Terry Schiavo's end speaks poorly of our judicial system

It's about the law

from JoeUser Forums

As far as the law is concerned, it has spoken. Many courts have heard Terry Schiavo's case and concluded that Terry would not have wanted to be kept alive through artificial means.

That is what this case boils down to. People have the right to decide whether they want to be kept alive via artificial means.  And the courts determined that there was sufficient evidence through testimony that Terry would not have wanted to be kept alive this way.

However, it's the "evidence" that is problematic here in my opinion.  She had no living will. Hopefully this incident will encourage people to start making living wills so that the judicial system can't be screwed around like this.  Terry's parents say she would not want to be starved to death.  Terry's husband says she would.

In my view, the word of Terry's husband is meaningless. He's moved on.  He has two children with another women.  As soon as he had a child with another woman, his "guardianship" rights should be reverted to the parents.  And the parents want her to be kept alive.  She's not on life support, she simply is incapable of feeding herself.

That is where I think the focus of the debate exists.  Frankly, we really don't know what Terry wanted.  I know I would not want to be kept alive via artificial means but on the other hand, I don't know if I'd like the idea of being starved to death over a two week period. I think when most people think of being taken off "life support" they picture themselves in a coma without the ability to breath on their own. 

That's why this case is so compelling.  We really don't know what Terry would have wanted and so many people feel that the default option should be life and not starvation.

Anyone who has ever worked in a group home for the mentally disabled can tell you that there are literally hundreds of thousands of people who would die without what would seem to most people extraordinary intervention.  She we starve them to death too?

In fact, why stop there?  How about the people are incapable of feeding themselves without government subsidies? Billions are spent providing food to people who somehow have managed to screw up their lives to the point that they can't afford to pay for their own food.  Should we stop providing them food?

What's ironic is if Terry were a convicted murderer, one could almost imagine the far left out in force protesting on the other side.  It gives the impression that the only lives that the left really wants to fight for are those who either have killed people (murderers) or want to kill people (terrorists). I know, that's a cheap shot but it does strike me as odd that the kind of same people who will camp outside a prison to protest the execution of a convicted murderer have contempt for the people who want to keep Terry alive.

I am a strong believer in individual choice.  If Terry truly would have wanted to die this way, then I am all for that.  I am just not convinced that that is the case based on the publicly available evidence.  And if we're going to choose death as the default when someone can't keep themselves alive on their own, then that takes us down a slippery slope that I'm not sure people want to go.

politics
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Reply #1 from JoeUser Forums Top
It's rare for me to have an "I'm ashamed of America" moments that LIberals so often have, but this is one for me. The idea that around the world, especially Arab world where we so desperately need PR, people are watching us starve someone to death simply because she is mentally handicapped.

And before anyone differs with that assumption, look at the facts. The woman was not in pain, the woman was not on life support. The woman was not in coma. In fact, the "husband" refused to allow any recent tests, or any new MRI technology to be used to even tell how much brain activity there was.

There was another blog where someone referred the the "I want" line in the news recently. Sure, she may have been saying she wanted to die, but that overlooks the KEY reason the pro-death folks cite. People who say "I want" are not vegetables, they are not meat. People who actively watch a ballon moved left, right, up, down, who laugh, aren't brain dead.

To my knowledge assisted suicide is not legal in Florida. Either we have allowed a husband to kill a wife with no proof as to her wishes, or we have allowed someone to take their own life while denying thousands of people who are REALLY suffering around the nation to sit and suffer.

Reply #2 from JoeUser Forums Top
Conservative conundrum: activist judges bad when dealing with gays or religion; good when overturning decisions we don't like...

Get off it. Either you want the judicial system involved in day to day life or you don't.

Now we've got the activist congress and the activist president trying to subvert the constitution for one woman. And you want judges to do even more. Yay activism!

We liberals may be irrational, but we aren't hypocrites. You are.

Cheers.
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Reply #3 from JoeUser Forums Top
We liberals may be irrational, but we aren't hypocrites. You are.


Mmm, that's why Liberals only want their appointees in the courts, and use procedural insipidness to block anyone that disagrees with them. When a court makes a conservative decision, all the little angst-bots throw up their hands and talk about how skewed the judicial system is.

