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TO ALL: I don't know WHY FREEPERS ARE SO DEFENSIVE IF WE QUESTION ANYTHING THE PRESIDENT OR JEB BUSH DOES. I supported both of them & had a major collection of anti-Kerry links on my web site which is currently under construction for 2005.

Anyway, former Surgeon General Koop has written about starvation and dehydration, specifically mentioning Terri Schindler Schiavo.

A Nations People Speak about Intentional Starvation and Dehydration: Its Killing

Quotes from the National Right to Life Committee, Robert Powell Center for Medical Ethics and C. Everett Koop, former US Surgeon General

“Far from being an isolated instance, the attempted starvation and dehydration of Terri Schindler-Schiavo is typical of the denial of food and fluids in less publicized cases taking place daily in nursing homes and hospitals across America,” said Burke J. Balch, J.D., director of the Robert Powell Center for Medical Ethics, affiliated with the National Right to Life Committee.

“For years, people who never asked to die have been quietly starved without much public attention, based on state laws and court opinions that permit third parties to make deadly decisions with little or no scrutiny or accountability,” Balch said. “The outcry over the Schindler-Schiavo case has awakened millions of Americans to the inhumanity of this practice. Now we must act to reverse this trend, and restore a presumption against starvation and dehydration.”

“We must not let the horror and outrage over the attempted starvation and dehydration of Terri Schindler-Schiavo dwindle and die away before we have acted to secure protection for the thousands facing s similar fate,” said NRLC Executive Director David N. O’Steen, Ph.D.

the book KOOP, The Memoirs of America's Family Doctor "... we must be wary of those who are too willing to end the lives of the elderly and the ill. If we ever decide that a poor quality of life justifies ending that life, we have taken a step down a slippery slope that places all of us in danger. There is a difference between allowing nature to take its course and actively assisting death.

The call for euthanasia surfaces in our society periodically, as it is doing now under the guise of "death with dignity" or assisted suicide. Euthanasia is a concept, it seems to me, that is in direct conflict with a religious and ethical tradition in which the human race is presented with "a blessing and a curse, life and death," and we are instructed '...therefore, to choose life."

I believe 'euthanasia' lies outside the commonly held life-centered values of the West and cannot be allowed without incurring great social and personal tragedy. This is not merely an intellectual conundrum. This issue involves actual human beings at risk..."

-- C. Everett Koop, M.D. **taken from the book KOOP, The Memoirs of America's Family Doctor by C. Everett Koop, M.D., Random House, 1991.

FV SAYS: LOTS IN THE LOCAL PAPERS THIS WEEK. 1. A Bailiff gets suspended for making rude comments about a woman who has a court hearing re: child support 2. THE CHIEF OF ELDER AFFAIRS FOR THE STATE OF FLORIDA IS TERMINATED BY JEB BUSH (while he's in Jakarta). 3. Florida House Representative Kevin Ambler is having a contest at GAITHER HIGH IN TAMPA. The contest is called "There Ought to Be a Bill". Ambler (R) is going to pick the contest winner from students of Gaither High and try to get it passed in the House and Senate.

I'm not a student at Gaither High (not even close) but my, my, THERE OUGHT TO BE ANOTHER BILL LIKE SB-692 to protect the DISABLED from what's happened to Terri and countless others. Kevin Ambler recently drove his car underneath a semi and was briefly hospitalized. I worked at Ambler's office a decade ago during a hospital merger here. He's a nice person. He needs to HELP TERRI. He wouldn't remember me now, but I URGE TAMPA RESIDENTS IN HIS DISTRICT TO CONTACT KEVIN AMBLER and ask him to support Terri's rights.

Pinellas residents can contact LESLIE WATERS.

Thanks, FV