A case of DNR vs. GVT

[A.B.Normal]

Michael Schiavo has a conflict of interest.

Court-appointed doctors say she is in a persistent vegetative state with no hope of recovery. Her husband says she would not want to be kept alive in that condition, but her parents insist she could recover with treatment.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,150988,00.html

 

[Gonz]

So many questions, so little time.

make huge cuts in Medicaid

What in the sam hell are you talking about? They should be cutting medicaid...they aren't. The pols have to give away money or they might have to explain themselves.

How come congress doesnt hold late night emergency sessions to save every slowly dieing person that slips through the sieve that is our health care system?

Because this is an unusual case.

Isnt this representative body supposed to approach their duty from the blunt deliberative broad end of things and not micro manage specific and individual cases?

Not necessarily

Isnt that a job for the COURTS?

Not necessarily. They've taken this type of job but it isn't specifically spelled out in the Constitution. In fact, see Article III, Section 2.

when medical professionals MANDATED by the courts to carefully observe and asses the situation

Just like the rest, they look at evidence & asses a situation by the probable outcome. I doubt that they've spent any more time with Mrs Schiavo than Tom DeLay has.

Terrys law

I still want to know why so many are in such a hurry to kill this woman. The death culture is an ugly thing.

 

[The Other One]

Helloooo Atlanta? There's a thirsty woman in Florida who would like a drink, please.

What if Terri wants to live?
By David Limbaugh
©03-22- 2005 WorldNetDaily.com
http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=43425

Just what is it that so earnestly motivates those who zealously want Terri Schiavo's feeding tube to be removed? While there are plenty of exceptions, I dare say that most people in this camp are not driven by constitutional concerns, despite their hollow protests to the contrary.

As my brother Rush cogently noted, it is easy to understand what drives those who want to save Terri's life: the human urge to protect and save the life of another human being. The motivation of those fighting with equal fervor to remove the tube is not so self-evident.

It's going to the 11th District Court of Appeals Atlanta.

The more I read about this case, the more it weighs on me – the more a creeping feeling of horror sweeps over me. If, in fact, Terri Schiavo wants to live and is going to be denied that right, the prospect of a court-ordered removal of her feeding tube is no less horrifying than that of a person being buried alive.

If Terri truly wants to live – as a lawyer visiting with her when her feeding tube was removed avers – how could any caring person wish death upon her? The question is not whether we think we would want to live in Terri's state, but whether in fact she wants to. Are those advocating Terri's death allowing themselves to consider that this woman truly wants to live – just like they do?

I doubt I'll ever be able to understand, much less relate to, the sympathies of certain people. Generally speaking, they seem to feel more compassion for wildlife than animals, more for animals than human beings, more for guilty human beings than innocent ones, more for Communist dictators and tyrannical thugs than freedom fighters, and more for the vindication of an abstract principle devaluing human life than for an actual human being like Terri Schiavo, who, though severely disabled, may truly want to live.

How can we possibly view in a favorable light the position of those who protest to save the lives of convicted killers on death row and who bend over backward to believe their most incredible stories of innocence, but won't lift a finger in support of Terri Schiavo and won't even momentarily consider that Terri wants to live? Where are the "Free Mumia" chanters when Terri needs them?

I realize some believe that many advocating for Terri's life are using her for their own political purposes and that even Terri's parents, the Schindlers, are putting their own selfish wishes to keep Terri alive above those of Terri herself.

But do we actually believe that loving parents – parents who would eagerly trade places with Terri in an instant – would place their own comfort above their daughter's? If not, how can we possibly believe they would fight to prolong her suffering? In examining this case from a distance, isn't it much easier to believe Terri's parents' assessment of her desire to continue living than that of her adulterous husband, whose conflict of interest should disqualify him from guardianship in this case and participation in this decision?

And isn't the essential argument of those wanting the tube removed that Terri's wishes ought to be honored? Since Terri left no legal document directing her death in these circumstances, shouldn't the system require clear and convincing evidence that Terri indeed would want to die in these circumstances? Yet the court is relying on the hearsay evidence of Terri's estranged husband, Michael.

The question is whether as a society we want to resolve these very difficult, doubtful cases in favor of death.

I detect more than a bit of intellectual dishonesty among many favoring Terri's death. They are claiming they merely want to honor Terri's wishes, yet they rely on her tainted husband, callously discount the testimony of her loving parents, blindly accept the disinformation that Terri is in a purely vegetative state, and ignore multiple firsthand accounts, including from examining physicians and nurses, that Terri is responsive, sometimes animated, and definitely wants to go on living.

