Posted on 03/14/2006 11:28:51 AM PST by KevinNuPac
Terri's Day challenges the nation to unify
Kevin Fobbs
March 13, 2006
Terri's Day — A Celebration of the Culture of Life honoring Terri Schiavo with a day of remembrance challenges each and every one of us to stop for a moment and ask ourselves a question, do we respect ourselves, our families, our lives?
And if we are faced with the question of the possible certainty of death, does anyone truly know, or even have the faintest clue about, our wishes? That is the greatest good, the greatest legacy that Terri Schiavo's death and an annual "Terri's Day" can bring to our lives and to the celebration of the Culture of Life.
On March 18th, we as a nation will begin to grieve again, to reach into our hearts and feel with our collective national spirit what the Schindler family felt last year at this time as each moment since Terri was disconnected from the feeding lifeline, the moments crept by like hours and hours like days.
All of us have felt in some way that pain — even if it were only in the privacy of our loved one's home, hospital room, hospice or perhaps talking with an attorney and doctor attempting to make sense out of some fleeting comments made in a conversation perhaps voiced ten, twelve or even two decades earlier — not necessarily an expression of her true feeling about an end-of-life decision but merely an incidental musing in a long-forgotten side conversation.
For at least one million Americans, and quite possibly a whole lot more, this is an opportunity to voice an opinion through a pledge supporting a resolution in each state called "Terri's Day — A Celebration of the Culture of Life." Each and every person who cares that your family, your spouse, your mother, your father, your sister or brother understands with clarity what you wish the end of life for you to be, with dignity and certainty should sign the online pledge at www.kevinfobbs.com and take the additional step to sign a Living Will — or as they call it at www.terrisfight.org, the Will to Live.
Some have asked why Americans should care about an annual Terri's Day. It is quite simple, we tend to keep turning the page on the Culture of Life because we feel it does not affect us. We tend to believe that seemingly universal belief that those who are handicapped, those who are not quite living a "perfect" life or by contemporary notion "ideal" then those lives are possibly disposable, marginal, not relevant, and part of the Culture of Death which embraces a "disposable society."
But life and our values for the Culture of Life are not disposable. Think about the young people today who would rather hurt themselves or even take their own lives rather than feel "imperfect" or the elderly person whose family is told by an insensitive health care professional while the stricken person struggles to cling to life, "she would be better off in another place," — just let her die, disconnect her from life, because her quality of life is not up to "contemporary standards. "
Why does celebrating the Culture of Life in Michigan become so essential for all of us in America? It is important for several reasons. Dr. Jack Kervorkian, also known as "Doctor Death" helped launch first in Michigan and then the nation the notion of the death culture. Secondly, and equally as important, at the May 12 event — just two days before Mother's Day — there will also be a "Mary's Moms" celebration of those women and mothers who have met challenges in standing up for some aspect of the Culture of Life.
This past weekend I sat at my cousin's funeral — or going home celebration, which more accurately describes it — thinking about the dearly departed and how she packed so much caring for others into her life even as she struggled with illness and advancing age. She was a wonderful woman who had lived through many, many challenges in her life, but in her 73 years she had met these challenges with dignity and had conveyed to her family when would be the right time to allow her to pass away.
Her daughter, who is a minister, spoke to the packed church about the times when, with all of her pain and then a stroke, the doctors had informed them that perhaps it was better to let her go. Yet that was three years ago that that occurred, and if the family had listened to the doctors and refused to see how she fought back and not only recovered but went back to volunteering at the church to feed and clothe the homeless. The medical professionals didn't care about an elderly lady who was on dialysis, but the family did and they knew better. Patricia lived three more years — years her extensive extended family considered "a gift from God."
So isn't part of the lesson of Terri's legacy and Terri's Day for families and loved ones to have a meaningful conversation with their family and to have the written document on hand as well that conveys the wishes clearly and concisely? You betcha.
As I sat in the church I thought of all of the families across the nation and the world who were sitting at their loved one's bedsides — or even standing outside of a hospital emergency room — overwhelmed with emotion, torn by what may be days of conflicting anguished decisions. I thought again of how out of death we may have the certainty of life. Terri's death reminded the nation that yes a state can and will starve you to death, and your family may be rendered helpless as you watch your loved one's precious life forces drain slowly away.
By signing the online pledge at www.kevinfobbs.com or going to www.terrisfight.org, you can learn about how to encourage your state legislature to establish March 31st as an official Terri's Day. Hold a Culture of Life Home Party or meet-and-greet to sign pledges, share ideas and support The Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation as well as Culture of Life activities and events in your community or around the nation. Between now and March 31st you can make a dramatic difference for yourself, your family and for the nation. Stand up for the Culture of Life because one person, one life, one family can and does make a difference in America. Make the difference and be the difference today. America...The countdown for the Culture of Life has begun.
