More on Terri Schiavo--UPDATE: Schiavo dead 31 Mar 05

[Elfdart]

Is it possible for SCOTUS to strike down this new law?

It better be, because this law could be applied to "review" other rulings against gay-marriage bans, evolution vs creationism, etc.

It depends. Congress has the power to make certain cases or issues off-limits to the courts (including SCOTUS). I don't know if they did that in this case, though.

[Durandal]

Well, the House voted to allow a Federal court to review the Florida court's decision...because the Federal court didn't decide to pass on it and the SCOTUS didn't decide to pass on it. I don't care about rogue judges, I'm more concerned about rogue legislators! We've got 208 of them in the House.

Wait ... what? Was this a House resolution or something?

[The Dark]

No, they merely remanded it to a Federal court. However, in so doing, they violated states' rights by overruling a state court without having just cause (the case is entirely within Florida, therefore it is not Federal jurisdiction without appeal). They also trampled on the SCOTUS by ordering a LOWER court to hear a case which the SCOTUS refused to hear because the appeal (presumably) had no basis. As such, if it goes before SCOTUS, it's possible they will strike the Congress' motion as unconstitutional and effectively prevent the Congress from doing this again (legally, anyway...).

[Durandal]

Is it possible for SCOTUS to strike down this new law?

It better be, because this law could be applied to "review" other rulings against gay-marriage bans, evolution vs creationism, etc.

It depends. Congress has the power to make certain cases or issues off-limits to the courts (including SCOTUS). I don't know if they did that in this case, though.

If this is what I think it is, Congress is magically granting itself another check on the judicial branch. There's no way in hell something with those kinds of Constitutional implications wouldn't go to SCOTUS.

[The Dark]

Well, the House voted to allow a Federal court to review the Florida court's decision...because the Federal court didn't decide to pass on it and the SCOTUS didn't decide to pass on it. I don't care about rogue judges, I'm more concerned about rogue legislators! We've got 208 of them in the House.

Wait ... what? Was this a House resolution or something?

The Senate had already passed it, but the House had been forced into a roll call vote, which couldn't occur until 12:01 this morning. It passed overwhelmingly, IIRC 208-43.

[Macross]

Is it possible for SCOTUS to strike down this new law?

I believe its only a matter of time before SCOTUS gets involved. They should have already gotten involved and put an end to this fiasco.

[Durandal]

Is it possible for SCOTUS to strike down this new law?

I believe its only a matter of time before SCOTUS gets involved. They should have already gotten involved and put an end to this fiasco.

They already have been involved. And they refused to hear the appeal. Once SCOTUS refuses to hear your appeal, that's the end of your lawsuit's run. Or at least, that was true for every other case brought before SCOTUS. I guess the obsessive families of brain-dead vegetables are exceptions to the Constitution.

[Macross]

Is it possible for SCOTUS to strike down this new law?

I believe its only a matter of time before SCOTUS gets involved. They should have already gotten involved and put an end to this fiasco.

They already have been involved. And they refused to hear the appeal. Once SCOTUS refuses to hear your appeal, that's the end of your lawsuit's run. Or at least, that was true for every other case brought before SCOTUS. I guess the obsessive families of brain-dead vegetables are exceptions to the Constitution.

That is true, but how many cases get congress, the senate and the president involved? This case has strayed away from 'typical" a LONG time ago. I believe that nothing short of SCOTUS can bring a quick end to this, now that the bill has been signed. They may have refused to rule on the case, but they could still make a ruling on the bill. Hopefully they will. Do any of us like the idea that the US Government can make any law that intereferes with the life, or death, of an individual citizen? Thats what this case has become about.

[DPDarkPrimus]

Sure, and if SCOTUS rules on it, people will be screaming about those "activist judges" abusing the seperation of powers.

[Atlan]

An interesting link for all of those who think that Micheal Schiavo did not provide Terry with therapy:
From: http://www.miami.edu/ethics2/schiavo/timeline.htm

February 25, 1990
Terri Schiavo suffers cardiac arrest, apparently caused by a potassium imbalance and leading to brain damage due to lack of oxygen. She was taken to the Humana Northside Hospital and was later given a percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy (PEG) to provide nutrition and hydration.

May 12, 1990
Terri Schiavo is discharged from the hospital and taken to the College Park skilled care and rehabilitation facility.

