Terri Schiavo died this morning around 10:00am, on her 14th day without food or water.
“Eternal rest grant unto her, O Lord; and let perpetual light shine upon her. May she rest in peace. Amen.”
– Eternal Rest Prayer
Theresa Marie Schiavo (1963-2005)
About The Author
Kevin
Kevin founded Wizbang in 2003. He still contributes occasionally and handles all the technical and design work for the site.
God… I didn’t even finish reading the above post. blah blah blah Why don’t YOU shut up already. If you aren’t interested in talking about it then click off.
God help the person who is stuck living with you.
Michael Schiavo continued being a self centered creep up till the end… How appropriate!
Shark, if you are tired of the whole Terri business, then turn off your computer, stop posting your cynical rantings all over the blogosphere, and go DO something real to bring the world into conformity with your values.
I am sure it’s a big surprise and incomprehensible to you, but most of us DID in fact love Terri, even without knowing her, because she was a human being. Not because she was smart, or pretty, or had snappy responses. No, just because she was human, and we love our species in no matter how obtuse, admirable, selfish, self-sacrificing, vile, humble, clueless, angelic, or DAMAGED we may be.
Most of us don’t believe that accidents of fate or nature can render someone “not-human”. You obviously believe that humanity must be earned and can be rescinded. I pity your useless cynicism; and I fear for you if you ever become a nuisance or a bore to those who believe as you do and who have power over you.
People around the world have had their hearts and minds captured by Terri’s case because it touches the deepest longings, conflicts and fears within us. So much progress, love and understanding has come from the discussions and heart-searching Terri inspired. I doubt anything about you will ever provoke even a tiny fraction of this much good. Are you just jealous that no one is looking to YOU for inspiration, love or wisdom?
We are more tired of you than you ever could be of Terri. If you don’t want to talk about it or hear about it, then just don’t. Turn off all your communications devices and live your own life in peace. The rest of us will miss only your lost potential, and with only small regret allow ourselves to forget you.
Terri, however, will be in our hearts for a long, long time. May she dance forever in the sunshire of God’s love.
Michael Schiavo insisting on having Terri Schiavo’s body buried in “his plot” in Pennsylvania (I think I read that he even wants “her” right there “next to” him in the ground) reads to me like a murderer insisting on keeping his prize. Many of them do, you know, they really, really need to keep trophies from their “work.”
Ohterwise, makes no sense. I mean, what about his common law wife? At his feet? Oh, on the OTHER side…
The man is one very, very sick human being.
“Fucking moron”? Angry because I am correct? I actually support the death penalty.
You’re anything but correct. And I doubt that you actually support the death penalty.
Check out the enclosed link.
There is no link. Proof positive you are a fucking moron.
From your prior post: [Bush] also killed over a hundred people as governor of Texas because some judges and courts decided to.
A governor can only exercise the powers granted to him under the state constitution and laws. The governor of Texas has a very limited role in capital punishment. If, and only if, the Board of Clemency refers a case to him, does the governor in Texas have the power to grant clemency. This requires the Board to hold a hearing and after a majority vote, make a recommendation of commutation.
This only happened ONCE. And the ONE time it happened, Bush GRANTED clemency. So, CAN WE PUT THIS BULLSHIT LIE TO REST ALREADY? Thank you.
Since we are not 100% sure Terry wanted this, can you be 100% sure on the guilt of everyone on death row? That is why we have a legal system.
But here there was a highly unequal legal system:
Schiavo: one fact finder, lowest burden of proof under the law, limited appellate review.
PsychoRapistBabyMurderer: 12 unanimous fact finders, highest burden of proof, extensive appellate review.
See the difference?
I think Scott Peterson was charged for the “unborn” baby because there was a second body.
No, Peterson was charged with killing a fetus. Note: the law did not say human being but fetus and contains exceptions for abortion or a death induced by the mother.
Oh, and you are a fucking moron.
A person calling into FOX early this morning, just after they announced Terri Schiavo’s passing (someone credible, but I was barely awake and don’t recall his name, just that I do clearly recall his statement made)…(anyway), caller-into-FOX said that, to caution others about just how outrageous this death of Terri Schiavo is, that Hitler and his plans/followers first set about putting to death the disabled, handicapped (all categories, types), affirmed, the elderly and inconvenient…and that there were millions who were killed by him and his PRIOR TO then moving onto the Jews afterward and taking millions of their lives.
