelberger Post author | 2017-07-15 07:32

    Notice that the underbelly story Bradley tells checks its own horror: there was no abuse of the law. I’m actually horrified when the doctor recommends all sorts of expensive procedures, can’t tell me the price, then does all those expensive procedures and still can’t tell me what’s wrong, but does Congress do anything about that? No!

    Thomas Middleton wanted to die, but doctors wouldn’t help him, says his wife.

    Vague handwavings about what reports don’t say does not document abuses. It only opens the door for a Trumpist/nihilist relativism in which you can make any blank page say anything you want.

  34. mike from iowa 2017-07-15 07:34

    In any human endeavor, there is someone willing and able to abuse it for personal gain.T here are also people willing to attempt to force their idea of morality on the rest of us. I guess it is just human nature.

    Mel sez it nicely and I whole heartedly agree.

  35. Porter Lansing 2017-07-15 08:18

    Hear, hear Mel.

  36. Bradley Williams 2017-07-15 08:22

    There are more details at dredf.org/public-policy/assisted-suicide/some-oregon-assisted-suicide-abuses-and-complications/
    But you can just look the other way.

  37. mike from iowa 2017-07-15 08:27

    Excellent advice, Bradley. Give it a shot.

  38. Bradley Williams 2017-07-15 08:31

    Yep, follow the money. Medical industrial complex, predatory corporate facilitater, covert organ trafficking, insurance actuarial greed, predatory heirs/new best friend, senior housing making room.
    Read the bill. The bill allows that one could be diagnosed and dead in 15 days with immunity for a predatory heir/new friend, all before the family knows. Poor excuse for public policy.

  39. mike from iowa 2017-07-15 08:40

    http://www.sacbee.com/news/article161409038.html

    An American vet is dying of a mysterious brain disease and he wants to hear from anyone and everyone.

    Make yourself useful, Bradley and contact this dying American hero.

  40. Bradley Williams 2017-07-15 08:56

    Meanwhile Now Oregon throws off the encumbrances of the covert assisted suicide “choice banner” in favor of open forced euthanasia of the mentally ill and disabled. Leave OR fast.
    Oregon Senate Committee Passes Bill to Allow Starving Mentally Ill Patients to Death

  41. Porter Lansing 2017-07-15 09:04

    Shame on you, Mr. Williams. That’s “FAKE NEWS”. Are you being deceitful again?

  42. Bradley Williams 2017-07-15 09:16

    Just google itOregon bill could allow mentally ill patients to be starved – Washington Times
    Oregon bill could allow mentally ill patients to be starved – Washington Times

  43. Porter Lansing 2017-07-15 09:31

    WOW, Bradley. Well, here’s a quick lesson. News comes from a reputable and valid source. That’s why it’s called news and not opinion.
    Washington Times is owned and controlled by Sun Myung Moon. You know folks, The Moonies. The paper is a wholly owned subsidiary of his church. Washington Times is Fake News.

  44. Bradley Williams 2017-07-15 09:41

    Google it yourself Oregon Senate Bill 494 2017 to legalize what has been stealth euthanasia to starve to death the mentally ill.

  45. Porter Lansing 2017-07-15 09:53

    Do you think I didn’t GOOGLE it already? Every site is from some group of extremist religious kooks. Are those who you work for?

  46. Bob Newland 2017-07-15 09:58

    In 20-some years of lobbying the legislature and in managing ballot-issue campaigns in the attempt to bring a measure of sanity regarding cannabis to SoDak law, the largest barrier was the reticence on the parts of people who agreed with us to self-identify as such.

    The national shift towards said sanity has reduced the fear of those people of being called potheads. Also, the charismatic leadership of Melissa Mentele and Angie Albonico has brought folks like Wullenstein and the principals in businesses like Crow Peak and Sears into the fold.

    Day by day, it becomes harder for knuckleheads like Jackley to demonize those who both understand the potential benefits of reversing the horrible destruction wrought by pot laws and the principles of a citizen-democracy.

    Seriously, the only people left who are vocal in opposition to either cannabis legalization or personal choice in ending life when life becomes untenable are zealot crazies like Bradley Williams and Marty Jackley.

  47. Bradley Williams 2017-07-15 11:06

    Libertarians and disability rights groups like DREDF, ADAPT, Not Dead Yet and second-thoughts.com stand against the “bigotry of low expectations.”The medical standard of care in OR and WA is an application of poison for anyone with feelings of concern about losing autonomy. This according to the state reports. These are secular progressive groups that object on the basis of discrimination not religious doctrine. Your name calling is hollow.

  48. mike from iowa 2017-07-15 11:21

    Bradley, oh Bradley- that bill you are all shook up over claiming Oregon was going to starve mentally ill was killed on June 20th, 2017 by the Oregon House.

    No need to get your knickers in a twist. Just read a little more and more carefully.

