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Your task is to extract the thesis of an opinionated news article by selecting some of its text segments. The thesis is a summarization of what the author wants to persuade the reader of. Your answer should consist of segments of the given text. Note that you are not allowed to combine different sentences.
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When should voluntary euthanasia not be an option? This week a court in Belgium announced that the convicted rapist and murderer Frank Van Den Bleeken would be put to death by a lethal injection, in spite of the fact that the death penalty is banned across Europe . Van Den Bleeken's case was unusual : having previously been declared insane and not criminally responsible, he had himself asked to be euthanised on the grounds that he would rather die than spend the rest of his life in jail . Today the Belgian justice minister announced that Van Den Bleeken would not be euthanised after all, amid reports that the prisoner had changed his mind . Nonetheless ,  the case provides a fascinating twist to the old debate about euthanasia . Should Van Den Bleeken have been allowed to die? The moral defence of voluntary euthanasia is usually applied to people suffering from a terminal illness . But Van Den Bleeken isn't terminally ill and isn't in physical pain . Another traditional requirement is that the wish to die should be voluntary and competent . But how can the choices of someone who has been declared insane be regarded as voluntary and competent? The concern is that granting his request would make it a case of involuntary euthanasia , and that is usually seen as morally unacceptable . If there is an issue about Van Bleeken's sanity that is because of his alleged inability to control his sexual impulses . But it could be argued that this doesn't affect the validity of his request to be euthanised . The implication is that while some of his decisions might be involuntary or incompetent, this doesn't apply to his choice of death over a lifetime behind bars . Even so , should his request have been granted, given that he isn't terminally ill? One argument for allowing voluntary euthanasia where terminal illness isn't an issue turns on the idea of wellbeing : people should be allowed to choose death where they would literally be better off dead or where their life literally isn't worth living . Another argument turns on human autonomy : we should respect a person's free choices as long as they don't harm anyone else . Someone who is not terminally ill could still satisfy these requirements . Had Van Den Bleeken been allowed to die, critics may say it would have risked opening the floodgates for other similar cases . Belgium has seen a dramatic rise in euthanasia since the practice was legalised in 2002 and permitted in cases of pain and psychological distress, as well as terminal illness . Some are opposed to voluntary euthanasia as a matter of principle . The philosopher David Velleman argues that there isn't a fundamental right to choose between life and death, and that a person's rights don't expand when they become terminally ill or psychologically distressed . He is heavily influenced by 18th century philosopher Immanuel Kant . According to Kant, morality requires that we respect the dignity of persons, and the dignity of persons makes them intrinsically valuable . For Kant, a person's dignity can't be traded against their wellbeing or happiness , and the fact that a person believes that their life isn't worth living doesn't make it acceptable for them to be euthanised . The Van Den Bleeken case puts pressure on these standard arguments for and against voluntary euthanasia . Suppose that, contrary to Kant's view, voluntary euthanasia is morally permissible as long as the person asking to be euthanised would be genuinely better off dead . Relatives of Van Den Bleeken's victim may well argue that the fact(if it is a fact) that he would be better off dead is precisely a reason for not allowing him to be put to death . From this perspective, euthanasia looks like a way for him to circumvent his sentence . Van Den Bleeken's victim was Christiane Remacle, a 19-year-old he raped and strangled in 1989 . Her sisters are reported to have said that Van Den Bleeken should be forced to languish in jail , and their reaction brings out an ambivalence in how we think about the death penalty for murder . Relatives of murder victims often demand the death penalty as the ultimate punishment , but the Van Den Bleeken case suggests that, at least from the standpoint of the perpetrator, the ultimate sanction may be life behind bars . But the intrinsic value argument against voluntary euthanasia can also be hard to swallow, in this case . Christiane Remacle's sisters might balk at the idea that a murderer's life is intrinsically valuable . It's hard not to sympathise , and there remain strong reasons for not allowing Van Den Bleeken to be euthanised regardless of whether his life is intrinsically valuable . As long as euthanasia is seen as a way for him to circumvent his sentence, respect for his victim and her family demands that he isn't given the option .
