Seven Days; Physician Assisted Suicide; Gun Safety Control/NRA

Oh. Nick. Nick Nick Nick Nick Nick. Nick Nick Nick. Nick Nick Nick. Hi I'm Stephanie Fowler and this is seven days our topics this week. Developments on assisted suicide and gun control bills in the legislature. Let's meet this week's panel Nasim Rocca is the Capitol reporter for the consortium of public radio in Oregon. Richard Geary is an editorial writer for the Salem Statesman Journal. Ah so Herring is the editor of the Albany Democrat Herald. And Tom Bonzi is Public Radio's Olympia correspondent. On Sunday one hundred twenty one delegates of the Oregon Medical Association voted to oppose Oregon's assisted suicide law measure 16 was approved by the voters in

1994 but is still in limbo in the federal court system. And today a proposed repeal of the law moved out of a legislative committee and onto the House floor. Now seem to the LMA vote have anything to do with the bill moving out of committee. I really don't I didn't see it have that much impact today. There was a lot of debate this morning the hearing began at 7:30 this morning and I did not see the OMAC decision or the OMAC switch which occurred on Sunday playing a big role and then let my be for two reasons one of them is that there is some question about how that vote was that of that vote came about and the count in that vote. And was it really as strong a signal as the as the as members of the o m a particularly members who are strongly against measures 16 and doctor assisted suicide. I would like to convince people that it was. Tell us a little more about that. Well it was a it was a voice vote. And so there was no clear numbers of who voted for the four measures 69 who voted against it and also

it was a vote that it said. We have problems with ballot measure 16 it was not a vote against Doctor assisted suicide per se so the people that the representatives that were pushing and have been pushing for a outright repeal of ballot measure 16 or delay a ballot measure 16 or at the very least a referral a ballot measure 16 went into that committee meeting today knowing that they were going to come out of that committee meeting with with what is amounted to a referral so that the voters will in Nov if this comes out of the house later on next week voters will have before them basically the same ballot that they had before them back in 1994 but in this case they'll be asked whether or not they want to repeal. And I think even of those things were that we constantly complain about because it's one of those it sounds as though it's going to be one of those measures where yes votes going to me and me no and vice versa that is.

And we've we've seen voters complain about that kind of thing because they feel they're being misled. And it may be that a misleading approach like that's the only way that opponents of this law are going to get rid of it. I guess my guess would be that that voters who favor this this this this law it gives them some kind of control. And what they fear is going to be the end of their life. We're going to keep voting I mean are you going to keep supporting that kind of law. And then there will be some additional ones who resent this kind of legislative interference in what they thought they'd already decided. So I wouldn't be all that surprised if it does come to a vote if this measure gets approved that is if the assisted suicide law gets approved or stays approved at a much greater margin with a greater margin of support than it had the last time which was very narrow 51 percent or something like that I think the opponents of assisted suicide deserve a little bit of credit though to how far they have come because only about a month and a half ago in ACM in the legislature as you know it seemed like this attempt to repeal 16 was dead.

But the Right to Life groups in the Catholic Church have been particularly strong and continue to lobby and they use this Omega vote as kind of an latest indication that there's a growing movement against physician assisted suicide never They don't know that that's the case and I think it was right in the fact that a lot of voters will object to once again being asked to vote on something they've already settled. And it's not the only thing like that that they're going to vote on. It appears that the law also be voting once again on annual sessions of the legislature. Once again voting on term limits and maybe voting on vote by mail. So I think this is a movement that voters are not going to like. It's highly irregular isn't it I mean this is this is not happen very they're not audiences you know it as I understand it when there was some kind of a measure that the voters approved against. Instead of railroads giving free tickets to legislators and I guess a real minority then legislators actually as I was about as a result of it was talking with the secretary of state Phil Kiessling yesterday looking through the blue book

that railroad law was one that the legislators referred back to voters but it was switched a lot it was switched it was a different wording and in the intent was different. On assisted suicide there isn't there is an interesting example of this happening and that is with the death penalty and that that was a law that was passed by initiative back in the early 1800s and then in the 1920s the legislative body referred it back to the voters and the voters at that point then overturned their initial decision and instituted the death penalty. Quick a quick reaction now when there's no action and I think well that was it. Of this I back resent. Go back to assisted suicide. Do you think that I don't mean railroads and especially Well that's the trouble. If there's going to be a campaign about this the opponents of the law as it stands now are going to point out they're going to point out the shortcomings of the law and there are plenty of I mean you know that.