Nah, nothing hypocritical about that...

The gays thing flys in your own face. Liberals in this case have said time and again for us to shut up, what the courts say, goes. When they find that gays can't marry though, the courts are meaningless.

"Activist Congress and activist president" is the most ludicrous accusation I have ever heard from you, and I have heard some doozies. Do I even need to make you a list of the idiotic causes Democratic presidents and some of your wackos in Congress have aligned themselves with? President Clinton actually founded the "population council" to promote the import of abortion pills. Activism?

Your "hypocrites" statement is probably the most hypocritical statement I have seen lately...
Reply #4 from JoeUser Forums Top
True, the judicial system has spoken, and the rule of law has been upheld by politicians. Those are both good things, but they are as far as any "good" can be said of this case.

~Judges used little more than "hearsay" evidence to come to their decisions.

~It was the wife killer, Michael Schiavo (not Terri Schiavo's Doctors) who ordered her physical therapy and further tests discontinued.

~the wife killer, Michael Schiavo has already lied several times, including about her condition, so why accept "this is what she wanted", especially after she had already been "living this way" for years before he "magically" remembered her wishes.

~There are NO medical protocols which would allow medical professionals to accept a verbal living will in any other case.

~The judges apparently did not interpret current laws, they simply listened to one side and made their choices.


What gets me most in this case is all the redefining of "life" that goes with these decisions. To use political definitions of life is to destroy all that life really means.
Reply #5 from JoeUser Forums Top
It's true the law has spoken. But it's still a clear case of legal murder resulting from torture. No food or water is a terrible way to die, if there are good ways to die. You all should be sickened by this cruel judgement. And most people are so misinformed about it. Some idiot I know was talking about her 'disease' and how it's not worth living through etc... Disease! How ignorant. But the real immediate morally-criminalistic people to blame here are her parents. To let the state decree such a torture on their child. And there they are appealing to the higher courts as if they were the true final word over their child's fate. How completely ignorant and cruel. Their ultimate inaction makes me wonder if they have the true deep bond between parents and their children. And before anyone gets on my case over any of this let me say that the parents have been made fools-of constantly through this ordeal. hearing after hearing after case after case and all they have done is been made fools of. There is justice, obtainable justice, but it seems to be reserved for those who don't let society dictate their destinies. For those who have the balls to act when it's for the common good. Here are her parents conversing for years with undetatched advocates, trying to convice them their daughter deserves to live her given life. It's laughable. Any true parent does whatever it takes to protect their children. They don't let unemotional detatched people make such decisions for them. And one crappy "coincidence" is this: If any one of us here or anywhere were ever caught up in a case where there was suspicion of foul play on our spouse's death, and we were in fact involved with their death, the very very first thing you or I would want to do immediately is to get a cremation done as soon as possible. No one could argue the prick cheating husband only wants to do her the highest respect by closing her ordeal once and for all and to move on. Judging from his decade-long attempts to have his wife killed, there's no reason to think it's done out of respect.
Reply #6 from JoeUser Forums Top

In fact, why stop there? How about the people are incapable of feeding themselves without government subsidies? Billions are spent providing food to people who somehow have managed to screw up their lives to the point that they can't afford to pay for their own food. Should we stop providing them food?

I already wrote a blog on that very subject, exposing the hypocrisy of the vultures.  And you know what?  Not a single one came to defend their ghoulish beliefs.

Where is Dabe now who advocates starving those that cannot feed themselves?  Their silence is deafening and highly enlightening.

Reply #7 from JoeUser Forums Top
I agree with almost everything said except this:

But the real immediate morally-criminalistic people to blame here are her parents. To let the state decree such a torture on their child. And there they are appealing to the higher courts as if they were the true final word over their child's fate. How completely ignorant and cruel. Their ultimate inaction makes me wonder if they have the true deep bond between parents and their children. And before anyone gets on my case over any of this let me say that the parents have been made fools-of constantly through this ordeal. hearing after hearing after case after case and all they have done is been made fools of. There is justice, obtainable justice, but it seems to be reserved for those who don't let society dictate their destinies. For those who have the balls to act when it's for the common good. Here are her parents conversing for years with undetatched advocates, trying to convice them their daughter deserves to live her given life. It's laughable. Any true parent does whatever it takes to protect their children. They don't let unemotional detatched people make such decisions for them


