DEALERS OF DEATH: The Right-to-die movement is using Terri Schiavo. Are you next?

Planet Envoy (Envoy magazine) ^ | January, 2004 | Toni Collins

[Deo volente]

The story of Terri Schindler-Schiavo will break your heart. This poor woman collapsed in her Florida home some thirteen years ago and suffered severe brain damage. Ten years ago, a medical malpractice case awarded $750,000 for her rehabilitation. But her husband (and guardian) has since forbidden any attempts at rehabilitation. For years, Terri has been languishing while her husband seeks court approval to kill her. In fact, he’s spent over half her rehabilitation money paying attorneys in an attempt to starve and dehydrate Terri by removing her feeding tube. Her parents’ heroic determination to fight Mr. Schiavo has helped Terri survive two such attempts. "Well," you might say, "I can understand that people wouldn’t want to be hooked up to machines indefinitely." That’s a reasonable position to take, and falls well within Catholic moral teaching. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states:

"Discontinuing medical procedures that are burdensome, dangerous, extraordinary, or disproportionate to the expected outcome can be legitimate; it is the refusal of ‘over-zealous’ treatment. Here one does not will to cause death; one’s inability to impede it is merely accepted" (CCC 2277).

But Terri isn’t hooked up to "machines." She is simply fed through a low-tech device invented in the nineteenth century. After all, everyone needs food and water to survive. Lately, Terri has become the cause cèlébre of the Right-To-Die movement and its leaders. The language they use is subtle, but the Right-To-Die marketers are masterful at using carefully tested language to lull the public into cooperation. And make no mistake, they’re using Terri to try to influence the general public into jumping on their bandwagon.

[trustandobey]

You or someone you know will be next because these ghouls cannot stop their deathwish. Life isn't sacred to them, they will not stop until every human that isn't up to their standards physically or mentally is put to death.

[floriduh voter]

bttt. New campaign for Terri. Customize your own return address labels with her www.terrisfight.org underneath your address. Anyone who wants to, the download for Terri's logo is on the Daily Terri Thread.

[trussell]

Terri Power Ping.

floriduh voter, thanks for the ping.

[floriduh voter]

You're welcome. I did a search at FR looking for Terri threads and thought this one was worth pinging again. By the way, Terri's new temporary residence is very near to the famous Madonna on the side of the bank building. I have that photo (discovered in 1996). Terri's closer to Mary.

When you see Mary on the window in person, it brings tears. Mary's very near Drew Street and Terri's on Drew Street.

[Deo volente]

That's fine, but Terri is not being kept alive on machines. She is receiving simple nutrition and water through a low-tech tube. Many people have to resort to this in order to have the basic means of sustenance.

And if they would just allow her the therapy that was originally ordered by the court, she might just learn how to eat on her own. Don't you think she deserves that chance?

[windchime]

Bump!

[Future Useless Eater]

This from the Planet Envoy article...
• Dr. Ronald Cranford was a member of the board of the former Euthanasia Society of America, which eventually merged with Partnership for Caring. Partnership for Caring lists Mary Labyak as a current member of their Board of Directors; she is also the CEO of the hospice where Terri Schiavo lives.

This from the reporting of Terri's 2nd DCA hearing in Oct 2002...
• Ronald Cranford, a Minnesota neurologist known for his involvement in so-called "right-to-die" cases, seemed content to testify about the tapes without having viewed them. Watching his own videotaped exam of Terri, I heard him first declare the woman could not hear him, and then giving her a series of very fast verbal commands. I've had neurological exams myself, but have never experienced one as physically brutal as the one I watched Terri receive on Cranford's videotape. He clumsily poked, prodded, thumped, shoved and pinched her -- she DID seem to pull away when he approached her, he testified. He thunked her hard between the eyebrows. She moaned. That was not a pain response, Cranford told the court.
My goodness, It seems that a NEUTRAL, UNBIASED doctor SHOULD HAVE been used to examine Terri and report HONESTLY to the court!!! ...then there's this from Envoy:
• Both George Felos and Barbara Sheen Todd have served on the Board of Directors for that same hospice; Mr. Felos was in fact the Chairman of the Board until Terri Schiavo was moved there.
• Mrs. Todd serves as a Pinellas County commissioner.
• Judge George Greer served with her for eight years; it is he who has ordered Terri Schiavo’s feeding tube removed.
Surprising incestuous connections! Does anyone know what years Greer served as County Commissioner? Could it be that's why the County refused and continues to refuse to investigate Terri's beating and strangulation? or Terri's insulin injections?

• Dr. Cranford’s published definition of the Persistent Vegetative State differs substantially from Florida law. Court transcripts show that Judge George Greer used Dr. Cranford’s definition in assessing Terri, rather than Florida’s stricter definition.

It DOES indeed seem like there is an 'angels of death' brotherhood intent on killing Terri in order to further their euthanasia advocacy.

[phenn]

This is a couple of blocks down from Terri's new digs:

[Dante3]

There appear to be also vested financial interests involved -- payoffs, whatever -- and the possibility that Terri is the victim of an attempted murder.

[FR_addict]

I know I'm not next - my wife and I both have living wills (witnessed by two notaries) that state we don't want to be kept alive on machines.

Make sure you specify whether you want to be starved or dehydrated to death, since there isn't any machine involved in this case and it's illegal in some states, as it is considered inhumane.

[FR_addict]

Good summary.

Toni Collin's article was the first I knew about Dr. Cranford's connection to the Euthanasia Society. I think this is an important point that needs to be brought to the media's attention.

[eleni121]

Thanks for posting this important article. Needless to say I am shocked and dismayed that the ABA has gotten into bed with death and death proponents.

[gooleyman]

Thanks for the ping FL_engineer.

I've long suspected a "brotherhood" of some sort. The decisions that have been made in this case would not have been made IMHO without this type of 'hood. They simply defy logic and decency.

My FR exposure has been limited since I've had to work a TON of overtime since our last discussion of this (I'm an Engineer too, a thankless profession sometimes), but have you found out any more information about Michael Schiavo having had his parents' feeding tubes pulled. On the last thread on which we discussed this, someone (probaby you) posted what he said on Larry King Live. But because of King's "planned" ineptitude, we didn't learn anything about it. Are there any more links in which HINO's actions regarding his parents is discussed in more detail?

[syriacus]

Thanks for your well-organized summary and your ping to this really great article, FL_engineer.

Thanks for finding this article, Deo volente

From the article

Terri Schiavo
is surrounded by
major players in the Right-To-Die movement.

[T'wit]

>> This poor woman collapsed in her Florida home

The heck she did. As best we can reconstruct from ER data and the later bone scan, she was violently assaulted by Michael Schiavo. Several of us think he was on her back, asphyxiating her, pushing her face into the floor with such force that he caused multiple traumas, including a spinal injury and a fractured femur.

[T'wit]

> I know I'm not next

One thing that is vividly coming out in this case is that living wills are scant protection, and indeed, are a tool of the Death Culture. Take care.

[T'wit]

>> When you see Mary on the window in person, it brings tears.

Yes. Theresa Marie... is named for Mary.

Thank you.

[iowamomforfreedom]

Also, in case others missed it, it was posted on another thread the the bone scan was NOT admitted to evidence during the original malpractice trial. There are those who claim that the bone scan means nothing because if it did, it would have been brought up in the malpractice trial. Since it was never admitted, neither the defendant nor the jury knew anything about it.