More on Terri Schiavo

[carlos123]

I sent an email through BlogsforTerri this afternoon (http://www.blogsforterri.com/) suggesting a course of action that, although I am hesitant to suggest it, has come to be needed.

Namely a call to be put out through church groups and other avenues for thousands of Christians and brave souls to converge on the hospice in Florida, to each be given a cup of water, and to walk up to the hospice peaceably to try and give Terri some water.

Teenages and senior citizen's could do this easily and be given nothing more than a slap in the wrist.

If juveniles can no longer be executed for committing murder, if they cannot be charged as adults, if teenage hoodlums can get away with vandalism and otherwise and be protected by our legal system why can't thousands of brave teenagers converge on the hospice to try and give Terry a cup of cold water?

If just one cup gets through it may prolong Terri's life long enough for other avenues to effect the saving of Terri's life.

I am in Canada but would be the first in such a line if I was near the hospice and could make it there in time.

The police force would be overwhelmed if thousands converged on the hospice on short notice. They could lock the doors to be sure but even if they did that can you imagine the impact on the collective and deceived mind of the American electorate on seeing thousands of teenagers or senior citizens holding cups of water (similar to candlelight vigiils) and trying to get in peaceably with every opening of the doors?

The people of America are in a state of deceived sleep walking but can be awakened if the truth can be brought before their minds.

Where are the minutemen who rose up as one man in defense of liberty, freedom, and life when the British killed their fellows at Concord, Kentucky during revolutionary war days? Where are the Christians willing to risk liife and limb who in times past saved Jews from the Nazi's or helped slaves escape to freedom in defiance of court orders to the contrary?

Have we, as a Church lost our stomachs and become so stone deaf that we would hide behind the color of law under the misguided notion that God would not want us to obey a higher law, His, to rescue Terri?

Terri's parents have asked people not to act in civil disobedience and understandably up to now but, given that most all avenues have been exhausted, is it not now time to ACT?

The Florida Constitution says....

Florida Constitution, Article I Section 2: All natural persons, female and male alike, are equal before the law and have inalienable rights, among which are the right to enjoy and defend life and liberty

[WayneB]

I received the following commentary that I felt everyone would like to read:

Between Life and Death

Lives in the Balance

by Chuck Colson, BreakPoint Ministries

March 25, 2005

On Good Friday Jesus died as a substitutionary atonement for the sins of mankind. This is what Christians commemorate. In dying, Jesus established, as a defining mark of a Christian society, the principle of human dignity and the sacredness of life. Fallen sinners?all made in the image of God?are so precious in God's sight that He would sacrifice His only begotten Son for them.

What an irony this presents this year. Jesus died so that we could be free and saved. It was a noble death, if there ever was one. But another death occupies the headlines today, one that mocks the death of Jesus. It is Terri Schiavo who is being killed by judicial fiat. For what reason?

She is being killed so that society can get rid of a nuisance. She is being killed so her husband can be free to marry the woman he has lived with for years and who has borne his children. Her husband, allegedly, profited from the damages paid because of the medical injury to Terri. She is being killed so that medical funds can be saved.

Good Friday marks a day on which God established the principle of the sanctity of life once and for all. One man died so that all men could be free. The Terri Schiavo case marks the triumph of utilitarianism over that Christian view of life. It is victory for the likes of Peter Singer, the ethicist at Princeton, who favors infanticide and euthanasia and who argues that the governing ethical principle in life has to create the greatest happiness for the greatest number.

But no life is safe in a utilitarian society. I am seventy-three. One of these days a committee of doctors could say that I am too inconvenient or cost too much to keep alive. "It is time," as former Governor Lamb once provocatively said in Colorado, "to do my duty and die and get out of the way of the younger generation, like leaves swept up off the streets."

The retired folks in Florida and elsewhere, many of whom are privately thinking they really would like to keep this principle of assisted suicide intact because they may want to avoid suffering, are turning the decision of whether they live or die over to others. Do they really want to do that?

