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Lundberg Report – February 2016

Lundberg, Kevin 0912.jpg Kevin Lundberg    

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  1. Assisted Suicide Bill

The Senate State Affairs Committee heard the Assisted Suicide bill on Wednesday. Proponents of this bill advocate for a medical professional, a physician who has sworn to do no harm, to prescribe a lethal dose of drugs for a patient who wants to end his or her life. They argue that this bill is necessary to prevent suffering in a person who is near the end their life. The Senate State Affairs killed the bill. 

However, in the House, a similar bill passed committee on a party-line vote on Thursday.

I do not support physician assisted suicide legislation. It allows a doctor to kill rather than heal, and also, of necessity, involves the pharmaceutical industry in this lethal process. The proponents argue that the bill will reduce suffering.

But we already addressed this in Colorado law with a palliative care bill several years ago (Senate Bill 102 in 2006 became C.R.S. 18-3-104 (4)). In this palliative care law a physician is authorized to give sufficient medication to relieve suffering for the patient. The only limitation is that the physician is prohibited from assisting the patient with an intentional suicide. This is language I helped craft to draw a bright line between giving as much pain medication as is needed and the very different action of intentionally ending the patient’s life.

The intrinsic value of life is the fundamental principle which I believe assisted suicide legislation ignores. It reduces our perceived value of life to a pragmatic analysis of comfort and usefulness. Life is a gift from God we must honor this immense treasure.

  1. Senate Bill 11

This week in the Senate we passed a bill that takes away mass transit funding from FASTER funds and restores all of the FASTER vehicle fees (the car tax, established in 2009) for road and bridge construction. In the Colorado Constitution, Article X, Section 18, it states: “…the proceeds from the imposition of any license, registration fee, or other charge with respect to the operation of any motor vehicle upon any highway in this state…shall, except costs of administration, be used exclusively for the construction, maintenance, and supervision of the public highways of this state…” Therefore, to take the dollars from the car tax and allocate them in any way other than to roads and bridges is an explicit violation of the State Constitution.

I did not support the car tax in 2009, partially because it really is a tax, and the people were not allowed to vote on it. But the bill did become law, and at a minimum the funds should be used for the purpose required by the Constitution. Senate Bill 11 now goes to the House. I trust they will pass the bill which will bring FASTER funding in line with Article X Section 18.

  1. Why is speaker Hullinhorst so opposed to Life? 

The Speaker of the Colorado House in her opening day speech severely criticized those who hold to pro-life values and declared “We will defeat these ideologues and opportunists.”

But she didn’t stop there.

She has taken this aggressive posture to the next level by stating at a press conference last week “I would simply say a woman’s right to make her own medical decisions with her doctor is none of their d*** business.” 

Then She went even further:  “I think we’re all gettin’ a little tired of the extreme right in our body [the House of Representatives] continuing to send these very extreme bills on women’s right to choose,”

I find this Speaker to be remarkably outspoken on this subject especially when the Left regularly condemns those of us who do defend life for opening the subject for discussion. The purpose of government is to secure our God-given rights of life and liberty. We are going to bring it up again, and again, and again, because that is the purpose of government. Apparently the Speaker disagrees and finds it necessary to disagree again, and again, and again. 

So the question that remains is simply, why is Speaker Hullinghorst so anti-life? 

 

  1. Just One More Thing…

Last Wednesday, in Judiciary Committee where I serve as vice chair, we passed a bill by Senator Laura Woods (R, Jefferson County). The bill, called “The Peter Falk Act” is designed to defend the rights of protected persons and wards from being isolated by a guradian.

It is called the Peter Falk Act because Peter Falk’s daughter, Catherine, brought the bill to our attention. During her father’s final months of life Catherine was unable to even meet with him because of the control of his guardian.

This isolation happens all too often to the elderly or adults with disabilities. If a family member of such a person feels that their loved one is being prohibited from recieving visitors or mail or placing and recieving phone calls, this bill allows them to petition the courts for the access that is being denied.