[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[Barrister]

"Healthcare is so terrible I want to die!"

"Joke's on you, you're not allowed to die."

...

More seriously, I guess it depends on whether you prioritize minimizing suffering (in which case increasing health care funding and allowing MAID are the choices), or on preventing deaths (in which case increasing health care funding and forbidding MAID are options).

OK, so I don't necessarily disagree with your characterization.

But I've heard the argument that suicide is a long term solution to a short term problem.

I think this was from the CUP article I posted - people with spinal cord injures are very frequently suicidal in the short term.  And a spinal cord injury is 100% incurable - no matter what medical science can do (at least at present) we can't cure that.  Which makes it eligible for MAID.

But the evidence shows that most people who suffer a spinal cord injury, who can go through some deep, dark phases at first, learn to accept and adapt to their injury and are no longer suicidal.

So the "short term problem" of a spinal cord injury isn't the spinal cord injury itself (obviously that will never go away), but the short term suicidal ideation that happens immediately after the injury.

[Barrister]

So hey - interesting article that is obviously adjacent to MAID, but very clearly is not MAID.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/suicide-forum-still-active-online-1.7048809

An online US_based website provides forums where people can advise each other about suicide.  It's banned in several countries, but not Canada.

There's a side aspect that a Canadian is linked to providing several people from the forum with materials to allow themselves to commit suicide.

Counselling or aiding suicide (aside and apart from MAID) is still an offence in Canada.



And just to be extra clear - while I think MAID criteria should be tightened up, I think it has its place.  Websites like this, that have nothing to do with MAID, are entirely different.  I posted this link just because I saw it and thought it interesting - I'm not trying to link the two debates.

[garbon]

I'm not linking these things but I've mentioned them both in the same post multiple times.

[Admiral Yi]

Beeb, how would you like the regs to be changed?

[garbon]

"Healthcare is so terrible I want to die!"

"Joke's on you, you're not allowed to die."

...

More seriously, I guess it depends on whether you prioritize minimizing suffering (in which case increasing health care funding and allowing MAID are the choices), or on preventing deaths (in which case increasing health care funding and forbidding MAID are options).

OK, so I don't necessarily disagree with your characterization.

But I've heard the argument that suicide is a long term solution to a short term problem.

I think this was from the CUP article I posted - people with spinal cord injures are very frequently suicidal in the short term.  And a spinal cord injury is 100% incurable - no matter what medical science can do (at least at present) we can't cure that.  Which makes it eligible for MAID.

But the evidence shows that most people who suffer a spinal cord injury, who can go through some deep, dark phases at first, learn to accept and adapt to their injury and are no longer suicidal.

So the "short term problem" of a spinal cord injury isn't the spinal cord injury itself (obviously that will never go away), but the short term suicidal ideation that happens immediately after the injury.

So would you support increased healthcare funding as Jacob noted?

[Josephus]

Let me find another controversial topic where CC & BB have opposite view. BRB.

In an ideal world, one day they'll be on opposite sides in a courtroom. I'll pay to watch that.

[Sheilbh]

"M'learned friend"

[HVC]

"M'learned friend"

What's the protocol for tipping a powdered wig. Yay or nay?

[Barrister]

Let me find another controversial topic where CC & BB have opposite view. BRB.

In an ideal world, one day they'll be on opposite sides in a courtroom. I'll pay to watch that.

Different practice areas.  I'd clean his clock in a criminal court, but he'd do the same to me elsewhere.

It would be like a basketball player going up against a hockey player (which, after I typed it, is exactly what it would be).  Basketball player cleans up in basketball, hockey player cleans up in hockey.

[Barrister]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxKI9zKhDNE

I find this video fascinating.  Narrated by Pierre Poilievre, it's a 15 minute deep dive into housing prices in Canada and was released over the weekend.

Given that it's 15 minutes long and actually makes substantive arguments I think you can find things to quibble with on both sides (the right wing complaint would be - so what about immigration) but I love efforts by politicians to try and deal with serious issues with facts and arguments (which of course is one of the many reasons I am so against Donald Trump).

So the video has been watched 4 million times on Twitter, and three quarters of a million times on Youtube.  And climbing.

I've seen now a few articles like this: they do pick apart various aspects of the argument Poilievre is making (hey it's 15 minutes long - there's a lot to pick at) but all conclude with something like this:

Still, Poilievre now owns the housing issue — the most important issue in the eyes of most voters — and the Liberals are viewed as being culpable for presiding over a hot mess.

https://nationalpost.com/opinion/poilievres-housing-script-a-hit

[crazy canuck]

Let me find another controversial topic where CC & BB have opposite view. BRB.

In an ideal world, one day they'll be on opposite sides in a courtroom. I'll pay to watch that.

Different practice areas.  I'd clean his clock in a criminal court, but he'd do the same to me elsewhere.

It would be like a basketball player going up against a hockey player (which, after I typed it, is exactly what it would be).  Basketball player cleans up in basketball, hockey player cleans up in hockey.

Yep, there is no way I would want to face BB in any criminal proceeding, unless he was prepared to tell me what I should do 

[Jacob]

Yeah, sceptical as I may be on Poilievre on housing, the Liberals need to fucking do something. And Poilievre talking about it in the way that at the very least suggests substance (whether or not there is substance) is still significantly better than what the Liberals are doing.

Get the fingers out of your asses, Libs, and do something.

[crazy canuck]

You have to give PP this, he knows how to campaign in the modern digital age.

He has effectively bypassed the media - much luck a Trudeau of a different age.

[viper37]

Or worse still, the prognosis is that that pain which continue to get worse until finally the patient must be constantly sedated, in which case they will lose the capacity to give consent.

That's about what I got from the conference.

It's from very severe cases where a patient has to be constantly medicated to alleviate pains or to maintain a semblance of reality and and it is no longer working.

The law will change to allow a person with receives an early diagnosis of, say, Alzheimer disease, to sign a consent form stating that when he/she reaches a status when he can no longer move, no longer has any contact with reality (I am describing the case of my grandmother and my grandfather here), they can decide in advance to receive MAIDS, while they are still in posession of the mental capacities.

[Barrister]

Yep, there is no way I would want to face BB in any criminal proceeding, unless he was prepared to tell me what I should do 

The annoying thing about being a Crown is you do have a quasi-judicial role so sometimes I do gently suggest to defence what they should be doing.

As private counsel you're free to take advantage of the other side's mistakes (only up to the point you want to make sure there's not an ineffective counsel argument on appeal).

I heard a lovely story from a colleague the other day about a former Crown who just recently passed.  He was running one of his very first trials as defence in front of this Crown, and was thinking of pleading him guilty.  The Crown told him to man up and run his trial.

When it came time for argument, the Crown proceeded to make the arguments that defence should have made (but didn't), then argued why those arguments were wrong.  Judge proceeded to acquit on the basis of the argument the Crown said defence should have made.