The NYT would argue that having a large family and going to church automatically means that he's not qualified to make judgements about Terri Shiavo. They'd spin that his religious views would get in the way.
That's true. His views on life and death probably aren't nuanced enough.
But surely they would give the Episcopal Church a pass? Seeing that it's becoming the Gay Church?
The telling point on Cheshire's CV, which I noticed Wednesday night after I heard his affidavit read on Hugh Hewitt's radio show, is that he has an MA in bioethics from Trinity International University in Deerfield, Illinois. This is the best of the Evangelical Protestant programs in bioethics, headed by Nigel Cameron. When I saw that, I knew that that is the line the liberals would take to discredit him, and sure enough, Thursday in the NYTimes, Cranford had a hit-piece, avoiding any argument on the merits of Cheshire's affidavit but dismissing him because he is a Christian. In that article, Cranford failed to disclose that he is a leading Deathicist who bills himself as Dr.Humane Death, and thus not a disinterested, "objective" medical expert. Hugh Hewitt exposed the "discredit Cheshire because he's a Christian" in his blog on Thursday (www.hughhewitt.com) but did not recognize Cranford as Judge Greer's Kevorkian until people emailed him about it; Hewitt then added a clarification on air that afternoon.
So the NYTimes in the current article is simply repeating what it said on Thursday--pure propaganda.