We used to say in law school, "Bad cases make bad law." This is a very bad case. Medical data concerning Terri is old and ambiguous. There is conflicting testimony about whether she really is in a persistent vegetative state. She certainly does not look and act like she is in one. She was not being maintained on life support. She was simply being fed and receiving water as any other human being would expect. So if we can kill Terri, who is next?

Thundering out of the heavens this Good Friday come God?s words: "I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses, now choose life so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God."

I shudder to think what is going on in the heavenly councils at this moment, as on this day of all days, black-robed judges in courts are ordering that an innocent woman starve to death. Choose life? Can anyone hear those words today?

Copyright

[seraph]

My wife and I have already put out explicit terms in our living will that we do not want extended life support where the chance of recovery is non-existant, including a feeding tube.

(snip)

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I didn't think food was 'extended life support' but rather a basic necessity.

[seraph]

Barbara Weller and Suzanne Vitadamo swore under oath that Terri tried to say "I WANT TO LIVE."

(emphasis mine)

DECLARATION OF BARBARA J. WELLER

STATE OF FLORIDA )

COUNTY OF PINELLAS )

I, BARBARA WELLER, Attorney for Respondents in the above-styled case, hereby declare under penalty of perjury:

I visited with Terri at various times during the day on March 18, 2005, the day her feeding tube was removed.

During the morning I was in the room with Terri and various members of her family. Terri was in good spirits that morning. The mood in her room was jovial, particularly around noontime, as we knew Congressional attorneys were on the scene and many were working hard to save Terri's life. For most of that time, I was visiting and talking with Terri along with Terri's sister Suzanne Vitadamo, Suzanne's husband, and Terri's aunt, who was visiting from New York to help provide support for the family. A female Pinellas Park police office was stationed at the door outside Terri's room.

Terri was sitting up in her lounge chair, dressed and looking alert and well. Her feeding tube had been plugged in around 11 a.m. and we all felt good that she was still being fed. Suzanne and I were talking, joking, and laughing with Terri, telling her she was going to go to Washington D.C. to testify before Congress, which meant that finally Terri's husband Michael would be required to fix her wheelchair. After that Suzanne could take Terri to the mall shopping and could wheel her outdoors every day to feel the wind and sunshine on her face, something she has not been able to do for more than five years.

At one point, I noticed Terri's window blinds were pulled down. I went to the window to raise them so Terri could look at the beautiful garden outside her window and see the sun after several days of rain. As sunlight came into the room, Terri's eyes widened and she was obviously very pleased.

Suzanne and I continued to talk and joke with Terri for probably an hour or more. At one point Suzanne called Terri the bionic woman and I heard Terri laugh out loud heartily. She laughed so hard that for the first time I noticed the dimples in her cheeks.

The most dramatic event of this visit happened at one point when I was sitting on Terri's bed next to Suzanne. Terri was sitting in her lounge chair and her aunt was standing at the foot of the chair. I stood up and learned over Terri. I took her arms in both of my hands. I said to her, "Terri if you could only say

[eve]

Saturday, March 26, 2005 8:01 a.m. EST

Terri Bleeding From Eyes and Mouth

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/3/26/80255.shtml

Contrary to predictions that Terri Schiavo's starvation death would be painless and dignified, an eyewitness who visited her hospice room early Saturday morning reports that she is now bleeding from the eyes and mouth.

Fox News Channel's "Fox & Friends" reports:

"Barbara Weller, who's is one of the attorneys for the Schindlers, says that the last time she checked in, not very many hours ago, Terri's eyes and tongue were bleeding now.

"Her eyes are sunken and her skin continues to flake off," Weller added.

On Thursday Terri's parents reported that their daughter now resembles "an Auschwitz victim."

At the request of Michael Schiavo's attorney, Judge George Greer has banned cameras and video equipment from her room, precluding the possibility that a photographic record of her deteriorating condition might be kept.

The eyewitness accounts stand in stark contrast to predictions from medical experts cited in numerous media reports who insisted that Terri's starvation death would not be gruesome.