Where do you think they should have gone to get the decision they needed tp save Terri? They should pull it out of their hat (a**)?They needed the *law* behind them to pull it off. There was NO other way to do it. If you think there was then lets hear it.
Reply #8 from JoeUser Forums Top
It's true the law has spoken. But it's still a clear case of legal murder resulting from torture. No food or water is a terrible way to die, if there are good ways to die. You all should be sickened by this cruel judgement


Probably the only few lines I ever agreed with Reiki-House....

But the real immediate morally-criminalistic people to blame here are her parents. To let the state decree such a torture on their child. And there they are appealing to the higher courts as if they were the true final word over their child's fate. How completely ignorant and cruel. Their ultimate inaction makes me wonder if they have the true deep bond between parents and their children.


Guess Reiki as usual decided to push it just a little bit more...give me a break. You blame the parents instead of the 'husband'? ....the man has consistently shown himself to be scum...asking if the 'bitch' was dead yet (at the hospital), denying her physical therapy and further tests that made have given a clear idea of her true condition instead of the one we are told by the courts and her 'husband'...but you blame the parents.......what an ass.


And before anyone gets on my case over any of this


To late....go back to your cubby hole Reiki...I'm sure theres something else you can harp about.
Reply #9 from PolMach Forums Top
Looking recently at a few law sites, and local libraries, i wouldn't be suprised if schiavo's [forgive me if i misspelled it] parents don't try and get michael charged with accesorry to murder...thats what it sounds like, if some one could send me any info[non biased] so that i can be educated about it...
Reply #10 from JoeUser Forums Top
You have pretty clearly stated the whole rationale behind this case which is whether the courts get to decide matters of life or death or if such decisions should only be made by elected officials. If the former, then things stay as they are. But if the latter......well, then, Roe v. Wade comes under challenge doesn't it?

One only need to look at the National Right to Life organization web page to see the implications. See http://www.nrlc.org/ Typically NRLC is more focused on abotion issues, but it is pretty clear from their web page that they see the Schiavo case as a stepping stone for challenging Roe v. Wade. Quoting from their page as follows:

"We must recognize that many doctors and judges are likely to believe we would be “better dead than disabled."" NRLC is challenging not only the courts but the medical establishment as well. I personally don't know of too many doctors that would want their patients dead rather than disabled, but if there are such doctors practicising then why are we looking to reform tort law again?

When Tom DeLay chose to end his father's life in 1988, the affair was conducted quietly and the decsion made only by the family. Tom DeLay's father was a 65-year old contractor injured in an accident. True, Charles DeLay was on intravenous and breathing assistance. And it is also true that the DaLay family made their difficult decision based on medical advice from professionals. But ultimately, the decision was based on what the spouse of the injured man thought would be his wishes:

"There was no way [Charles] wanted to live like that. Tom knew — we all knew — his father wouldn't have wanted to live that way."- Maxine DaLay, widow of Charles and mother of Tom. See http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-delay27mar27,0,5710023.story?coll=la-home-headlines for source.

Were there any relatives in the family that disagreed with the decison not to connect Charles to a dialysis machine that would have kept him alive? Did the family express concern that this might have been an uncomfortable form of death? I can't imagine that. Does it come down to breathing on one's own? Is that the criteria? Or is it based on informed medical opinion, which is now being challenged?

But the fact remains that, under the advice of physicians and based on what was thought to be the patient's wishes as communicated by the spouse, the decision was made. And you have to ask why the Schiavo case is different.
Reply #11 from PolMach Forums Top
Looking recently at a few law sites, and local libraries, i wouldn't be suprised if schiavo's [forgive me if i misspelled it] parents don't try and get michael charged with accesorry to murder...thats what it sounds like, if some one could send me any info[non biased] so that i can be educated about it...


I think he should be charged with cruelty to animals at the very least. florida is enforcing that law.
Reply #12 from PolMach Forums Top
But the fact remains that, under the advice of physicians and based on what was thought to be the patient's wishes as communicated by the spouse, the decision was made. And you have to ask why the Schiavo case is different.