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One argument for allowing voluntary euthanasia where terminal illness isn't an issue turns on the idea of wellbeing Some are opposed to voluntary euthanasia as a matter of principle


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Power without purpose: the tragic rule of David Cameron. When the history of David Cameron's time as prime minister is written , no doctrine will be named after him . The government has been ideological, but not in a way that bears an intellectual imprint of the Conservative leader . There have been upheavals in schools, the health service and the benefits system , but those revolutions belong to Michael Gove, Andrew Lansley and Iain Duncan Smith . Cameron gave permission , he never pioneered . Cameron has also said he abhors "isms" and wouldn't want posterity to anoint him with one . Friends say this makes him a practical conservative of the old school , guided by ancient and uncodified British instincts of decency . His enemies think that is a posh way of saying he lacks principle . With no pattern of belief associated with his name, Cameron's legacy will be a collection of tactical manoeuvres, with as many prominent surrenders as victories . The true spirit of "Cameronism" in education, for example, is better conveyed in the removal in 2014 of Gove to placate the teaching profession than in his appointment to shake up the department in the first place . But in no field is the Tory leader's trademark better defined than in his approach to Europe . If any political manoeuvre deserves to be named after the Conservative leader , it is the habit of trying to sate the appetites of hardline Eurosceptics with morsels that would always leave them hungry . It might be called the "Cameron concession" . Thus has he fed the Eurosceptic pack enough to keep it snapping at his heels and frustrated it enough that his voice was drowned by angry barking . Perhaps the saddest aspect of this spectacle is that it saw a potentially sound policy trampled in the melee . The outline of Cameron's position is that Britain should stay in the EU but under changed terms . They will change anyway because the priority for most other member states is bolstering the single currency . This involves the integration of a euro-core with serious implications for Britain's status one way or another . So the principle of pro- active renegotiation, ratified by referendum, is sound . But Cameron spoiled a plausible position with cowardice : he set his renegotiation up as an empty vessel into which hardliners poured Ukip-ish fantasies of ending immigration . He bought the argument that says the terms on offer from Brussels get better the closer Britain gets to the exit , although that logic is commonly advanced by people who want the negotiations to fail . The deadline for his referendum, the end of 2017, was plucked from thin air without regard for what was diplomatically feasible or economically wise . But the chief reason Cameron's EU policy hasn't worked for him is that voters also consider motive when awarding merit . Those who want a referendum in order to leave the EU mistrust the prime minister because he wants a different outcome ; and pro-Europeans don't trust Cameron to defend Britain's interests in Europe because the whole policy came about as a sop to the sceptics . That doesn't leave many people who think the Tories have the right policy for the right reason . Europe exemplifies the problem , but it runs deeper . Cameron's team are sure they are running on an admirable record: economic growth, rising employment, lower crime, a reduced deficit and reformed welfare . These are things, like the EU referendum, that should make the Tories popular . By the same calculation, Labour, lacking those credentials, should be out of the running . Yet the campaign has started and Ed Miliband is still ahead . Downing Street clings to the now familiar explanation that voters haven't properly engaged with the choice, and that the Tory surge will come at the eleventh hour when the reality of a possible Miliband regime penetrates the national consciousness . But what if Cameron has hit the limit of credit available for five years in charge because even the good bits don't connect in people's minds with decent motives? That is what Labour strategists are banking on . Miliband's personal ratings are bleak, except on measures of decency and empathy . So those are the leadership qualities his campaign aims to project . The contrast they want to draw is between Cameron's ethical plasticity and a challenger who sticks to his beliefs . Miliband will be cast as a man guided by what David Axelrod, Barack Obama's former aide now advising Labour, calls"a north star" - a compass point that tells voters a leader is propelled by something more noble than the salvation of his own skin . Waverers who don't warm to Miliband(and who aren't irredeemably riddled with anti-Westminster rage) might still be persuaded that he is in politics for the right reason . The opposite is true of Cameron . Even those in his own party who like the direction of policy cannot sincerely claim that their leader is driven by much beyond a sense of entitlement to the job . That was less of an impediment in the past . For much of the 20th century, Britain was ruled by Conservatives who thought of political theory as something suspect or vulgar, a folly for continentals and socialists, and no substitute for the innate good sense drilled into English boys at the best schools . The Thatcher revolution disrupted the patrician culture in the Conservative party, but not the underlying belief that Tory rule is a default setting for British politics; the norm to which the country tends . That assumption, more than economic growth, deficit reduction, an EU referendum or any other part of the prospectus, is what makes Cameron think he can stay on after May . It is the confidence that he is an archetypal prime minister and the only credible candidate for the job . Perhaps he will be proved right . He will have money and much of the press to amplify that view . But even loyal Conservatives can't entirely ignore the intellectual void at the centre . The right has decried it as often as the left . The past five years have posed huge challenges for Britain regarding the economy, our place in Europe, England's relations with Scotland, the decline of trust in institutions . But of which encounter with a great problem can it be said the prime minister truly rose to the occasion? Cameron doesn't have big answers , he shrinks questions . And that is how history will remember him, whatever happens in May . He successfully pursued power and spent it without purpose .