June 18, 1990
Court appoints Michael Schiavo as guardian; Terri Schiavo’s parents do not object.

June 30, 1990
Terri Schiavo is transferred to Bayfront Hospital for further rehabilitation efforts.

September 1990
Terri Schiavo’s family brings her home, but three weeks later they return her to the College Park facility because the family is “overwhelmed by Terri’s care needs.”

November 1990
Michael Schiavo takes Terri Schiavo to California for experimental “brain stimulator” treatment, an experimental “thalamic stimulator implant” in her brain.

January 1991
The Schiavos return to Florida; Terri Schiavo is moved to the Mediplex Rehabilitation Center in Brandon where she receives 24-hour care.

July 19, 1991
Terri Schiavo is transferred to Sable Palms skilled care facility where she receives continuing neurological testing, and regular and aggressive speech/occupational therapy through 1994.

May 1992
Terri Schiavo’s parents, Robert and Mary Schindler, and Michael Schiavo stop living together.

August 1992
Terri Schiavo is awarded $250,000 in an out-of-court medical malpractice settlement with one of her physicians.

November 1992
The jury in the medical malpractice trial against another of Terri’s physicians awards more than one million dollars. In the end, after attorneys’ fees and other expenses, Michael Schiavo received about $300,000 and about $750,000 was put in a trust fund specifically for Terri Schiavo’s medical care.

February 14, 1993
Michael Schiavo and the Schindlers have a falling-out over the course of therapy for Terri Schiavo; Michael Schiavo claims that the Schindlers demand that he share the malpractice money with them.

July 29, 1993
Schindlers attempt to remove Michael Schiavo as Terri Schiavo’s guardian; the court later dismisses the suit.

March 1, 1994
First guardian ad litem, John H. Pecarek, submits his report. He states that Michael Schiavo has acted appropriately and attentively toward Terri Schiavo.

Interesting reading, and it completely puts to death the accusations that there never was any therapy for Terry.

[Wicked Pilot]

And the public weighs in. There is hope.

ABC NEWS POLL: TERRI SCHIAVO – 3/20/05
EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE AFTER 7 a.m. Monday, March 21, 2005
Federal Intervention in Schiavo Case Prompts Broad Public Disapproval
Americans broadly and strongly disapprove of federal intervention in the Terri Schiavo case, with sizable majorities saying Congress is overstepping its bounds for political gain. The public, by 63-28 percent, supports the removal of Schiavo’s feeding tube, and by a 25-point margin opposes a law mandating federal review of her case. Congress passed such legislation and George W. Bush signed it early Monday. That legislative action is distinctly unpopular: Not only do 60 percent oppose it, more, 70 percent, call it inappropriate for Congress to get involved in this way. And by a lopsided 67-19 percent most think the elected officials trying to keep Schiavo alive are doing so more for political advantage than out of concern for her or for the principles involved.

And there's more charts and stuff if you click the link.

[Patrick Degan]

This case simply get more ghoulish the longer it drags on: a family who refuse to admit that their daughter effectively died years ago and are willing to keep a breathing corpse alive to service their own denial of reality. Religio-whores who are fighting tooth and nail to keep a breathing corpse alive. Republican lawmakers who are putting the weight of the Federal government against the husband, the courts, and medical common-sense to keep a breathing corpse alive and are willing to drag the breathing corpse before a Congressional hearing to "testify". And last but not least, a pretend-president who finally, finally, finds reason to break off from one of his interminable vacations when Osama binLaden, the Iraq War, and the tsunami couldn't provide that reason, to make a huge show for the Religio-whores by making the breathing corpse the centrepiece of his "Culture of Life" propaganda. It's sick. And if this doesn't demonstrate to even the thickest Republican that the party is now completely dominated by the Christian Taliban, nothing will.

Meanwhile, the poor breathing corpse will never —never— be reachable for comment no matter how much her delusional parents and the even more delusional Religio-whores dearly wish to believe otherwise.

[RedImperator]

And the public weighs in. There is hope.

