Rush Shares Personal End Of Life Story (MUST READ!!!)

Rush Limbaugh.com ^ | 03/21/05 | Rush Limbaugh

[goldstategop]

RUSH: Here's Gary in Champaign, Illinois. Gary, welcome to the program. It's nice to have you on with us.

CALLER: Thank you. Rush?

RUSH: Yes, sir.

CALLER: I'm a Republican. I voted for Bush, all that stuff like in your commercials, but I have to disagree with everybody on this one, and let me tell you why.

RUSH: All right.

CALLER: Six years ago my mother had a brain aneurysm, went through a surgery to repair it, had another operation, procedure and a few other things. Finally the neurosurgeon, the neurologist came and told us she was in a chronic or permanent vegetative state. And for nine months I convinced my five siblings to withdraw the tube feeding her and let her die naturally. We did not kill our mother, we let her die naturally. Now, I've seen film of this lady, I've seen the news reports, doctors have said she is in a chronic or permanent vegetative state. What that means is, you have very, very basic brain function. The part of your brain that makes you breathe still works, you may have some response to pain or other minor basic stimuli but they have absolutely zero cognitive function. That lady has no idea what's going on around her. She doesn't know the difference from night to day. She doesn't know who people are. She doesn't feel anything at all. The right thing for her to do is what her husband wants to do, and that is pull the plug on her and let her die a natural death.

RUSH: Okay. You've told a personal story.

CALLER: I've been there.

RUSH: Well, so have I. And I'm going to tell you a personal story.

CALLER: I do not think that I killed my mother. I let her die naturally.

RUSH: I know you don't want to think that. You let her die. You had the doctors remove the feeding tube so you didn't even do it. She died a natural death, starvation, on the basis that she couldn't feed herself, so she starved. I'm just going to go back to the first hour, and, you know, the New York Times ran a brilliant story on Sunday that starvation is painless, it's a very dignified way to go. We could rid the world of poverty by letting them all starve. They may not all be in a vegetative state, but they soon will end up in one after they don't eat or drink long enough. Just gonna let 'em die.

Let me tell you my own personal story. My grandmother, my maternal grandmother. To give you the short, down-and-dirty of this, she had a stroke and was sent to the hospital, and the doctors said, "We don't know how long she's going to live like this." She was not in a coma but she was not quite there. The doctors said, "We don't know how long she's going to live like this, but we're going to give you 48 hours, you've got to make up your mind what you want to do, pull the tube or send her to a nursing home and pay for it because we need the bed." So my mother, my father had passed away, my mother talked to my brother and I about it and she wanted to pull the tube. And I said, "Mother, you really want the burden of having killed your mother? You really want that?" Before the 48 hours had passed a decision had to be made, my grandmother had another stroke while nobody was there and passed away in the hospital. At least that was the story. I've always doubted it. Given that we were given 48 hours to move her out of there, I've often wondered. Nobody will ever know, so it's just speculation on my part. I don't know how many patients are actually killed already on the basis that they don't know what's going on, it's better for them, we need the bed, insurance isn't going to cover this, blah, blah, all these decisions.

Now, I know, Gary, that you don't want to think that you killed your mom, and this sort of thing, but the argument about this woman exists because I think your scenario of her circumstances doesn't jibe with what some family members are saying. Some family members are saying she does respond to stimuli, that she does know when her dad and mom walk in the room, this sort of thing. So I think that the way you have to understand this -- well, you, the audience, the way you, the audience, have to understand, because everybody -- well, 90% of the people on the phones waiting to talk to me disagree with me on this, and I think the culture of death is very seductive. We can tell ourselves that we're doing the best thing for the person that's going to die. And we do that to hide the fact that we don't want to be inconvenienced ourselves in some way, either financially or personally or a combination of the two or what have you. And individual case, okay, so Gary's mom died the way she did, that's not going to wreck society, a single instance, it's not going to, you know, sow the seed, fabric of destruction. However, when a culture of death overtakes a society, and we have one now, you know, we've gotten to a point where it's permissible and even heroic to abort babies.

In order to make that argument we've now started calling pregnancy a disease. Pregnancy is a disease, it's not a natural state for women say some abortion rights activists. Then on the tail end of the life spectrum we decide, "Well, this person wouldn't want to live this way." Even though they may never have said that they don't want to live this way we assume it for them because we project. We don't think we would want to live that way. "I don't want to see my family member suffer," or what have you. And I realize that each one of you that have been in this situation do not think that you have contributed anything but love and the goodness of your wishes to your family member in taking this action. But there are societal ramifications for all of these particularly as they accumulate and the cumulative effect of the culture of death is one of the things that takes us to where we are at now. And that is that we literally have divided up sides in this argument that perplex me, and they give me pause. There's an actual energized enthusiasm for this woman's death out there, and there's an actual energized enthusiasm to save her life. I can understand the energized effort and enthusiasm to save life. We're oriented toward that in so many areas of our society. Sadly, we're also oriented on the side of ending life, and there are a lot of people-- I hear all this talk, Democrats have all these accusations, Republicans have ideological attached to this. Let me tell you something, if you want to argue who's more ideologically at risk here by losing this, take a look at the left.

