Let Lauren Live!

ChristtheKingMaine ^ | May 7, 2008 | Judie Brown

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LAUREN RICHARDSON - YOU CAN HELP!
By Judie Brown

It has been a source of ongoing sadness to read of the difficulties Lauren Richardson’s father has had over the course of the past several months. For those of you who are not familiar with her case, Lauren overdosed on heroin on August 28, 2006. She suffered oxygen deprivation and, as a result of the overdose, is now in a coma and unable to speak out for herself. At the time of the overdose, Lauren was expecting a baby. Her parents honored what they knew would have been her wish and did all they could to keep her healthy and comfortable until the child was born. Today, though Lauren may not be aware of it, she is the mother of Ember Grace, who was born in February 2007.

Since the birth of her daughter, Lauren remains unable to speak of her concerns, but she has a loving father who is doing all he can to protect her from suffering the same fate as Terri Schiavo. However, Lauren’s mother, who has been named her legal guardian, is sadly not of the same opinion and is working with attorneys to pressure the courts to permit Lauren’s starvation.

Lauren’s father has kept hope alive, even at times when there appeared to be no hope in human terms. Lauren’s father is a man of hope in Christ and is dedicated to spending every breath he has on defending Lauren, regardless of what it might cost him in physical exhaustion and worldly goods. The most recent update for those concerned about Lauren tells us the following:

We struggle at times as we seek to share with the public the details of what is happening with Lauren because of the disagreement we have with Lauren’s mother. We cannot understand her reasoning in refusing a path of hope, healing and restoration for Lauren and insisting on causing her death by withholding food and water from her. The issue in Lauren’s case is the eternal truth that all people, no matter what their medical condition, bear the image of God and deserve basic care and an opportunity to be restored to health.

Bobby Schindler, Terri Schiavo’s brother, has written about Lauren in an editorial earlier this year, "False Compassion," and is working closely with Lauren’s father in order to provide expertise that he is uniquely qualified to share during a trying time like this.

There are many links on the Life for Lauren web site that will assist you in tracking this case and learning who is supporting Lauren’s ongoing care and who is opposing it. More importantly, there is something you can do to express your concerns.

ACTION NEEDED NOW

The governor of Delaware, Ruth Ann Minner, is being asked by pro-life Americans across this nation to intervene in this case in order to save Lauren from what many fear is an imminent court order dictating that Lauren be starved and dehydrated to death. I am asking you to be one of those who communicates your passionate belief that Lauren’s life is sacred and deserves to be protected from those who would order her death. The governor’s e-mail address is governor.minner@state.de.us.

Further, it would mean a great deal to Lauren’s father, Randy, if you sent him a copy of your e-mail to Governor Ruth Ann Minner. Randy’s e-mail address is Lifeforlauren@aol.com. 

During a recent visit to Anchorage, Alaska where Bobby Schindler was invited to speak, he told a reporter from The Catholic Anchor, "Once we accept that killing is an acceptable answer to human suffering, we lose any type of parameters. Euthanasia is a form of abandonment. It is not compassion."

Truer words were never spoken. As I frequently tell people who argue that we pro-lifers are being heartless and cruel for fighting to defend the rights of a "hopeless case," "God is the author of every human being’s life, and He has never given permission to a single one of us to arbitrarily rob another human being of life for any reason including disability or illness."

As Flannery O’Connor once wrote on the subject of false compassion, "In the absence of faith, we govern by tenderness. And tenderness leads to the gas chamber."

Lauren Richardson is not terminal – she is severely disabled. Lauren Richardson should not be murdered.

Judie Brown is president of American Life League and a member of the Pontifical Academy for Life.

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Good information source in this thread by wagglebee...

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Springfield, IL, Aug. 4, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - If you're seeking information about post-abortion issues, or if you have information to share about your own post-abortion experience, your ministry, or your opinions, you may want to check out the latest collaborative clearinghouse on abortion information, http://www.AbortionRisks.org.
 
