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Schiavo rumblings
mr.Curmudgeon:
Your "Liberal Media" at work:
In presenting the results of a CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll, CNN.com used a visually distorted graph that falsely conveys the impression that Democrats far outnumber Republicans and Independents in thinking the Florida state court was right to order Terri Schiavo's feeding tube removed.
Laid out in this manner, the graph suggests that the gap between the two groups is overwhelming, rather than only 8 percentage points, within the poll's margin of error of +/- 7 percentage points. Also, this presentation obscures the poll's finding that majorities of all the groups sampled approved of the removal of Schiavo's feeding tube. A more accurate presentation of the poll's findings would have looked like this:
(via: Media Matters for America)
mrC
GGKoul:
Just thinking about this...
She can breathe on her own but needs assistance to eat.
--Can you feed her by other means or does she require a feeding tube 100%?
She can't move out of bed
--Does she should signs of any body movement?
She going to require 24 hrs assistance
--Which costs money.
If the family is willing to pay for the continue care, then I say keep her alive... Because you never know.
But here is the issue, is the husband looking to end life in order to stop the pain or is he just looking to cash in on the remaining trust fund? Or are the parents looking to keep the her alive in order to make the husband spend all of the trust fund money, which happend to be the money they weren't given access too?
Then what happens when the trust money runs out? Do the parents end up paying the bills since they want to keep her alive?
Messy, but making a person starve isn't the best thing medical science can do.
Zero_Hour:
An interesting Read:
http://www.miami.edu/ethics/schiavo/wolfson's%20report.pdf
Dr. Jay Wolfson is a professor of public health and law at the University of South Florida; in 2003, a Florida court appointed him to be Terry Schiavo's guardian ad litem for a month, seeking data on mental abilities disputed by Schiavo's husband and parents.
As part of that charge, he reviewed all court and medical records, he also spent quite a bit of time visiting with Terri, her husband, family, and various medical professionals connected to her care.
Dr. Wolfson recommended that both parties in the case abide by the results of tests -- including a swallowing test -- which would gauge Schiavo's cognitive ability. In the end, he couldn't get them to agree. So here we are.
Dartful Dodger:
There are two conflicting sides to this case what he says she wanted and what her family say she wanted. If this were a criminal case she would get the benefit of the doubt and she would not be put to death. She did not have a living will; we do not know what she wanted.
The government has a responsibility to protect the weak, those who can't defend themselves.
saint:
Her husband says that she told him essentially just this. You don't believe him, fine that's your perogative. But it is *exactly* the spouse of a person who is the one person whom should be believed in this type of situation. That's part of what marriage is for pete's sake. Unless you have reasonable cause to believe that the husband is not trustworthy in the matter then he is the one who should be making this call.
Now, if you think the husband's motive are questionable that's one thing and certainly a reason for society to step in, but you didn't say that here. A blanket statement that a person in this situation should always be kept alive no matter what the spouse says the patient themselves wanted is just loony. More than loony, it gets into the realm of scary. Here's a blanket statement for the world -- in this situation, if it's me that's the patient, believe what my wife says -- she's the most qualified person in the world to make that judgement. Not my parents, not my kids, not the courts, not the president -- my wife.
Now starving to death is horrible, yes. But when a person says they don't want to be kept alive in such a situation, it's exactly this kind of thing that person is saying they are willing to have happen to them. If it is true that she told her husband she wouldn't want to be kept alive in this situation, then until society is as concerned with the right to die as it is with the right to live, this is the only way. It's sad, it's horrible, it's a situation I wouldn't wish on my worse enemy, but it is the way it is.
So if the issue is whether or not the husband is telling the truth, that's one thing. I don't know where the answer to that lies in this case, but I do know it's been through numerous courts trying to work it out. However, the position that the spouse shouldn't be the person to have the right to make that decision is quite another matter, and frankly just plain wrong.
"A woman