Five reasons why assisted suicide is the most important ruling from the Supreme Court of Canada

Friday's Supreme Court ruling on assisted suicide is critical for Canadians. It impacts literally everyone

On Friday, the Supreme Court will rule on the right for terminally-ill patients to seek doctor-assisted suicide. This will be the second time the Supreme Court ruled on the matter — in 1993, the court ruled against it. But whatever the outcome, the ruling promises to be one of the biggest decisions in the history of the court.

Here are five reasons why tomorrow’s ruling matters:

1. It impacts literally everyone: The only great certainty in life is that every single person will one day take their last breath. A ruling on people’s rights regarding death will have far reaching consequences for millions of Canadians.

2. It affects people’s lives, not just their deaths: People don’t just die from a terminal illness — they live with it. As do their family members and doctors. Granting the right to seek assisted suicide will change how people live with terminal illness and how families will cope with their deaths and how doctors will administer care.

3. An aging population: In Canada, most cancer diagnoses happen after age 50, and most Alzheimer’s patients are diagnosed after 65. This puts the aging baby boomer generation (who count for roughly 30 per cent of the population) in a bind. As they watch their parents die, they are also feeling the affects of their declining health and facing their own end of life.

4. The debate has already hit home: In Feb. 2014, Quebec passed its own law allowing euthanasia, which is now being challenged in federal court. If the Supreme Court upholds its ban on assisted suicide, this could affect Quebec’s own attempts to legalize medically aided dying.

5. Public support is at an all-time high: When the Supreme Court ruled against assisted suicide in 1993, a Gallup poll showed that 77 per cent of Canadians supported assisted suicide. But by Oct. 2014, those numbers had climbed to 84 per cent. In an Ipsos Reid poll of 2,525 Canadians, 84 per cent agreed with the following statement: “A doctor should be able to help someone end their life if the person is a competent adult who is terminally ill, suffering unbearably and repeatedly asks for assistance to die.” Of the fifty or so people I canvassed in my community,  just to get a cross-section of opinions, there were eight against the concept. The people who were in agreement with assisted suicide had very strong opinions on the subject.

Ask Maxy

Dear Maxy ,
I have a friend who I always thought was gay . I was Ok with that. It's his business , and I really do believe people should be able to do whatever makes them happy . So the other day he came to tell me he was getting married to a woman and she was pregnant . I was so shocked I didn't know what to say . Over the years I have seen him with lots of men, but never once with a woman . I've been married for five years and I know how much commitment marriage is . I wonder if he gets that and also, if he is gay , how is he going to do this ? Given that he is a good friend of mine , I want to talk to him about it ,  just to see where his head is . Is that going too far on my part ?
Crossing the Line
Dear Crossing the line,
Since you are a good friend and you are sincerely concerned for his future happiness, it is not going too far to talk to him about it. But only if he is willing to discuss it and I think you should make sure of your facts first. You're not sure if he is gay. And if so, has he told his future wife about his sexual orientation ?
FACT: Over 4 million women are currently married to gay men or have been married to gay men in the United States.
FACT: Over 63% of Gay Husbands Will NEVER tell their wives the truth.
Current research shows that most of these couples break up immediately or within the first two years. There is so much to consider in a mixed orientation marriage: children, social considerations, belief systems and personalities, as well as levels of sexual openness between the two of them. They have to decide whether they will be monogamous or have an open marriage. And how much they will tell their families ?
Some men are more attracted to their own gender and attempt to fight their feelings by marrying women, in the belief the relationship will change the way they feel about their own gender.
If your friend is gay, he is making a huge commitment and he would benefit from talking to a councilor or psychotherapist recommended to him by his family doctor.
Maxy

Dear Maxy ,
I fell down at work , kind of randomly . I was walking down the steps headed to a meeting for work and tripped . I broke my ankle and I am on crutches for a few weeks . I feel horrible , literally because my ankle hurts but also because I never meant to cause any trouble . I had to file a worker's compensation claim , and now my boss is mad at me . How can I let him know that I don't mean to be a burden ? I am at work doing my job after having to take a few days off . 
In a Hard Place
Dear in a Hard  Place,
Your  boss knows  that injury on the  job is  something  the  company is  responsible  for  covering . Yes, it  may be  frustrating  for  him , but it doesn't come as a surprise. These things happen from time to time . Naturally you wish  you hadn't  fallen . You can express  your  regret  that this accident  happened when you talk  to your  boss, but  don't  belabor the point . The  best way  to show  your  commitment is to do  your  job well . Even with  this temporary disability , let your  boss see  you are serious  about  your work  and that  you do  not intend  to allow  your injury  to cripple  your  work out-put .
Maxy

