Posted on 03/24/2005 5:26:02 PM PST by Congressman Billybob
By the time you read this, Teresa Schiavo may be dead of starvation as required by Florida Judge George Greer. Thousands of people have produced millions of words on this subject. I should write nothing, unless I have more to offer than the MSM (mainstream media). I do.
Personal experience colors what I say. On 1 January 1994, my mother was taken to Mission Memorial Hospital in Asheville with serious injuries from an auto accident. She’d suffered both a heart attack and a stroke after the accident. She was in a coma, but still alive.
Seven years before, her life was saved in that same excellent hospital, by emergency surgery to repair an aorta aneurism. She spent a week in intensive care, and told both her sons that she did not want to be “hooked up to tubes again.” In 1994, my brother was in a different hospital after the accident; decisions on my mother’s care rested on me alone.
Four different medical specialists were called in. I took their advice. I talked to all the grandchildren. Ultimately I made not just one decision, but a series of them, leading directly to my mother’s death, four days later.
I have not yet steeled myself to write the complete history of those four days. Someday I should, because advances in medical care mean that many more Americans will face similar decisions about family members. I understand what Terri Schiavo’s family are going through except the extraordinary time those burdens have been on their shoulders and their hearts.
That said, what can I offer on this subject? For the best medical discussion, I recommend Charles Krauthammer’s excellent column this week. On the legal side, events now are a direct consequence of a legal failure seven years ago, and the arrogance of judges who cannot admit error and merely dispense with the case, rather than take the tougher path and decide it.
The attorneys for Terri’s family should have filed for her divorce from Michael Schiavo seven years ago. He was clearly guilty of adultery. She was clearly blameless. I’m unaware of any divorce action brought by a “next friend” for a woman who cannot speak. But I am aware of divorces the other way – husbands and wives who obtained divorces from spouses who were profoundly disabled, or in prison, or who had disappeared. Turnabout is fair play.
Had Michael been removed as the husband, he would not have been named, or continued, as her guardian. Therefore, what is happening now would not have occurred.
Then there are Michael’s reasons for bias. He had three personal reasons at home (a “wife” and two children). He had hundreds of thousands of reasons in the bank (a million-dollar malpractice settlement). But Judge Greer also had reasons for bias.
In Florida, judges are subject to retention elections. In his last election, Judge Greer received substantial contributions from at least five lawyers who have represented Michael over the years. This is a matter of public records in Florida. None of the MSM have bothered to research and report on this.
Speaking of bias, ABC had its own mini-Rathergate this week. ABC touted a “memo circulated among Republican Senators” which sought to make political hay from Terri Schiavo. The memo is a fraud. It contains references any Senator or staffer would have known not to use concerning legislative business. It also lacks the standard cover sheet and initials of sender for all intraSenate memos. This fraud story was broken by www.Powerline.com; they have the details.
Like CBS, ABC rushed to broadcast with a forged document because it didn’t ask competent experts whether it was false. ABC was in a rush (dare we say biased?) to attack the Republicans. The bias has continued in an ABC poll that misstates the facts of the Schiavo case to produce false results. A day after this memo was exposed as a fraud, Lanny Davis cited it as true on Fox News. Given Davis’s history, that was predictable.
Lastly, on the Internet I’ve seen a brain scan of Terri Schiavo She has a larger gap of fluid than in a normal brain. But I’ve also seen the scan of a woman with a similar void – who was given up for brain dead – who recovered, and who corresponded with me and others and released her medical records, to present an alternative to the assumptions of “experts.”
What we have here is a gross failure of common sense and decency in state and federal courts. Terri Schiavo should be in the physical custody of her parents, who love her, not in the hands of her “husband,” who wants her dead. Her soul now and forever is in the hands of God.
About the Author: John Armor is a First Amendment attorney and author who lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. John_Armor@aya.yale.edu
This seems to be a conflict of interest that should have caused Greer to recuse himself from the Schiavo case??? And it seems that it would make, if it can be proven, all of Greer's decisions regarding this case, null and void.
Regarding the MSM investigative reporting - I agree, it is almost non-existent. But, the MSM is not in charge of policing the errs of our system; they are reporters not cops. But there is an Attorney General in Florida?????
Knowing that she "wouldn't want to live that way," then it seems that Michael Schiavo had ample opportunity to act upon Terri's wish, at any time during 1990, but he did not. He let her live in suspended animation for almost 8 years before acting upon her wish.
In a "living will," should you set time frames for taking action? Are their time frames for such instances, where there is no "living will" but a family remember has Michael Schiavo's memory?
Thanks.
My friends, please ping this out if you deem it fit.
John
They are pariahs right now.
Every quarter of the Judiciary was petitioned on her behalf, every quarter denied her life, with the exception of the gentleman judge in the 11th circuit.
The speedy, sequential and cascading image of the stamp of death, death, death will not be forgotten.