First of all we never been able to try this law out because it's been blocked in the courts and there's a particular shortcoming in that and that it requires It allows people to request supposedly lethal medication and then under after a certain under certain conditions it's supposed to be prescribed and then they're supposed to take it on their own. First of all many many people may not be able to do that if they're in that kind of situation because they are they simply too sick and they can't do it and the other is that nobody really knows. And there's not a there's not 100 percent effective dosage for fetal I mean for fatal medication for. How do you think that is that new information. We know that we did voters know that when they know that do they know that uncertainty when they passed it in 1994 and what's the change that justifies. Asking voters to vote again on the very same thing they voted on. Well I think you're going to have to raise some issues that hadn't been at least as much on the forefront of the public debate. And one is that the issue of the dosage it obviously isn't something that has and has had a lot of testing. But in the Netherlands for example studies have shown that up to a

quarter of those patients linger for hours or days after taking an oral medication and sometimes have to have a lethal injection. That is something that may have doomed the measure in Washington in California because it did talk about lethal injection. Sponsors a measure in Oregon left that part of it out. It became more of a situation of a personal choice whether to take your life with advice and with consultation with a doctor. You know in a way that is still the real issue and that is that the control that people want when they feel that otherwise they're going to be completely at the mercy of doctors or hospitals or some other kinds of providers. People want the idea more than maybe even the practice. They want the idea of being able to control the end of their suffering if that's at all possible I think. I think what's also going on is that there is a realisation and an acceptance and an acknowledgement that this is occurring today. Already I mean there's been studies that have come out that that that up to 60 percent of some doctors have have given their patients lethal doses or have hastened death in one way or another when their

people are terminally ill. Now now talk when you talk about that you're going to get a sharp disagreement from some doctors who who say that is a story that's been going around for years and it is simply not true in the sense that we repeat it all the time. What is true is that sometimes pain is medicated to the extent that a side effect of the medication is then cause the death. Well then how about nobody intent and nobody according to the people who talk to the doctors of talk talk to me about this. Nobody intentionally gives as so much medication as to kill somebody. Well what what what what the studies are showing is that the doctors are giving a certain amount of medication to either that that either hastens death or put them in a comatose state similar state to what patients would get in if they took the second all that is prescribed under the Doctor assisted suicide law. They the study is that another one is showing that says Well in some cases 25 percent of cases and some inside situations. That you have got patients that their deaths don't happen immediately. They may not happen in the first hour they may not happen in the first three hours.

But but but what does happen is that those patients eventually die that they can't go into a call most toe state similar to what is what a doctor might not do and I think the thing about this debate though that's the new dimension is I think people are ahead of the profession when it comes to considering this issue and I think maybe that's why the doctors at least this group of doctors that oppose it. Are uncomfortable with the fact the public is going out there and saying this is what we want and this is the way we want it to be done. Medical professionals don't like to be told what they do certainly by government and I think they were very uncomfortable with the law for that reason that I like to be told what to do by patients. Exactly that would be very interesting to see what the U.S. Supreme Court does because their ruling may come down possibly right after the legislature in Oregon goes home. You know seeing it up all over again you know I think it is lies in Washington and if you're going to write it it really says is from Washington state and that's kind of made the debate in Washington say pretty much go away while while we await word on my money my thinking and my guess would be that the court

decision if it comes down is not going to help in this debate too much because from some of the comments that the justices have made in considering the cases from New York and California. They said that this might be a subject that is really not ripe for judicial decision it may have to be left up to the people or to the legislatures of the various states and of course in Oregon that is exactly what we've done and we've already done what the court has sort of advised people thought the people ought to do. I think I think I've got to get back to what you were saying about the legislative vote in the referral in itself and starting back to that. And that is you know what the what the House has before it next week with the 60 members have to decide is number one are they going to take the unusual an unprecedented measure and you could be looked at to refer a vote that that voters approved back in 1994 back to voters so that they can look at it nine thousand ninety six in November 1996.

