Legacy Matters

Due Process, Not Justice

I must say, I am confused about what's really true in the Terri Schiavo case.  And I am heartsick on the death watch of a woman whose wishes we do not know as she suffers and dies.

I've spent much time in the past few days reading court documents, conflicting medical opinions, charges and counter-charges and I will write more later.  I've not wanted to add much until I was clearer in my own thinking and in my own conclusions.   

In the end, it may be that Terri Schiavo got due process, she didn't get justice.

Note that I've already begun speaking of Terri in the past tense for she will surely die of dehydration.

She didn't receive a proper medical diagnosis.
Her guardian did not insure her proper care in the last few years.
We do not know what she would have wanted.
She was not terminal or dying prior to the removal of the feeding tube.

To quote Rabbi Marc Geller, "She is not at death's door. All this sound and fury is about cruelly bringing the door to her." 

It all seems to stem from a stipulation that the Schindlers made early on the case that Terri was in a persistent vegetative state.  Once that was stipulated and considered fact, no judge at the appellate level could reverse that. 

Once determined that she was in a persistent vegetative state, Michael Schiavo's memory that Terri "would not want to live like that" or "be a burden" became the clear and convincing evidence as to her wishes.  That too became a finding of fact that could not be reversed absent a legal mistake.

We all need food and water, and its supply through a feeding tube is easily done, unlike a respirator which breathes for a person.  Were a certain law not passed in Florida that said "artificially provided sustenance and hydration" is a life prolonging procedure, Terri would be receiving food today. 

So how was that law ever passed?
George Felos takes the case of Michael Schiavo in 1998.
George Felos files suit to withdraw food and water from Terr.i
George Felos files petition to introduce HB 2131 in 1999.
The law gets changed.
The Schiavo case gets heard. 
George Felos argues that Terri should die because she was being kept "artificially" alive.

The more I read about the incestuous goings on in the Pinellas Court System, at the Suncoast Hospice  and the terrible state of guardianship throughout the state of Florida, the more I think some enterprising reporter is going to have one hell of a best-seller in a couple of years.

Mickey Kaus asks P.S. Where do you sign a living will saying you want them to leave the tube in?

I don't do rants, I love reading them.  Here are two, make it three, incredible ones.
Ben Stein on Simply Terrifying
Rachel Lucas at Blue Eyed Infidel with Die already Vegetable and Batshit Insane

UPDATE: Moxie asks the question that struck me anew.  After the feeding tube was removed, why weren't her parents allowed to slake her thirst with water, or even food?