Posted on 04/11/2005 3:54:53 PM PDT by CHARLITE
Wake up America . . . the alarm clock just went off and we keep turning over and going back to sleep. There's an "uprisin' on the horizon" and we refuse to face it. Sleeping through it might make it easier, but the end result will be devastating. We've had a lightning bolt cut through the very core of our foundation forming a crack so deep we could topple by our weight of indifference. This ship is listing badly; so tilted we may never be uprighted again.
Our love affair with America is "breaking apart" because our foundation is cracking. The winds of hatred are blowing hard; the thunderous protests have challenged our will, and the disease of apathy is eating away at our very root system. Go ahead and tell me I'm crazy. I'd actually rather hear that than to believe what I know to be true. I can handle my portended lunacy, but the reality of what I see happening before my very eyes is worse than a Shakespearean tragedy.
Last week was one of the most painful times of my life. I have never been on such a roller coaster of emotion and I can't seem to get beyond it. That's an admission I'm not proud to proclaim, but it's the truth. For a person who's always ready for "NEXT, one-two-three, GO," . . . I was stricken with a paralysis. My country was in great distress over a situation that caused everyone to lose. The visuals still play clearly in my mind and are more painful than I can express.
I was one of those people who wanted Terri Schiavo to live. I was one of those people who could not find any joy in Michael's Schiavo's relentless desire to fulfill his wife's "suddenly remembered" request seven years later. And lastly, I was one of those people you told to sit down and shut up. So I did. I needed just a little more time to mourn; it wasn't that easy for me.
With the passing of the Pope two days later, I could not move away so quickly from thoughts of Terri Schiavo's passing. I knew the Pope would be okay, but I wasn't sure about the rest of us.
I've cried in my quiet moments - not only for Terri - but for my beloved country, America.
My own quietness has brought about much anguish for me because I am not a quiet person. It is frightening . . . it is terrifying, for I realize the line has been drawn. The "crack" was so loud when Terri Schiavo died, I believe the Pope hung his head even lower and gave up his own will to fight any longer. He had been so deeply passionate about her life that we may have cast a blow to his. What a tragedy for all of us. What a sad commentary on mankind.
The "crack" became an earthquake forming a deep divide as a line drawn in the sand. Americans are standing strong on the side of what has become their truth. We are no longer able to discern what the truth really is because the clouds have become so dark. There is an expert on every issue arguing both sides, so what is the truth anymore? The steel that crumpled on that fateful day in September of 2001 may be dwarfed in comparison to the crumbling of our nation's structure -- its foundation. It's a slower fall, but it's happening nonetheless, and could be just as fatal. Our "spirit of steel" -- layer by layer, floor by floor -- is crumbling.
It's not only that Terri Schiavo died . . . it's the way we sent her to her death. We stood by watching it happen as if on a daily countdown. We recorded and showed on the nightly news parents and children trying to give her water. I guess we feared she might stand up and walk. That very act defined who we are and makes me ashamed. Those are the pictures that haunt my heart.
Even if you believe Terri Schiavo had a right to die; and even if you believe her husband Michael had the right to stand by her decision to "not live like that;" and you believe her parents were pathetically selfish in not giving her the dignity she deserved in death, do we truly believe she would not want her parents at her bedside when she breathed her last breath? Do we believe that Terri would have refused her own mother's desire to hold her in her arms one last time and say, "I love you, my precious daughter?"
Then we would also have to believe that Terri would tell her family: "You cannot have a funeral with my body -- I want it burned to ashes immediately -- so go have your own service without me." For some strange reason, this was not the Terri who was portrayed to us as the young vibrant woman who went "religiously" with her family to church every weekend, and not the same person who would refuse a funeral service of her own faith?
It's also mystifying how fervent Michael was to carry out her wish of "not wanting to live like that," never considering how he made her die. But he seemed to know his wife so well -- these were surely her wishes.
Her family could not have her in life, nor could they have her in death. We can argue all day about who was right or wrong, but in the end, we became damaged goods. What we did to each other is unforgivable. What we did to Terri is a sin. And where we go from here is petrifying.
The Pope's death has been a celebration of life, but America has suffered a death that can never be celebrated. A part of us died with Terri.
Yes, the Pope is in a better place, and so is Terri Schiavo . . . but not America.
We have lost our way.
Debbie Daniel can be contacted at: dddtx@yahoo.com
Well, which is it, Einstein? Did she actually speak, no matter what she said, or how badly she could enunciate or communicate? Or is she in a PVS? You can't have it both ways you know.