AbortionRisks.org is a Web 2.0 site designed to allow anyone in the world to find or contribute information related to post-abortion issues. Using the same software platform that underlies popular websites like Wikipedia, AbortionRisks.org allows registered users to add their own information and pages to the site, as well as to edit information that is already there.......................
 

New Website to Serve As Clearinghouse for Post-Abortion Information

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Count on leftists to be leftists, one thing for sure, they are predictible. Thread by wagglebee.

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Every four years Americans elect a president and both political parties hold conventions to coronate their nominee and build up excitement in advance of the November elections. They also review and approve party platforms and one top pro-abortion is ready to get involved.

NARAL president Nancy Keenan informed her supporters on Tuesday that she is headed to Pittsburgh this Thursday to participate in the Democratic Party's platform committee meetings......

Top NARAL Activist Promises to Keep Democratic Party Platform Pro-Abortion

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A remarkable illustration of just what abortion really is in this thread by wagglebee...

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OTTAWA, August 5, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - 20 weeks into her pregnancy, a happily married Catholic teacher was informed her baby had holoprocencephaly - a hole in the brain stem - as well as fluid in the brain and a severe heart condition.  After being given her medical "options", including the choice to terminate her baby's life, she informed her doctor that she refused to be the one responsible for her child's death, trusting that God had a plan for her son.

"Termination was not an option for me, and I informed the doctor of this immediately," said the woman, who wishes to remain anonymous. "He is our creation and God's creation and we will take him as he comes."

The woman related the details of her story to LifeSiteNews.com in a telephone interview and a letter. The woman, who is still pregnant with her child, decided to come forward with her story in the hope that it would encourage other women, in similar circumstances, to embrace the challenges of going through with a difficult pregnancy, even when the prognosis for the child is extremely grim. No matter how seemingly certain the imminent death of an unborn child may be, she said, we can never be justified in taking innocent life.

"With each new day, I learn to accept this situation," she said. "For example, I know that I cannot change my circumstances, and therefore must proceed with the daily grind of life. In other ways, it becomes more difficult. It is a very odd experience to be pregnant, knowing that I may never get to bring my baby home from the hospital, and that instead of anticipating his whole life, I may have to prepare for his funeral and burial."

"Quality of life" considerations were given by doctors as reasons to kill the child in the womb; however, once the mother informed her doctor that she would not take the life of her baby, she says she had "100 percent support" from the medical professionals looking after her.

She did say, however, "had I not been so definitely opposed, the option of abortion may have been the end of my story (except for future psychiatric pills)" - referring to the morally neutral manner in which abortion is presented as an "option" to patients and the well-known negative psychological effects that arise as a consequence. "I am sure that for many women, abortion is strongly recommended in cases like mine, especially if women do not have a strong belief about it originally," she said. 

Woman Told of Fetal Abnormalities: "I Will Not be the Killing Hand"

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From Canada to the north to Mexico to the south, the left coast population flirts with state sponsored death. Thread by wagglebee.

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Sacramento, CA (LifeNews.com) -- A leading California pro-life group is continuing to urge pro-life advocates to contact their state legislators to oppose a bill that would promote euthanasia. The California Pro-Life Council is opposed to AB 2747, a measure sponsored by the lawmaker who has repeatedly tried to legalize assisted suicide.

"Patty Berg's bill AB 2747 encourages medically vulnerable individuals to kill themselves through voluntary dehydration," the pro-life group says in a new legislative alert.................

California Pro-Life Group Continues Opposing Bill That Promotes Euthanasia

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Population control in a thread by narses...

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Steven W. Mosher is president of Population Research Institute (www.pop.org) and author of the book Population Control: Real Costs, Illusory Benefits (Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick, NJ, 2008). Michael J. Miller interviewed him on the subject of his book.

Miller: Dire scenarios about imminent overpopulation, from Malthus to Paul Ehrlich’s The Population Bomb, have not materialized. Where are the mistakes in their calculations?

