Posted on 05/11/2005 5:18:04 AM PDT by syriacus
Q Who made the world?
A. God made the world.
Q. Who is Terri Schiavo?
A. She is one of God's creatures, who suffered a heart attack and irreversible brain damage at age 26. She is at the center of an international battle over whether she should be kept alive artificially. She has been kept alive for the past 15 years because she was given nutrients through a feeding tube. Her husband says she would not want to live that way; her parents desperately want to keep her alive. Congressional subpoenas and last-minute legislation hope to overcome a court order removing the feeding tube.
Q. Why shouldn't she be kept alive?
A. Because she told her husband she would not want to live like that. Because many doctors with a great deal of medical expertise and compassion have found that she exists in a persistent vegetative state.
Q. Why did God make Republican political leaders?
A. To protect his Word and will. To denounce judges as activists. To grandstand on so-called moral issues. To interfere with Terri Schiavo's wishes.
Q. How are they interfering with Terri Schiavo's wishes?
A. They have introduced bills in the Florida Legislature and Congress to "save" Schiavo and prevent her feeding tube from being removed so she can die a natural death. Even though their previous efforts to do this have been ruled unconstitutional. Even though our nation and state have a thing about separating the powers of the legislative, executive and judicial branches.
Q. Who said her feeding tube should be removed?
A. Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge George Greer, for starters. And every court that has reviewed his decision has agreed with his assessment that Terri Schiavo would not wish to stay alive by artificial means. The appellate judges who reviewed the case (two of the three on the panel were appointed by Republican governors, by the way, so stop with the "judicial activism" rants) wrote: "… in the end, this case is not about the aspirations that loving parents have for their children. It is about Theresa Schiavo's right to make her own decision, independent of her parents and independent of her husband."
Q. Who is Judge Greer, anyway, some kind of liberal wacko activist jurist?
A. No, actually Judge Greer is a former Republican Pinellas County Commissioner and a Southern Baptist to boot.
Q. Why doesn't Judge Greer just show some compassion and keep her alive as her parents wish?
A. Because if he did he would be breaking the law. He would then be legislating from the bench. He would then be a judicial activist. Which is exactly what pro-life groups hate. Even though those same groups want Judge Greer to do something that is not part of the law. Which would be judicial activism.
Q. Isn't that hypocrisy?
A. Yes.
Q. Wait a second, aren't you Judge Greer's former political consultant?
A. Yes, I was. Judge Greer is a former client and good friend. I first met him when I was a reporter for the Tampa Tribune and he was a Republican county commissioner. I found him bright, witty and conservative. He really appreciates good wine. He is deeply faithful. He can't see well enough to drive. He once offered a friend whose kidneys had failed one of his own for transplantation.
Q. Where is God?
A. God is everywhere.
Q. What does God want us to do about Terri Schiavo?
A. Ahh, now there's a tough question. Many people and groups who claim to know His will say that Schiavo should live. They call Judge Greer a "murderer," a "killer," a "Nazi" and seek to impeach him on websites that profess to be Christian but instead spread hate. Judge Greer fears for his life. They send e-mails and letters and make phone calls to Republican lawmakers telling them to approve "Terri's Law" or else.
Q. Or else what?
A. Or else those religious right and pro-life groups will ensure that those Republicans aren't re-elected.
Q. Can they really do that?
A. Actually, no. The Christian right does not control Republican primary elections. And they certainly don't represent the vast majority of Republican primary voters on this Terri Schiavo issue.
Q. How do you know that?
A. Because in polling that was done for a 2004 statewide campaign, among 800 registered Republican voters 60 percent of likely primary voters said they opposed the governor or the Legislature intervening in Terri Schiavo's case. Only 27 percent of Republican voters agreed with intervention. Even among voters who identified themselves as "conservative," 54 percent opposed legislative or gubernatorial meddling. In a Republican poll.