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the history of David Cameron's time as prime minister is written The government has been ideological, but not in a way that bears an intellectual imprint of the Conservative leader


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It's time to adopt an Alcoholics Anonymous approach to world peace. You see it everywhere this time of year: "Peace on Earth, Good Will to All People." Meanwhile, according to the British newspaper The Independent, only eleven countries on earth are free from violent conflict . There are more than twenty- five full-on wars happening right now and 169 violent militia and rebel conflicts . Peace on Earth -- when will it happen? It's time to adopt an Alcoholics Anonymous approach to world peace . According to scientists, for as long as there have been intoxicants, a portion of human beings has struggled with addiction . For millennia, various disciplines including medicine, psychiatry and religion attempted, unsuccessfully, to help people suffering from an addiction to booze . All of the approaches stemmed from the same common approach : Let's resolve your problems so you'll stop drinking . Alcoholics Anonymous reversed this . A.A  has succeeded because it was the first to say,"Stop drinking FIRST and then we'll work on your problems." Thanks to this subtle shift, countless jobs, marriages, and even lives have been saved . Heretofore, humanity's approach to peace has been like outdated approaches to alcoholism . Attempts at peace have centered on,"Let's resolve our differences so we can stop killing each other." This has only lead to the discovery of more differences and more killing . It's time we followed the example of recovery programs such as A.A  and resolve to, FIRST, stop killing each other and then we can work on our differences . War is used as a tool of international policy because people accept it . All we have to do is change our minds-- to cease to believe that war is an acceptable necessary evil and to begin to believe that no disagreement is worth killing each other's children . Countries have been trying to resolve their differences so that there will no longer be war . We need to declare peace first and then spend eternity working out our differences . The option of war is simply removed from the table . This is why I am declaring enduring world peace beginning September 21, 2056 . Seriously . September 21st is the United Nations World Day of Peace -- so there is already momentum there . We just need to turn those national celebrations into a countdown to world peace . 2056 is far enough in the future that it gives us time for enough people to make the requisite shift in belief such that peace will, indeed, reign on planet Earth . Who am I to make such a proclamation? I'm just a writer and an ordained minister and there are crazy preachers who, every decade or so, declare the end of the world is coming on this or that date . So why can't I say when world peace will begin? Incidentally, this is not a new idea . The Kellogg Briand Pact of 1927, sponsored by the United States and signed by 62 countries declared that war may not be used to resolve "disputes or conflicts of whatever nature or of whatever origin they may be, which may arise." Every major religion shares a common belief in the sanctity of human life and yet war has endured . If enough people believe-- just believe , that as of September 21, 2056 war will end on planet earth-- it must happen! If eleven, only eleven out of 196 countries are at peace , it still means that right now, in at least eleven countries there is peace . We simply need to build on this over the next forty-two years . This year, when you say,"Peace on Earth," give peace a beginning date .
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It's time to adopt an Alcoholics Anonymous approach to world peace