Dear Maxy ,
Every year, a co-worker helps his daughter sell Girl Scout cookies and it's hard to say no because the day forces everyone to make a purchase . The cookies are amazing , but I would prefer to purchase them from a place of happiness as apposed to being forced to make a purchase . 
How can I make the experience more enjoyable the next time around because I believe in helping the organization ? 
Cookie Peddler 
Dear Cookie Peddler,
Your co-worker is wrong to put you all in that position. He is presuming upon his office relationships and friendships to strong-arm you into buying the cookies. He also knows you would be reluctant to disappoint a little girl. It's not a competition...it's a charity and the responsibility for selling the cookies should lay with the girl scout. Parents often accompany the girls for safety reasons but it doesn't apply in  this situation.
It is understandable that he would want to help his daughter but you will have to speak up about it if his method offends you. Refuse politely and firmly to make the purchase and tell the co-worker you have made a commitment to the girl scouts in your own neighborhood. If the guy really ticks you off, speak to him privately and tell him you would appreciate it if he excluded you in future.
Maxy

Planck telescope puts new datestamp on first stars

Planck has mapped the delicate polarisation of the CMB across the entire sky

Scientists working on Europe's Planck satellite say the first stars in the Universe lit up later than was previously thought.
The team has made the most precise map of the "oldest light" in the cosmos.
Earlier observations of this radiation had suggested that the first generation of stars burst into life about 420 million years after the Big Bang.
The new Planck data now indicates they fired up around 560 million years after the Universe got going.
"This difference of 140 million years might not seem that significant in the context of the 13.8-billion-year history of the cosmos, but proportionately it's actually a very big change in our understanding of how certain key events progressed at the earliest epochs," said Prof George Efstathiou, one of the leaders of the Planck Science Collaboration.
 
The assessment is based on studies of the "afterglow" of the Big Bang, the ancient light called the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB), which still washes over the Earth today.

200 Year Old Buddhist Monk Still Alive

A 200-year-old Buddhist monk found mummified in Mongolia "is still alive" and nearing a state of Nirvana, it has been claimed.
According to an expert on Buddhism, the lotus position in which the body was found indicates the mummy is still in a heightened spiritual meditation called "tukdam".
That is very close to Nirvana, which according to Buddhist beliefs, is the highest possible state achievable when the physical body dissolves.
Profesor Ganhugiyn Purevbata of Ulaanbaatar Buddhist University in Mongolia, has advanced the incredible theory the mummified monk is still alive - despite it looking very dead after two centuries spent wrapped in an animal hide.
"Lama is sitting in the lotus position vajra, the left hand is opened, and the right hand symbolizes the preaching Sutra," he said.
"This is a sign that the Lama is not dead, but is in a very deep meditation according to the ancient tradition of Buddhist lamas."
Buddhist monk Dr Barry Kerzin said the continuing meditative state of the 200-year-old monk is a source of joy to those nearby.
"If the meditator can continue to stay in this meditative state, he can become a Buddha," said Kerzin.
"Reaching such a high spiritual level the meditator will also help others, and all the people around will feel a deep sense of joy."
The mummified monk was discovered in the Kobdsk region of Mongolia inside a cave. It came in to the possession of the authorities after a man was caught trying to sell it on the black market for an enormous sum.

TransAsia Airways Crash into Keelung River

A dashboard camera captures the dramatic moment a passenger plane clips a taxicab and a bridge before plunging into a river in Taiwan

 

TAIPEI, Taiwan - Rescuers were searching for 12 people Thursday morning after using a crane to hoist the fuselage of a wrecked TransAsia Airways plane from a shallow river in Taiwan's capital following a crash that killed at least 31 others.

Flight 235 with 58 people aboard — many of them travellers from China — banked sharply on its side Wednesday shortly after takeoff from Taipei, clipped a highway bridge and then careened into the Keelung River.

Rescuers in rubber rafts pulled 15 people alive from the wreckage during daylight. After dark, they brought in the crane, and the death toll was expected to rise once crews were able to search through submerged portions of the fuselage, which came to rest a few dozen meters (yards) from the shore.