Steven Mosher: In some cases they were deliberately exaggerated, even fabricated, in an attempt to frighten individuals into having no more than one or two children, and legislatures into funding population control programs.

Assuming that the alarmists really believed those projections, I think that their principal error came in the 1960s when they assumed that Third World countries would have to reach Western standards of living before birth rates decreased. They supposed that only affluence would convince people in Nigeria, China, or Peru to have fewer children.

Of course, population control programs played a role in limiting fertility. But the principal reason why almost all Latin American countries today are at or near replacement-rate fertility levels is that the death rate among infants and children went down, and therefore couples voluntarily stopped having large families. They’re still relatively poor, yet they began limiting the number of children. Reduce the mortality rate and population growth ceases.......................

The Underpopulation Problem [Frightening and Open]

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Ooops! Sorry, NYer. Thread above by NYer.

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Terri and coverage...

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The "Schiavo Case" was widely discussed from a medical, ethical and social standpoint in the United States and elsewhere. In an article to be published in the September 23 issue of Neurology, the journal of the American Academy of Neurology, and available online August 6, a team of bioethicists composed of Dr. Éric Racine of the Institut de recherches cliniques de Montréal (IRCM) and experts from Stanford University, in California, and the University of British Columbia examines the media coverage featuring this famous case.

The study reviewed American daily newspapers that were most prolific about this story: the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Tampa Tribune and the St. Petersburg Times. A total of 1 141 articles and over 400 letters to the editor were analyzed. Never before had the media coverage of such a clinical case been studied so extensively. The accuracy and the nature of the statements on Terri Schiavo's neurological condition, her behaviours, her behavioural repertoire, her prognosis and the withdrawal of treatment were examined.

"In the course of our research, we were surprised by the amount of medical inaccuracies that these newspapers had published, said Dr. Racine. Some journalists even wrote about Mrs. Schiavo's reactions to specific words or expressions supposedly showing that she was conscious." More than scientific and medical information, the legal, political and ethical dimensions made the headlines.

Only 1% of the articles examined gave a definition of the "persistent vegetative state," an essential concept to understand the issues at stake. The persistent vegetative state is an established neurological condition characterized by severe lesions to the cerebral cortex, which eliminate higher functions: inability to communicate, absence of memory, absence of pain, etc.

However, the brain stem responsible for vital functions is not damaged, which accounts for the patients' reflexes and their ability to breathe and swallow independently. Despite the fact that Terri Schiavo's medical condition did not allow any reasonable hope of recovery, a fifth of all articles (21%) contained statements according to which her condition would improve. "Our observations show that the press capitalized on the controversy to a large extent, and selling copies mattered more than delivering scientific information. Media coverage sustained myths and false hopes," explains Éric Racine.

The Neurology article provides an objective measure of misinformation, which underlined that the information available to the media had limitations. "The public debate surrounding this case showed that the medical, ethical and legal consensuses on the legitimacy of the withdrawal of treatment in accordance to a patient's will were challenged." In fact, Racine points out that while in the 60's and 70's people mostly rallied over the right to refuse treatment, an opposite pressure was applied in the Schiavo Case by relatives and public opinion. "This case is quite original because it reveals the emergence of a pro-life social stream, a trend that has now reached Canada," adds the researcher.

For their misunderstanding of the subject matter or their bias, are journalists to be blamed? Mass media have become a space of complex social interaction where the public takes its information and reacts to it. However, Internet and the media cannot replace official sources, be they medical, legal or political. In order to improve the quality of the information that is relayed to the public, families and key-actors, specialists must adopt strategies that will take into account the limitations identified in the media coverage of the Schiavo Case. Such ethical and medical debates would certainly benefit from information that is both more accurate and more accessible to the layperson.

The Schiavo Case: Are Mass Media To Blame?

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Terri's family carries out her Legacy in this story in LifeNews. Thread by wagglebee.