Q. So why do lawmakers listen to these groups if they are a distinct minority?
A. Because lawmakers run scared in the face of organized, well-financed and loud voters, no matter how few there are. Because some on the religious right can also raise a few serious bucks for these Republicans' campaigns. Because lawmakers ignore media polls (like a 2004 Florida Times-Union/South Florida Sun-Sentinel survey that found only 29 percent of Floridians supported the governor's and legislative intervention in the case) as being liberal and biased.
Q. Is God just, holy and merciful?
A. God is all just, all holy, all merciful, as He is infinitely perfect.
Q. What about our lawmakers?
A. Are you kidding?
The Political Whore says a prayer for Judge Greer, Terri Schiavo, her family and everyone involved in her case. You can reach Political Whore by e-mail at wayne.garcia@weeklyplanet.com.
He's got that right.
"Wayne Garcia spent 13 years in daily print journalism as a reporter and editor for the Gainesville Sun, Tampa Tribune and St. Petersburg Times."
I wonder if he still has some influence at those papers.
Garcia's PR firm ( Repper, Garcia, and Associates) did work for Greer in 1992.
I helped elect a lot of folks who I think did (and in some cases, continue to do) a lot of good for our community.Shawn Harrison. Rose Ferlita. Clearwater Mayor Brian Aungst. Frank Hibbard (who replaced the horrible Ed Hart, whom I also helped elect). Ed Turanchik. Mary Brennan. Calvin Harris. David Fischer. Ken Welch. Sheriff Everett Rice. Soon-to-be-Sheriffs Jim Coats and David Gee. A whole bench full of excellent judges, including George Greer, Claudia Isom, Lauren Laughlin, Marion Fleming, Linda Allan and Linda Babb. There are far too many others to mention here, so apologies to those I've left out. (For a slightly dated list of campaigns my firm handled over the past two decades, go to http://repper.com/ campaigns-elections.html.)
She was also on the Board of the Hospice that Terri has been in.
John C. Lenderman was a Hospice of the Florida Suncoast Advisory Board member in 2000.
Martha was on the Board of the Hospice of the Florida Suncoast
Her brother, John C., Greer's fellow Judge, was a Hospice of the Florida Suncoast Advisory Board member in 2000
st pete times, one of the most liberal rags in the state.
How helpful of Garcia to provide "talking points" for his man, George Greer.
Well, the political whores have their spin pretty well perfected.
It's all a pile of crap, but it's a perfected pile of crap.
I'm sure Garcia is available to give "tips" and "talking points" to his pals who are at the St. Pete Times.
PR men are good at finding public niches for their ideas.
Wayne Garcia
Wayne Garcia is a 13-year veteran of the media and communications business, with much of that spent covering local government and politics for daily metro newspapers in Florida. His skills in research, writing and information gathering have been recognized throughout the Tampa Bay area.A native of New Jersey, Garcia grew up in Ft. Lauderdale and is a graduate of the University of Florida's College of Journalism and Communications. After stints at the Gainesville Sun and the Tampa Tribune, Garcia joined the St. Petersburg Times as a political and Scientology reporter in 1992. Two years later, he left to re-launch a business and legal weekly, Warfield's Tampa Bay Review. Within one year, he more than doubled its circulation, created a vibrant editorial product and constructed a comprehensive site on the Internet called ReviewNet, which was named the 1996 Editor & Publisher/Kelsey Group Best Online Newspaper.
As a member of the Repper, Garcia team, Garcia primarily handles all creative aspects of media production and media relations. In addition to his duties as an RGA partner, Garcia is the media relations director for the Clearwater Jazz Holiday, a member of the Clearwater Jazz Holiday Foundation board of directors, chairman of the Ybor City Chamber of Commerce marketing committee and is an adjunct professor of journalism at the University of Florida, where he originated the College of Journalism and Communications' computer-assisted reporting curriculum.
FLORIDA POLITICIANS AND OFFICIALS LENDING UNDUE CREDIBILITY TO SCIENTOLOGY
From a recent St. Petersburg Times editorial: Some Tampa Bay area public figures who lately have sounded like supporters and defenders of the [Scientology] church - including Pinellas County Commissioner Susan Latvala and political consultant Mary Repper - should know of those hazards. So should Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio, who accepted campaign support from Scientologists earlier this year and recently had dinner with actor Tom Cruise, a celebrity Scientologist, at Repper's house.
