Replies

thanks, CR:

Thinking It Through by Dr. Richard Reeb
Thursday, March 3, 2005
Terri Schiavo's husband wants her dead
http://www.desertdispatch.com/2005/110986025279241.html
The Terri Schiavo saga has been in court for 12 years. News articles invariably repeat the claim, accepted by the Florida courts, that the brain-damaged woman is in a vegetative state, even though her parents say otherwise. Her husband, Michael Schiavo, proposes that her feeding tube be removed, which would starve her to death in a few weeks.
Witnesses besides her parents claim that she is aware of what is going on, but is simply unable to communicate with words. Terri may not have what trendy liberals call "quality of life," but she has loving parents who are willing and able to care for her as long as she needs them.
At long last, millions of us are now seeing the face of this unfortunate woman in the media. With our own eyes we can see that, however impaired Terri Schiavo may be, she is not comatose or brain dead, but clinging to life. It is not unheard of for people long unconscious to regain consciousness, but Terri is not even unconscious. Yet MSNBC found a doctor who contended that she would feel no pain if she were starved to death.
As Gov. Jeb Bush and the Florida legislature try to figure out a way to save Mrs. Schiavo, she is impaired but not comatose from causes not settled, while a state judiciary has conferred a "right to die" on her that she never asked for. The Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, although not directly applicable to the case, gives us reasons for sparing her forced starvation, as her husband demands.
This amendment was written to protect the rights of all persons to life, liberty and property against arbitrary state infringement. This guarantee is applicable to incapacitated persons no less than everyone else. That other people must care for them is immaterial. After all, children must be cared for years after they are born, but no one has the right to end their lives.
Yet Florida courts continue, in effect, to deny the personhood of Mrs. Schiavo.
The operative issue is: what would she want in this case? Her husband maintains that she told him she "wouldn't want to live like that." As everyone knows, she cannot speak for herself, but this is not because she is in a vegetative state. Her parents visit her daily and she appreciates those visits, becoming sad when they end. Witnesses have reported that she communicates with blinks and smiles and frowns.
Unfortunately, judges and lawyers in Terri Schiavo's case are too lazy to see her. If they did, they would learn that Terri is not comatose, or better off dead. By declaring her incompetent, the courts have reduced her to the equivalent of a nonperson, who might as well be dead. Her husband wants her dead because he wants to save the money set aside for her medical care and take it for himself.
Clarity on these factual matters is crucial to a right decision. But the Schiavo case has been shrouded in lies from the moment it became publicly known because lawyers and judges who seek to terminate "unwanted" persons are not easily deterred.
What seems especially to enrage some about the Schiavo case is that "third parties" besides her husband are involving themselves in it. These "third parties" begin with Terri's parents, who have enlisted the aid of many other people. The rage regarding "third parties" reminds me of how Abraham Lincoln characterized Stephen Douglas's argument for "popular sovereignty"(designed to prevent Americans outside the Western territories from banning slavery there): "If one man decides to enslave another man, no third man may object."
Do "third parties" not directly involved have the right to object to Mr. Schiavo starving his wife to death? Of course. As they are rightly alarmed by the possibility that a grave injustice, if not a murder, is about to occur. As long as Americans care about equal justice and their own futures, they can be counted on to take a strong interest.
Concerned Americans, then, realize that if Terri can be starved to death, so can others. If a feeding tube can be taken from a conscious person who seems not to be losing all hope for life or wishing it would end, nobody is safe. Doubtless, if Terri dies, similar "right to die" cases will be ginned up all over the country.
Is Terri in agony just because she needs to be fed through a tube? (No, but she will be while she starves.) Is her life no longer worth living? Hardly. But under the circumstances, the decision to starve her to death is not hers; it is the choice preferred by her husband, whose motives are not merely questionable but highly suspect.
Michael Schiavo has been living with another woman for two years and has fathered two children with her. He is spending the money awarded for Terri's botched medical procedure on his fight to take away her feeding tube. Mr. Schiavo has been quoted as saying, "Is that bitch still alive?" He could divorce his wife and be free of responsibility, but then he would be unable to collect the remainder of the settlement. The classical question in murder cases, cui bono? (who benefits?) is the right one to ask here.
As we have seen, Terri Schiavo is being treated as if she were not a person. Unless we are deluded by mere forms and miss the real substance of things, we can see that a man has a financial interest in his wife's death and is attempting to make it happen. Justice demands that she be saved.
Richard Reeb, Ph.D.
Richard Reeb taught political science, philosophy and journalism at Barstow College from 1970 to 2003. He is the author of "Taking Journalism Seriously: 'Objectivity' as a Partisan Cause" (University Press of America, 1999). He can be contacted at rhreeb@verizon.net
http://www.desertdispatch.com/2005/110986025279241.html
[posted on 03/03/2005 11:28:20 AM EST by Chocolate Rose]

Terri is being denied the ordinary care that would be given to any other patient in her condition. She is not allowed up and out in her wheelchair, even though we see in a video clip that Michael took her out to a park ('91) and was pointing out ducks to her; even though we've seen the photo of her out at the mall getting her hair done, even though the St. Petersburg Times has a photo of Michael and her gazing into each others' eyes.

Terri is kept away from all visitors in her darkened room. Any cards or flowers that have been sent to her have been removed from her walls and tables. Even though it has been said that she enjoys little tastes of jello, her family is "not allowed" to try to feed her.

. . . etc etc.