For anyone to suggest that you and I and those like us delight in the misery of others is a foul lie and reveals a deeply disturbed mind and calloused heart. It is an outrage to find a blanket apology laced with retraction followed by further retractions and dissembling.
There is no moral or ethical defense for the killing of Terri. She is physically healthy and mentally aware. (If intellectual astuteness were the litmus test for life or death there would be far fewer people posting on FR) The court awarded her financial security and she has family to love and care for her.
Only two of those things are required to claim your Constitutionally protected right to life. Physical health and mental awareness. The test for each is stringent, at least it used to be. Physically you must not be fatally injured or diseased beyond help. Pass or fail on that is simple. If after all possible measures have been taken your body dies then you fail.
Lacking any other tests for mental awareness you must not be brain dead, ie lacking electrical activity in the cognitive parts of the brain. Terri passes both of these tests with ease.
Only one other factor can be considered, the conscious will of the patient to limit heroic life sustaining measures that will likely be permanent. The test for determining and accepting that conscious will should be very high. Hearsay casual comments are so non-specific that they set a standard so low that almost everyone could be shot immediately 'by their own request.'
Terri lives or the legal right to live of the less than perfect dies with her. Unborn babies have already lost that right. Who's next?