Posted on 11/23/2015 7:23:36 PM PST by markomalley
Ben Carson called Terry Schiavo’s brother Friday morning but declined to meet with him or apologize for saying the gargantuan Republican effort to save the Florida woman’s life was “much ado about nothing.”
Instead, Carson simply repeated his earlier dubious assertion that the media misquoted him about Schiavo.
“We spoke for a few minutes,” Bobby Schindler told this reporter. “I don’t remember him apologizing. I don’t think starving somebody to death is much ado about nothing.”
“He basically repeated his clippings,” said Schindler, referring to Carson’s insistence that a Florida newspaper misrepresented his impromptu comments on the woman whose case continues to galvanize the pro-life community.
Carson insisted his “much ado” remark to the Tampa Bay Times on November 10 actually referred to how the media depicted activists who rallied to Schiavo’s defense. But a transcript of his exchange with the paper shows he said absolutely nothing about media coverage and spoke only of the intervention by then-Florida Governor Jeb Bush, state legislators and congressional Republicans.
In a phone conversation that only lasted a few minutes, Carson told Schindler, who lives in the Philadelphia area, that he prayed for his family in 2005 when the saga made nationwide headlines. But Schindler got the cold shoulder when he asked Carson to meet him when he campaigns in Philadelphia on November 30.
“[Carson] basically said he was going to be unavailable and had no time,” he recalled.
Schindler said he was upset that Carson refused to unequivocally condemn how his sister was basically starved to death after Schiavo’s husband won a lengthy court battle to have her feeding tube removed.
“I asked him to be clear but I don’t remember him answering,” he said.
Schindler worries that even Carson’s clarification will embolden people who want to have the feeding tubes of brain injured people removed. Because Carson suggested it was acceptable to do that if all family members agreed.
“We are much too quick to give up on them.”
In a clumsy spin control effort, Carson told LifeSiteNews.com on November 18 that, “When the patient is not terminal, as Terri Schiavo was not, the treatment plan should be determined on the basis of the consensus between the family and the healthcare providers. Terri’s case should have never been turned into the media circus that we witnessed.”
In his November 19 statement requesting to meet with Carson, Schindler said that, “What I and my family find troubling even about Dr. Carson’s clarified remark is that he has not unequivocally condemned the killing of my sister. Indeed, would simple consensus within our family and among Terri’s physicians justified her death by starvation and dehydration? If we had all agreed that it was right to deny her food and water, would that have made it right? Dr. Carson’s latest remarks seem to indicate continued confusion on the basic rights of medically vulnerable patients.”
“Now more than ever it’s important for pro-life leaders and the entire pro-life community to be united in the face of the normalization of medically imposed death and suicide. I believe Dr. Carson can provide such leadership, and welcome the chance for unity.”
But he didn’t.
It seems being Republicans’ great black hope for 2016 means never having to say you are sorry.
I don't think Dr. Carson learned that important point in medical school.
He's going to lose more than 5 points this week.
Terri Schiavo was not dying; she was murdered.
Jeb Bush hid under his desk while a citizen of the state of Florida was murdered, with the direct collaboration of police.
Ben Carson is a flake. There are too many moral issues on which he is muddle-headed.
FYI
Tell me why Ben Carson still has the Christian vote. He doesn’t seem to believe that disabled lives matter.
I’m just speaking my mind here.
Wasn’t it up to the family? On Terri’s express wish not wanting to live if she became a vegetable? Would you wanna live like that?
A guy I’ve been best friends with for about 15 years was paralyzed by botulism for 6 months. When he recovered he told me he could hear everything, but he couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, couldn’t even open his eyes. He was trapped within his own mind not even able to tell the doctors he was in pain, or able to press his morphine drip.
He said it was excruciating, dark, impossible to even imagine, and I think it really effected him more than most would notice.
Brain death is a step further. You are gone. A shell, whatever part of you that made you you has been stripped away and you have the intelligence of a small rodent. Personally I would say you are no longer human at that point, without a mind you’re just a body. Now no one knows that for sure, but even if your mind and personality exist, you’re trapped, and it’s a living hell.
I don’t personally know what I would want in that situation, but I imagine I’d want to die.
Oddly, this guy likes Jeb.
Ben is becoming — wait for it — Carsonogenic.
“This is more than just a stain on Jeb”
Schiavo’s brother in question here has said only nice things about Jeb.
Terri wasn’t on life support nor brain dead but severly brain impaired. They tortured her to death with dehydration/starvation. Extremely cruel and many will pay for what they did to her. I dont blame Jeb for her death but blame him for lack of guts to save her when he was the last hope but he caved in to the swamp judge’s edict. Had he ignored it and gotten her out of there he would have been a conservative hero instead of a zero.
Terri never became a “vegetable.”
I agree with you. I have had concerns about Carson’s judgement, and good judgement is what we really need in our president.
You know, a convicted rapist/murderer on death row has a better chance of getting a reprieve than Terri did.
Yeah, that would be philosophically and scientifically impossible.
No thanks.
Yeah, slowly starving suffering people to death by court order is hysterical, let's make juvenile jokes about it.
Do you think I was making a joke? Because I was not doing that.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.