Dramatic video clips apparently taken from cars were posted online and aired by broadcasters, showing the ATR 72 propjet as it pivoted onto its side while zooming toward a traffic bridge over the river. In one of them, the plane rapidly fills the frame as its now-vertical wing scrapes over the road, hitting a vehicle before heading into the river.

Speculation cited in local media said the crew may have turned sharply to follow the line of the river to avoid crashing into a high-rise residential area, but Taiwan's aviation authority said it had no evidence of that.

Emergency personnel try to extract passengers from a commercial plane after it crashed in Taipei, Taiwan.

Taiwanese broadcasters repeatedly played a recording of the plane's final contact with the control tower in which the crew called out "Mayday" three times. The recording offered no direct clues as to why the plane was in distress.

It was the airline's second French-Italian-built ATR 72 to crash in the past year. Wednesday's flight had taken off at 11:53 a.m. from Taipei's downtown Sungshan Airport en route to the outlying Taiwanese-controlled Kinmen islands. The crew issued the mayday call shortly after takeoff, Taiwanese civil aviation authorities said.

TransAsia director Peter Chen said contact with the plane was lost four minutes after takeoff. He said weather conditions were suitable for flying and the cause of the accident was unknown.

"Actually this aircraft in the accident was the newest model. It hadn't been used for even a year," he told a news conference.

Thirty-one passengers were from China, Taiwan's tourism bureau said. Kinmen's airport is a common link between Taipei and China's Fujian province.

Taiwan's Civil Aeronautics Administration said 31 people were confirmed dead, 15 were rescued with injuries and 12 were still missing. It said two people on the ground were hurt.

Part of the freeway above the river where the plane crashed was littered with debris and was closed after the accident.

Relatives of the victims had not reached the scene by dusk Wednesday but some were expected to arrive Thursday, including some flying from Beijing.

The plane's wing hit a taxi on the freeway, and the driver and a passenger were injured, Chen said.

Taiwan's Ministry of National Defence said it had sent 165 people and eight boats to the riverside rescue scene, joining fire department rescue crews.

Another ATR 72 operated by the same Taipei-based airline crashed in the outlying Taiwan-controlled islands of Penghu last July 23, killing 48 at the end of a typhoon for reasons that are still under investigation.

ATR, a French-Italian consortium based in Toulouse, France, said it was sending a team to Taiwan to help in the investigation.

The ATR 72-600 that crashed Wednesday is manufacturer's best plane model, and the pilot had 4,900 hours of flying experience, said Lin Chih-ming of the Civil Aeronautics Administration.

Greg Waldron, Asia managing editor at Flightglobal magazine in Singapore, said the ATR 72-600 is the latest iteration of one of the most popular turboprop planes in the world, particularly favoured for regional short-hop flights in Asia..

It has a generally good reputation for safety and reliability and is known among airlines for being cheap and efficient to operate.While it's too early to say what caused the crash, the accessibility of the crash site should allow for a swift investigation, and an initial report should be available within about a month.

Murder of Another Hero....ISIS Strikes Once More

Jordanian pilot Moaz al-Kasasbeh

Moaz al-Kasasbeh beside his jet fighter

Captured by ISIS

Triumphant terrorists

A battered prisoner

Moaz al-Kasasbeh awaiting his fate in a cage

Setting fire to a trail of gasoline

Doused in gasoline, he covers his face

The depravity of the Islamic State terrorist group in Syria and Iraq plumbed new levels yesterday as it released a video showing Jordanian pilot Moaz al-Kasasbeh being burned alive while locked in a cage. The chilling footage, entitled 'Healing the Believers' Chests', shows the captured airman wearing an orange jumpsuit and seemingly doused in fuel as a trail of gasoline leading up to the iron bars of the cage is seen being set alight.
Flames are seen quickly spreading across the dirt to the cage, where they completely engulf the helpless pilot in images that are extremely distressing, but at the same time, should be viewed to demonstrate the unconscionable atrocities being committed by ISIS. And hopefully stir the coalition to immediate retaliatory action.
The release of the expertly-edited video - which represents a new level of barbarity from a group notorious for its savagery - has prompted Jordan to announce it would execute all six prisoners convicted of association with ISIS at dawn today. Within an hour of the 22-minute-long video's publication, Jordan reportedly moved ISIS-linked prisoners to a jail in the south of the country which is usually used for state executions. It is understood that will include the execution of Sajida al-Rishawi, the female militant whom ISIS had originally demanded Jordan release in exchange for Kasasbeh.
Last night Jordanian officials told the 26 year-old pilot’s devastated family they believed the footage to be genuine and the man, branded a ‘hero’at home was dead. The video was the first time the pilot had been seen since he was captured in December by triumphant ISIS fighters when his F-16 jet crashed near the group’s Syrian headquarters of Raqqa during a US-Coalition led airstrike.
Mamdouh al-Ameri, spokesman for the Jordanian armed forces, confirmed the pilot's death and vowed revenge, hours after the video was released. In a televised address, he said: 'While the military forces mourn the martyr, they emphasize his blood will not be shed in vain. The revenge will be as big as the calamity that has hit Jordan.'

