Day: 31 March 2005
What Do You Say?
Is there any response that could fully sum up all the circumstances, feelings, actions, and arguments that constituted the Terri Schiavo case? No doubt at this moment millions of bloggers are commenting, including one whom I think is right. None of us know the Schindlers or M. Schiavo personally (if you do, I would like to hear from you), but there are some objective facts (well, maybe some subjective ones as well) here that should not be forgotten..
1. Terri Schiavo lay in a bed for almost 14 days and starved to death. 14 days.
2. Michael Schindler’s crocodile tears fool no one but the most credulous.
3. I think I’ll punch the next person who takes the words “sanctity of marriage” and applies them to Michael and Terri’s non-marriage (at least for the past 15 years). This is about the most transparent and ridiculous argument that I have heard yet. Sanctity? Where? He has a common-law wife and two kids with her. Yep, he takes it very seriously. And somehow because he’s “suffered” so much (not for a long time, I don’t think), he has the right to say what happens to his ex-wife? Perhaps we should go Biblically, and as soon as he had sex with that other woman, the responsibility for Terri should have gone back to her parents.
4. Her parents wanted to take care of her. Think about that: What possible motivation could M. Schiavo have for wanting to starve his former wife to death, when her parents are willing to remove the entire “burden” from him? This was some ideal for him: I must kill her, I must kill her, I must kill her; she told me that’s what she wanted…
“I personally believe that the Schindlers had good ground to question whether Michael Schiavo should have continued as the guardian after he formed a new family with another woman and ultimately had two children by that individual,” [Professor] Jonathan Turley [of George Washington University] told FOXNews.com.[all quotes from Fox News]
5. Anyone who buys the “victim card” from Michael Schiavo, I’ve got a couple bridges I want you to see.
6. M. Schiavo wouldn’t even let Terri’s parents be in the room while she died. I don’t care what kind of personal disputes they have had in the past, “let’s add insult to injury! I get the last word!”
7. Someone else I’d like to take behind the woodshed? George Felos, M. Schiavo’s attorney.
George Felos declined to describe in detail his client’s wife’s passing, but said: “It was evident to everyone around him, the profound emotion and loss for Mr. Schiavo. It was clear to everyone he loved Terri deeply and her passing was a tremendous loss for him.”
“It was disquieting to hear the priest issue venom and make those extremely harsh statements about Mr. Schiavo,” he said. “Instead of words of healing, words of reconciliation, compassion and understanding, we had a platform for an ideological agenda. It was counterproductive and disquieting.”
What did the priest say?
“His heartless cruelty continued until the end,” [Father Frank] Pavone said.
Sorry George, what would you call it?
And by the way, what would NOT BE “counterproductive and disquieting”? Perhaps letting the family be with their daughter and sister at the moment she died?
More from George:
“Bobby [Terri’s brother] suggested he wanted to remain in the room with Mr. Schiavo and the police officer. Mr. Schiavo made the decision that it was not appropriate under the circumstances,” Felos said. “Mr. Schiavo’s overriding concern was that she had a right to die with dignity and in peace. … Mr. Schiavo was not going to permit a potentially explosive situation knowing there had been a dispute” between Schindler and the police officer.
Die “in dignity and peace.” Good one. As Dr. Gregory House has said, “No one dies with dignity.”
And then this: “Her husband was present by her bed, cradling her… Mrs. Schiavo died a calm, peaceful and gentle death.” Yeah, that’s usually how starving people go. I’m wondering what people would think in nations where the kids have to go scavenging through the garbage dumps to get food? I’m sure they would think that this story is the most wonderful thing they’ve ever heard, and isn’t M. Schiavo so compassionate?
8. “Terri Schiavo suffered catastrophic brain damage in 1990 after a heart attack, brought on by a chemical imbalance associated with bulimia.” I’ve heard it hinted more than once that it was essentially her fault because she had bulimia. No need to say more.
Portuguese Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins, head of the Vatican’s office for sainthood, denounced Schiavo’s death, saying that “an attack against life is an attack against God, who is the author of life.”
Amen.
Balaam's Ass 