They've got two things they're going to lose on, if the judge here -- and he's a Clinton-appointed judge, and I have no idea what's going to happen in this case -- but if the left loses it, they lost twice. They're going to have lost because the Congress has exercised Article 3 and is exercising its authority over the judiciary. They can't stand that because that's going to send a bad signal over their filibuster of Bush judges. The second thing they're going to lose on is their base, the pro-abort, feminist base. I mean, they're as actively involved in this as -- "Well, Rush, this has nothing to do with abortion." -- no, it doesn't have anything to do with abortion. It has to do with the rights of individuals under the so-called declaration of privacy or what have you to terminate a life they'd rather not deal with. Which is what abortion is. That's all it is. I want to kill this baby, I don't want to deal with it. You come up with other excuses, "I don't want it born to poverty, oh, it's a sorry circumstances," da-da-da-da-da-da, but boil it down, that's what it is, and if they lose both of these -- and that's why they're panicked. They've got two ideological battles that they're fighting in this little battle here over Terri Schiavo, and they're afraid to lose both of them. But don't think they don't have an ideological stake here, either.

[M Kehoe]

I had always thought a good and noble goal in life was to exit this planet without, directly or indirectly, killing someone.

Why doesn't everyone have that goal?

OK, so I'm naive, big deal.

Then again, I do carry a handcannon. Go figure.

5.56mm

[SerpentDove]

But either Rush is lying or he isn't. You believe he is.

[virgil]

I think that's right. Euthanizing someone, and that is what this is. No one wants to say it. But that's exactly what they want to do to Terri. Euthanize..cowards won't say it. That's whats at the heart of this culture of death. Saving money. 20 years ago, they didn't just shut people off like that. Now these spiders want us to believe that death is best.

[Zevonismymuse]

What's the point of replying to these people?

I know. I must be a glutton for punishment. I just like this site and think I am helping a few people think this through in a rational manner.

[Zevonismymuse]

Chances are better than average that the damage was sustained as a result of a beating by Michael Schiavo

Apparently every court and investigating agancy involved does not agree with you.

[Zevonismymuse]

If actually true, how does she sit upright in a chair?

Because balance is a function of the basil ganglia, not the cerebral cortex.

[Servant of the 9]

But either Rush is lying or he isn't. You believe he is.

I've been listening to Rush since he first went National, and yes, Rush lies.
He's a junkie for God's sake.
And don't tell me how he got that way, or that he stopped.
How he got that way is irrelevant to the effects and like an alcoholic, he may be 'dry' now, but he'll always be a junkie.

You don't think he lied to everyone about his habit?
Or were you too worshipful to notice?

Rush Limbaugh is a great man, and a conservative icon, but he is not a Saint.

SO9

[XR7]

"Euthanasia" Killings in Nazi Germany

(http://www.holocaust-trc.org/hndcp.htm)

Forced sterilization in Germany was the forerunner of the systematic killing of the mentally ill and the handicapped. In October 1939, Hitler himself initiated a decree which empowered physicians to grant a "mercy death" to "patients considered incurable according to the best available human judgment of their state of health." The intent of the so-called "euthanasia" program, however, was not to relieve the suffering...

[SweetCaroline]

If she is not aware then what difference does it make if her parents continued to take care of her?

....my daughter died some years ago, I would have loved to care for her if she would have survived, no matter what was wrong with her!

....my heart just breaks for this mother!

[zot]

Thanks for the ping.

The decision in this case should have been simple. Her husband wants her to die. Her parents want her to live. Nobody knows what she wants. Regardless of how disabled she is, it hurts no one to give her to her parents and let them take care of her.

[XR7]

[LibertarianInExile]

Not buggin' me at all. I'm glad at least one person agrees with me, instead of jumping on the "mess-with-federalism-like-liberals do" bandwagon.

[It's me]

How many of you on this site are divorced and left your wife/husband for a better one but are hammering Mike Sciavo for doing the same thing.

---

HE'S STILL MARRIED!!!

He should divorce her if he wants another woman.

[It's me]

Quote: Food and water are not artificial.

A feeding tube IS artificial.

---

Is an IV artificial?

[AlbionGirl]

It's not even just money Virgil, it's that when Mom becomes a problem she'd better only be a little problem because if she isn't then reconsideration is in order.

Part of that is because we've lost that connection and love for extended families being together for their lifetime. Grandma used to be taken in, not sent packing. When real, true love of family breaks down, this kind of stuff happens. Suffering is insufferable to the smooth palmed and well heeled. Life always meant something to those who understood the unfathomable profundity of the precariousness of it.

This is a historical watershed moment, IMO. Recapturing the culture is imperative, but that assumes that there lies somewhere, underpinnings worth recapturing. I do think they are there, but they can't be found in large measure, and for the most part, they can't be found among the upper middle class.

[conservative cat]

My mother was brain dead and never would of been able to survive on her own.

I had a friend who also had an aneurysm and was truly brain dead (no brain activitiy at all) and was taken off life support. You are absolutely right- there is a huge difference. He was dead with machines keeping him breathing.

[lodwick]

We all might live, if we stop jacking with the "terriers."

[agrace]

Is it always the desire for MONEY that causes mankind to do such horrible things to those we once loved?

Maybe.

1 Timothy 6:10 For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.

[RPTMS]

You mean cold hard falsehoods. You should try going a week without food, asshole.

[RPTMS]

The most important fact to me is that they are starving this woman to death. Many souls will go to hell for this.