King Abdullah II, speaking during his U.S visit in Washington, also made a statement on Jordanian TV, saying he had received news of the 'martyrdom with sadness and deep sorrow'. Calling the murder a 'cowardly act of terror', he also pleaded for his countrymen to stand 'side-by-side', vowing that Kasasbeh's death 'would only make us stronger'.
Last night, King Abdullah arrived at the White House for a hastily-arranged meeting with President Obama, following the news of the barbaric murder.
President Obama said earlier that if the video turns out to be authentic, it would be more evidence of the group's 'viciousness and barbarity. He added that the U.S. would 'redouble the vigilance and determination on the part of our global coalition to make sure they are degraded and ultimately defeated,' adding that the footage serves to indicate that 'whatever ideology they are operating out of is bankrupt.'
Somehow, I don't think 'bankrupt ideology' is a strong enough term. Maybe the coalition should be taking action as in: 'extermination', 'annihilation' and 'wiping them off the face of the earth'.


Robin Williams Family in Conflict Over Estate

Susan Schneider and Robin Williams (Getty Images)

Robin Williams has been laid to rest, but there is nothing peaceful about what is going on between those he left behind. Williams's widow, Susan Schneider, is reportedly at odds with the Oscar-winning actor's three children over his estate. Court documents obtained by The New York Times show that Schneider — who was Robin's third wife — and his kids from his previous two marriages, Zak, 31, Zelda, 25, and Cody Williams, 23, are fighting over money and property. Robin committed suicide on Aug. 11 at his home in Tiburon, California. He was 63.

Susan's legal team filed papers in December complaining that some property was "unilaterally removed" from their home "days after Mr. Williams’s untimely death." She claims that the children gave her three days notice after Robin's death before they wanted to come to the home and take what was promised to them. Susan went on to say that she "became frightened of the co-trustees invading her home" and refused.

As a result, the papers state that since she lost "her husband through a shocking and emotionally charged event," Mrs. Williams has not been "given time to grieve her loss free from the frenetic efforts to interfere with her domestic tranquility."

Zelda, Zak and Cody Williams

Robin's three children filed their response last month. They say they “are heartbroken” that Susan Schneider Williams — who they note was married to their father for "less than three years" — has "acted against his wishes by challenging the plans he so carefully made for his estate."

In his will, Robin left his estate in its entirety to a trust whose beneficiaries included his three children. It was updated after he and Susan tied the knot in 2011 with provisions for her. She also has two children from a previous relationship.

Zak, Zelda, and Cody say Susan's filing "adds insult to terrible injury" and is a means to "prevent them from receiving what their father wanted them to receive."

According to TMZ, the late actor left his personal effects, including his Oscar for the movie Good Will Hunting, movie memorabilia, action figures, graphic novels, theater masks, and other items to his kids.

Supposedly, Susan acknowledges she has no right to any of that, but she wants other items like the tux from his wedding and other "knickknacks"......whatever that means.

Robin with children and second wife Marsha

Robin made no secret of the fact that his children were his first priority at all times.While Williams publicly spoke about his battles with substance abuse and depression, he was equally as open when professing the love he had for his children. From day one, his kids came first and his decision to go into rehab had everything to do with them.

During a sit down with Diane Sawyer after he completed rehab in 2006, the journalist asked Robin if he could go back and relive any day in his life, what it would be.

"Just the birth of my children," Williams replied. "Each one. Those are all great days and they've all turned out amazing… that's the gift that keeps on giving, and that's the thing that makes life worth living. That's why you want a world, you want to make the world a better place."