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In dispute
by Arlington

The point of the dispute is that Schiavo's husband seemed to want to get rid of her as a matter of convenience. On the other hand, he was her legal guardian and entitled to make medical decisions on her behalf. I don't see how a good decision could have resulted in that case. I guess the rule of law was upheld, but I wish the husband had just turned over responsibility to the parents, as they requested. Maybe that would not have been a good solution, either, since there was a possibility that Terry Schiavo really was suffering.

Many people felt connected to or invested in the Schiavo case who really weren't connected to it and shouldn't have been invested in it. It was unique, after all, and deserved to be considered for its own unique circumstances. The same could be said of every right-to-die case. Each one should be considered on its own merits, without regard to the legal points and general hysteria that accompany other cases.

Each of us is an individual, and each of us deserves to live and die according to what we believe about dignity, religion, pain, etc. There's no way to guarantee we'll go out when we want, the way we want. At the least, we all deserve to be spared the three ring circus that surrounded Terry Schiavo during her last days.

Re: In dispute
by Pondering_It_All

I guess there are not many who are willing to argue with a dead woman about her right to keep on living! This was the ultimate case of vested interest for the author.

BUT: I understand her motivation is to protect the rights of the disabled, and that is honorable, but she was simply mistaken. Throughout her essay she refers to Terry Schiavo's life, her right to live, her feelings, and so forth. But her physicians had already confirmed several times that Terry was brain dead, and therefore had no life and no capacity to ever feel anything again. In the autopsy it was confirmed that her brain had atrophied down to the size of a walnut. Terry Schiavo died many years before they stopped keeping her corpse animated. Medical science has given us the capacity to keep organs alive for a number of days without a living body, but that is always done with the intent of transplanting the organs into a living patient. Keeping Schiavo's corpse alive without a brain was just the sickest perversion of Medicine possible.

Re: In dispute
by Philadelphia Steve

Re: "The point of the dispute is that Schiavo's husband seemed to want to get rid of her as a matter of convenience."

That was a claim made by the Religious fanatics and their helpmates in Congress, all of whom had a political agenda, and still do in bringing this up again.

Shame on Slate for being a part of this contrived political ploy to try to arouse the Religious Right inthe run up to the November elections.

Re: In dispute
by Leporello
Terri Schiavo's husband's name is Michael. Did you ever meet him? Did you talk to him, or get to know him and, that way, conclude he was trying to 'get rid of her as a matter of convenience'? If you did, please accept my apologies for being rude. If not, how dare you pass judgement? You weren't there before, during and after Terri's illness. You didn't have to deal with the monsterous changes those times brought. Michael was there and did what he had to do. Maybe he did right, maybe he didn't. I wasn't there and I don't know enough to judge. I do, however, know that he was Terri's husband and it fell to him to make the call. That's not an easy call, but it was between Michael and his conscience. Terri's autopsy showed conclusively that she was long gone, and only the shell remained. This was emotional agony for everybody involved. Why people from both sides had to get their two cents in is beyond me. This was a case of well-intentioned people making a bad situation astonishingly worse.
Re: In dispute
by duhwayne

Dear Michael Schiavo,

Please continue to pay thousands of dollars in bills each month to let us visit your dead wife for as long as we want.

If you dont agree to pay, we will ask every branch of state and federal government to force you over your obviously selfish assertion--demonstrated during the eight years of care provided before your first petition to remove the tube--that Terri preferred not to leave her engine running without a driver.

Signed,

Your loving parents in-law

================

<link>

All I can say is that because of this case I have a living will and detailed do-not-resucitate document, copies of which have been delivered to parents and spouse. If I become a vegetable I want to be in the ground before the bills deny my kids an education--measured in days under our current healthcare market.

