Posted on 03/24/2005 1:48:41 PM PST by Bluegrass Conservative
U.S. oversteps in Schiavo case
By Merlene Davis
HERALD-LEADER COLUMNIST
Just let me die.
If for any reason I cannot eat, drink, speak or go to the bathroom on my own for 15 years, please have compassion and let me die.
If my sister and brother fight my husband's attempts to remove my feeding tubes, just know that my siblings are sick with grief and are not thinking straight.
Tell them to let me go.
The Terri Schiavo case,-involving a 41-year-old woman in Florida whose heart stopped beating briefly in 1990, leaving her brain damaged, has gotten this country's priorities all messed up.
Florida lawmakers, led by President George W. Bush's-little brother Gov. Jeb Bush, tried to turn good common sense into stupidity by attacking Michael Schiavo's right, as-Terri's husband and the next of kin, to decide his spouse's medical procedures.
Michael Schiavo has said Terri asked not to be forced to live in a vegetative life. Terri's parents said she never said any such thing.
The Florida Supreme Court sided with the husband, saying the law Jeb Bush pushed through two years ago ---Terri's Law -- was unconstitutional.
In fact, 19 judges in Florida have sided with the husband during the past seven years.
But over the weekend, federal lawmakers in both political parties, who had gone home for the Easter break, returned to Washington just to vote to trample all over what should be a private matter.
They voted to have federal courts decide what the state courts already have decided, by transferring the case to the federal courts, where they said the wishes of Terri's parents can be heard.
I guess the 19 judges were deaf.
Not only does this hurriedly-passed bill dissolve the sanctity of marriage that was so briskly waved when gays tried to wed, it also crushes any consideration for states' rights.
It makes you think big-government Democrats are in the White House and running Congress.
Look, in all laws up to now, it is the spouse who decides medical treatment for an incapacitated husband or wife. That long-held tradition is based on the fact that when two people marry, they become one. Parents, siblings and friends no longer have a say-so.
Neither do governments.
Where is the sanctity if the federal government can step into a marriage and make personal and private decisions against a spouse's will? That's like taking one of the two people ceremoniously ordered to cleave together, then throwing him or her out of the picture.
This is not a civil rights issue. Florida courts have said time and again that Terri should be allowed to die according to her husband's wishes.
There is no reason for the federal government to intervene.
The parents have proved their love for their daughter -- or maybe their stubbornness -- in a feud with their son-in-law. Either way, they lost.
The husband gets to decide.
Feeding tubes are removed every day without notice by the federal government. Families grieve and say good-bye to loved ones, keeping memories alive instead of shells of bodies.
Tell the folks paying the attorney fees for both sides, the TV and radio talk show hosts, the groups that set up prayer vigils and mass e-mails, and the politicians seeking re-election on an emotional issue that the show is over and to go home.
It's long past time for the grieving to begin.
Dying is a part of life.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Reach Merlene Davis at (859) 231-3218 or 1-800-950-6397, Ext. 3218, or mdavis1@herald-leader.com.
All i wish for merlene is a 'husband' as wonderful and devoted as mikey schiavo.
I thought of replying, but your post says it much better than mine would have.
Nice boiler-plate pro-death column offering zero new information or insight. Sure it's not from the NY Times?
Don't worry Bozo, when it's your turn you will get your wish.
In the intrum, shut up.
It's all about Merlene.
I don't know who the hell you are, Marlene... but okay. Go somewhere and die.
Wasn't that easy?
SHUT UP!!
Her husband's wishes - her husband who has two children with another woman and may benefit financially upon her death. Yeah, let her husband decide.
So9
As someone once said, "When my time is up, I'm ready to go. But I don't want to be pushed."
The moderator didn't think so :-)
This columnist still does not know the basic facts of the case, does she? Her ignorance is striking but expected.
Very few of the MSM do.
Lie of the left. You mean to tell me that people who are not terminally ill are starved to death by their families every day?!?!?!?!?
Allowed to die? Try FORCED to die. And he should not continue to have spousal rights long after he has joined himself to another woman. Move on if you wish, but moving on means MOVING ON when it comes to making vital decisions regarding life and death.
Sooner the better. It's more "dignified."
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