I love the need for end of life counseling. So many people do not have any plans for what they want for their funeral much less what should be done with their money, their power of attorney, when to pull the plug, what parts should be donated, what type of quality of life they want to have when hospitalized or institutionalized and how they want to have their lives ended. Humans do not ackowledge death as a given. We do not want to look it in the face.

Discussing how you want your life to end is the ultimate of control. To have the government encourage this conversation with your physicians and most importantly your family is imperative.

I hate the fact that some are calling these death panels rather than facing the truth of just encouraging people to have a plan for when they are very ill or when death comes a ‘knocking at their door, which it will for all of us at one point in time or another.

During the election, Sarah Palin made endless noise regarding death panels when it was a scary, hot-button topic that served as grist for her tirades about what she hawked as the democrat’s agenda. Interesting, with Arizona’s cutting out coverage for organ transplants, it looks like Sarah might have been prescient. But, oops, Arizona is a Republican state and it’s her party that has implemented the first actual steps toward her “death panels”. Anyone care to predict how little she will have to say on the subject now?