  49. Porter Lansing 2017-07-15 11:26

    Can we see those Oregon state reports, sir?

  50. Bradley Williams 2017-07-15 11:51

    Losing autonomy (%)
    Less able to engage in activities making life enjoyable (%) Loss of dignity (%)5
    Losing control of bodily functions (%)
    Burden on family, friends/caregivers (%)
    Inadequate pain control or concern about it (%) Financial implications of treatment (%)
    Health-care provider present
    (collected since 2001)

    There you go from Oregon 2016 DWD report on page 10: concern about losing autonomy is the primary reason for their poison therapy.

  51. Porter Lansing 2017-07-15 11:59

    Sorry, Mr. Williams … You’ve now been caught being misleading, deceitful and deceptive several times in only two days. That means your credibility isn’t up to the level where you can be believed on face value. Show the report from the Oregon state government that collaborates your post in full, please.

  52. Porter Lansing 2017-07-15 12:41

    Mr. Williams … Is it correct that your concern with Oregon is that patients very close to death aren’t giving the proper reason (i.e. – losing control of their life) for asking for DWD medication? Are you in the majority in Oregon in this opinion? What is your motivation for believing you know better than a dying person what’s best for them? Three questions, sir. Please address all three. Thank-you.

  53. Bradley Williams 2017-07-15 13:53

    My concern about Oregon and the South Dakota 2017-18 Initiative that does not provide witness to self administration making for dangerous public policy.
    This is not about people who are dying anyway, all of us, all ages are at risk. Medical standard of care according to the Oregon state reports is poison for expressing feelings of concern about possible loss of autonomy.
    The deceptive marketing trick of mentioning the assurance of “self administration” 7 times then omitting an ordinary witness eviscerates the so called safeguards. The difference is a witness honors and secures our choice without a witness it allows exploitation of all of us all ages via stealth euthanasia. This nontransparent Oregonmodel assisted suicide initiative ignores our choice by empowering others including predatory corporations encouraging enabling and embracing filicide
    There is no transparent reason for falsifying the death certificate which serves to block investigations and public study.
    It provides Instant immunity for all involved even a predatory heir who can be a witness or a predatory corporation.
    The bill allows that a stranger who claims to know how we communicate can speak for us through out. One could be diagnosed and dead in 15 days with immunity for a predatory heir, all before the family knows. This bill is not the one if you want our choice to be honored.
    We trust our doctors and health care workers but there is no transparent reason to tempt them with this sword.

  54. Porter Lansing 2017-07-15 14:12

    Mr. Williams … I see you work closely with The Catholic Conference. Does your zealous denial of a person’s dying rights stem from the belief that painful suffering brings the dying closer to Jesus? That the dying person’s suffering can thereby become a source of blessings and graces for the Church and the world? That the chronically ill and suffering are therefore not just to be objects of our pity: they have an important vocation in the Church? – Dr. Robert Stackpole (Doctor of Sacred Theology)
    ~ Faith in sharing in the suffering of Christ brings with it the interior certainty that the suffering person “completes what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions” (Col 1:24)

  55. Bradley Williams 2017-07-15 14:31

    MTaas.org is a single issue group that welcomes all supporters even as we may not agree on other issues. Early on we established over 5,000 supporters in Montana. These supporters represent the entire spectrum of the public, from atheists to eastern philosophy and libertarians to progressives including the disability rights community. We focus narrowly on the language of the assisted suicide bills/laws, the omissions , double speak, commissions and how it can be administered.

  56. Porter Lansing 2017-07-15 14:53

    I see. We’ll see you at the State Fair, then.

  57. mike from iowa 2017-07-15 15:59

    Witnesses my ass. You want interventions and to try to talk people into suffering more. There is no earthly reason for you to interject yourself into strangers lives.

    You’d do all these people a better service to leave them to hell alone. I am positive they can muddle their way through this. I mean they were born and grew up, got old without your help.

  58. Mel 2017-07-15 20:38

    Whew it definitely hasn’t gotten any better then last time I checked. Except for love notes from Bob which are my favorite ❤️ Corey no push back has been really noted a couple had a meltdown in Spearfish last night BUT the Sears owners were unconcerned. At this point those who support us have it down to one single issue: compassion either people have or they don’t and we are all ready to stand tall against those who don’t. This article shows a very small portion of where our petitions are. We are signing new ones up every week and have a nice list of proud supporters ready to publish this week.

    Mr Williams….see you at the state fair. It will be a tough crowd for you as we have the facts and you have a bunch of opinions. I hope whomever pays you to troll states in this manner is paying you well….just from all the typing on this site I would guess it’s a full time income.

