To the editor:

The Declaration of Independence states that we are “endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights.” Life was mentioned first.

We preach about the right to public health care, the right to an education, the right to a living wage, the right to not be impoverished. Minor children have a right to contraceptives without parental permission.

What nobody wants to admit is all of these rights are illusory if a human being does not have the “right” to gasp their first breath of air. The right to life is THE right from which all others flow. The ACLU argues if one of us does not have the right to free speech none of us has that right. Ditto for assembly and the vote.

I have a solution to our Social Security and health care issues. (AARP take notes here.) Let’s exterminate all of our citizens over the age of, say, 75. That is close to the current life expectancy of an adult. Nobody gets to live forever, and think of all the money we can save in the area of Social Security and health care without all of those senior citizens dragging us down. In the words of Planned Parenthood, “We can take care of this quietly and no one ever needs to know.”

So do we have a “right” to life after all?

Scott Burkhart,
Lawrence