A Husband With an Agenda

Crisis Magazine: ”

The immediate cause of Terri’s brain damage was cardiac arrest, which caused her brain to be deprived of oxygen for more than five minutes. In January 1993, Michael Schiavo won a malpractice award of $1.6 million from the hospital that treated Terri. He was also personally awarded $600,000 for loss of consortium. In his testimony, Michael spoke of his love for his wife and his intentions to honor his wedding vows for the rest of his life and to use the award money for Terri’s care and rehabilitation. Indeed, Michael repeatedly assured Bob and Mary Schindler that he would seek rehabilitation therapy for Terri once he had obtained a settlement.
A month after Michael received the money, the Schindlers approached their son-in-law to remind him of his promise. This led to a heated argument, with Bob and Michael yelling in the hall outside Terri’s room. Michael stormed off and vowed that he was going to see his lawyer and that Bob and Mary would “never see [their] daughter again.”

BlogsforTerri

Terri info: Terri speaks
According to Sherri’s sources “Terri Schiavo speaks!”
When the Federal Marshal appeared at the hospice to serve subpoenas, they were accompanied by local police. In serving Terri, she was asked twice, “Do you want to live?” Twice, she responded, “Yes”.

And again…

Attorney Barbara Weller was with Terri earlier today. She told the media that, during her visit with Terri, she explained to her what was happening. According to Weller, Terri began to cry and could not be quieted.

That “Website of the Weird”, BoingBoing, today gives us a classic example of why X-ray alone doesn’t work:

couple of months after 9-11, he got a package through that had a battery pack in the center, with sensors connected by coiled wires going out to all sides of the box. He called the Burbank police, and they called the bomb squad.
They evacuated the building and sent a guy in wearing one of those big bomb shield suits. He had a tiny video camera with him, and he poked a hole in the box away from the sensors and peeked inside with the camera. He came out of the building laughing, holding the box under his arm. He handed it to my friend who discovered it, and told him to open it.

Go see the link for the punch line.

Fat Steve points up that the press is still playing ‘see no evil, report no evil’….

Wonder how long it will be before the MSM really picks up on this? There are currently (10:41 PM) 628 stories on Wolfowitz as the new World Bank President, 944 on the Senate voting to allow drilling in the ANWR, and 807 on whether Italy will pull troops out of Iraq, and only 44 on the Airbus accident.

Outside The Beltway and Ace of Spades HQ both make mention today on the case of Terri Schiavo, a case i”ve not mentioned here until today.

There are many reasons I’ve not expressed anything on this case, most of them very personal reasons; This is not easy for me to think about, much less write publicly about. It cuts too close to an issue I’ve been wrestling with for years, now.  Without saying much about that aspect, let me just say that I know from rather anguished personal experince that the death Terri Schiavo is expected to face is not an easy one, by any stretch. 

But understand me; If that were the only issue, here, I’d lean toward the like of Neil Boortz today. But I can’t. And the reason I can’t is simple; and expressed well by Ace:

Terri Schiavo is not on videotape, as Dr. Kervorkian’s clients were, stating clearly her desire and intent to take her own life. She signed no Living Will specifiying that in certain dire medical circumstances she would prefer to be left to die rather than kept alive.

She expressed to no one, even verbally, her general preference to die in dire medical circumstances.

Well– that last point is actually the whole subject of debate in this case.
Her husband, Michael Schiavo, claims that she did in fact raise the issue at one point and state that in some situations, she’d like him to see to it she had an easy and quick death, rather than being allowed to persist in a bad state.
One person claims she says this.

… and one person only. All we have to go on is the husband’s word. Word I’d be a lot more accepting of, were that problem not coupled with the with the idea that there seems some question about her care and her husband’s motives, here, as Ace rightly points out. Ace has an inset quote here that I won’t paste, I’ll simply ask you to go read it.

Look, the right to die issue will not be solved by this case, regardless how it falls out. This is a case of someone trying to manipulate the ‘right to die’ into what I can only describe as a legal murder, and as such will help neither side of that valid issue.

The larger issue, here is that of process and protection which Terri Schiavo has clearly not been provided, by those who claim to be representing her better interests.

However this falls out, the woman is in my prayers, as I hope she is yours. She can use all the help she can get.

Update: Michelle has more, including a Terri Schiavo news aggregator.

Billy reminds us that there are benefits to the death penalty.

Sheesh.

Boortz today makes mention of the ANWR vote yesterday.

“Make no mistake .. there is a huge, almost insurmountable level of ignorance about ANWR.  You’ll hear people talk of gently rolling grasslands, pristine rushing streams and waterfalls, snow-capped mountains.  True … some parts of ANWR fit this description … but not section 1002 .. the section originally set aside for oil exploration.  In the Winter .. the only time that vehicular traffic will be permitted across the precious frozen tundra … section 1002 looks like an iced-over dirt field.

I’ll concede that there are people who are opposed to oil exploration in section 1002 for purely environmental reasons.  These people are deluded and ill-informed.  The rest of the opponents are lying to you about their motives.  Their goal is to make sure that America does not alleviate its dependence on foreign oil sources, to weaken America’s economy, and to keep high gas prices as a campaign issue.”

The fastest way to get opec to lowering price is to convince them we can and will source our oil domestically. Watch for pump price to start dropping before drop one of oil coes out of ANWR.

Power Line’s Deacon on Blogging and Gender Bias, ala Susan Estrich:

“But our seriousness cuts both ways. Most bloggers are too passionate, and in many cases too busy, to link to a piece that isn’t quite up to par merely in order to practice affirmative action. “

Or maybe just too honest?

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. (AP) – Scott Peterson was sentenced to death Wednesday for murdering his pregnant wife, Laci, more than two years ago.

Good.
Such an indvidual is exatcly the kind of person the death penalty was created for.
Of course, we’ll still have to feed and house this slime for 20 years….

Gennie at Dizzy Girl is a brave soul. She’s been watching Moonbat Central, otherwise known as Democratic Underground.
Bloody amazing she’s still with us, actually.

I have not been able to pull WPHT in very well the last few mornings… normal problem in Rochester for this time of year. I’m glad others are listening, including readers of Michelle Malkin… who passes on a reader comment today;

Reader Richard Davis just heard on the radio (Michael Smerconish, WPHT Philadelphia) an interview with Widener University President Dr. James Harris.

According to Davis, Harris said Widener will begin giving four-year full scholarships to children whose military parent was killed in either Iraq or Afganistan.

Good on them.

Little Green Footballs passes along a link today, reporting that the V-Street Anthrax thing was an error.

Who the beep is “”Mario Vasquez” , and why do I care? Are we so lacking in important topics of the day that we need to focus on this kinda of nonsense?

I said a few months ago;

It is something of an indication of where we are, in the state of the world, when we can pass our time, and our anger in comparative minutiae. As someone else recently noted to me; when the exact location of Madonna’s tongue is front page news, you can pretty much figure we’re still here; that the threats we face are not larger, at least than they were the day before.

Of itself this suggests that the White House is doing a far better job than they’re being given credit for by the leftists who desperately want back into the place.

I’m not sure if I’m happy about the non-change in the state of play, or not.

Alarming News notes the case of one Rachel Corrie.. she of the ‘Standing in front of a moving tank is cool’ crowd.

Apparently, Rachel Corrie came by her stupidity honestly.
Her parents are now suing Israel, the IDF, and Catepillar.

Lawsuit reform, anyone?

The Cocktail Hour (mcPhillips) links to a George Neumayr column today, which speaks to the people’s perception of the law, once the Judiciary gets done with it.