  59. Porter Lansing 2017-07-15 20:48

    @Mel … Mr. Williams didn’t type much today. I researched him fully and every post he made today was a copy and paste from his previous comments … except when he thought the Washington Times isn’t fake news. LOL He doesn’t deal in thought. Just repetition of false narratives.
    Keep up the good work. #YouRock

  60. Cory Allen Heidelberger Post author | 2017-07-16 15:05

    Is “self-administration” a “deceptive marketing trick,” or is forcing people to have a witness an invasion of privacy at an extremely personal moment? To assuage Bradley’s concerns (if he were really looking for a policy solution and not just riding his hobbyhorse to prove his own awesomeness by defeating this initiative), the practical policy solution would be to require a complete stranger, a party with no connection to the terminal patient whatsoever, to witness the self-administration of the fatal prescription. Forcing an individual to spend her final moment in the company of a complete stranger seems rude.

  61. Cory Allen Heidelberger Post author | 2017-07-16 15:35

    Fine, full bite:

    Bradley keeps reciting his line about autonomy and “medical standard of care” and says the Oregon 2016 DWD report somehow backs up what he is saying in opposition to the assisted-suicide initiative. Bradley’s claim appears to be that corporate profiteers push the fears of losing autonomy to trick people into giving them lots of money and sacrificing their absolute autonomy by killing themselves.

    The Oregon 2016 DWD report uses the word “autonomy” twice, in the chart Bradley sloppily and incompletely pastes and in this clearer sentence on the bottom of page 6: “Similar to previous years, the three most frequently mentioned end-of-life concerns were loss of autonomy (89.5%), decreasing ability to participate in activities that made life enjoyable (89.5%), and loss of dignity (65.4%).” That statement does not give any evidence of corporate fear tactics. It gives no indication that terminal patients are incorrectly perceiving a loss of autonomy. As Bradley says of his wife’s experience, terminal patients do indeed lose autonomy as their conditions worsen.

    Nothing in the Oregon DWD 2016 report connects the dots that Bradley throws at us to show that the makers of secobarbital, pentobarbital, phenobarbital, or morphine stand to make more money by prescribing drugs to kill terminal patients early than they can by keeping suicide illegal and prolonging patients’ lives through other, more costly pharmaceuticals. The Oregon DWD 2016 report says money is the least of the cited concerns of terminal patients, so it seems the drugmakers would have no problem selling most of those terminal patients greater volumes of more expensive drugs if they could persuade those patients to stick around.

    And really, what kind of a bonehead builds his business model on eliminating his customers? Heck, if I’m a pure capitalist selling morphine, and if you tell me Joe is going to die in another year of some painful malady and wants to end his life today, I lobby for Joe to stick around and buy and use a year’s supply of morphine!

    The DWD org says powdered pentobarbitol costs maybe $500; secobarbitol up to $5K; phenobarbital/chloral hydrate/morphine sulfate mix up to $500. Heck, I can make more money on a month of hospice room rental.

    The Oregon 2016 DWD report indicates 133 people ended their lives under DWD; proportionate to SD population, that’s maybe 24 customers in our state. Building a business model on the hope that you’ll get 24 customers a year at $500 a pop ($12,000 for the year), knowing that not one of them will give you repeat business, is a worse business model than South Dakota political blogging.

    If the allegation here is that the Brandon Pharmacy is just a capitalist dog trying to cash in on life-ending prescriptions, I’m not seeing the numbers to support such a claim. Brandon Pharmacy can make a truckload more money on a year’s worth of pain-killers and other prescriptions to a terminal patient than it can on a one-time suicide dose. So not only does Brandon Pharmacy lose customers to one-time suicide drugs, but it also runs the risk of a boycott driven by rabid propaganda from single-issue shouters like Bradley just for circulating petitions to give people a chance to weigh in on the issue.

  62. Porter Lansing 2017-07-16 15:43

    I believe the same mindset that wants to be in the bedroom with you when you have sex, so you do it their way, want to be in the room with you when you die, so you don’t do it wrong. It boils down to a group of busybody bullies who think it’s their God given right to tell others what to do … especially women. Requiring a witness to a death is just a ploy to defeat the law similar to the onerous restrictions on women’s rights. Notice it’s the same group opposing assisted suicide AND women. Religious zealots!!!

  63. Lar Buck 2017-10-04 07:04

    Take a look at Minnesota, Iowa, North Dakota, Montana. These states are similar to South Dakota in beliefs and history and values. With Sanford factions appearing on the original measure writing in North Dakota. Governor Dayton’s family over sees and runs the medical marijuana industry in Minnesota. A 4 year study by the state of Iowa and using the assets of the two state higher learning facilities of Iowa State and Iowa published over 400 pages of fact findings. On the CBD effect on treating seizers. This is far from a “pothead” idea and to refer to it as such is irresponsible and extremely ignorant when millions of dollars we’re spent to study the facts. The facts are why it’s legal in those states. Not because of someone’s opinion. And an uneducated opinion at that. If you’re gonna fight against assisted suicide you damn sure should be backing the industry that provides the pain management that cannabis provides to live with these debilitating diseases and the extreme levels of pain that is associated with them.

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