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Kevin Fobbs is President of National Urban Policy Action Council (NuPac), a non-partisan civic and citizen-action organization that focuses on taking the politics out of policy to secure urban America's future one neighborhood, one city, and one person at a time. View NuPac on the web at www.nupac.info. Kevin Fobbs is a regular contributing columnist for the Detroit News. He is also the daily host of The Kevin Fobbs Show on News Talk WDTK - 1400 AM in Detroit. Listen to The Kevin Fobbs Show online at www.wdtkam.com daily 2-3 p.m., and call in toll-free nationwide to make your opinion count at 800-923-WDTK(9385) © Copyright 2006 by Kevin Fobbs http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/fobbs/060313
Well, that's a good start.
FV did you notice it wasn't that far away, and the Ron Schonwetter connection? They are incestuous, inbred and all a part of the same cabal.
I really get frustrated about this, hope Congressman Weldon jumps on this cancerous grownth before it spreads further.
A year ago this day, FV, I was convinced it would be impossible in this country for the bad guys to take the step. I was sure it would never get to pulling her tubes. It was so far away from possibility in my mind, I never thought it out.
Our country, our court system, corrupt as they might be, simply could not let this happen. Somebody with courage would rise up and stop this whole charade. I just wondered who that might be.
And this is from AP...
One year ago: Doctors in Florida, acting on orders of a state judge, removed Terri Schiavo ‘s feeding tube. (Despite the efforts of congressional Republicans to intervene and repeated court appeals by Schiavo‘s parents, the brain-damaged woman died on March 31, 2005, at age 41.)
8mm
Terri after the attack and before bioethicking.
Judges across America are becoming increasingly nervous, claiming that their judicial independence is being threatened.
The real problem is that they’re afraid of judicial accountability and the ever increasing demands by the public that the judiciary be held accountable for their actions, to cease their judicial activism and their wrongful rulings which are unjustly destroying people’s lives.
EDITORIAL - Forget Judicial Independence, It’s Time For Judicial Accountability
8mm
Crystal Clear the care for Terri Schindler-Schiavo should have been very simple.
8mm
But the dehydration process is not painful, Glorioso said. At that point in the Schiavo debate, some doctors started to speak up, but Glorioso questioned why more health care professionals did not step forward.
8mm
Your turn.
And for those critics who voice deceitful little sermonettes about government not interfering with "private family decisions," get this straight too. Government, in the person of Judge Greer, not only intervened, it prevented Terri's family from having any say in the decision. Government intervention denied Terri her rights and would not let her be represented by an attorney. Government intervention executed an innocent woman for the "crime" of being disabled and helpless.
Today is March 18th. Prayers for Terri Schindler and her family!
.....and be sued by Tom Cruise..
>> He would follow with another question: "Would you want a feeding tube?"
>> The answer: "Nope."
Good answer, good answer! You choose death. Death is our business. Have we got a deal for you! In about two weeks your tormented and abused organs will give out and kill you. Until then, you must endure unimaginable pain and agony. We will watch you being tortured, and we'll smile a catty smile, and we'll tell reporters you are beautiful.
... and have Howard Dean and Molly Ivins as cellmates.
A quote: "During her speech, O’Connor singled out former House Republican Majority Leader Tom Delay, R-Texas, who attacked state and federal judges after they did not prevent Terri Schiavo, who was brain dead for many years, from being taken off life support."
Brain-dead editorialist in Charleston, West Virginia
I guess Sandra Day O'Conner is brain dead too these days. Hope she gets better.
And Hitlery as master
Just posted at another thread from last year:
Jeb Bush - Damned if you do - Damned if you don't
Old story, but the issues are fresh and unresovled!
Post #150 on that thread:
FYI - cubreporter 'et al = It's not over. Terri's Legacy grows.
And whose fault was it? Include Jeb Bush 'et al.
#132 - Excuses excuses. (Jeb Pilate and the Republican Congress: Stood by while someone died)
Tick tock what is the holdup?
1,109 posted on 03/23/2005 3:04:27 PM PST by keysguy
Of course, we also know that the prominent Democratic Leaders continue to be dunces and hypocrites on the principle of right to life .
#138 - Summary of Case - (by CyberAnt)
#145 ThUMP! - 'Color US stupid'
ThUMP! (or Ter-ump!) is a Terri-BUMP!
from: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1374280/posts
See #158 above
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