On Wednesday, for instance, the Los Angles Times reported:

"Doctors say that going without food and water in the last weeks of life is not traumatic, and that the body is equipped to adjust to such conditions."

The paper quoted Dr. Perry G. Fine, vice president of medical affairs at the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization in Arlington, Va.

"What my patients have told me over the last 25 years is that when they stop eating and drinking, there's nothing unpleasant about it -- in fact, it can be quite blissful and euphoric."

"It's a very smooth, graceful and elegant way to go," Dr. Fine added.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Michael Schiavo intends to cremate Terri and bury her in his plot of land.

The cheapskate - I would think he could at least buy a coffin rather than an urn.

Edited March 26, 2005 by eve

[eve]

Terri Schiavo Friend: She Often Had Bruises, Talked Divorce

By Steven Ertelt

LifeNews.com Editor

http://www.lifenews.com/bio849.html

March 26, 2005

Pinellas Park, FL (LifeNews.com) -- A friend of Terri Schiavo's says the disabled woman frequently had bruises on her arms and legs prior to her collapse in 1990. The comments lend further evidence to allegations that Terri's estranged husband Michael abused her and that those actions caused her current condition.

"I did notice bruises on her upper arms and upper legs," Jackie Rhodes told Fox News Channel's Greta Van Susteren.

The two worked together at an insurance company's office.

Rhodes said she wasn't phased at the time by Terri's frequent bruising and attributed it to "maybe running into the desk at work or, you know, maybe she was extra-sensitive."

"But now, hindsight tells me that I did see them quite frequently and that they may have been more than just a bump into the desk," Rhodes explained told Fox News.

"They were mostly bruises where normally they would be covered up, you know, during the work day," she said on Van Susteren's program. "They were smaller bruises, like maybe someone had grabbed her or, you know, like, squeezed her arm or leg really tight."

In her Friday interview, Rhodes revealed that Terri and her husband had a heated argument on the evening prior to February 25, 1990, when Michael supposedly woke up to find Terri unconscious in the hallway of the couple's St. Petersburg home.

Rhodes told Fox News that Terri called her in tears after the fight and she confirmed other accounts of Terri saying she and Michael had discussed a divorce.

Meanwhile, in an interview with the Orlando Sentinel newspaper, Rhodes said Terri had gone the day before to get her hair done and the fight developed because Michael disapproved of Terri spending so much money.

"It sounded like she had been crying," Rhodes said. "I asked her if she was OK. She said she had a fight with Michael. He was extremely upset with her because she had spent $80 on her hair."

Rhode testified in court during a previous hearing that Michael frequently made derogatory comments about Terri, such as Telling her that her legs were too skinny.

A bone scan conducted on Terri one year after she collapsed found possibly physical trauma indicating potential abuse. After Michael and Bob and Mary Schindler began their legal battle in 1998, local authorities said the scan was too old to investigate.

The Florida Department of Children and Families hoped to half Terri's starvation death for 60 days to look into various accusations of abuse and neglect, but Judge George Greer denied the requests.

Meanwhile, Terri's brother Bobby Schindler told Fox News Channel's "Hannity & Colmes" on Thursday that a doctor has testified that she might have been strangled before she was found unconscious.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

If Michael Schiavo says he loves his wife Terri, that Terri is his life as he claims, he could at least have some compassion, consideration or even pity for his parents-in-law and also share the previously awarded compensation money with them. He should ask himself WWJD. Or what would a true Christian do? - eve

Edited March 26, 2005 by eve

[eve]

More:-

Terri's money used to pay for starvation death

- http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=43510

Judge Greer is blind....

- http://www.michnews.com/artman/publish/article_7424.shtml

Terri Schiavo's condition.....

- http://www.michnews.com/artman/publish/article_7445.shtml

Edited March 26, 2005 by eve

[sachi]

"What my patients have told me over the last 25 years is that when they stop eating and drinking, there's nothing unpleasant about it -- in fact, it can be quite blissful and euphoric."

Excuse me....?

His patients apparently did eventually EAT so as to be able to survive and relate these alleged experiences ...

Or did he receive communication from the dead?