I see many differences. But the 2 Biggest ones are that Maxine had not shacked up with another man as Charles lay in that vegetative state. In addition, when they pulled the plug, he did not linger and suffer but a few minutes, not 2-3 weeks!

We dont allow our pets to suffer like that. Yet we are torturing a poor innocent woman for no other reason that she married a lying philanderer. How many of us deserve death for making one bad decision? That was not even illegal.
Reply #13 from JoeUser Forums Top
It's hard for me to see the confusion in this.

Terri Schiavo was not terminally ill, nor was she an elderly person that would be on REAL life support, i.e. a machine keeping her heart beating and lungs pumping for the rest of her life.

Terri Schiavo was a handicapped person that needed the care that thousands of other handicapped people get around the nation. There are some people that find that distasteful, granted, but we don't kill people who are distasteful.

And, considering our assisted suicide laws, her concious decision to kill herself, if she ever actually made it, should be considered assisted suicide. The "right to die" laws we have now are stretched to the limit, and beyond, if this case applies.

Reply #14 from JoeUser Forums Top
In nature, parents have the ultimate task of protecting their children. Going to some old men in black robes begging them to keep their offspring alive?!? I guess you don't see what the solution is and always has been. The husband. Sure he's to blame, but if he wasn't there this would not be an issue. Tell me how much right does he have to live when he uses his God-given time to try have his wife killed. There was a time threshhold where the parents would have been able to do something about it. But once it became national it became impossible to take any real sort of action. Making things look like accidents are only useful when you have friends in power who will not ask too many hard questions ie. coroner, sheriff, whoever. She will soon be dead and there will not be one single corpse to be held accountable for their evil support. If anyone tries to kill my kids, the amount of relevant-to-the-case-dead would surpass Custer's final blunder. The hospital would be awash in policemen or lawyer or evil-husband blood. Anyone who would try keep me from giving aid to my child would and should be put down with no more remorse and thought than banging a nail on it's head. This is my own blood I'm talking about here. Rule of law doesn't apply to such familial situations. The state has no right to have my child taken off of food and water. If they tried to they would have a legal bloodbath on their hands. How can anyone apply to the courts in the hopes of keeping their child's lungs full of oxygen? It's ludicrous and morally unethical. Before you think I'm being hypocritical keep in mind that I speak only of those who actively keep me from keeping my child alive. Those who interfere, on the job or not, are completely open to any repercussion that may come their way for their actions. It's not just doing your job when you keep a cup of water from reaching your dehydrated and dying daughter. Blood is blood, and there is nothing that can equal it. Nothing. It's part of the reason the resistance in Iraq keeps growing. The ripple effect.
Reply #15 from JoeUser Forums Top

Myrrander - what the hell are you talking about? Where did I complain about judges? Where did I argue that we need activist judges

I realize there were a lot of big words in the article, but surely you can manage to at least read them all before writing some ridiculous response that had nothing to do at all with what I wrote.

The reason this case speaks poorly of our judicial system is NOT because of the outcome but because we obviously don't have a clear set of laws on how a case like this should be handled.

We are putting a woman to death because she's mentally handicap because her husband convinced the court that she would want to be starved to death rather than live our her life mentally handicap. 

I am sure there are many people (myself included) who has seen a case where someone suffers an injury and becomes severely handicap and says "If that ever happened to me, shoot me."  Christopher Reeve couldn't even breath on his own after his accident.  What would have happened if he was unable to communicate after his accident? Should we have let him suffocate?

 

Reply #16 from JoeUser Forums Top
Tell me how much right does he have to live when he uses his God-given time to try have his wife killed. There was a time threshhold where the parents would have been able to do something about it


Sorry your wrong. No threshold exsisted. As long as Terri and Michael stayed married there was NOTHING her parents could do. Guardianship via marriage trumps blood EVERY time!


If anyone tries to kill my kids, the amount of relevant-to-the-case-dead would surpass Custer's final blunder. The hospital would be awash in policemen or lawyer or evil-husband blood. Anyone who would try keep me from giving aid to my child would and should be put down with no more remorse and thought than banging a nail on it's head.