Re: In dispute
by duhwayne
My bad. The last line of the letter should have read "engine running without a driver--by means of jumper cables."
Re: In dispute
by Walter In FL

My Summary of the Terri Schiavo Tragedy

The Schindlers’ were not concerned in Terri’s interest. They were concerned with Terri’s trust fund and their livelihoods. They knew Terri’s true non-recoverable condition. IMO, as I’ve stated before, I believe the Schindlers were trying to get control of Terri’s trust fund and to do that they had to get control of Terri’s guardianship from Michael Schiavo (her husband by law). After they gained control of the guardianship plus the control of the trust fund, and a reasonable period of time they would come to a “revelation” that there really wasn’t any hope for Terri and have the tube (PEG) removed themselves. The trust fund would be theirs. Their next efforts were to vilify Michael Schiavo with slanderous and libelous statements to the media to make him give up and surrender the guardianship to them. But they lost their attempts in the courts. Under the leadership of Randall “Bullhorn” Terry, which was paid $10,000 for his services, rallied the RTL and RR staged protests in front of Terri’s hospice and several other locations. The Schindlers requested donations to pay for their legal expense which was already being paid by other foundations. All four of the Schindlers’s livelihoods are now being provided by those donations of millions of dollars, which they’re still requesting donations to their Terri Schindler Foundation and to which they’re all employed.

Explain why the Schindlers attempted to present a false display of Terri Schiavo condition with their highly edited 4-minutes of staged videos out of 4-hour of videos made by them. That was the Schindlers’ biggest distortion of the truth to the world. It worked with the media and public but not in the courts. That alone shows their intention were to falsify Terri true condition. That proves the Schindlers knew the TRUE condition of Terri Schiavo for them to even to create the video falsehoods.

That is one thing a lot of people don't understand. Once Michael Schiavo turned it over to the court it was out of his hands and control. The court proceeded to hearing and viewing the evidence then made a ruling in response to what was proven to represent Terri's "wishes."

The Schindlers distortion those procedures to vilify and make it appear that Michael controlled the events. The Schindler rhetoric and propaganda especially what the Anit-Choice is shoveling is a perfect example to this day.

It was proven in court that Terri had a virtual “Living Will.” Judge Greer made the ruling and either Michael or the Schindlers could change it. It was a court order to remove the PEG. Who ever had the guardianship after the court ruling it wouldn’t make any difference. They would have to honor and obey the count order.

Terri Schiavo’s Virtual “Living Will”

Terri’s self-determination is that her dying not be artificially prolonged under the circumstances set forth as Terri declared that, if at any time she is mentally or physically incapacitated and by any or all of the following: terminal condition, end-stage condition, persistent or vegetative state, and it is determined that there is no reasonable medical probability of her recovery from such condition, Terri directed that life-prolonging procedures be withheld or withdrawn when the application of such procedures would serve only to prolong artificially the process of dying, and that she be permitted to die naturally with only the administration of medication or the performance of any medical procedure deemed necessary to provide her with comfort care or to alleviate pain.

It was about Terri's Schiavo's Self-Determination.

Re: In dispute
by Walter In FL

Leporello

I have met Michael Schiavo several times and have been indirectly involved. Today there are several individual posting the truth about The Terri Schiavo Tragedy on the Topix Terri Schiavo Forum. You and all are invited to come and learn the truth. I will continue to follow this Forum also.

Re: In dispute
by Walter In FL

<link>

Randall Terry's Wave Of Hatred

From the demagogue Randall Terry, head of the reactionary cult Operation Rescue, on his group's agenda: "I want you to just let a wave of intolerance wash over you... I want you to let a wave of hatred wash over you. Yes, hate is good... Our goal is a Christian nation. We have a biblical duty, we are called by God, to conquer this country. We don't want equal time. We don't want pluralism." (The News-Sentinal, Fort Wayne, Ind., 8/16/93)

Re: In dispute
by Walter In FL

This is a Christian talking, I think not! I Know NOT! This is a opportunist and fanatic talking and someone the Schindlers befriended.

Re: In dispute
by Walter In FL

Who is Randall Terry? <link>

Monday, March 21, 2005 8:35pm ET

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