And part of that decision is in part of the convoluted ness of this whole thing and as you said earlier that you know a yes vote could be no. The cover of the convoluted mess of this is that that there have been attempts to to fix some of the problems some of the quote unquote flaws of this bill and those attempts have been centered in the subcommittee that has been meeting for more than two months. But all of those attempts have up to this point failed. And so right now they're on this. This kind of what what Representative minister who was the big pusher for this repeal has said is they're going to take this bifurcated test track on one hand they're going to hold what looks like more try to next week pass a bill through the house that says voters have a new opportunity to look at measure 16 and a new opportunity to vote on it. The same measure the same that they passed the same measure I fast in November of 1990 for.

On the other hand we're going to look at the current measures 16 that we have and try to fix some of the flaws and then we'll vote on that too. And so will voters will have before them. And it's going to be very confusing what those who have before them in November if this goes through the House and Senate is they will have this vote in front of them and says Do you want to measure 16. If you don't measure 60 in the Met and the majority says we don't want it then it's gone. But if the majority says yes we want measures 16 they say OK you can have a 16 but it's really not this measure 16 you're getting it you're getting this well imagine 60 with all the facts saying that I had a strategy. Is that not the strategy to confuse people because generally voters confuse They turned about like the right stuff and if that's the strategy this whole idea this whole thing is going to be a waste of time because the law is going to stay the way it is the on the books imperfect as it is and somebody sooner or later when the courts finally lift the injunction against it is going to try it out and then all this debate about you know whether it works and whether or not the dosage is going to be a problem whether or not people are going to be too depressed or declared to be depressed or whether or not psychiatrists are going to be able to certify that

anybody is not depressed and they say they can't do that sort of thing. All these problems will be solved because either the law is going to work or it's not and if it's not about then then this whole debate might start in some other kind of context. But the real I mean what honest doctors are saying to me is that if we need if we really want a kind of this kind of a law that helps people get out of life then when they really want to go. What we need is a law is a law that allows doctors to apply injections. I mean but that's the sort of thing that people are just very very uncomfortable with and that's and that's why the law as it is the way we have it was written the way it was it was sort of a it was the sort of thing that is entirely up to the person who put the person himself or herself and what's the difference between the active intervention of a diabetic and an intervention if given the prescription the difference is that one of them is going to work for sure honor percent all the time no doubt.

I mean that you can you can inject somebody with you know what if stuff like that and doctors are in your position that they can't use the fear of course is that the beacons coersion and the fear of course is if in a system of health care where you're trying to manage costs someone some time might make that cost analysis and decide that maybe someone doesn't have much time left anyway so why not stay with the pills here still in control and hand. Well supposedly sort of an organ although that kind of the course of the arguments against the law has always been that they can be so much pressure brought against somebody especially one who's so. Well slow down about the state of life that it can be so much pressure that somebody will feel that he has to take his own life. Even though if you really had a choice a real choice he wouldn't do it. You know what I think it's been the most positive part of this whole debate though and it's one that hasn't got enough attention is it has put more resources into it into examining pain medication and more emphasis by doctors in relieving suffering. And that was something that I think would be hard to argue was an afterthought maybe 20 years ago in medical schools it's now come to the forefront and they're now

more aggressive in scribing pain medications. Talking about substances that as ridiculous as it sounds nurses and doctors would want to prescribe. Medication to people dying because they were afraid they might get addicted to it. You know ridiculous kind of things like that but there's a lot more attention on that now so maybe people are suffering less than they used to and if there's anything that's positive out of this debate maybe that's it. Well Richard it may in fact as you suggest be to be the solution to the whole thing because if that I mean that's what doctors have been saying on some doctors have been saying all along that if people only paid more that those practitioners only paid more attention to managing the pain then people wouldn't want to take their own lives. And certainly that is true. I mean at least I would think that that would be true in almost all cases. And if that actually is what happens in hospice programs and some of these kinds of settings. Then nobody is really going to ask for this law to be applied. They might they might ask for the pills just in case but they would never want to go through with it because there wouldn't be any point to it a lot of it's a reassurance.

