Just when you think you've heard the dumbest thing ever uttered by a moonbat, something like that comes along.
Was this the guy you were talking too?
Posted on 06/15/2006 7:44:45 PM PDT by Mr. Silverback
Recently, I told you about Michael Schiavo’s new book, Terri: The Truth. I compared reading the book to “falling down Alice’s rabbit hole and ending up in a new and bizarre world.” This world is “a scary place” where “survival of the fittest” is taken to a whole new level—a world that Christians must never stop fighting against.
Now, I stand by everything that I said about Michael Schiavo’s book, but there’s something that I said about his late wife that I need to take back. I’m embarrassed, not only because of the mistake I made, but also because I was had and should have known better.
In the earlier commentary I said that “the autopsy showed that [Terri] had been brain-dead.” This “finding” did not affect my belief that it was wrong to take her life. My concern from the beginning was with the process we followed and its implications for the sanctity of human life.
My calling Terri “brain-dead” was based on what the media said about the autopsy. For instance, MSNBC began its report this way: “an autopsy on Terri Schiavo backed her husband’s contention that she was in a persistent vegetative state . . .”
Well, I should have known better than to take the media’s word. Terri’s brother, Bobby Schindler, thanked me for the commentary but drew my attention to what the autopsy report actually said.
That report said that there was no evidence that Terri suffered, as had been widely reported, from an eating disorder. The medical examiners were unable to determine what caused the heart attack that left her brain-damaged.
Damaged, not dead. In fact, the autopsy report referred to her receiving morphine, which would not have been necessary if she were brain-dead or in a persistent vegetative state. The report, while it noted “severe brain damage,” said nothing about Terri being in a persistent vegetative state.
What’s more, persistent vegetative state is a clinical diagnosis, made through observation and, as such, is a matter of interpretation. So reports like MSNBC’s were, at best, highly misleading. If she had not been deliberately starved, Terri, in the estimate of the medical examiner, “could have lived easily for another decade . . .”
As bioethicist C. Ben Mitchell puts it, the autopsy confirmed “our worst fears.” Terri didn’t die from any illness but “at the hands of her husband and his lawyers.”
As I said, I’m embarrassed about this mistake, but more than that I am angry. It’s not enough that the legal process sentenced her to death, but the media deliberately or negligently got the circumstances of both her life and her death wrong.
As a result, the “culture of death” has taken several steps forward. Instead of giving life the benefit of the doubt, we are all-too-ready to choose death. As Mitchell said, “Terri Schiavo should be alive today and in the loving embrace of her parents.” Instead, she has become a symbol of the “scary place” our culture is headed: a place where everybody is on the lookout for signs of death, not life. And as for those who defended Terri Schiavo and have been pilloried in the media, well, in the cold light of day, we now know we were right after all.
Thanks backhoe, you rock!
Your point is well taken. However, the thing about the Terri trial that's scary is not that a woman who might have recovered was allowed to die, it's that half-remembered daced-old conversations were taken as equivalent to a solid living will. That's already scary stuff before you Add in the fact that this was done to keep her in the custody of a guardian who was unfit on several levels.
It's called free speech, dear. Ever been at a baseball game and heard somebody say "Throw that bum out of the game?" Well, you can bet that fan is not under the delusion they've become a major league umpire, they are just expressing their opinion. I haven't suffered the delusion that I'm a mod, and using the phrase "knock it off" only has some magical signifcance if it comes from Jim or the mods.
Chuck Colson would never belittle & put down as you just did.
1. I never claimed to be nice. Of course, I never claimed to be a superior thinker either, so I guess it's a mixed bag.
2. I only "belittled" people who hate President Bush. Where did I belittle either MHG or Citizen Reporter?
3. After your crack about Holiday Inn Express, isn't this a little hypocritical of you? (See, it works both ways)
Just when you think you've heard the dumbest thing ever uttered by a moonbat, something like that comes along.
Was this the guy you were talking too?
As the article points out, that's not necessarily true, and there was plenty of other evidence that there was somebody in there waiting to come back out. This is one example from an op-ed I wrote about terri last year:
A priest walks into a patient’s room on St. Patrick’s Day and offers to sing “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling,”…in Polish.Does that sound like a joke to you? It got a laugh out of Terri Schiavo.
Schiavo, as you’ve no doubt heard, is a patient at a hospice in Pinellas Park, Florida, who suffered brain damage after collapsing in 1990 and is the focus of a long court fight between her husband Michael and her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler. Barring a legal win for the Schindlers, her feeding tube will be removed on the 18th. Michael claims she will never recover and would want the tube removed; she’d expressed worry about being a burden or living on a machine. The Schindlers say she’s been denied treatment, has a chance to recover, and would be no burden at all, because they’ll take care of her.