So, society remembers and remembers well and has dealt greatly with that loss of millions of Jews at the hands of Hitler and his followers, and yet, what about all those millions they murdered before that? All those people killed simply because they were, to Hitler and his politics, to sum it all up, expensive, inconvenient and undesirable. Deemed not worthy and not living already so do away with them and the like, subhuman, all that.
What’s taken place where Terri Schiavo is concerned is the same thing. You get one person who arrives at some “she’s dead” conclusion and “she wants to die” by a creepy smart guy with a legal degree and then no one intervenes afterward and look what took place.
All that based upon heresay. Hitler didn’t have much other than that to rely on, either.
And, the entire argument on Terri Schiavo’s behalf has always been and should remain that it has not been “proven” that Terri Schiavo “wanted to die” (the only indication about that is a conclusion Michael Schiavo produced several years after her demise based upon something he insists she said during watching some filmed media, after a financial award for Terri Schiavo’s rehabilitative care was awarded, but after many years of Michael Schiavo insisting, and consistently, that he “didn’t know” what Terri Schiavo “wanted or would have wanted” in her then-current circumstances).
All that took place is by default, society, so to speak, through ONE JUDGE, determined that Terri Schiavo’s “wishes” were “to die” because the laws allowed her husband to act on her behalf without a written record of what her intentions were. So, Michael Shiavo produces this heresay years later (how convenient) and the prior years of not knowing what his wife’s wishes were or were not are not even considered by that judge and presto, it goes on record based upon that one decision that “Terri Schiavo wanted to die.”
And then the entire legal system failed Terri Schiavo from that point forward, just failed her completely and opted instaed to protect and defend and enforce the “husband’s” will and determination.
I don’t dispute a spouse’s right to speak and act on behalf of their mate, but not as some carte blanche, unreasonable rule as in M.S.’s case, whereby all other circumstances and suggestions and even testimony was discounted just because there was that one initial interpretation that no record by Terri meant that that meant she had to die (recap there).
About her medical status, the PVS status is also debated by many physicians so there’s room to consider that that may not have been her circumstance, however gravely disabled she was. A grave disability does not mean, concurrently and therefore, that someone has to die, wants to die, should die, ought to die, that putting a person to death becuase of a grave disability is in order — legally, ethically, religiously, morally, all of it.
A lot of people project their tolerance and intolerance levels onto Terri Schiavo’s experience (and others with grave disabilities) and conclude that no one “like that” “would want to live” and such, but, unless theres’ directive that they DON”T want to remain alive, I can’t see the automatic conclusion that they be put to death by default.
Which is where we are today as a society, at least in Florida. No proof, nothing, just a guy with a common law wife and an aggressive attorney who is all to fascinated with the right-to-die movement who is also involved in a hospice organization that is shared with the judge making nearly all significant rulings affecting Terri Schiavo and you get a dead woman by the hand of others.
Not like an autopsy can make her alive again.
The counter arguments on behalf of Terri Schiavo’s life far outweigh the significance of Michael Schiavo-the-dubious-spouse’s comments and needs. There was never any harm in simply allowing someone else to care for Terri and letting Michael Schiavo carry on with his life with his common law wife. I mean, not the actions of a man in love with his wife.
mrs. bickerson:
Felos continues to harp on on any media who will film him and reprint his statements because he’s getting paid to work the media. He gets paid and paid reasonably good fees to interact with the media…thus, he interacts with the media.
Yes, I agree with you that George Felos is a questionable person. The good that comes from all his many media appearances is that there’s a lot of filmed/recorded appearances by the guy for future purposes (also a large inducement, I am sure, as to why he’s devoted so much time to the media).
Unfortunately, Felos hasn’t been charged of any crimes (to my knowledge — not like I’ve looked into this, however) and whatever his medical records are as to his mental/emotional health are probably not going to be accessible.
I find it more than interesting, however, that many people are uncomfortable with the personality of George Felos. Can’t decide quite why, just that there’s a hunch, a feeling, something that makes you want to disconnect, turn him off, run away…I think this is one of those situations where someone’s well hidden and it’s up to other intelligent, well intended persons to find out what that uncomfortable thing is because otherwise, Felos and people like him will continue to exploit and use the legislature to the fullest extent of their wants possible and that is that people have to die, to live is to die, death, death…
Julie and -s-, like two nuts in a shell.
frameone – a man with no nuts.
