"Of course I'll marry you! ...Oh, by the way, I really hate the idea of being autopsied."

. . . but if you tell anyone I said that, you'll have to kill me.

A cremation nicely destroys all evidence.

pj: Just to be clear, evidence of what? Not cause of death, that's going to be quite clear...

Just John:

Head & trachea trauma.

"The body is mine! You lost your right to it when Terri and I said 'I do', so but out you meddling pieces of %&&*."

The poster boy for libertarianism and state-assisted killing sure is acting like a murderer trying to get rid of the evidence.

God, the more I hear about this mutt the less I like him. And I didn't like him much to begin with!

I heard on the radio this morning that Mr. Schiavo is asking for an autopsy.

So perhaps some of you here are being a bit premature.

Actually, I agree with Jeff, here. The issue isn't and should never have been whether or not he is pure of heart. I can readily believe that, after a seven year battle to kill her, he is completely convinced of his own righteousness.

What confuses me is how and why this has become a partisan issue. What do liberals hope to gain by insisting that this woman die and what is even more confusing is why Schiavo's second family has been given a bye?

Talk about a perfect situation for endless drama, appearances on GMA, Oprah and Larry King. A second family anxiously waiting for daddy to make it legal. Why aren't there reporters and photographers staked out at their door taking pictures of the hussy and her ill-conceived spawn??

I haven't heard a word about them, nor seen any pictures, not even in the supermarket tabloids? Obviously the MSM have gotten the word to back off. Why? When we know this kind of stuff sells.

Now Schiavo agreed to an autopsy. Why? Have they lined up a doctor willing to toe the party line? What's going on here? The left is panting to impeach President Bush and smear Governor Bush. Of course, they're crazy because even if they could impeach Bush, they'd get three more years of Cheney as president. Hardly a good choice from their point of view. So what's going on here?

Could there be an issue here we're not seeing? This whole thing is scaring me.

Just John - Bone scans of Terri described in the court records found damage to her neck vertebrae (consistent with a strangulation attempt), skull fractures (consistent with severe blows to the head), rib fractures (consistent with beatings to the chest), and damage to her femur (consistent with beatings to the legs).

Also, the evidence that there was no heart damage, so her brain damage couldn't have been caused by a heart attack.

Most likely, the stangulation occurred in 2/25/1990, while the blows to the head caused a cerebral hemorrhage and the bulk of her brain damage sometime between 2/27/1990 (when she had a normal CT scan of the brain) and 3/30/1990 (when she had severe brain damage and was hydrocephalus).

See CodeBlueBlog for medical analysis: http://codeblueblog.blogs.com/codeblueblog/

This is all so far beyond confusing that I don't blame most people for throwing up their hands and saying that the judge and medical authorities must have worked things out correctly, so why try to muddle through the media reports? I've lost track of all the total inconsistencies that are being reported.

Was Michael Schiavo training to be a nurse when they met, or did he begin nursing training to prepare himself for a lifetime (ha ha) of caring for her after her collapse?

Is Terri in a PVS, and therefore unable to feel pain, or has she been regularly given medication to deal with menstrual pain?

Has she been given a morphine drip, or only a few small doses (and if she can't feel pain, why even that?)?

Does she look "peaceful" and relaxed, or like a concentration camp horror show? (who can seriously doubt it's the latter?)

Is it not true that Michael has always insisted in the past that there be no autopsy? Why the change? Will it even be possible to deduce from the body of a dehydration victim whether she did or did not have a heart attack 15 years ago?

Is it true that George Felos was active in pushing for FL legislation that characterized feeding tubes as "extraordinary measures" whereas they previously were considered basic care? Isn't this at least as relevant as whatever was the situation with Tom Delay's father?

It is all too bizarre. If Terri looks peaceful and wonderful, why not show us a picture and prove her family liars? If she looks great, how would it harm her dignity? Why would her family make a claim that could be trivially proved wrong? What the heck is going on here?

b:

George Felos has said twice since Saturday that she is peaceful, relaxed, and beautiful. He did not mention whether his soul communed with hers, and provided a calming effect (as he apparently has claimed with another dying 'client' who was in distress until he entered the room).