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St. Petersburg, FL (LifeNews.com) -- After her husband won the legal right to subject her to a painful euthanasia death via starvation and dehydration, the mainstream media coverage of Terri Schiavo ended abruptly. Proving they were more interested in protecting people than the lure of the cameras, Terri's family hasn't stopped fighting for the disabled.

Following Terri's death, the Schindler family converted the foundation they established to provide her with medical care to helping other disabled patients.

The foundation now serves as a legal, medical and information clearinghouse for patients and their families.

LifeNews.com recently profiled the case of Janet Rivera, a California woman whose family fought a decision by a public guardian to deprive her of food and water.

Behind the scenes, the foundation played a critical role, as Terri's brother Bobby Schindler tells LifeNews.com.

"When we heard about her circumstances, the Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation immediately sprang into action," Schindler said...........

Terri Schiavo's Family Carries Her Legacy Forward Helping Disabled Patients

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A different view of Terri's plight....

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Whether to remove her feeding tube was the center of the Terri Schiavo family battle.

Coverage of the controversial Terri Schiavo case in some of the nation’s top newspapers was full of inaccuracies and misinformation, according to a study just published in the journal Neurology. 

Schiavo, who died in March 2005, suffered a brain injury that left her in a vegetative state for 15 years. She was at the center of a public court battle among members of her family who disagreed over whether her feeding tube should be removed. A judge ultimately decided to allow the tube to be removed, and she died 13 days later at the age of 41.

A team of neuroethicists led by Éric Racine of the Institut de recherches cliniques de Montréal examined coverage of the case in four major daily newspapers: The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Tampa Tribune and the St. Petersburg Times. The researchers analyzed 1,141 relevant articles published between 1990 and 2005..........

Much Schiavo Coverage Brain Dead

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Another take....

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In 1990, Theresa Schiavo, an American citizen, had a cardiac arrest that caused irreversible brain damage which led to a persistent vegetative state diagnosis. A few years later, this diagnosis became a source of conflict over the interruption of artificial nutrition. The "Schiavo Case" was widely discussed from a medical, ethical and social standpoint in the United States and elsewhere. In an article to be published in the September 23 issue of Neurology, the renowned journal of the American Academy of Neurology, and available online today, a team of bioethicists composed of Dr. Éric Racine of the Institut de recherches cliniques de Montréal (IRCM) and experts from Stanford University, in California, and the University of British Columbia examines the media coverage featuring this famous case.

The study reviewed American daily newspapers that were most prolific about this story: the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Tampa Tribune and the St. Petersburg Times. A total of 1 141 articles and over 400 letters to the editor were analyzed. Never before had the media coverage of such a clinical case been studied so extensively. The accuracy and the nature of the statements on Terri Schiavo's neurological condition, her behaviours, her behavioural repertoire, her prognosis and the withdrawal of treatment were examined. "In the course of our research, we were surprised by the amount of medical inaccuracies that these newspapers had published, said Dr. Racine. Some journalists even wrote about Mrs. Schiavo's reactions to specific words or expressions supposedly showing that she was conscious." More than scientific and medical information, the legal, political and ethical dimensions made the headlines.

Only 1% of the articles examined gave a definition of the "persistent vegetative state," an essential concept to understand the issues at stake. The persistent vegetative state is an established neurological condition characterized by severe lesions to the cerebral cortex, which eliminate higher functions: inability to communicate, absence of memory, absence of pain, etc. However, the brain stem responsible for vital functions is not damaged, which accounts for the patients' reflexes and their ability to breathe and swallow independently. Despite the fact that Terri Schiavo's medical condition did not allow any reasonable hope of recovery, a fifth of all articles (21%) contained statements according to which her condition would improve. "Our observations show that the press capitalized on the controversy to a large extent, and selling copies mattered more than delivering scientific information. Media coverage sustained myths and false hopes," explains Éric Racine.