RE: -S-‘s post (March 31, 2005 07:47 PM)
Let me get this straight.
So:
What’s taken place where Terri Schiavo is concerned is the same thing.
is equivalent to:
So, society remembers and remembers well and has dealt greatly with that loss of millions of Jews at the hands of Hitler and his followers, and yet, what about all those millions they murdered before that? All those people killed simply because they were, to Hitler and his politics, to sum it all up, expensive, inconvenient and undesirable. Deemed not worthy and not living already so do away with them and the like, subhuman, all that.
OK, I’ll call it though technically this is a violation.
Godwin. Move along, folks. Nothing to see here.
Frameone: Someone now can make the case that we wouldn’t want to live as brain damaged as you appear to be here, and so we should lock you in a room and withold your feedings. No hope of appeal. Gives you a whole new slant on it doesn’t it??
Next time. Try to say something more useful ( hard I know..but try) than your last posting.
Whether or not Terri made the alleged statement to Michael about not wanting to “live like that,” there’s another question I haven’t seen answered. None of us would choose to live like that, and yet if there were no alternative, how many would change their minds and grasp at life, no matter what? I asked that question of many, many people over the last several months and not one of them could say for sure they’d want to die..several who had said they’d not want to be kept alive actually saw my point and agreed.
That judge didn’t even bother going to see Terri himself. How dare he make a judgement call like this!
frameone: like sticky to 409.
If the best you can do, frameone, is write about nuts, me and Julie, I’ll take those comparisons. At least Julie makes great contributions. And, I sure do love my Macademias. Have you priced a grove of the trees lately? Not to mention the nuts. Yummm, nuts.
The exciting realm of the flyby nonsense is yours. I know zapping in insect persistence random User I.D.’s on the internet is hard work, sticky sweetly smack and all, so, all that nonsense, whew, such hard work! You’re doing a great job with it!
Anonymous Drivel: if you can’t — and you can’t, by your own omission, this thread (and previous) — comprehend what one individual’s experience of such public proportions has to do with the possibilities of others, then please just give up writing nonsense and your ongoing nonsensical oh-the-quandray-with-flowery-emotionally-laden-terms-and-references-of-the-personally-derisive-and-quite-petty kind about people you don’t and won’t know (me, for one, in this case).
IF you just cannot handle or tolerate issues and process information, nay even understand it, then you — and a few others here, and most people/readers/commentors know who they are — need to move along. Not everyone else, but you. YOU need to move along. Unfortunately, egoists and narcissists (frequently mutually affecting problems to the same individuals) never do. I bet it never occured to you that you just admitted you offer limited understanding about the societal ramifications of a disabled person under quite questionable circumstances (long since enumerated and discussed but you seem to have missed that, too) to other humans.
…
I laugh each and every time you darken the issues with nothing much to offer other than to advise others to stop trying.
Terri Schiavo has passed away and the best Anonymous Drivel can do is focus on his/her/it’s own navel. Not even Terri Schiavo’s navel, but his/her/it’s OWN navel. Michael Schiavo and his brother on national television today, along with George Felos, are doing exactly the same thing: it’s all about them, their suffering, how bad things are…for them. Speaks volumes about them, not about Terri, may she rest in peace and I know that she is.
I’ve spent much of today crying. But probably not for reasons that would be apparent to most of the people who have posted on this topic in the last two weeks.
As I wrote in another thread, last year I lived through the horror of saying that my father had told me that he didn’t want to be kept alive on machines. He hadn’t told that to my mother or any of my four siblings, so I was the all of a sudden the orator of my father’s wishes. Of course, in this instance, my family knew I wouldn’t lie about such a thing and that the decision wasn’t really a difficult one after watching what was happening to him.
Even then, it was the loneliest, most horrible time in my life. There was no one to confirm what I knew was true. What if it was just something he thought that day we discussed it and then changed his mind. He couldn’t tell me, and he never finished filling out the forms that would have spelled it all out. I struggled for six months to even be able to smile, or get through a day sober. I would wish that feeling on no one.