One of the Schindlers’ supporters is Monsignor Thaddeus Malanowski, the Polish priest I mentioned. He filed an affidavit swearing (among other things) that Terri recognizes him, and that one Saint Patrick’s Day he really did walk into her room and offer to sing her an Irish diddy in Polish. Her response was to laugh. That’s a remarkable response from a person who supposedly is operating on little more than a brain stem, a “vegetative” person. Quick, go to the fridge and tell a cucumber a knock-knock joke! OK, did you get a laugh? I didn’t think so.
Of course, as I've said, the scary part isn't that someone who might have been rehabilitated has died. The scary part is the process that got us there.
I have to admit that, old and experienced and cynical though I am, I still get fooled by believing MSM reports. You absolutely can't even trust the page numbers unless you count them yourself...
There's no reason for any female to accept that kind of insult. Sophie Scholl was a girl. Joan of Arc was a girl. Not to put her in exactly the same category, but criminy, Ann Coulter is a girl!
Hmm, you may have a point. OK, I'll change it to:
Jeb Bush is a shrubbery!
Man, you got that right.
Try this one when you need some grim meditation: (
1) In Roe vs Wade, yhe USSC professed invincible ignorance as to "what is a human life"; and
2) In "Diamond vs. Chakrabarty," the USSC held that living, manmade genetically engineered organisms are ownable and patentable.
Roe + Diamond = you can genetically engineer human beings, patent them, and own them.
As governor, he has the power to suspend or halt a miscarriage of justice and order a more thorough review. He can even pardon a convicted criminal awaiting death, if he so chooses.
Terri's 'collapse' was never adequately investigated, never. The proceedings in which Terri was shuffled from one guardian to another, without thorough review of either medical realities, court proceedings, or the recommendations of guardians was never adequately addressed in oversight.
The same judge who gave the orders to put Terri down like a stray pound dog appointed himself her guardian at a point in past proceedings, and released her trust funded assets to pay the lawyer of the man trying to have her put to death.
No thorough review of Terri's medical progression/digression during her disability was ever undertaken, to determine if she was losing abilities and why ... and there is clear video record of just such strange loss of abilities.
And finally, never was a law enforcement investigation done to find out whether Terri's adulterous husband was abusing her with neglect and or chemical abuse, even though there is substantial sworn testimony that he was and the medical history proves he was forcing neglect upon her! One poster above stated tht 'the girl was no longer there' ... yet earlier video proves she 'was there' prior to the court awarded monies to her and her husband. THAT gave the governor of Florida the legal power to suspend the killing and get the investigations done in a timely fashion, before the disabled person was put down and the issues became moot to the state of Florida.
Frankly, after watching the entire sickening episode unfold, I'm now convinced that governor Bush played politics and then adopted a feckless posture when he didn't get the political leverage he desired, sacrificing Terri Schiavo to avoid political fallout from media ghouls and democrat sleaze mongers. And yes, it worked because we have blind partisans defending his feckless inaction and he got reelected, wheee.
If the governor of a state will not protect the disabled in his state with the powers vested in his office, I won't even drive through such a state and I will discourage anyone in my family to avoid the state like it is plague inflicted.
Should read, 'I will discourage anyone in my family from visiting the state.' Been successful so far ...
Certainly her husband had no compelling reason to deny her parents to take over her care. If, indeed (as I believe), she really was already dead, what would be the harm in letting the parents take care of the still breathing body? Only a real low-life would have denied them that.
It is also scary, and disgusting, that anyone can suggest with a straight face that the right to live would hang on the prerequisite that rehabilitation (to what standard?) is possible. (in whose opinion?)
What are the odds that anyone over the age of fifty will ever be rehabilitated to the state of health and vitality that they enjoyed at 25? Would anyone age 25 or younger say that they would want to live if their quality of life was degraded to a point far below what they now have? Should the opinion of a fifty yr old count? after all his/her faculties have slowed down to a point where they can't really assess what it's like to live like a 25 yr old anymore. Isn't it cruel to hold out the hope to old folks that their life can ever be like it was again? /s
Beyond that; criticism of a particular person's actions is not an abandonment of the agenda unless the agenda is just power for its own sake. I'll let the libs take that path. It's the path to certain failure in the long run no matter what your goals are.
GTBOS
glad to be of service
I didn't ask whether you were buying anything. I actually wondered whether anyone noticed whether the autopsy determined that she needed pain medication or whether the autopsy only said that she had it whether she needed it or not. I don't have an opinion on what the correct answer is. I only see a point that is vague and could be exploited by demagogues on either side.
Never mind the ludicrous idea the Felos crowd was putting out that she would not feel any pain while being denied water, food and comfort measures.
Again, if the parts of the brain that would be aware of pain were no longer working, then being denied food and water would not cause pain. This point brings us back to my original question. Was there evidence that her brain damage was severe enough that she no longer felt pain regardless of whether they gave her morphine? I'm not asking what either side thought. I'm asking what the evidence showed.
Bill
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