Has the Schiavo case Become a Political Football?

Tico,

You mean it isn't an automatic divorce for adultery? Or the loss of any marriage rights? How can that be?
Wioyo has been saying he should lose all his rights for adultery. You mean he wasn't correct?

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I will never agree that it is appropriate to kill a person via dehydration if there is any chance that person can experience discomfort or feel pain. I think there has been adequate evidence and/or testimony presented to support the possibility, if not the probability, that Terri Schiavo can.

Foxfyre- I agree. I also think that it is unconscionable to put the family through this trauma of seeing this woman die slowly. If it were me, I would prefer a lethal injection. But now we are bringing up euthanasia, which is another hot button subject, that many people find objectionable.

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There are times when it can be appropriate in certain circumstances to temporarily set aside a law when a higher principle of law comes into play. Many would say the Terri Schiavo case was one of those circumstances for numerous reasons posted on this thread. We all do not agree with that, of course.

Globally, I think that it bad practice to start making exceptions to a law. If a law is bad, if it is obsolete, then it needs to be changed. In terms of the issue of Terri, I see no reason to set aside her next-of-kin's right to make decisions for an incompetent individual.

I also question the practice of the government becoming more and more involved in a citizen's private issues. Unless a law is broken, IMO, they need to butt out!

I think that the problem in this case is that people have become involved in the emotional issues, and have not separated them out from the legal ones.

Tico,

You mean it isn't an automatic divorce for adultery? Or the loss of any marriage rights? How can that be?
Wioyo has been saying he should lose all his rights for adultery. You mean he wasn't correct?

Once again, you fail to actually read the post and the basis of a legal argument that the parents might be able to successfully argue in court. I never stated anything was automatic, except your complete disregard for the written word.

Perhaps I have a bad source but I just read somewhere that she is not brain dead and that she responds to her mother and father.

Wioyo,

Quote:

Once again, you fail to actually read the post and the basis of a legal argument that the parents might be able to successfully argue in court. I never stated anything was automatic, except your complete disregard for the written word.

It is YOU That fails to read. The argument has been DISMISSED by the court. There is no basis to argue it at all. It will be thrown out. The court will probably sanction you if you bring it up again. What is AUTOMATIC is that the argument will LOSE.

Perhaps I have a bad source but I just read somewhere that she is not brain dead and that she responds to her mother and father. Is this true? What can she do?

I read earlier that her brain is literally liquifying.

Maybe I am stupid but I am having trouble knowing what the truth is. Anyone have a good reliable source for her condition?

Patients who survive catastrophic brain damage may be left permanently unawarein the permanent vegetative state. Many doctors are likely to manage these patients at some point in their career. The diagnosis has been the subject of reports prepared by official bodies. It has been defined as "a clinical condition of unawareness of self and environment in which the patient breathes spontaneously, has a stable circulation, and shows cycles of eye closure and opening which may simulate sleep and waking." A wide range of causes has been reported, but head injury is probably the most common.

The diagnosis of permanent vegetative state is of particular importance; once it has been made, active medical treatment may be stopped. In the leading English case of Bland in 1993, the House of Lords held that artificial nutrition and hydration (for example, feeding by percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy tube) constituted medical treatment and that if a patient was permanently unaware of self and environment, it was lawful not to continue such medical treatment.7 Up to October 1998, court approval to stop active medical treatment had been given for 18 patients.

Criteria for diagnosing permanent vegetative state have been drawn up by various groups. Although these criteria are the result of collective thought and wisdom, they are not always helpful in clinical practice. In contrast to the diagnosis of brain death, where a few specific clinical criteria can determine the state,8 the diagnosis of permanent vegetative state depends on providing evidence of a negative: a lack of awareness. The criteria developed have included incidental but irrelevant clinical observations (for example, response to ice water caloric testing). Furthermore, they have failed to focus on the fundamental question of awareness, which has lead to difficulties in some of the cases that have come before the High Court. It has also become recognised that (un)awareness is part of a continuum.

http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/319/7213/841

One need not even consider Michael's motivation or Terri's condition, at all, to admit that simple truth. Yes, Florida Law lacks a provision to appropriately re-evaluate the "next of kin" status in this situation.

Michael could be the kindest, most considerate, compassionate Ex-husband there has ever been… but there can be no doubt that he moved on and when he did he ceased to be her next of kin in anything but flawed law.

Florida's flawed Law governing next of kin status has allowed this woman to be condemned without representation loyal to her or her true next of kin.

March 22, 2005
Tom Gone Crazy!
Via Digby, I see Tom DeLay is proving my argument from yesterday, namely, that the further Terry gets from the headlines, the more ludicrous become Tom's attempts to keep her under the cameras. Her exit, after all, means the reentrance of his scandals. So on the 18th, Tom argued that she was as "alive as your or I", that she was not "being kept alive", and promised that, on Palm Sunday weekend, she would not be forsaken. Pretty good, huh? Well on the 19th, he accused the Supreme Court, who didn't want to hear the case, of perpetrating a "moral and legal tragedy" and told them they owe it "to the dignity of human life" to explain their decision. Pretty nutty, huh? On the third day of Terry-saving, the 20th, DeLay stumbled in from the bar to explain that "Terry Schiavo is not brain-dead; she talks and she laughs, and she expresses happiness and discomfort" and that "it won't take a miracle to help Terry Schiavo".

So in three days, he went from concerned, to outraged, all the way to issuing press releases from a land entirely of his imagination. But Terry was still exiting the news! That bitch! So here's Tom on the 21st:

One thing that God has brought to us is Terri Schiavo, to help elevate the visibility of what is going on in America," Mr. DeLay told a conference organized by the Family Research Council, a conservative Christian group. A recording of the event was provided by the advocacy organization Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

"This is exactly the issue that is going on in America, of attacks against the conservative movement, against me and against many others," Mr. DeLay said.

Mr. DeLay complained that "the other side" had figured out how "to defeat the conservative movement," by waging personal attacks, linking with liberal organizations and persuading the national news media to report the story. He charged that "the whole syndicate" was "a huge nationwide concerted effort to destroy everything we believe in."

In three little paragraphs, Tom has called the woman with a liquified cerebral cortex a gift from God, compared her situation to his own, and used her to uncover a vast left-wing conspiracy determined to topple Tom DeLay and the values of America conservatism. Look behind you kids. Yeah, that's right, wave to the shark. Yeah, keep watching the shark. Those men taking Uncle Tom away are doing it for his own good, but he wouldn't want you to watch.