So, watching Michael Schiavo be skewered and threatened daily for doing what he knew in his heart was what his wife wanted him to do, brought up feelings almost as intense as that day last April. Let me just assure you that no one would willingly put himself through what Michael Schiavo has gone through to, oh let’s use the words of the whacko extremists, “MURDER TERRI SHIAVO” when he had the option of handing her over to her parents and then divorcing her, privately, with no television cameras or reporters breathing down his neck every day. As everyone has been so quick to point out, the money is gone. Probably has been for a couple of years. He could have just walked away. So there is no way he would have done this, unless, and this is just a crazy thought that I’m sure no anti-abortion, pro-life christian republican can relate to, he loved his wife so much that he would let his entire life be displayed and scrutinized by the entire world in order to do what she had told him to do for her.
When I read that lame-ass post saying that “we’re coming after you,” I cried. Let this man grieve his loss. If you freaks are so goddamned intent on lynching someone, why are O.J. Simpson and Robert Blake walking the streets? There is far more evidence to suggest that they actually murdered their wives and then somehow got away with it. All of these vigilante remarks are not only inappropriate, they reveal the writer as a fraud. There are so many horrible crimes committed in this country every day that you don’t lift a finger to stop, yet you’ll plot revenge against a man you’ve never met over something so personal and private that you have no business even knowing about.
I miss my father today. He was a devout bible-reading Christian (this time with a capital C because he actually lived his life in a Christian manner) who would have sat on his back porch with me and talked rationally about this subject. And even if we disagreed, we would have understood and respected each other’s views.
But all there is today is invective and ranting. Turn your rage inward and fix your own lives. This man lost his wife 15 years ago, lost his privacy, almost lost his right to carry out his wife’s wishes, and now people want to steal his right to grieve. To that I say, go fuck yourselves.
“Try to say something more useful”
That’s too much. I challenge you to cite one useful thing Julie or -S- has said in this thread. Better yet, tell me one thing you’ve said that’s been “useful.”
“CollegePundit (and others) have let their anger cloud their brains. No one knew when the exact moment of death would come. Schiavo and the Schindlers were taking turns in Terri’s room — it was just as likely that one group or the other would be there when she died. (And if it had been the Schindlers instead, then CollegePundit would probably be calling Schiavo a “heartless bastard” for NOT being thre.)” – Harold George
Naturally, you have sources to prove they were taking turns, right? Because, from what I’m told and what I’ve read, they were barred from the room before for various and sundry reasons, and today when Bobby Schindler became (rightfully) angry that his sister was about to die of starvation, and was taking it out (not-so-rightfully) on a cop. So, I wouldn’t be entirely surprised if their visitation was restricted AGAIN. They were waiting at a thrift store, man. The fact of the matter is is that Bob and Mary Schindler are Terri’s parents, and they most of all deserve to be in that room with her whenever they could, at all times if they wished. They fought exceptionally hard to keep her alive, the least that should be done is give them a measure of respect and let them be with their daughter when they want to be. Terri was not some sort of exhibit – open for viewing for a limited time by a limited audience – she was a human being with family that wanted to be there. It’s called “courtesy”, not a game of “Michael May I?” I somehow doubt that they would wilfully leave when they know that this was, quite possibly, her last few hours on the planet. And, look how it turned out – it was.
Short end of the stick is, I am of the opinion Michael Schiavo IS a heartless bastard, whether he was in that room or not. THAT much is not going to change. I don’t buy a word he, or his loudmouth lawyer Felos, are saying. Particularly and especially a smarmy man like Felos, who can somehow pull of the quantum leap of logic that starving to death is dying in a dignified manner. It’s sure as hell not the way I intend to go out dignified.
Michael got (what he thinks) he wanted, let her parents decide how they want to remember Terri and move on in their life. It is really that simple, and it would be a nice, token gesture to do so.
I also take offense to the fact that you go ahead and snipe me on this blog (by citing my “clouded mind” about this subject, which I am inferring you mean my own blog posts and not just the relatively few comments here on Wizbang), especially when I have my own open commenting system on my blog itself for you to comment in. Or is it the fact you have an audience?
My entire original comment in this thread was hoping God would take Terri into his hands, and my frustration that she had to die the way she did. My entire frustration with this case deals with the insanity that surrounds her cause of death – starvation. We don’t do that for anyone else, why in the world should she be different? Especially since the decision rode largely on a conversation she had with her husband and his brother during a television program. If that’s letting my mind being clouded, then damn, guilty as charged.