The Neurology article provides an objective measure of misinformation, which underlined that the information available to the media had limitations. "The public debate surrounding this case showed that the medical, ethical and legal consensuses on the legitimacy of the withdrawal of treatment in accordance to a patient's will were challenged." In fact, Racine points out that while in the 60's and 70's people mostly rallied over the right to refuse treatment, an opposite pressure was applied in the Schiavo Case by relatives and public opinion. "This case is quite original because it reveals the emergence of a pro-life social stream, a trend that has now reached Canada," adds the researcher.

For their misunderstanding of the subject matter or their bias, are journalists to be blamed? Mass media have become a space of complex social interaction where the public takes its information and reacts to it. However, Internet and the media cannot replace official sources, be they medical, legal or political. In order to improve the quality of the information that is relayed to the public, families and key-actors, specialists must adopt strategies that will take into account the limitations identified in the media coverage of the Schiavo Case. Such ethical and medical debates would certainly benefit from information that is both more accurate and more accessible to the layperson.

Reference: Media coverage of the persistent vegetative state and end-of-life decision-making.
Éric Racine, Rakesh Amaram, Matthew Seidler, Marta Karczewska, Judy Illes. (2008)
Neurology, published online August 6, 2008.
Click here to view article online

Éric Racine is Director of the Neuroethics Research Unit at the Institut de recherches cliniques de Montréal (IRCM). He is also Associate Researcher at Université de Montréal and Adjunct Professor in the Department of Neurology and Neurosurgery at McGill University. This research was funded by the IRCM, the National Institutes of Health, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and the Greenwall Foundation.

Established in 1967, the IRCM is recognized as one of the country's top-performing health research centres. It has a mandate to understand the causes and mechanisms of diseases in order to find diagnostic tools and means of prevention and treatment; to train a new generation of high-level scientists; and to contribute to Québec's socio-economic development by facilitating the commercial development of new discoveries. The IRCM has 37 research units and a staff of more than 450.

The Schiavo Case - Are Mass Media To Be Blamed?

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Obamanation and Terri again...

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(NCRegister.com) -- It’s important for Americans to know exactly where Barack Obama stands on abortion, because abortion is more than just a "Catholic issue." It's one of the fundamental issues Americans should be most concerned about.

The United States was founded on the rights to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” and Americans have spent the past two centuries since trying to live up to those founding principles. First came disagreements over the pursuit of happiness — religious and economic liberty. Then, over slavery. Today’s big battle is over the most important right: the right to life.

Obama’s votes and official positions deny the right to life to three categories of human beings: the unborn, the “accidentally” born and, at least in one case, the adult “unfit.” Let’s look at each.

The Unborn

Alveda King, niece of Martin Luther King Jr., understood how the right to life is fundamental. “I and my deceased children are victims of abortion,” she has said. “The Roe v. Wade decision has adversely affected the lives of my entire family. I pray often for deliverance from the pain caused by my decision to abort my baby.”

Obama's position on the question rejects her view..........................

Obama vs. The Right to Life... Obama’s votes and official positions deny the right to life to three categories of human beings: the unborn, the “accidentally” born and, at least in one case, the adult “unfit.” Let’s look at each.

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We have it from OpEd (Opposite of Edification...) to define their propaganda into a semblance of logic.

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So I see the manifestation of the conservative movement as a very divisive manifestation, and I think it has done a tremendous amount of harm. I also find it wonderfully ironic that you have a conservative movement that has morphed into being involved into making personal decisions, from being involved in the Terry Schiavo case to decisions about who you can marry, to decisions about whether you are given the freedom to choose.

These don’t seem very consistent with the words – the actions of the conservative movement seems to be inconsistent with the words of the conservative movement. And certainly, you’ve seen government used as a blunt instrument, in some cases, and then completely abandoning in other cases..................

Failed Conservative Values: Gavin Newsom on Division & Schizophrenic Tasmanian Devils

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Leave it to the country of my ancestors to display an outstanding grasp of the obvious. Thread by wagglebee.

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OSLO, Norway, August 7, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A 2008 study by the University of Oslo in Norway has found that young adult women who have had abortions are more likely to become depressed.

