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.
family members is not a vast conspiracy to kill off the inconvenient, but personal, heart wrenching, and very rightly, private.>>
So is burying them in the garden so the police don't find out.
The man who will never be President speaks.
Senator Frist, are you aware the Judiciary is part of the Government?
One could argue that is not the function of government -- at least not a limited government as conservatives espouse.
We still take a position that we cannot actively administer a shot to kill someone who is dying, even though we would for an animal.
FWIW, I think it's a good thing that we don't.
The Terri-bots are crazy. My advice is to get out of this one as soon as you can and stop wasting your time.
Thanks. But I've argued with many a Terro-bot during the last days of Terri's life. I'm well aware of their emotional arguments, slanders, etc. as I've been the brunt of many of them.
For me, death and dying of a loved one is not some esoteric issue, but something I have faced, and something I have faced as an heir, and expect to face one day myself, unless I am just hit by a truck one day and never face the onset of dwindling disease. Believe me, I know the costs, law, and most important, loss and grief involved when someone is incapacitated and dying.
It is presumptuous and rude for you to assume families cannot and do not make decisions about what treatment will work, and what treatments have no hope for benefit, and what is the best way to provide care that makes sense when it comes to their own family members.
One could argue that is not the function of government -- at least not a limited government as conservatives espouse.>>>
One could also argue that a government that doesn't prevent the strong from butchering the weak is just what the strong killers want.
Are you interested in discussion of these important issues or not?
It is presumptuous and rude for you >>>
It's far more presumptuous and rude to kill your mother because you can't stand watching her suffer--or spend all that money you're going to inherit on something as pointless as long term healthcare.
Discussion of mass murder of the weak?
The "money" was not an issue; it was part of our overall estate planning. Surely you have a regular will? The medical power of attorney leaves your instructions so you don't end up with a Schiavo "Well, she said...." situation.
THANK you for saying so. My point about a medical power of attorney is that you keep the decision-making where it belongs, in the family circle.
You can display all the emotional rhetoric you want, but it has little or nothing to do with Terri or end-of-life decisions in general.
Shut up and do not presume you can infect your twisted reality on the memory of my mother. Cancer killed my mother, and I was at her side for those very difficult days. You are not welcome there.
A LOUD AMEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Not sure you're seeking discussion (just argument)
It's not my version of reality, it's God's. What part of "thou shalt not kill" do you not understand?
I'm sorry your mother died of cancer, and I'm sorry that it was painful for you, but I'm not sorry for being rude to you. Your brand of "pity" leads directly to Hell.
And who appointed you God? Judge not, lest ye be judged.
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