ABC NEWS POLL: TERRI SCHIAVO – 3/20/05
EMBARGOED FOR RELEASE AFTER 7 a.m. Monday, March 21, 2005
Federal Intervention in Schiavo Case Prompts Broad Public Disapproval
Americans broadly and strongly disapprove of federal intervention in the Terri Schiavo case, with sizable majorities saying Congress is overstepping its bounds for political gain. The public, by 63-28 percent, supports the removal of Schiavo’s feeding tube, and by a 25-point margin opposes a law mandating federal review of her case. Congress passed such legislation and George W. Bush signed it early Monday. That legislative action is distinctly unpopular: Not only do 60 percent oppose it, more, 70 percent, call it inappropriate for Congress to get involved in this way. And by a lopsided 67-19 percent most think the elected officials trying to keep Schiavo alive are doing so more for political advantage than out of concern for her or for the principles involved.

And there's more charts and stuff if you click the link.

That data is very interesting--even a majority of evangelicals don't support reinserting the tube, and a considerable majority of both evengelicals and conservatives see Federal intervention as innappropriate and politically self-serving.

[Durandal]

Here's a nice timeline of events, as well as answers to some common questions about the case.

[Elfdart]

My father had a stroke in 1986. As far as I can remember, when we pulled the plug, his brain was functioning at about the same level as Schiavo's is now. The eyes and eyelids moved, but it was nothing he controlled (the doctors taped the lids shut because it was so upsetting to one of my aunts). He was already dead. The brain was damaged beyond any recovery.

There was no will of any kind. All we had to go by was that he said he did not want to be "hooked up to jumper cables" in his words and he didn't want any kind of fancy funeral. Since my brother, sister and I were considered his next of kin, it was left up to us (even though my sister and I were both minors). We pulled the plug. I am thankful that even my most backward relatives were neither superstitious nor ghoulish enough to try to use my father's corpse as a prop in a three-ring circus for fundies and a freak show by fetus christers. Goddamnit I fucking hate these people.

[Vympel]

I think the word "ghoulish" is the absolute best word to describe this loathsome spectacle- the timeline of litigation provided by that florida law website Durandal provided really outlines just obsessive and disconnected from reality the parents are- motion after motion after motion until Judge Greer felt it necessary to refer to these seemingly endless motions in one of his judgements. Just let fucking GO ... I can't wait till this is over.

[Durandal]

Stephen Colbert on The Daily Show, after Jon Stewart asked about the inconsistency of this federal intervention with traditional Republican principles, has provided a great new motto for the GOP: "There are principles for every occasion."

[RedImperator]

Stephen Colbert on The Daily Show, after Jon Stewart asked about the inconsistency of this federal intervention with traditional Republican principles, has provided a great new motto for the GOP: "There are principles for every occasion."

On the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal this morning, that august publication intoned "it is ironic that many of those who oppose intervention on the grounds of Federalism have discovered it only now that it suits their purposes"--this from an editorial page which has cried Federalism to the heavens for decades, except now, when it doesn't suit its purposes. And now the polls indicate that a majority of conservatives, who would be expected to support Federalism, think the government is overreaching. So the Journal's classification of anti-interventionists as liberal bleeding-hearts who welcome Federal involvement in state matters over abortion and gay marriage falls flat on its face.

Just to make that editorial just a little more sophomoric and embarassing, they repeat the Schindler family's thinly veiled and entirely unsubstantiated innuendos about Michael Schiavo and his motives. Meanwhile, another columnist ON THE SAME PAGE who also favors intervention made a very good argument for believing Michael Schiavo is honestly fighting for what he believes are his wife's wishes.

Jesus Christ, I disagree with the WSJ editorial page quite a bit, but I don't think I've ever seen such a disgraceful display from them. I ran a rabidly right-wing student newspaper in college and I never would have let that piece of asswipe go to press. When you're crowing about your opponents compromising their principles IN AN EDITORIAL IN WHICH YOU COMPROMISE YOUR PRINCIPLES, maybe it's time to find a new editor for the op-ed page.

[Elfdart]

I think the word "ghoulish" is the absolute best word to describe this loathsome spectacle... <snip>

I chose "ghoulish" over "necrophile" because it had fewer syllables. These fundie corpsefuckers should hope against hope that there isn't a hell because if there is, they're going to be pretty close to the front of the line to attend Satan's barbecue.

[Alyrium Denryle]

Jesus christ, I dont care what the bastards motivations are. let the woman die. SHe has no functioning brain cells, she isnt alive in any real sense, stop wasting resources money and time. Let everyone get on with their fucking lives.

[Elfdart]

This is just what I expected:

http://mediamatters.org/items/200503220001

Who is Randall Terry?