And alot of us beg to differ on the credibility of these "every credible doctor" types you seem to believe no matter what.
Also, we don't *know* her wishes! She didn't leave written wishes. And the judge wouldn't allow her friends to testify to what she'd told them.
Hearsay is when you say that someone said something and you have no proof of it other than your word. Doesn't change a darn thing when the person who says he *heard* her say that something is her husband.
Now if they had a credible third person witness, that's different.
I don't believe that Schiavo, his brother or his sister in law should be believed and not Terri's friends who heard her say different.
IF our Constitution does NOT APPLY/PROTECT/HAVE MERIT, for ONE of us, then WHY would it have VALUE for the REST OF US??????
And you really think that Schiavo, Felos and Greer let Terri "die with dignity?"
You really believe that starving and dehydrating to death is a dignified way to go? Where is the dignity in that kind of death/murder?
Terri's dying with dignity was in her fight for her life and she fought long and hard those 13 days to stay alive, her dying with dignity wasn't in her horrendous death.
Remember Terri was tortured to death, where a criminal when given lethal injection is just put to sleep. Terri was purly TORTURED for 12 days. Shame on America!
Then why didn't they just put her to sleep like they do criminals? Why torture her in the most satanic way for 12 or 13 days? Death by dehydration alone is as bad as it gets, plus starvation. THINK!
RIGHT ON Earthdweller!!!!!!! Excellent POST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
OHhhhhhh I so relate to your post. My mom died in 96 and dad in 94. There is not a day goes by , but what I don't miss those two precious parents!!!
not to mention that said UNFAITHFUL HUSBAND forGOT that TERRI said that she " wanted to die" until AFTER he won the SETTLEMENT that was supposed to "Care for his precious wife for years"!!!!!!!!!
You need to understand being dehydrated and starved to death IS NOT just letting go. Put yourself in her shoes. Would you want to be dehydrated and starved to death, or just put to sleep, or even beheaded? Much less suffering with those last two..Huh?
Her situation was quite different from YOUR father's.
She was STARVED and DEHYDRATED to death. There is no digity or kindness in such a death. ASTOUNDING that you cannot see it or discern the difference between her circumstances and your father's.
There are a lot of people in this world who cannot eat in the 'normal way' - we certainly should not starve them to death. Terri was not dying of some incurable disease nor was she on a respirator or any other 'machine'. She merely could not eat on her own just as many disabled people cannot today. This case has many horrible aspects to it but the bottom line is that she had loving parents who wanted to care for her and as a healthy, but disabled woman she surely had the right to life and to be FED. It is disgusting when people try to say that since they wouldn't want to 'live like she did' without truly knowing how she felt that she should be denied the right to food and water. SICK - it is SICK and in fact it is NAZI'ish.... I just wonder how many have really studied the facts and the misinformation in this case as I have.... FOR YEARS
Exactly right - some people think they can determine what another person's 'quality of life' is and I am sure they would do this to many people. Hitler would be proud - as would Margaret Sanger, noted lover of killing the infirm and those she deemed 'less worthy' of life by HER determination. She was founder of Planned Parenthood - she was a racist too!
"The priesthood have, in all ancient nations, nearly monopolized learning. And ever since the Reformation, when or where has existed a Protestant or dissenting sect who would tolerate A FREE INQUIRY? The blackest billingsgate, the most ungentlemanly insolence, the most yahooish brutality, is patiently endured, countenanced, propagated, and applauded. But touch a solemn truth in collision with a dogma of a sect, though capable of the clearest proof, and you will find you have disturbed a nest, and the hornets will swarm about your eyes and hand, and fly into your face and eyes."
John Adams - letter to John Taylor
You have no idea of the facts of this case. Please do not post until you become knowledgeable.
Thanks
I disagree with your position, to say the least.
BTW, quote "God take her/his course" .. Her?? Confusion abounds.
Huh?
God the Father is not a woman and gets highly ticked off if people use that terminology. Check out the Book of Jeremiah, for starters. Tough language in there on this kind of Bravo Sierra.
I'm sorry to hear about your dad. You only have one set of parents ( a dad and a mom) and neither one can be replaced.
Sanctity of Marriage? A great excuse for murder you make it. Murder's never holy. Nor was Michael married to Terri in much of a "Sanctity of Marriage" way. His children were not Terri's, his manhood found a different furrow to plow night after night after night, and more than one furrow too from some reports. Not very sanctified, eh? More like abused, corrupted, broken.
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