Could it be that something besides Terri's wishes motivates many of the death-soldiers, such as an allegiance to the culture of death, or some abject, inhumane resentment that we spend so much money keeping severely disabled people alive? I've received appalling e-mails from people complaining about the financial burden to society of keeping Terri alive.

I'm not pointing fingers at anyone specifically, because I know that many who want the tube removed are motivated by their perceived compassion for Terri and even honoring Terri's wishes. But I fear that many arguing for tube removal are doing so with complete disregard for Terri's actual wishes in this case. To the extent that is going on, we are witnessing up-close the face of evil.

We must fight on. … More prayers for Terri.

 

[Thulsa Doom]

What in the sam hell are you talking about? They should be cutting medicaid...they aren't. The pols have to give away money or they might have to explain themselves.

so Gonz you didnt pick up on the clear irony of the same people who are scrammbling around frantically to save this brain dead woman are also the very same ones proposing to cut back on the program which is helping to keep her alive? Let me know when that sinks in.

Because this is an unusual case.

yes theres never been any other "unusual cases" in the history of medicine eh?

Not necessarily


Not necessarily.

Good counters there.

Just like the rest, they look at evidence & asses a situation by the probable outcome. I doubt that they've spent any more time with Mrs Schiavo than Tom DeLay has.

Tom DeLay? You meant Bill Frist? Who had the hubris to say after looking at a short video of the woman supplied by her parents that she seemed in pretty good shape and aware of things going on around her? And he calls himself a doctor?? You dont do that. UNLESS you have something to gain politically... 2008 anyone?

Furthermore, her main doctor and a second consultant doctor have testified as to her being in a persistant vegetative state. IN FACT they have even more specifically said that much of her cerebral cortex is simply gone. Now how do you recover from that? I dont think you can. Can you? When the part of your brain that allows you to do higher order thinking has atropheed away? Do you wait for a miracle from god allowing it to suddenly grow back?

My suggestion to you is to stick to the case at hand and try not to defend the revolting actions of the congress to take advantage of this situation for their own political gains. Lest we forget what they have said in their OWN memos that this is a 'great political issue for us'. REAL moral guys...

 

[Gonz]

Lest we forget what they have said in their OWN memos that this is a 'great political issue for us'.

Link?

I've stuck to the facts of the case as I've seen them. For two years I've commented on this case. This has nothing to do with Congress. I believe that Michael has so poorly handled everything that he looks guilty & clearly has a conflict of interest.

What irony? The one where Michael Schiavo wins a million dollars in a lawsuit to help his wife get better & then spends a decade trying to kill her? There is no need for medicaid, in this case.

 

[Thulsa Doom]

Link?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A55427-2005Mar21.html

I've stuck to the facts of the case as I've seen them. For two years I've commented on this case. This has nothing to do with Congress. I believe that Michael has so poorly handled everything that he looks guilty & clearly has a conflict of interest.

I think he often comes off as a scum bag too which as I have already said makes me wonder. But what Im protesting is the way republicans in congress have used this issue to their benefit. I mean how low can you get. To use the tribulations of a brain dead woman to score political points. I dont see why you arent disgusted by that too.

What irony? The one where Michael Schiavo wins a million dollars in a lawsuit to help his wife get better & then spends a decade trying to kill her? There is no need for medicaid, in this case.

Actually... from what I understand... the trust fund established by the malpractice suit has been whittled down to next to nothing now. And that "Schiavo's costs during the past few years have been borne by a confusing and twisted agglomeration of Social Security disability benefits, Medicaid and a corporate hospice fund for indigent patients." source So it seems less and less about gaining some windfall as it used to be and yes indeed medicaid IS playing a role in keeping her alive.

 

[Gonz]

From your source

Someone -- no one knows who -- committed candor and truth in Washington (a federal offense?) by circulating a memo to Republicans alerting them to the obvious: Schiavo was "a great political issue."

Could it be...John McCain? John Kerry? Billary Clinton?

I've not listened to one word out of a pols mouth about this (when I can help it) so I don't know & don't much care what they're saying as long as they're acting in the best interest of this woman. Yes, I'm sure they're getting mileage from it. Imagine the mileage the Dems get for not returning to DC in time to vote Sunday morning. They now have to explain nothing.

Give the woman two years of therapy. If, after that, she has not shown significant improvement, shoot her like a horse.

 

[The Other One]

I wonder if there is a cop in Fla. that will arrest gov. Bush if he decides to go into the hospice and remove Terri?