The study, which involved 768 women between the ages of 15 and 27, was carried out in order to "investigate whether induced abortion was a risk factor for subsequent depression."

According to Willy Pedersen from the University's Department of Sociology and Human Geography, who conducted the study, past studies have suffered in accuracy due to bad design, specifically a lack of control of "compounding factors."........

Study Confirms Abortion Increases Risk of Depression

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Good for him....

Thread by wagglebee.

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Members of the U.S. Senate don't typically earn money from another job after they're elected to the august body because of concerns that they will be unduly influenced by customers or colleagues. Oklahoma pro-life Sen. Tom Coburn is an OBGYN and is coming under fire for helping his patients.

When he is not in Washington, Coburn works at the Muskogee Regional Medical Center.

The hospital changed from a public one to private ownership in April and, following that decision, Coburn has come under fire for working there. However, Coburn changed his practice and now delivers babies at no cost....

Pro-Life Senator Tom Coburn, Under Fire for Delivering Babies For Free

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Leave it to the country of my ancestors to display an outstanding grasp of the obvious.

Then again, this is also the country that produced the treacherous Vidkun Quisling.

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Haleigh Poutre not forgotten...

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In the wake of horrific abuse allegedly endured by 11-year-old Haleigh Poutre of Westfield, the House established the Committee on Child Abuse and Neglect to closely examine issues in the child welfare system. After nearly two years of detailed research, extensive public hearings and intense debate, the House carefully crafted and passed legislation to protect our most vulnerable children from abuse and neglect. The measure also worked to ensure the protection of children remains at the top of the state’s agenda by creating a new child advocate dedicated solely to child welfare cases.

Casey: Another productive session draws to a close

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Barry Barack Hussain Muhammad whatever again...

Thread by wagglebee.

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Objections continue to be raised to the charge that Senator Barack Obama supports infanticide, most recently in a Huffington Post column by Seth Colter Walls. I have made this claim myself, as have Sen. Rick Santorum, Terry Jeffreys, Jill Stanek, Bill Donohue, Gary Bauer, and Nat Hentoff.

It's a dramatic charge, but here are the facts.

No one disputes that for three years running, while an Illinois state senator (from 2001 to 2003), Barack Obama was faced with a decision about a bill mandating medical care for children born alive during induced abortions. (The Illinois bill was called the Induced Infant Liability Act.)..................

With Abortion Backing, Is It Fair to Say Barack Obama Supports Infanticide?

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From the OpEd (Opposite of Edification...) pages today we find a cheering section for good ole Charlie.

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During the primary, Crist also defended his refusal to intervene when he was Florida's attorney general in the Terri Schiavo case. The brain-damaged woman died in 2005 after the courts allowed her feeding tube to be removed.

That was after the Legislature and Congress passed laws, signed by Bush and his brother, President Bush, that were designed to keep her alive. The Florida Supreme Court, including Cantero and Bell, unanimously declared the state law unconstitutional.

Crist said then the courts were the proper place to decide the case and as governor he would "appoint judges that adhere to the rule of law."

Applicants for the two high court vacancies include some with obvious political connections, starting with 1st District Court of Appeal Judge Clay Roberts........

Crist has big part in new Fla. Supreme Court appointments

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Lauren, how is your care going? Are you being well cared for as the grand intellectuals ponder your fate? Governor Minner, are you watching over Lauren these days?

We do hope no Nurse Ratchett or Nurse Mikey is making the rounds and that your care is at least of high enough level similar to those not facing a death sentence for the crime of innocence.

"We will not be silent. We are your bad conscience. The White Rose will give you no rest."

[floriduh voter]

When CHARLIE CRIST WAS FL AG, his AG Dept. told callers that "They didn't have a civil rights department." That was a BOLD FACED LIE AND DERELICTION OF DUTY.

Calls go to Tallahassee and are routed to the Fort Lauderdale AG's Office where the Civil Rights issues are processed.

LYING, CHEATING RINO CRIST.