And just how would this help? You'd end up either dead or in jail. Then who would watch over your children? Your talking moronic nonsense!
Reply #17 from JoeUser Forums Top

When Tom DeLay chose to end his father's life in 1988, the affair was conducted quietly and the decsion made only by the family. Tom DeLay's father was a 65-year old contractor injured in an accident. True, Charles DeLay was on intravenous and breathing assistance. And it is also true that the DaLay family made their difficult decision based on medical advice from professionals. But ultimately, the decision was based on what the spouse of the injured man thought would be his wishes:

You can't compare situations because in the first case, the family was united on the issue. And the subject was literally on life support.

In this case, you have a dispute over who should the legal guardian be.  The husband of a couple of years who has long since moved on, had children with another woman or the parents of the child.

When in doubt on the person's wishes then the law, as already written, should be enforced and that law is that we do not execute severely disabled people.

I happen to support assisted suicide. If someone WANTS to end their life then they should have the right to do so.  But we don't know what Terry wanted. Therefore, we are creating a precedent -- if we don't know for sure what a mentally disabled person wants, then the state can have them executed through starvation.

In the case of Tom Delay's father, if his father's wife wanted him to be kept on life support do you not think he would have been kept on life support? And again, I want to stress, the two cases aren't comparable but despite that, you can still be pretty darn sure that if any family member with power of attorney wanted him kept alive he would have been kept alive and that's in the case where you have a guy completely on life support, not someone who simply can't feed themselves.

Reply #18 from JoeUser Forums Top
Since we all know where I stand on this, it is about the law.. but as I have said many times here, NO WHERE IN ANY STATEMENT MADE FROM CREEP HUSBAND DID terry say " I want to be starved to death" no where.
Reply #19 from JoeUser Forums Top
this case has really upset me as i am older person with poor health.waiting for tests to be completed to find out whether i am going thru 3rd round of cancer.i am signing a living will within the next couple of weeks that no treatment is allowed if i am unconscious.
no IV's,no resuscitations,no tubes,nothing.there will be no permission for any doctor to even decide anything.the horror of laying as terri scares me so bad that i would much prefer the starvation.the thought that lawmakers are going to interfere in family decisions like this is unbelievable.the judges had no personal interest in the way he decided so i cant see why people are criticizing the whole legal court system.it worked as it is designed to do
br3n
Reply #20 from JoeUser Forums Top

legal court system.it worked as it is designed to do

Oh, so the legal system forces torture on innocent people?  Then it is time to rethink the judicial system.  For anyone that advocates torture as humane is no better than Nazi Germany.

Reply #21 from JoeUser Forums Top
Dr. Guy, you are of course entitled to your opinion, but I respectfully disagree with the use of the word "torture." I Googled "Effects of discontuing forced feeding" and one of the first articles that I found was "Withholding nutrition at the end of life:Clinical and ethical issues" from the Cleveland Clinic Journal of Medicine, authored by Jacquelyn Slomka, PhD, RN, Assistant Professor, The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. You can view it yourself at http://www.ccjm.org/pdffiles/Slomka603.pdf (PDF format, so you need Acrobat.)

Conclusion: Forgoing nutrition and hydration near the end of life leads to greater patient comfort in many instances.

I don't expect agreement, I assume that you have valid reasons and supporting evidence for your opinion, but at least acknowledge that the topic is open to debate.

And yes, the court system works as intended. We have laws governing which party has the deciding vote in situations such as this. Spouse for spouse and parents for minor children is the law. Brad, that was exactly the point that I was making in my post. You asked "if his father's wife wanted him to be kept on life support do you not think he would have been kept on life support?" No, I think that it was her decision to make, just as it is Terry Schiavo's husband's decision to make. The law doesn't say "Unless the spouse in question is a louse." (And by the way, I think that is exactly what he is. No offense to the rest of the lice out there.)

But lets get back to the data, as we know it: 1- She is in a persistent, vegatative state. That hasn't changed. The evidence to the contrary presented by the parents is not believable to me and the medical evidence to the contrary has proved scanty. 2- The medical professionals involved in the case agree with the proposed euthanasia. (Call it what you will, it is euthanasia.) I have to think that the doctors that have treated her know more about her condition than I do. 3- All the focus on starvation is moot. Would anyone's opinion change if an intentional overdose of a sedative was proposed? I don't think so.