Worse than that....If the birds could read, the illogic would drive them crazy.
An event held at the Belleair Country Club in Belleair, FL on September 27, 2003 was touted by a Scientologist front group called Clearwater Community Volunteers as "safe pointing" Scientology expansion in the Tampa Bay area.TAMPA OFFICIALS ATTEND SCIENTOLOGY GRAND OPENINGThis event was described as a fashion show featuring local politicians and VIPs, [snip] Pinellas County Commissioner Susan Latvala, political consultant Mary Repper, and State Representative Kim Berfield were listed as expected participants in this event. Cat Coates, the wife of Pinellas Deputy Sheriff Jim Coates, and Teresa Hibbard, the wife of Clearwater Commissioner Frank Hibbard, were also named in the promotional material.
On March 29, 2003, in Tampa, FL, Scientology celebrated the opening of their new building on N. Habana Avenue with a ribbon cutting ceremony. Political consultant Mary Repper attended this event,
ping
I attended the party, as I have on one previous occasion, as a guest and not as a journalist.I worked with Scientologists when I was the president of the Clearwater Jazz Holiday Foundation and forged some friendships.
(Some of the officials who attended - including Harrison, Hibbard, Brown, Rice, Jackson and Crist - are former political clients of mine.)
It's a strange position to be in, given that when I was a reporter for the St. Petersburg Times in the early 1990s, Scientology was my beat for about a year. I did regular battle with Scientology's spokesman over what I wrote and whether the stories I pursued were newsworthy or not.
Jerry, By Ruben Toledo, SO Detention Deputies
[snip] Jerry [fifty-seven year old family man, who has worked for the Sheriff’s Office Detention and Corrections Bureau for over six years.] was accused of not reporting an incident and conduct unbecoming. Shortly thereafter, PBA appealed his firing.[ Rice's] Office offered his job back, under certain conditions... that he lie and admit to doing wrong.
Jerry was shocked at this offer and he could not believe that the agency he had worked for all these years would place him in this predicament. If he accepted the offer, he would be able to provide for his family and get his life back on track. Jerry did not even think about the offer and turned it down. He knew that truth and justice would prevail in the end. It took over ten months to get a hearing date.
...Jerry and his family were financially devastated. ...
On March 31, 1999 Jerry had his hearing with the Department Of Administrative Hearings (DOAH). Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) Carolyn Holifield presided in his case. .... ALJ Holifield’s recommended order was to reinstate Jerry. .. All that was needed was the approval of the Civil Service Board.
The Civil Service Board has never reversed a recommended order from an ALJ during a Civil Service Board Hearing.
It was clear that the deck was stacked against Jerry. Civil Service members R.D. McIntyre, William Repper, and Walter L. Schafer, Jr. Esquire voted against Jerry and without competent, substantial evidence reversed the ALJ recommended order...
[Rice] handpicked all the three board members who voted against Jerry. ... Repper did not justify his vote. I guess I would have voted the same way if my wife was Sheriff Rice’s campaign manager.
Pinellas County Sheriff Everett Rice
Political observers thought that Everett Rice's opponent was headed for re-election in the 1988 sheriff's race.The incumbent sheriff was well entrenched and well funded, despite a spate of bad headlines about abusive practices in his department. But Rice overcame his opponent's barrage of TV and radio ads with an extensive local campaign organization and
the help of local media stories restating investigations into the incumbent's administration.
In a Republican primary where incumbents in Pinellas had been unbeatable, Rice won the election with 68 percent of the vote.
Remember the story about Greer's opponent dropping out of the race against him?
He is such a good and decent man and to have this kind of rap being put on him right now is so unfair," said Mary Repper, a political strategist who has helped Greer's campaigns. "If ever this was to be put into the hands of someone who is going to be fair and do the right thing, George was the right person."From October 2003 AP story on FreeRepublic: Judge in Life or Death Case Considered Conservative, Compassionate
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