Online-only letters

Assisted suicide

Dore misread Death with Dignity Act

I don't know what I found more shocking — the fact that guest columnist Margaret Dore is an attorney who can't read or that The Seattle Times, a reputable newspaper, printed her outrageous lies ["The indignity of I-1000: Backers' claims misleading," Times, guest column, Aug. 20].

Anyone who has read I-1000 word for word, as I have, would have been outraged to read Dore's article. I don't know whether she intentionally made up the lies about an heir needing to be present and that anyone can help physically administer the medication or if she just needs a pair of reading glasses.

The truth is that one of the witnesses cannot be an heir and nobody can physically help a patient administer the medication in any way. I suggest your readers read the initiative for themselves and discover that there are safeguards built into the initiative to prevent her wild scenarios.

— Jessica Grant, Burien

Not everyone is a "greedy son"

Guest columnist Margaret Dore may be an attorney specializing in probate, but she is clearly not an expert on I-1000. Her remark about "font so small, you can barely read it" speaks to the extensive safeguards in Death with Dignity.

I had no problem reading it. She takes words out of context by not mentioning the request must be witnessed by someone who is not a blood relative and will not benefit from the death. She fails to mention the patient "may self-administer" refers to the patient having the option to change their mind. While Dore may have observed the repercussions of a "greedy son" (maybe her own), the Death with Dignity Act's safeguards prevent greed from being a factor.

Her callousness has clouded her ability to see compassion in people who believe those who are terminally ill should have a choice, and in supporting the right of choice we show love, not greed. Dore should visit a hospice facility and see family members standing by the bedside of those they love with compassion, not greed.

Voters are smart to read the text (regardless of font size) and not let Dore's "greedy son" prevent them from using their critical-thinking abilities to vote "yes."

— Nancy Niedzielski, Lynnwood

Illicit practices would wain with act

Guest columnist Margaret Dore raises good questions, but she lacks important information on how I-1000, the Death with Dignity Act, would work.

Under the law in Oregon, illicit assisted dying occurs at one-quarter the rate in other states where there are no legal safeguards and, therefore, a much greater chance of the specific abuses Dore fears. With the law in place, studies show almost no illicit assisted dying in Oregon. With no regulation, "back alley" physician-assisted dying has far greater likelihood of abuses than assisted dying under a law such as I-1000.

Which does Dore really want?

— Tom Preston, Seattle

Zero-waste plan

It's the responsible thing to do

In Danny Westneat's column ["As wallets scream, city feels no pain," Local News, Aug. 17], Eugene Wasserman, president of the North Seattle Industrial Association, has some very critical words for Seattle politicians, including comments that blue-collar workers are being priced out of town.

For the most part, I agree with him. But where Wasserman lost me was with his reason for the sorry state of our city — a responsible, long-overdue 21st-century plan to manage our waste. He proposes we just keep sending our garbage to "big open pits in the middle of essentially nowhere."

I hate to be the one to break the news, but there is no "nowhere" anymore. Landfills are a cancer on the planet and a major contributor of the gases that cause global warming. Climate change knows no boundaries and affects white-collar and blue-collar workers alike.

Before making any major decision, Native Americans, as a tradition, consider the possible effects on the planet seven generations in the future. Decades from now, people will look back at Seattle's zero-waste policy and be grateful we paid the price by taking responsibility for our actions.

A healthy planet is essential for all, no matter what color your collar is.

— Joel Ancowitz, Seattle

Proposal was long overdue

Commentator Eugene Wasserman talks about how Seattle is waging a "cultural war" on people who aren't "college-degreed and working in mirrored-glass biotech parks" and says the new garbage proposal is "driving lower-income people out of the city."

If the city hadn't embraced a zero-waste strategy, which includes items like banning styrofoam and encouraging reusable bags, we would have built a third waste-transfer station. And where would that station have been built? In Georgetown, home to many blue-collar workers and lower-income people.

I understand the financial pain of wallets are being squeezed. I feel like I am constantly giving my billfold the Heimlich maneuver, but the notion that our city is suddenly talking about garbage is incorrect. This isn't an issue that came out of nowhere — it was actually long overdue.

— Kathy Nyland, Seattle

Top-two primary

Washington voters lose with new system

As voters celebrate their "freedom of choice" in Washington's new top-two primary, they should realize that they will not have more choices in the general election ["Exercise the right to vote on your terms," editorial, Aug. 19]. All third-party and minority-party candidates are disenfranchised by this system: They will not appear on the final ballot. Already in some cases, only representatives of one party will be listed as candidates in the November election.

Voters may think this is a more democratic system, but like the emperor's new clothes, the folly of this process and its fundamental unfairness is clear: Less is not more. Fewer choices in the general election are fewer choices, and Washington state, parading its naked contempt for electoral diversity, will be the biggest loser of all.

— Alan Moen, Entiat

New primary destroys democracy

As discussions go on about I-26, I hear and read all sorts of statements indicating that the state of Washington, for some reason, has no understanding of the value of political parties and of the two-party system.

Political parties have been around almost from the founding of our country. Like-minded folks get together and work to promote their principles and objectives to the people as a whole.

One of the steps they take is to write and make public a platform so everyone will learn what the party stands for. In general and in part, the Republican Party platform calls for the lowest possible taxation, encouragement of free enterprise largely unfettered by government control and for governance at the lowest possible level.

Democrats tend to want to raise taxes so money can be transferred to those the party feels need it, believe the government is best equipped to take care of any and all problems, tend to regulate business and are more inclined to want governance at the federal level.

Candidates who agree with these platforms run for office with the platform principles as the foundation of their proposed service.

With the knowledge of where the candidate is really coming from, the voter is better equipped to choose. In the case of primaries, the idea is to select the party with the platform you most agree with, and then choose the candidate you feel best able to put them into action. Those who say, "I vote for the person, not the party" are unwittingly saying they will vote for the best speechmaker — the one who sounds the best.

It would seem that The Times editors have never participated in party politics (and they probably shouldn't). Saying voters in our present primary will vote "without the prying manipulations of the state's political parties" indicates a surprising ignorance on how the system and the parties work.

I have been a precinct committee officer delegate for more than 25 years and have never seen any pressure or manipulation from the state party. At our precinct caucuses, we discuss issues and send written reports and platform requests on to the district. Delegates there discuss and argue over platform planks, and the result is sent on to the county convention and then to the state level where delegates, elected at the county and district level, decide on a final state platform. There is no pressure or arm-twisting involved — just democracy in action.

What we have now is an election that will be won by the candidate with the prettiest face, the best-sounding promises and with the most money for ads. In areas heavily favoring one party, no opposition-party candidate will be heard in the general election, perpetuating the existing power. Is this the way to conduct elections?

The present primary destroys the two-party system that has served this country so well for so long.

— Henry Kroeger, Redmond

Self-cleaning toilets

Government spends tax money unwisely

Politicians just love to spend taxpayer money on allegedly advanced technologies — it must make them feel so clever [$5M toilets get flushed for $12,549," page one, Aug. 16]. But only the government would consider million-dollar toilets a good investment.

Seattle taxpayers learned that the hard way this week when the city finally unburdened itself of five space-age, self-cleaning public toilets it paid $5 million to install four years ago. Sold for $12,549 on eBay, that comes to $4,987,451 in public funds flushed away on toilets that attracted more hookers and drug addicts than tourists.

This debacle makes the days of the Pentagon's $500 hammers seem quaint.

— James G. Lakely, Chicago