<p>Before I go offline, I want to leave you with an interesting topic for discussion. This issue is a really hot topic so I know that when I get back home I will find some interesting opinions.</p>
<p>as a civil liberties fanatic, i side with her husband.</p>
<p>For the case itself, I'm indifferant. But I'm furious at the actions of the Republicans in Congress.</p>
<p>I'll have a longer explanation later, but my nose is dripping some unfortunate looking fluids</p>
<p>I agree with sirwonkalus.</p>
<p>I also think that euthanasia should be legal, because living a life of a vegetable is no life to live.</p>
<p>and you thought your parents were having a hard time letting go!</p>
<p>***, thats a bit rude...I mean, seriously, don't relate it to parents letting go for college. Yeah, say you were joking, but think twice.</p>
<p>and btw, i don't think i cussed...the asterisks do not reflect any hostility</p>
<p>What word was asterisked out?</p>
<p>As a parent writing in, I can't imagine having the right to end the life of someone else's child. Who has the right to make this decision? Certainly not a man who has made a new life for himself.</p>
<p>maybe joe? i didn't say the "a-word"</p>
<p>I definitely support the husband. I can't see how anyone thinks fifteen years of vegetation without medical hope for redemption is worth it.</p>
<p>Okay, lets get one thing straight: if it were not for the shameful actions of congressional Republicans, this story would not be on national news, and we wouldn't be hashing out this family's difficult situation on television. </p>
<p>Terry Schiavo did not leave a living will....for goodness sake, she was 25 when she had her loss of brain function. Her wishes were unclear, so her husband and her siblings took their disagreement to court. For 15 YEARS</p>
<p>haha, i find it hilarious that you claim to be civil liberties fans when you are clearly telling all of us that you think she is her husband's property. Because that's what this is. Her husband says "yeah, yeah, she told me she wanted to die, etc., let's yank the tube, she's my wife and my responsibility". </p>
<p>When did we all revert back to the idea that a woman has no say of her own? And when silent, we assume they have the right to life. End.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Court-appointed doctors say that Mrs Schiavo, 41, is in a persistent vegetative state, and will not recover.<a href="%5Burl%5Dhttp://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4362679.stm%5B/url%5D">/quote</a></p>
<p>No one really knows what she wants, but everyone knows that there is very little difference between her remaining on life support and her being taken off of life support.</p>
<p>Um, yeah...the reason that the feeding tube is being detached is not because a woman is solely the property of the man. It is because the spouse has rights, in this case, over the family. If Terry Schiavo were a man and her wife demanded the feeding tube be removed, then the same situation would occur. Don't bring the loaded word "property" in this because that is not only irrelevant, but ambiguous.</p>
<p>"And when silent, we assume they have the right to life. End."
That isn't true. Know the facts in the case before commenting. The judicial system doesn't run on your absolute statements, and regardless of how you view a situation in moral terms, your statements hold very little weight until you can justify them with the law (at times morals supercede the law, but only when one knows which laws are being applied).</p>
<p>They have already litigated this out, and over 40 judges and justices reviewed the case. It went all the way to the Supreme Court. The final judgement was this: Terri Schiavo's husband, as her closest relative, has the final say over her medical care. He believes that it would be Terri's wish to end her life rather than live in a vegatative state. And so, today, Terri's feeding tube was removed. Of course Terri is not her husbands property, but she certainly is not her parents property, and she obviously cannot speak for herself.</p>
<p>You can be against euthenasia, or for it, but the decision was made, the courts had ruled, and this case was settled.</p>
<p>Now enter the United States Congress, and the Republican Party, who just last night, at the 11th hour, decided to take intrest in a private, family matter.</p>
<p>Let me explain just how this issue came to the floor of Congress.</p>
<p>Congress was supposed to be busy passing a budget this week. Plenty of contentious debate on that already. Well after the House passed thier budget resolution (this is late at night), Rep. Sensenbrenner (R-WI), brings up this bill to make the removal of Terri's feeding tube illegal. It passed.</p>
<p>In the Senate, they SET ASIDE THE BUDGET, and took consideration of a similar, yet different bill, offered by Sen. Martinez (R-FL). (Btw, I totally fault the Senate Democrats, because they could have stopped the whole thing if just one senator had upheld the objection of Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR)). The Senate passed the bill, but during the debate, the House went into recess, and since the Senate and House passed differing versions of the bill, it cannot be signed into law until the House is back in session...two weeks from now, when Schiavo would presumably be dead.</p>
<p>Maj. Leader Tom Delay then does the unspeakable; instead of living with the political reality, he SUBPEONAS Terri, her family, and her caretakers. The Republican Leadership was hoping that in a court challenge, they could use the subpeona power of Congress to say that as a potential witness, Schivao needed protection from possible harm, and ergo have her feeding tube replaced. A Florida Court has already ruled Congress' challenge invalid, and there is ANOTHER appeal to the Supreme Court over the issue, IN ADDITION, to the other 2 federal lawsuits that have been filed in the case since 1PM EST. All that Mr. Schiavo wants to do is carry out what he believes are his wife's wishes, but in the name of political opportunism, the National Republican party will simply not let him. Funny that the party of small government feels that it is its place to weigh in on family matters that have already been decided by courts.</p>
<p>I am offended that Congressional Republican Leadership, who only at the last minute gave a rat's patoot about this case, has inserted itself into a private family matter that was ALREADY decided by the courts. The GOP is using this family's tragic situation for political gain, so they can grandstand in press confererance after press conference, pontificating on the culture of life that they profess to belive in. If they believe so much in life, House Republicans wouldn't have voted to cut 69 billion from Medicaid, the medical insurance program for the poor. If they really cared so much about euthensia, they would have passed a bill about it long before today. </p>
<p>I am offended that Congress, in its grandstanding, is accusing Schiavo's husband, of trying to kill her. Nobody is trying to kill Terri Schiavo, a heart attack 15 years ago already did that. Mr. Schiavo is simply trying to carry out his wife wishes, which is a right that he earned after 15 YEARS of litigation.</p>
<p>But I am most offended by the Republican war on the judicial branch. They are using this case to make people think that they are stepping in to save this woman from those evil lawyers who are trying to kill her. They demonize and debase lawyers and judges at every turn, whether through nominating the ideological descendants of Adolf Hitler to the federal bench, or by accusing the judical system of, and I swear I just heard this quote on CNN, of " trying to stave Terri to death". I'm sick and tired of it.</p>
<p>We may not have the best image of lawyers in American, but if it weren't for a lawyer suing someone in federal courts, I wouldn't have the right to the same public education as my white counterparts. If it weren't for a lawyer suing in federal courts, women in this country wouldn't be able to make their own reproductive decisions. And if it weren't for a particularly courages lawyer in Floriday, Terri Schiavo and her husband would not be able to make one of the most difficult, most excruciating descisions; the method of one' own death. Even still, it seems that they do not have that right.</p>
<p>I'm tired of it. I swear to God this case has made me reaffirm my values and my beliefs. I will spend every waking hour that I can making sure that Democrats take Congress back in the next election. I can't stand these Congressional Republicans and their Gestapo tactics any longer.</p>
<p><em>descends from his soapbox</em></p>
<p>Shit, you know a ton about this!</p>
<p>I watch C-SPAN for fun.</p>
<p>lol</p>
<p>Hehe, well, you sound like an Ivy Leaguer to me.</p>
<p>Well, I don't often get really passionate about some things, but this made me throw things at the wall....I was sooo mad when I was watching TV today.</p>