Posted on 01/29/2006 10:06:22 AM PST by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON - Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, who took a leading role in the Terry Schiavo case, said Sunday it taught him that Americans do not want the government involved in such end-of-life decisions.
Frist, considered a presidential hopeful for 2008, defended his call for further examinations of the brain-damaged Florida woman during the last days of a bitter family feud over her treatment. Schiavo was in a persistent vegetative state.
The case became a rallying point for right-to-life advocates, an important segment of the Republican Party. It also drew interest from those supporting the right to refuse life-sustaining medical treatment and led to charges that the GOP was using a family tragedy for political gain.
Asked on NBC's "Meet the Press" if he had any regrets regarding the Schiavo case, Frist said: "Well, I'll tell you what I learned from it, which is obvious. The American people don't want you involved in these decisions."
Schiavo, 41, died March 31, nearly two weeks after her feeding tube was removed and 15 years after her initial collapse and hospitalization. Courts in Florida had supported her husband's contention that she would not want to live in such a state. Her parents and siblings disagreed and for years fought efforts to remove her feeding tube.
An autopsy later showed that Schiavo had suffered severe, irreversible brain damage and was blind.
Frist, R-Tenn., said in the full Senate that he supported what he called "an opportunity to save Mrs. Schiavo's life." A heart surgeon, Frist had viewed video ordered by a court and taken by a board-certified neurologist who had concluded she was not in a persistent vegetative state.
Congress passed a bill to allow a federal court to review the case, and President Bush quickly returned from his Texas ranch to sign the bill into law. But a federal judge refused to order the tube reinserted, a decision upheld by a federal appeals court and the Supreme Court.
Frist was later mocked as having made a diagnosis from his office using a video screen. "I didn't make the diagnosis," Frist said Sunday. "I raised the question of whether or not she was in a persistent vegetative state."
Looking back, Frist said, "When you're taking innocent life, with parents who want that life preserved, you've got to make sure, and therefore stepping in to say, let's take one more review, that's what we did."
He added: "I accept the outcome. I don't agree with the moral sense of it."
Frist plans to leave the Senate when his second term expires in January 2007. He said Sunday he will return to his home in Tennessee and decide whether to seek the Republican nomination for president.
Time for me to leave as well...supper looms ever nearer...Its just barely near 8pm here, and we always eat very late...perhaps we can one day meet on a general thread about end of life issues...hope for that, but not really hopeful that it will happen...
11 of the paragraphs in the article refer to the Schiavo Case. Only one paragraph doesn't.
It's logical to think posters would discuss her case.
If government can't protect a woman from being murdered by her adulterous husband...what use is it?
Oh my goodness! I hope he went to jail, too.
Didn't he make more money off Medicare by prolonging the deaths of his patients as well?
What a terrible, terrible man.
Please explain what you mean. Your statement is very general.
Sure. I didn't mean to offend you by discussing the article.
I took it to be a "Frist reconsiders his earlier position about government involvement" thread, too.
That seemed to me to be the 'news' in the story. Everything else was just 'catch-up', as in background.
I noticed the same thing, myself.
You know, I never considered that...but you are right...the man would have made more money, I suppose, if he could prolong my dad for as long as he could....good catch there...
My dad died before my mom...I never again did take my mom to that doctor for general care...I found her a better GP, one who would abide by her wishes...and when I brought her up to live with me, she went to another different GP, who also said he would abide by her wishes...if the doctor, thinks he is God, and tries to substitute his wishes for his patients wishes, then he is of no use to me...
Aside from being a doctor who wished to substitute his own wishes for his patients wishes, he was a crook...and who knows how many others he tried to coerce, and was successful with, thereby assuring more money in his pocket...thats a good question...I need to have my aunt look into that tho since this was several years ago, I doubt she would meet with any success...
Still, what you theorize, makes absolute sense...prolong the dying phase, to collect more money, and double money actually owed...what a crook...
Perhaps we could do a 'Chat' thread sometime? I don't know how to start one, but if any of you do, or find one, please ping me.
You do eat late. Has the sun set by now?
Have a good evening.
Please let us know what you find out.
11 out of 12 paragraphs
I dont know how to start a thread, I just get onto others threads...
I am up in the Pacific Northwest...its just a little before 8pm....we usually eat dinner between 8pm-9pm...thats because we have always been 'night workers', and 'day sleepers'....even tho we are both retired, we have maintained our old ways, and stay up much of the night, and sleep very, very late...hence our dinner time always seems late to others...but when you eat breakfast at 11am, dinner at 8pm is appropriate...
Its chilly, rainy, windy and pitch black here now...winter in the Pacific Northwest is always like that...
Have a good evening yourself...
I will certainly let folks know what happened, if I can find out...this was at least 10yrs ago, and my aunt is now in her 80s and has somewhat failing memory...still, I will try to find out more if I can...
Check post #3, which I repeated.
It came originally from Sen. Frist this a.m. on Sunday talk show.
After what you went through with your Dad, you must have felt so much better while caring for your Mom, to have a GP who knew what she and you wanted for her.
Yes, I remember that you live in the Pacific Northwest, it sounded so beautiful.
Goodnight, now.
Amen!
Well, I did a google search on this Dr. and came up with nothing...I will have to call my cousin, who takes care of my aunt now, and see if she can contact the local newspaper of where my aunt and parents lived, and see if they have an archives section that would send me a copy of any news articles they have regarding this awful doctor...the newspaper article that my aunt sent me at the time, was about his doctor, and what he had done, and how he was caught double billing Medicare, and how it had been going on...
Hopefully there will be some follow up on the Dr. and I can find out what the outcome was...
I thought so! Have to go to bed now...
:)
I still don't understand why those of us, who mentioned Terri in some (not all) of our posts were made to feel we shouldn't mention her.
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