The major issue, to me, about taking the decision making away from doctor's and the courts is that it sets a precedent that we will have to live with for some time. As I pointed out, I am concerned mostly with that precedent, especially regarding Roe v. Wade. That precedent is precisely why groups such as National Right to Life have taken such a strong stance on this issue.
Reply #22 from JoeUser Forums Top
What's ironic is if Terry were a convicted murderer, one could almost imagine the far left out in force protesting on the other side. It gives the impression that the only lives that the left really wants to fight for are those who either have killed people (murderers) or want to kill people (terrorists). I know, that's a cheap shot but it does strike me as odd that the kind of same people who will camp outside a prison to protest the execution of a convicted murderer have contempt for the people who want to keep Terry alive.


Exactly.
Reply #23 from JoeUser Forums Top

Dr. Guy, you are of course entitled to your opinion, but I respectfully disagree with the use of the word "torture." I Googled "Effects of discontuing forced feeding" and one of the first articles that I found was "Withholding nutrition at the end of life:Clinical and ethical issues" from the Cleveland Clinic Journal of Medicine, authored by Jacquelyn Slomka, PhD, RN, Assistant Professor, The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. You can view it yourself at http://www.ccjm.org/pdffiles/Slomka603.pdf (PDF format, so you need Acrobat.)

Why?  Did she starve herself to death?  The truth is they just dont know.  And dead men (and women) tell no tales.  How many of these articles did you see a year ago?  it is only the ghouls trying to salve their conscious with their ghoulish decision.

But I turn it back on you.  WHy would they give her morphine if it was painless?  because it is not.  We all know that.  God created a complex being that would fight with everything in its arsenal to live.  And hunger was an early and terrible taker of human life, as it is legislated against in all 50 states to this day.

For every living creature except people.

if Starvation is so easy and noble, why the hell do we give a damn about starving kids in Africa?  Or anywhere else?

You can google to your hearts content and you will find both opinions in equal number.  Google ranks them on hits.  perhaps that is number one for the simple reason that so many know they are torturing and killing an innocent life.  And want to be able to sleep at night.  They will. Ghouls never have a problem with conscious.  They make it up as they go along.

Reply #24 from JoeUser Forums Top

Spouse for spouse and parents for minor children is the law.

You dare say that on this day when the Supremes decided parents have no rights with minors?  Are you just playing stupid?  I sure hope so!

Reply #25 from JoeUser Forums Top

1- She is in a persistent, vegatative state. That hasn't changed. The evidence to the contrary presented by the parents is not believable to me and the medical evidence to the contrary has proved scanty.

No, that is opinion not fact.  I can cite as many experts that says she has cognitive awareness and feels joy and sorrow!  Why do you keep defending the indefensible?  I dont know, but that is the rub!  No one knows!  So if we dont know, we just kill them?

2- The medical professionals involved in the case agree with the proposed euthanasia. (Call it what you will, it is euthanasia.)

Euthanasia is when you kill someone, humanely that has no hope of living and is in extreme pain.  Neither applies here.  So that is just a lie.

3- All the focus on starvation is moot. Would anyone's opinion change if an intentional overdose of a sedative was proposed?

My GOD Man!  Have you not read anything I have written?  Please, dont make a fool of yourself with such an assinine statement again!  That is EXACTLY what I have been advocating and yelling!  And yes, not all, but many that abhor this ghoulish endeavor are screaming for exactly that!  We know her bastard of a husband is going to kill her no matter what!  Starvation is NOT DEATH WITH DIGNITY. PERIOD

it is cruel and inhumane and in this case just a ghoulish delight for a man so shallow that he is beneath contempt.

Look , there is no point in you arguing any further.   I just showed where you were wrong on all counts.  I dont believe you are a ghoul, but you fell into their trap and while your intentions are good, your methods are not.

Dont lecture me when you have not done your homework.  We are not so far apart.  I just dont believe in torture.  For People or animals.