Schiavo Judge Tells DCF, FDLE, Gov. Bush No Protective Custody
By The Empire Journal

“The law of this case is that she will die….I don’t want anyone trying to feed that girl”, Florida probate court judge George Greer thundered from the bench in 2001.

The Pinellas County death judge who acted in contempt of Congress by defying a federal subpoena designed to save the life of the Terri Schindler-Schiavo issued an order Wednesday afternoon saying that anyone giving the disabled woman treatment that will save her life is breaking the law and will be held in contempt of court---including Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Florida’s Department of Children and Families, Florida’s Department of Law Enforcement and apparently, even President Bush.

County probate court judge George W. Greer issued his order after Gov. Bush and the state’s Department of Children and Families (DCF) filed a petition to take the 41-year-old mentally handicapped woman into protective custody as they are statutorily empowered to do.

DCF is empowered by Chapter 415 of Florida Statutes to enact emergency protective services intervention if the department has reasonable cause to believe that a vulnerable adult is suffering from abuse or neglect that presents a risk of death or serious physical injury to the vulnerable adult and if that adult lacks the capacity to consent to emergency protective services.

If the vulnerable adult’s caregiver or guardian is present, the protective investigator must seek the guardian’s consent before the person may be removed from the premises unless the protective investigator suspects that the vulnerable adult’s caregiver or guardian has caused the abuse, neglect or exploitation.

DCF had filed a motion last month to intervene in the case saying they were investigating 30 allegations of abuse, neglect and exploitation of Terri Schiavo and that Michael Schiavo was the suspect. They asked for a 60-day stay of the death order but Greer not only denied the stay, but refused them their statutory right to intervene in the case.

Greer said he would rule on the issue of unsealing the records by noon Thursday but refused to allow DCF to take the dying woman into custody while he considered the motion. However, according to law, DCF does not need court permission to enact protective custody.

DCF has also indicated that it had received new evidence from a neurologist at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville that says that Terri may have been misdiagnosed, saying that she is in a minimally conscious state and not a persistent vegetative state as Schiavo, Felos and Greer have maintained.

Meanwhile, at the hospice Wednesday, Pinellas Park Police took 10 protestors into custody including a father and his three children, and a 69-year-old survivor of a Yugoslavian concentration camp for trying to take water to the disabled woman dying of thirst by order of Judge Greer.

http://www.theempirejournal.com/35052_schiavo_judge_tells_dcf.htm

http://www.theempirejournal.com/92450_constitutional_showdown_to.htm

Maybe in a manner reminiscent of ANOTHER action that trumped the Fla. court's desision....

Janet Reno Rescues Terri Schiavo in Daring Raid
by Scott Ott scrappleface.com

(2005-03-11) -- Shortly after midnight last night, former Attorney General Janet Reno and a squad of retired agents from the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) stormed a Florida nursing home and rescued Terri Schiavo from her impending death by starvation which had been slated to begin March 18.

Ms. Reno, in helmet, KEVLAR® and jackboots, led the daring raid in a fashion reminiscent of the ATF rescue of Elian Gonzalez in April 2000.

"The power of government must be used for the good of humanity," said Ms. Reno. "But the decline of respect for life, especially among the judiciary, has forced us to take this decisive action to save Terri's life. As always, we Democrats have compassion for the helpless."

Mrs. Schiavo is being held in an undisclosed location pending an attempt by businessman Robert Herring to ransom the brain-damaged woman from her doting husband, Michael, for $1 million.

Ms. Reno denied accusations that she is merely trying to upstage Florida Gov. Jeb Bush in preparation for her own gubernatorial run.

 

[The Other One]

Judicial Tyranny on Display in Florida!


A probate judge has ignored in the span of less than a week:

1) A Congressional subpoena.

2) A state agency's statutory authority to investigate whether a crime occured.

3) A law passed by the Congress on a bipartisan basis and thus far not even challenged let alone deemed unconstitutional.


Is it correct for a contributor to a judge's election campaign to argue a case in front of the judge he helped get elected?

Michael Shiavo is represented by attorneys Hamden Baskin III, Felos & Felos Deborah Bushnell, Gyneth S. Stanley, Steven Nilsson, and Beth Wilson all of whom have contributed to Judge George Greer's '04 election campaign. The result? Greer denies many or all of Schindler’s motions in favor of Felos and
Greer allows hearsay as evidence and disallows Schindler’s statements. Quid pro quo.

 

[Gonz]

As Robert Bork said last night on Sean Hannity's radio show...a bunch of judges may have looked at this case but only one has looked at the evidence...once & that has changed over the last 10 years.