That's right just to know it's there that insurance policy. OK let's move on to our second topic. There are several bills in the legislature that would increase regulations on gun owners. One would require people to lock up their guns to keep them away from kids. Another bill would encourage schools to teach a gun education course put together by the National Rifle Association. These subjects are on the NRA his agenda this weekend as it holds its annual meeting in Seattle. Tom the Washington legislature dealt with similar issues during its session did they pass any significant gun we kind of have a preview of all the things that they have a sensor coming up in Oregon what the only thing that passed there was some talk not as much as in years past. The only thing that passed was the toothless resolution to encourage schools to teach the NRA so called Eddie Eagle gun safety program. My sense is this gives as a nice piece of paper that some legislators will send to the next NRA endorsing meeting and that's about is that that's about it. That's my somewhat cynical point of view. The schools have been NRA you know they doesn't need the

legislature to tell the schools that they can offer this and he has mailed this I'm sure to every principal and a few of them have actually used it. Well I think it might be easier for a school district especially in times of budget cuts and so on. If it if it felt as though there were some official encouragement to offer a program like that otherwise they might say well you know that's just some pressure group asking us to use something. But if the legislature has said as I think your house is what would it look almost over well I mean almost you know what are you going to say. Why should I know you know why almost if not there was Lucian's one dissenting vote in the Oregon House against that sort of thing and it encouraged schools to use the so-called Eagle program that teaches young people to be very careful about guns and if they see one that's not authorized to run away and to tell adults and so on. Well you know you can dismiss all that as being so much window dressing and just public relations and so on so loose if it helps two or three kids to get away from some dangerous situation. Who would who would be able to complain. I mean that makes sense then there was a dissenting vote was cast by Representative joy and Bowman who's provided her own bill put forward a bill that would ensure gun safety

by imposing first criminal penalties but now she's backed off and is only proposing civil penalties and forfeiture of guns for unsafe gun storage around children. John minutes representative has not wanted that to get out of this committee. But there's some indication that that bill might be moving now with the NRA support. That's interesting because it's almost exactly the same thing came up in Washington that was the other measure that got a lot of attention and it was a variation of I would hold parents legally responsible for damage hurt caused by a child who got their hands on and I was sitting on my hand there was no opposition in committee there if you had the parents of the child 8 year old who was killed by a playmate. Who is playing with a gun comment they testified in there even a few gun groups or individuals from gun groups came and said This is a reasonable thing we need to show that we're reasonable people and support this and you know the lawmakers are almost reduced to tears based on the testimony and then nothing happened and it was because the NRA quietly afterwards put the kybosh on

it saying you know this is what you said because I told you I thought Ron Hoggard today one of the lobbyist but I don't think he was actually on his way to Seattle right now. And he said the they oppose that that bill so what have you heard. Well just the indication that they would at least consider it which was a departure from their blanket opposition to any kind of gun control. I think you know that would make it a civil rights civil civil penalties perhaps forfeiture of guns for unsafe gun storage. Well you know that sort of thing may smell some people but I can't wait. I mean people really start thinking about what kind of sense does that make. I mean if some some some tragedy happens and a child is injured or even killed to take away you take away the gun afterwards seems almost ridiculous I mean that the system that does that kind of thing to a family that has already suffered that much. I mean you just don't like a whole lot of sense that with a new law that well you well you took preventative purposes isn't it doesn't that to say OK that there is this law so now I've got to be more cautious about what I put my God I've got to be more cautious and there's an almost almost all gun owners that

are extremely cautious with their guns already and then there may be you know. Well that's a good thing. You know if you're going to arrest people you know perfect Garner who I don't doctors we're going to share with 40000 children in Oregon with access to unsecured weapons in 1095 the last year figures available there were 42 deaths of children under 17 using weapons. All right but 16 of them were homicide so they had access to these weapons. It's happening in some of those homes so it's not another legal weapons that you're talking about these are these include you know gang shooting and drive by shootings and so on they have nothing to do with an unsecure done to somebody else. There were seven accidental deaths and that is that's a terrible thing of course but there may be some way to prevent that but you surely are not going to prevent it by by imposing some restrictions on irresponsible parents who are not going to obey him anyway. I mean if you didn't save the next kid if there was a family with four children and one of them died with a gun taking that gun away wouldn't.