As Rush put it, creepy. This guy is Kevorkian with a law degree.

b:

George Felos has said twice since Saturday that she is peaceful, relaxed, and beautiful. He did not mention whether his soul communed with hers, and provided a calming effect (as he apparently has claimed with another dying 'client' who was in distress until he entered the room).

As Rush put it, creepy. This guy is Kevorkian with a law degree.

Perhaps we should avoid demonizing that not only obscures the point, but may well be completely wrong.

The fundamental question is whether an individual should have the power, a priori (Peter will, I am sure, beat me up if I used that wrong), decide under what circumstances medical care will be discontinued.

So let's take as stipulated that Mr. Schiavo in fact discussed this subject with Terri, and in fact is carrying out her expressed desires.

Should she be allowed to make such a decision?

If not, why not?

And in a land supposedly characterized by religious freedom, why are Jehovah's Witnesses and Christian Scientists allowed to forego live saving medical procedures, but the rest of us are not?

Jeff:

"let's take as stipulated that Mr. Schiavo in fact discussed this subject with Terri, and in fact is carrying out her expressed desires."

You're taking a theorem and stating it as a postulate. Many of us don't buy the proof, so wherever you try to go based on a faulty, non-proven theorem isn't the issue.

If there existed written documentation of Terri's wishes, this would not be an issue. If there were no family dispute, this would not be an issue. Your religious freedom comment was silly, and you know it.

Jeff,

The problem with Michael's testimony about Terri's wishes is that he didn't 'remember' it until 7 years after her collapse. Do you find that troubling?

The question at hand is whether George Felos suggested it to him. If so, does that fall under "advice of counsel"?

Jeff:

"The fundamental question is whether an individual should have the power (to), a priori, decide under what circumstances medical care will be discontinued."

No Jeff, the fundamental question is whether one disabled woman in Florida should be starved to death at the behest of an husband-in-name-only on the basis of a couple of oral statements made informally in emotional cricumstances twenty years ago.

Robert can keep calling her brain dead, but it won't make it so however many times he repeats it. Felos and his medical buddies can keep saying she is serene and that starvation is painless, but only wilful fools believe him. You can keep recasting the question in abstract and distorted philosophical terms, but it won't make the real question go away.

Not "an individual", Jeff. Terri Schiavo. Not "have the power". She has been powerless for fifteen years. Should Terri Schiavo be starved on Michael Schiavo's say so? That's the question. Think about it. If you say yes, then for cryin' out loud, say yes.

B, Peter, Jim:

I was asking the question in larger terms than the Schiavo case alone, which is why I inserted "taken as stipulated." Not because I believe it to be true--I don't pretend to have enough information to judge one way or the other.

Which leaves us with what the law says. So far as I know, the relevant law is conclusive: he gets the say so, like it or not.

I strongly suspect she is well and truly brain dead above the brain stem. Which means Terri has been dead for fifteen years, and all this whole kerfuffle is over nothing more than a pulse rate.

There is an alternative, however. While it seems her frontal cortex--and everything that made Terri Terri--is well and truly destroyed, that apparently isn't the only form of brain damage that can lead to a permament vegetative state.

The other way to get there is through profound damage to the cerebellum. Which means Terri could possibly still be there.

But wholly, unutterably, cut off from outside world.

When people claim that murderers have more rights than Terri, they should keep in mind we would never torture even murderers in such a manner.

But that leaves my honest questions unanswered--I really was looking for your opinions here.

Jeff:

To be general: In my opinion anyone, regardless of their motive, should be able to refuse any medical treatment. However, the discussion of living wills makes me nervous, because of the well-documented fact that healthy people have no real concept of what it is like to be disabled, and in general think people who have become mentally or physically disabled are miserable, which is not the case. My elderly grandmother recently told me at a family gathering that her main hope is that she's always able to stay "productive". I don't even know what that means. I want her to be happy, but couldn't care less if she is "productive". I fear that we as a society are going too far to convince ourselves that even certain normal modes of life (such as extremely old to the point of little physical strength, but basically healthy) are not worth living. Of course I do not think we should keep someone's body at 98.6F forever if they have a massive catastrophic stroke but we hook them up to a machine before their heart fully stops.