"It's a very smooth, graceful and elegant way to go," Dr. Fine added.

Well, if its so "smooth", then why not apply it to all those on death row who have been convicted on heinous murders . . .?

Ahh - you see, that would open up a whole different can of worms and incite a variety of lobby groups.

[Guest charlie]

Pinellas Judge George Greer Attains New Fame, Infamy in Schiavo Case

By Vickie Chachere Associated Press Writer

Published: Mar 26, 2005

CLEARWATER, Fla. (AP) - Amid the pitched legal battle over Terri Schiavo that has been fought through his court, Pinellas County Circuit Judge George Greer has been under the protection of armed guards, and friends say his family also is protected.

Death threats have been made against him for allowing Michael Schiavo to remove the feeding tube that has kept his 41-year-old wife alive for the past 15 years, and the Southern Baptist church that Greer belonged to for years has asked him to leave the congregation.

Greer - a conservative Christian and longtime Republican known for an easy manner - has become the public face of the judiciary in this internationally watched fight.

But despite the mounting pressure, he has been steadfast in his rulings that Terri Schiavo is in a persistent vegetative state and did not want to be kept alive artificially.

"There are very few people who have shown the will to stand up to raw power," said Stetson University Law Professor Michael Allen, who has studied the Schiavo case. "He's one."

"This is simply a case of people not liking this decision, and the fact that a judge is standing up to this is quite important," Allen added.

On Saturday, Greer rejected arguments by Terri Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, that their daughter tried to say "I want to live" before her feeding tube was removed March 18. They argued that she said "AHHHHH" and "WAAAAAAA" when asked to repeat the phrase.

Greer said that "all of the credible medical evidence this court has received over the last five years" suggests Schiavo's behavior is not a product of cognitive awareness. Doctors have said Schiavo's past utterances were involuntary moans consistent with someone in a vegetative state.

When informed of Greer's rejection, Bob Schindler reacted with somber sarcasm: "He did? Great surprise."

It was Greer who first ruled that Terri Schiavo was in a persistent vegetative state and would not want to be kept alive artificially. Three times he has ordered the feeding tube be removed, as requested by Michael Schiavo, and his rulings have consistently been upheld in appeals filed by the Schindlers.

Greer, 63, also stood up to congressional efforts to intervene in the case, rejecting an attempt by the House of Representatives to subpoena Terry Schiavo as a means to force the reinsertion of her feeding tube. Since then, other judges have followed in refusing to act under a newly crafted federal law allowing them to consider the case.

Greer, a former county commissioner, became a judge in 1992. He was recently re-elected to a six-year term, but has announced that he will retire once that term is up.

While in legal circles he is garnering acclaim for his consistent application of Florida law in the case, there has been a price.

Protesters now show up at his Clearwater home. The FBI arrested a North Carolina man it said placed a $50,000 bounty on the head of a judge in the case, although officials didn't name the judge.

This past week, he parted ways with his Southern Baptist church, which had advocated keeping Terri Schiavo alive, after his pastor suggested it would be better if he left.

"You must know that in all likelihood it is this case which will define your career and this case that you will remember in the waning days of life," Calvary Baptist Pastor William Rice wrote to Greer in a letter than later became public. "I hope you can find a way to side with the angels and become an answer to the prayers of thousands."

Greer could not be reached for comment because of the frequent hearings on the Schiavo case, but longtime friend Mary Repper said she recently spoke with him and he judge sounds "worn out" by the case that has been on his docket for more than seven years.

"It's been going on so long and it's reached its fevered pitch," Repper said. "It's gotten so angry and so hostile, but he's still hanging in there."

Repper said Greer has taken comfort in being consistently upheld by higher courts, but his split with his church has been a blow.

"The people in that church should be ashamed of themselves, to demonize George and to ask him to leave for doing his job, for upholding the law," she said. "To me, that was the most offensive thing that has happened so far."

Greer has been asked to step down from the case five times and has refused.

Attorney Pat Anderson, who had represented the Schindlers for three years of the court fight, filed three motions for recusal but said she could not get Greer to budge.