My frustration also involves how this case was handled – Judge Greer should have recused himself for his connections to Terri’s Hospice, Felos should have followed suit, the Schindlers should have taken up the whole “clear and convincing evidence” cause in the federal courts a lot sooner, and the results may have been different. In the end, it boiled down to one party wanting to try every possible means they had available to them to improve their daughter’s condition, and a man who is on record as barely tolerating a woman who was dead to him fifteen years ago, and he won.
Pardon me for being a little bit pissed that I feel it wasn’t fair to starve someone when there were other viable options. I guess we all can’t be so wildly dispassionate about everything.
frameone: you really do appear to be suffering from depression, in all seriousness. You display a routinely flat and antagonistic tone and attitude to and about both specific and impersonal individuals (what is the provocation, I’d like to know) and you discourage any empathy to and about nearly anyone, everyone.
However, you attempting, as does “AnonymousDrivel” and the a few earlier I.D.’s, Wizbang comments, to target a few of us here is unnaturally concerning…not about those you target (as same applies to “A.D.”‘s same behavior) but that you seem motivated to target, that you even waste time to that effort (targeting others, without specific cause or purpose, just that it appears you are generating some sort of personal reward by the acts of detraction alone).
The thread is about Terri Schiavo in memorial. It’s not about you, it’s not about “julie” or me, for that matter, it’s not about Michael Schiavo, it’s about Terri Schiavo. Terri Schiavo has lost her life due to deprivation, intentionally, by others. She’s the one who suffered and who has died. Unfortunatley, like Michael Schiavo, the story, the issue, seems to be forcefully positioned to be all about Michael Schiavo, all about frameone, all about Anonymous Drivel.
It’s not about any of you, but about a woman who has died. Write in honor of her life, or perhaps consider writing elsewhere to dishonor yourself, or anyone else. About me as your perceived target, you’re the only person who can explain what that’s about but you do still have my prayers.
CollegePundit…I agree with you.
Rest in peace, Terri Schiavo. For Michael Schiavo, he still has a tough road to how, not that he hasn’t set about creating that road and the tough issues ahead by his own determination.
Yes RIP. Now can we worry about the 49,000 abortions that occurred during the 14 days that Terry Schiavo commanded all of the political capital of the pro-loife movement?
RE: -S-‘s posts (March 31, 2005 11:49 PM and March 31, 2005 07:47 PM)
I admit it. I have a hard time equating the 15 year legal and ethical saga of one American who finally had her last wishes fulfilled to the millions of people, “subhuman” or otherwise, killed by Hitler who did not have their last wishes fulfilled. But by all means, run that standard up the ash heap of humanity. I suspect you’ll have some followers with the same perception of relativity and proportionate hyperbole.
Sorry I keep introducing new sounds into your echo chamber, but not everyone shares your opinion or the reflected waves. Hearing it twice doesn’t improve the message. Also, when you have to resort to ad hominem debate, however applicable you think it is, your scorecard gets a debit. I’ll mark the tally sheet and adjust the bullhorn – it’ll be uproarious.
Here you go “julie”:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7305206/site/newsweek/
Wow, thank you for providing a link that I never requested to more BULLSHIT LIES! Can you read critically? Or do you just accept what ever you read as truth? Did you bother to check to see if what Alter wrote was true? Or did you just accept it as gospel because it was in the msm? Whether reasonable doubt was raised in a few cases is Alter’s opinion and anti-death penalty proponents *opinion. * For some reason people think that the mere allegation of contradictory evidence equals reasonable doubt. It does not. Note how he does not give the names of the cases he says where reasonable doubt existed. If he did, one could easily look up the court opinions and see the overwhelming amount of evidence against the condemned. You could find the HC of the defendant and see how lame their so called proof of reasonable doubt is. And you do realize that they are not referring to clemency hearings, right? No? Maybe, because they are intentionally misleading you. Bush only had the power to grant clemency in one case and he did.
Instead of taking your opinions from moonbats, why don’t you go directly to the sources: Board of Parole and Pardons, the Texas Const., the Texas Admin. Code, and TCADP. Knock yourself out.
She died a long time ago.
Her brain was down to 5% liquid. Bush lost.