It's part of the soul of the Country now due to the emotion involved. Nascent now, subdued in a short while, but it is an indelible mark.
You deathsquadders aren't going to convince many of us that this woman's rights aren't being violated, or that starving the helpless is allright. The govt. is derelect in their duty to protect this woman from the likes of you.
Excellent essay!
Well said, John. I've been close to having to make those kind of decisions twice in the last 10 years, and I'm sure it won't be long before I'll have to step into that very lonely void and say goodbye to my mother and father and I will do as they have asked.
I was only 18 when Roe v. Wade was decided by SCOTUS and I was utterly shocked. We were told that abortion would never be common. Lon Horiuchi, an FBI sniper engaged a target that violated all ROEs for snipers, killed a woman in the process, and got off for something that would have gotten me court-martialed. The Posse Comitatus Act supposedly precluded the use of the US military in an enforcement role within the United States, but active duty troops were at Ruby Ridge supporting the FBI and ATF, and we know how that turned out. That's just a few highlights - of many - in the last 30 years. Where will we be and what will we accept as commonplace in another 30?
ah yes. None of us want to be on tubes. The difference here is that this is not a terminal patient on tubes, merely a disabled woman who is tube fed for convenience...resource plus is six cans for 4 dollars, and she probably could swallow it by mouth if you gave her some thickener in it and slowly fed it to her.
But thirty years ago, when I worked at an institution for retarded adults, we were sued by the federal government for risking aspiration pneumonia because we fed them with a spoon.
And one neurologist-- Ronald Cranford, has said even spoon feeding a "vegetative" patient was extraordinary treatment and could be stopped.
The demonization of the disabled is increasing in recent years, see:
http://www.raggededgemagazine.com/
I suspect that in Europe, they will institute euthanasia in the next ten years as their elderly population starts bankrupting their society...ironically, it may be the devout Muslims in that continent that will stop this atrocity, not the few Christians left in that sad area...
Finally, yes I agree, none of us want to be disabled, dependent on others, and with a mind that is unable to properly think.
But if all of us have a path to tread before we die, and if you believe God is in control, then contemplate this: What if our disability is God's will? WOuld you accept it, or say, non servium? Believe me, I pray every day that me and mine would never fact such things, but you know I recently moved back to the Philippines so we won't have to face both the unwanted extraordinary treatment in modern hospitals,but also where the frail and elderly are still cared for at home and loved....
IN the US, many many family members leave jobs to care for their loved ones...we docs see this every day. But from the papers, one would not know it...
I am happy my elderly mom died at home, still of her own mind...I have seen many many terrible things. But when you know what is being read and taught, I am afraid...we are losing our moral vocabulary, the ability to recognize that even brain damaged humans are children of God....
ping
"It is her family who need comfort and her tormentors who need one's prayers..."
Definitely. Bobby Schindler was on tv this morning (I think was FNC sometime after 9am) saying that people should pray for Terri, but to also pray for Michael Schiavo because he's so lost his way. It was as pure an intention as I've ever heard. May God bless Terri's family who need His comfort.
I know how much you Terri supporters hate to hear the truth, but here it is. From the Marc 24th Chicago Tribune. Please note that the alleged "murderer" husband lived with the Schindlers, along with Terri, for 3 years following Terri's collapse. Guess he wasn't a murderer in their eyes until later, when they had their falling out. And note that the SCHINDLERS urged Michael Schiavo to date. THEY urged him to date. Just a little fact or two to throw in amongst all the lies you folks spew.
"When Terri first collapsed, relations between Schindlers and their son-in-law were amicable. The Schiavos moved in with her parents, and they helped him care for their oldest daughter. Eventually, they encouraged him to date. Michael Schiavo even introduced a couple of women to Terri's parents.
He dressed his wife in fancy clothes, applied her makeup, and even took her to California for experimental surgery to implant electrodes in hopes that would stimulate her brain. Michael Schiavo and Mary Schindler belied the tired cliché about mothers-in-law; the two were very close."
Gov. Bush has a get out of jail free card. W would pardon him.
And all that time, he kept from them, his knowledge that she did not want to live that way; he kept that denial of her wish, for nearly 8 years.
But now, it laid out for all to see.
Speaking for myself, I am glad I married a Catholic woman. She will do right by me when time comes for that,
"Just a little fact or two to throw in amongst all the lies you folks spew."
So people who disagree with you "spew" lies? How respectful of you. I'm impressed.
Obviously in the early days after Terri's collapse there was not yet bad blood between the in-laws. We each have our own theories and interpretations of facts. I disagree with you on major points. So what? I'd not resort to venom at you.
Lord Almighty! This is insane! Why have I never heard of this before? Do you have a link or something here? Sean Hannity and Rush should know about this!
*I have emailed, written and made phone call to everyone I can think of about the Terri travesty. *
Me too.
I heard on Fox that MS has denied a priest entry into Terri's room to administer the Last Rites because he regards a communion wafer as food.
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