Now, to the case at hand: Ignoring all the other information that we have, can you please explain to me how your diagnosis is at all consistent with her being given morphine? I really want your honest answer, because this makes absolutely no sense to me.

Jeff:

OK - let's take Michael's word for it (and the whole situation for the population in general).

It bothers me that people would rely so much (as b said) on what they might say when in perfect health, and extrapolate that to when they are in poor health.

Obviously, people like Terri Schiavo cannot contradict what might have been said years ago, but it is just too fuzzy (in my view) for courts to 'stipulate' facts from what seems to be whole cloth.

But, to your question, are people capable of making such decisions? Should it be 'allowed'?

For me, I would rather have some statement on the record, not so much for my sake (presuming I am almost dead), but for those who are standing around the bedside - my wife, my children, etc. If the circumstances arise suddenly, they are going to be confused, lost, and very vulnerable.

Would I want to 'live' like Terri Schiavo? Probably not. But her case is unique, in the sense that things may have been quite different had she received better care from the beginning.

A better question is - would we want to live like Hilary Swank, after being injured? Many would say no, and there is no shortage of vultures who would like to speed the wounded along. But there are probably tens of thousands of paraplegics and quadriplegics who live each day better than I do now. Again, what we would say when we are fit and walking around is one thing, but what we might say in the hospital, after coming to grips with paralysis, could be quite different.

Likewise, what about the profoundly retarded? Any of us could have a brain injury tomorrow that would put us in their place. We don't know what they feel or think. But we do know that WE change as we care for them, as we get to know them, as we learn to love them. I might recoil at living that way, but I cannot call it 'useless'. That is a bit too easy for me.

It is no coincidence that most of the same people who have no problem with abortion also believe Terri is not being murdered by cutting off her food and water.

The real truth is that people are afraid that if they consider abortion and Terri's case to be murder (which it is) then it will someday cost them to care for their aged father or an unplanned child when they would rather buy a new car.

This "killing the innocent" issue is what rejuvenated the Republican party. The Democrats cannot win; but they will murder as many innocents as possible until they lose.

B:

Thanks for the thoughtful response.

I am far less worried about living wills than you, because the circumstances need taking into account. The "living" will, just like the time-honored kind, exists to document intent after the author is no longer able to--it is an instruction on what to do with the body after the mind is irrevocably gone.

This has nothing to do, therefore, with being productive. Or, for that matter, with a healthy person's inability to conceive of being "disabled." Terri is not disabled, she is, so far as all the things required to make a body a person go, brain dead.

Why a morphine drip? I have no earthly idea. But I am convinced the caregivers are not murderous monsters, and while convinced the diagnosis is correct, have no desire to cause unnecessary pain to whatever is left, even though it be nothing more than a brain stem.

Jim:

Thank you also--there is just no place like BroJudd Industries for getting intelligent, articulate, replies to difficult questions.

Like you I would rather, and, in fact, do, have a statement on record.

What surprises me most about this whole thing is that the same segment of the population so concerned about the sanctity of marriage have no problems ignoring it when the decision doesn't go their way. Yes, it would have been far better, and would have left much more time to follow the Micheal Jackson circ... trial, had she documented her intent. But she didn't. And so far as I know, the law is clear on what to do in that event.

I agree with your assessment of how we should view disability, and how we would likely view it ourselves in the actual event.

But that is a far different from imposing that view upon someone who does not share it.

In LA, around 1985, there was a case that goes directly to this point. A woman had suffered a progressive, degenerative, autoimmune disease that not only left her a quadraplegic, but also in unremitting pain.

Having only first-hand knowledge of her circumstances to go on, she directed the doctors to provide her hydration only--she had simply had enough.

Several religious groups lined up to prevent that outcome. It took a serious court fight to allow her choice to predominate.

Do a search on Project Death In America, Soros and Felos's book excerpts and Florida Suncoast Hospices and follow the money trail. Just a thought

Do a search on Project Death In America, Soros and Felos's book excerpts and Florida Suncoast Hospices