Christian activist Randall Terry has reappeared in the news in recent days as the spokesman for the parents of Terri Schiavo. Terry, founder of the anti-abortion group Operation Rescue and the Society for Truth and Justice, appeared on Fox News at least four times in the past four days -- on the March 18 edition of Hannity & Colmes, and during live coverage of the Schiavo case on March 20 and March 21. But Terry has a controversial past that was not fully disclosed in any of his Fox News appearances or on the March 19 edition of National Public Radio's Weekend Edition, which aired a brief clip from Terry. In all but one of those instances, Terry was identified only as the Schindler family spokesman.

Only when Terry appeared on a March 21 "Fox News Alert" did another guest -- Fox News contributor and Democratic strategist Susan Estrich -- point out that Terry was "involved in the anti-abortion movement" and with Operation Rescue, which "operated outside the law."

On his own website, Terry noted that he "has been arrested over forty times for peaceful opposition to abortion," but he neglected to mention the details of his anti-abortion activities with Operation Rescue in the 1980s and 1990s. In an April 22, 2004, Washington Post article, staff writer Michael Powell summarized some of Terry's anti-abortion actions:

In 1988, Terry and his legions started standing in front of local abortion clinics, screaming and pleading with pregnant women to turn away. They tossed their bodies against car doors to keep abortion patients from getting out. They waved crucifixes and screamed "Mommy, Mommy" at the women. When Terry commanded, hundreds went jellyfish-limp and blockaded the "death clinics."

In 1989, a "Holy Week of Rescue" shut down a family planning clinic in Los Angeles. More than 40,000 people were arrested in these demonstrations over four years. Subtlety wasn't Terry's thing -- he described Planned Parenthood's founder, Margaret Sanger, as a "whore" and an "adulteress" and arranged to have a dead fetus presented to Bill Clinton at the 1992 Democratic National Convention.

Additional evidence suggests that actions by Terry and Operation Rescue may have provoked violence at abortion clinics. As the New York Times reported on July 20, 2001, "One of his [Terry's] most avid followers in Binghamton was James E. [sic: C.] Kopp, now charged in the 1998 murder of a doctor who performed abortions in Buffalo [New York]." Kopp was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to 25 years to life in prison. A November 6, 1998, Times report further detailed Terry's connection to Kopp:

In July 1988, when Randall Terry drove through the night from his home in Binghamton, N.Y., to Atlanta to start the series of anti-abortion protests that would finally put his new hard-line group, Operation Rescue, onto America's front pages, James Charles Kopp was in the van riding alongside him, said former leaders of Operation Rescue.

And when Mr. Terry was arrested on the first day of Operation Rescue's "Siege of Atlanta," Mr. Kopp followed him into jail, said the leaders, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Along with more than 100 other Operation Rescue members, according to some people who were there, Mr. Kopp remained in jail for 40 days and adhered to Mr. Terry's orders not to give a real name to the police or courts.

After his release, Mr. Kopp returned to Operation Rescue's Binghamton headquarters, and was there working alongside Mr. Terry as the group's power and influence in the anti-abortion movement surged in late 1988 and 1989, according to the former leaders of Operation Rescue.

Further, the Miami Herald reported on March 20 that Operation Rescue's "sympathizers continue to make an impact, some serving for the Bush administration."

As CNN noted on March 4, 1998, Terry was named in a lawsuit -- seeking to "force anti-abortion leaders to pay for damages caused in clinic attacks" -- which was filed by the National Organization for Women (NOW) under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, and Terry settled with NOW out of court. The New York Times reported on November 8, 1998, that Terry "filed for bankruptcy last week in an effort to avoid paying massive debts owed to women's groups and abortion clinics that have sued him." As the Los Angeles Times reported on February 28, Terry's use of bankruptcy law to avoid paying for the judgments against him helped prompt Senator Charles E. Schumer (D-NY) to propose an amendment to the bankruptcy bill recently passed by Congress that "specifically would prevent abortion opponents from using the bankruptcy code to escape paying court fines," although it was not included in the final version of the bill. Versions of that amendment appeared in earlier versions of the bankruptcy bill, which stalled action on it in 2002 and 2003 when "a core of House Republicans balked" at the provision, the Los Angeles Times noted.

