Shocking, eh? Brings to mind this classic bit from Monty Python:Cass Sunstein, President Barack Obama’s nominee to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), has advocated a policy under which the government would “presume” someone has consented to having his or her organs removed for transplantation into someone else when they die unless that person has explicitly indicated that his or her organs should not be taken.
Under such a policy, hospitals would harvest organs from people who never gave permission for this to be done.
Sorry bout that, it's too obvious and has been done elsewhere, but it's one of my favorite bits from the Pythons and I welcome the chance to revisit it. Morrissey explains that the situation is a lot less dire than the CNS summary would suggest, but there remains a nagging suspicion that far too many people in this administration have a collectivist mindset that views individuals as resources to be exploited for the good of the state. The thought process seems to go: Sick old people are expensive and relatively non-productive, so let's make it easier to deny them therapies and procedures that might make their lives better; but on the other hand they have valuable organs, so let's make it easier to take those so they can be used to help other, more productive people. Will this end in a Pythonesque nightmare? Not likely, but we are skirting too close to the edge for my comfort.