Wouldn't that potentially save three kids well I suppose but if they really wanted to and I'm sure that they could find some some way to get it I think they really answered all that kind of thing is really in and making sure that people live up to their responsibilities not to try to punish them after something something bad happens. I mean that's that's the sort of thing that seems to me to be I think that's a moment. That was our thing to live up to their responsibilities without doing something like me for example making it a crime to allow a child unsupervised access to a gun. The lowest saying and this is our standard in society if you're a parent if there are kids in the household you can't have guns around where the kids can get them and that was not controversial that that basic principle but I did then it ended up being that you know if if injure in the political sense in the Washington legislature. Well if the gun control people get this then they'll be emboldened then then they'll come after you know our guns or so there's that sense of that you know is this principle that responsible parents live up to already. Right yeah I mean certainly we're talking about the margins and whether it will have effect there that

who knows. Sure doesn't sound reasonable to just secure your weapon I mean a lot of us put the club on our car when we drive somewhere there's going to have you know I was seen that program was also sometimes because I'm two seconds. Let's just assume the same thing is the same down though it slows you down and it's not a long walk might slow down a kid. Well there's one more thing I mean sorry I mean now that very little of anything past of the Washington legislature and the people are taking up the issue and the citizens initiative that would go a little further than I think most gun groups would ever have thought the washing legislature would go in terms of requiring licensing of handgun owners which is like red flags all over the place and it's actually not a license to own but in order to buy you would have to get a license and to get the license you would have to prove that you had taken a course about 8 hours and gun handling and safety and safe storage and that will need 200000 voter signatures by July to get on the November Washington state ballot. I have the feeling it's pretty hard to get in the midst of on the ballot to begin with in Washington state because of

the high signature standards and they're planning to collect signatures this weekend and already convinced certainly they're going to have lots and lots of free publicity and Puget Sound this weekend. But I'm not sure if it gets on that whether it will get on the ballot and then if it will get on the ballot then you know every gun rights group around the country will pour money into the opposition camp and it also requires a trigger lock to buy a son and to be sure with every handgun. And as you know I mean it presumably if you really did want to you wouldn't have to use it but it would be offered to you in the package. Any time you bought a gun and that same sort of device would provide an exemption in the Oregon law for parents who have guns and how they would be permissible if they had trigger lock devices on them. Then that but that's the sort of thing that people object to because then you get the state involved and whether or not the trigger lock was properly secured on that on the rifle or on the on the gunman on the handgun when something bad happened. So what what is the what is the negative I mean generally negative argument for why why shouldn't the legislature say that that people who have gone from their household have to take

precautions that those gongs are unsafe situations of the children all have the only negative to it is that ever more that the state somehow gets involved in people's affairs. You know and and tries to somehow control them and tell them what what the what's the sensible thing to do. Sensible people already know that. And with these education programs that bring the point home to people who are not on their own sensible. Irresponsible people couldn't care less what the legislature says or what it says about trigger locks and so on they just do whatever they want their house so there are people who consider it sensible to have guns around the house to protect themselves and their families. I mean there are some on the ground there. Sure there are but but nobody considers it sensible to have and I have a loaded firearm readily available to where little kids can find it. I don't think anybody considers that responsible or sensible. You know I think it's interesting that 28 states have a law that's similar to this that says that there's some kind of punishment whether it's civil fines or whatnot that if you don't take the precautions to protect children from guns in your

household. And and and so I think it's interesting that here in the in the West in Washington in Oregon we're debating it and trying to get this through. At the same time you've got the NRA who's lost almost a quarter of its membership in the past several years going into launching into campaigns that are very much education focused you know the eagle and the eagle going into the schools with the gun education program. Is there any indication that the enemy's political power is diminished in the legislature at least in the Oregon I just nature it doesn't sound like it. Why did it lead up to their demise I don't think so. Good Way too often and I think the political reality is there will not be a gun control measure that the NRA doesn't want passed by this session with the Republicans in control. I spoke today with House and Senate majority leaders and they both said that gun control isn't even on the radar screen with the agenda that they have dealing with education funding. A lot of other measures this isn't even going to rise to the level of going very apart I think.

But what I think is interesting is it does raise contradictions. If the Senate I guess just passed the bill that drunk drivers get their cars taken away but someone could get killed with a gun but you don't take that away. So it's interesting that the NRA is actually it's kind of interesting that their losses on the federal level have gotten a lot of attention but they are doing very well on the state level all around the country. It's not any big deal to us here in the northwest to have a concealed weapons permit. But that most states don't allow just anybody to pack heat you know walking down the street and gradually state by state the NRA is establishing that right and you know you want it's not written about that much but there are still very effective. So it sounds like they've moved their focus from the national law to that to the state level. There are certainly doing better by doing that. OK we're out of time high so hearing Tom Dancy Nassim rock and Richard Gary thanks for joining us this weekend seven days and thank you for watching. Good night.