Terry Schiavo’s Darkness Brought To The Light

Site of Reference: http://apnews.myway.com/article/20050320/D88UENJG0.html

Your wife or child is terminally ill and you have to decide whether or not to pull the plug and end their life that choice is up to you. Should a politician tell you if you could or not?
To make the life of a terminally ill woman the spearhead of political maneuvering is obscene, and that obscenity spreads to both sides of the aisle. This is an ugly, damning fight being fought over a grave that has not been dug yet.

The Associated Press reports, “As a deal in Congress was worked out to have federal courts decide Terri Schiavo's fate, emotions swelled outside the brain-damaged woman's hospice room Saturday, with protesters arrested after they symbolically tried to smuggle in bread and water on her second day without a feeding tube.”

Terri Schiavo’s husband wants her feeding tube to stay out and her parents want it back in. What do you think who has the right to say, the parents or the husband? The husband is after all the closet relative by law. The binding of marriage that the Republican Party has fought so hard to sanctify is the ruling that should be followed. It is open to opinion whether the family would want it removed but the law, the present law on the books would put the decision in the husband’s hands.

The AP reports, “Congressional leaders announced a compromise between Senate and House Republicans that would allow the brain-damaged woman's case to be reviewed by federal courts that could restore her feeding tube. Opposition waned after House leaders agreed to give up broader legislation and accept a narrowly crafted bill that applied only to Schiavo's case.” Is that a misprint? A deal was reached between the Senate and House Republicans? The last time I looked at the list of those that were serving in the House and the Senate there were Democrats and Republicans.

The husband of Terry Schiavo’s, The AP reports him saying, "I feel like the government has just trampled all over my personal life," he said on CNN's "Larry King Live" Friday. "It is uncomprehensible that a government can walk all over somebody's private judicial matter, because of their own personal feelings." All of this results in the fact that there is no living will in the Terry Schiavo’s case. But to make matters worse than the lack of a legal document is the protesting and posturing of the right-wing. The AP reports a disgusting facet of this event, “About three dozen supporters of Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, maintained a vigil outside the hospice where she lives. Four people, including right wing leader James Gordon "Bo" Gritz, were arrested on misdemeanor trespassing charges when they attempted to bring Schiavo bread and water, which she would be unable to consume.”
This is a touchy subject for anyone who has ever had to remove the feeding tube from a loved one, and I am sure at that moment no one wanted a politician to tell them whether or not to do it.

- Chris Mansel