On Saturday, Brittany Maynard killed herself.Maynard's death was a suicide, but a legal one. The 29-year-old, who was terminally ill with a rare and advanced brain cancer known as a glioblastoma multiforme, had moved to Oregon to use the state's Death With Dignity law.We don't like to think about death — and so we don't. State legislatures rarely grapple with assisted suicide laws in any serious way. Regulating death is terrible politics. And so death goes unregulated. But the dearth of debate and discussion doesn't eliminate assisted suicide. Instead, it pushes it into the shadows, where doctors will only admit anonymously to helping patients end their own lives.

Oregon passed the law, so clearly some places are willing to talk about it.