"A lawyer told me when I first got involved in this case that he (Greer) does not have a reverse on his transmission," Anderson said. "He apparently is too prideful to say 'I made a mistake. I made a mistake because I didn't have all the information and I am sorry I made a mistake.'"

AP-ES-03-26-05 1550EST

[carlos123]

....On Saturday, Greer rejected arguments by Terri Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, that their daughter tried to say "I want to live" before her feeding tube was removed March 18. They argued that she said "AHHHHH" and "WAAAAAAA" when asked to repeat the phrase.

Greer said that "all of the credible medical evidence this court has received over the last five years" suggests Schiavo's behavior is not a product of cognitive awareness. Doctors have said Schiavo's past utterances were involuntary moans consistent with someone in a vegetative state.

Let's see now....that tells me that Greer considered it impossible that the medical diagnosis could have been wrong, that judgments based on suggestion are okay when it comes to deciding whether a person lives or dies, that person's previously diagnosed in PVS have NEVER come out of their states, that Terri could not have possibly have been attempting to say "I want to live!" and that there is absolutely no possibility that his judgments regarding the facts could have been wrong. Did I miss anything .

It seems to me that this man is incredibly arrogant and filled with a pride that absolutely blinds him to even the possibility that he could have been wrong. Some may look at such a statement as being un-Christian but the very Jesus who said love thy neighbor also called certain men of his day hypocrites and white-washed tombs full of dead men's bones! It's time for the Church to get back to acting in line with ALL that Jesus was and wants us to be and to have no bones about calling arrogance and pride what it is.

Arrogance and pride are no less evil than adultery and homosexuality and we as a Church should be just as willing to condemn such in the heart of a particular individual as we are to condenm outward acts of sin in those who practice them. Especially among those who claim to be Christians.

This reminds me of a case years ago where I a woman, being likewise starved and dehydrated to death, was judged to be incompetent and starved anyway though she cried out for someone to give her water and something to eat!!! Eventually the courts ruled in her favor but it was too late by then as she had died though nurses had been so horrified that they had tried to give her food and water in defiance of court order.

There are many web sites that talk of this case but the following summary is from the National Right to Life web site at (http://www.nrlc.org/euthanasia/Terri/consequences_of_casual_conve.htm)

MANY DEHYDRATION CASES have involved such casual statements. The most disturbing of these was that of Marjorie Nighbert, which, ironically, also occurred in Florida. Marjorie was a successful Ohio businesswoman who was visiting her family in Alabama when she was felled by a stroke that left her disabled but not terminally ill. After being stabilized, she was moved to a nursing home in Florida where, it was hoped, she could be rehabilitated to relearn how to chew and swallow without danger of aspiration. To ensure she was nourished, she was provided a feeding tube.

This presented an excruciating quandary for her brother Maynard, who had a general power of attorney from Marjorie (not power of attorney for health care), as a consequence of which he became her surrogate medical decision-maker. Marjorie had once told her brother that she didn't want a feeding tube if she were terminally ill. Despite the fact that she was not dying, however, Maynard believed that if she were unable to be weaned off the tube, she would have wanted to die rather than live using the tube for nourishment. When she did not improve, he ordered the tube removed.

As she was slowly dehydrating to death, Marjorie began to ask the staff for food and water. In response to her pleas, members of the nursing staff surreptitiously gave her small amounts. One distraught staffer eventually blew the whistle, leading to a state investigation and a temporary restraining order requiring that Marjorie be nourished

Circuit Court Judge Jere Tolton received the case and appointed attorney William F. Stone to represent Nighbert and to conduct a 24-hour inquiry, the sole issue being whether Marjorie was competent to rescind her power of attorney and make her own decisions. After the rushed investigation, Stone was forced to report to the judge that she was not competent at that time. She had, after all been intentionally malnourished for several weeks. Stone particularly noted that he had been unable to determine whether she was competent when the dehydration commenced.

Utterly DISGUSTING and completely against the grain of the value God puts on life!!!

Carlos