According to a June 14, 2003, report by the conservative World Magazine (no longer available online, but reprinted on the right-wing bulletin board Free Republic), Terry solicited donations by declaring on his website that "The purveyors of abortion on demand have stripped Randall Terry of everything he owned," but failed to disclose that the money would be used to pay for his new $432,000 house. The report noted Terry's defense: "Terry told World that he wanted a home where his family will be safe and where 'we could entertain people of stature, people of importance. I have a lot of important people that come through my home. And I will have more important people come through my home.' " World noted that the same month he paid the deposit on his new home, a court ruled that Terry, who divorced his first wife and has remarried, "was not paying a fair share of child support." In an article on his website, Terry denounced the World report as "journalistic trash, a 'hit piece' of malice and misinformation."

Terry's words and personal life have also stirred controversy. As the Fort Wayne (Indiana) News Sentinel reported on August 16, 1993, at an anti-abortion rally in Fort Wayne, Terry said "Our goal is a Christian nation. ... We have a biblical duty, we are called by God to conquer this country. We don't want equal time. We don't want pluralism. ... Theocracy means God rules. I've got a hot flash. God rules." In that same speech, Terry also stated that "If a Christian voted for [former President Bill] Clinton, he sinned against God. It's that simple." According to a March 18, 2004, press release, Terry declared on his radio program that "Islam dictates followers use killing and terror to convert Western infidels." As The Washington Post reported on February 12, 2000, in his 1995 book The Judgment of God Terry wrote that "homosexuals and lesbians are no longer content to secretly live in sin, but now want to glorify their perversions." In a May 25, 2004, interview about his gay son with The Advocate, Terry stated that homosexuality is a "sexual addiction" that shouldn't be rewarded with "special civil rights."

According to the February 12, 2000, Washington Post report, Terry was censured by his church, the Landmark Church of Binghamton, New York, for a "pattern of repeated and sinful relationships and conversations with both single and married women." Terry denies the accusation.

— A.S.

=-=-=-=-=-=-

What little sympathy I had for Schiavo's parents just went down the crapper. They bring this guy into it? Fuck 'em.

[Darth Wong]

Jesus Christ, I disagree with the WSJ editorial page quite a bit, but I don't think I've ever seen such a disgraceful display from them. I ran a rabidly right-wing student newspaper in college and I never would have let that piece of asswipe go to press. When you're crowing about your opponents compromising their principles IN AN EDITORIAL IN WHICH YOU COMPROMISE YOUR PRINCIPLES, maybe it's time to find a new editor for the op-ed page.

I once saw an old but impassioned editorial in the WSJ about how the forced government disassembly of the Bell corporate monopoly (yes, from way back when Bell owned all the lines and all the phones) would utterly destroy the entire telecommunications industry and plunge the nation into chaos. WSJ editorials have been utter shit for a long time.

[Stravo]

I found it extremely interesting that the Legal contributors to Fox news today to a man all sided with Schiavo's husband and one judge even went so far as to say that the legal community in general is alarmed and somehwat disgusted by the Congress' actions in this matter. He said without hesitation that the judge would find for the husband on this matter and that the constitutionality of this law should be examined.

Sam Sheppard asked "Well what can we do if we find the Congress enacted an unconsitutional law?"

"Vote the clowns out."

Niiicee.

You can see that Fox is having trouble scraping up anyone credible to take the parents' side on this. That doesn't stop them from constantly showing pictures of Terry all happy with her parents, in her wedding dress, looking bright and healthy. I haven't seen any shots of her with that horrid blank expression of hers in these special reports.

Gotta love Fox, drinking from Republican Mules 10 years running.

[Vympel]

All of you should head to www.newshounds.us to see coverage of Fox's coverage of this fiasco- pay paticular attention to when it covers Sean Hannity's disgusting egging on of T. Schiavo's crazy fucking family- these people are scum. They assert that M. Schiavo wants to kill her to prevent her from "pointing fingers" even though there is NO evidence whatsoever that he was responsible for what happened to her and every indication that the woman had severe bulimia ... for fuck's sake ... these people deserve to be jailed.

[Fleet Admiral JD]

And as I type they are reporting on CBS4 Boston that the Judge ruled against reinsertion of the feeding tube.

Quickley, my personal stance on this:

I think that starving her is somewhat cruel. If they are going to let her die/kill her, why not just euphanize her instead of starving and dehydrating her to death? We kill animals when they are in pain, but can't do the same for people?