Redstate

And on the government employees who killed her.

Today, you will read in the papers that Terri Schiavo is dead.

Don't you believe it.

For at this moment, she is more alive than your or I. She has gone up higher - that is all.  That which is born of the flesh may die, but that which is born of the Spirit will live forever - and there is no man, no court, no judge that can prevent it.

What cause does her passing serve, a la John Brown?  An explosion in the legal cottage industry of power of attorneys and living wills?  Let's all pause and remember that the government in no shape or fashion declared Terri Schiavo unfit to live - rather, it found the testimony of her husband (among others) was sufficient to determine her intent to refuse care.  That's all this was, folks.  Everything else we brought to the party.

What we did as a nation with this very personal tragedy was despicable.  We turned it into an OJ media circus, complete with clowns on the left and the right.  Can you imagine if your family was subjected to this travesty?  I'll be interested to see what this "John Brown" moment actually portends.  My two cents says nothing, because there is no policy conclusion derived from the experience, unless it is to place a greater restricion on the use of certain forms of evidence when making this determination.  Whoopee.

   

... and we fret the temporal stuff, but there is a peace which surpasses all understanding.  Terri knows this now directly.

What cause does her passing serve, a la John Brown?

It powerfully focuses public attention upon the practice of killing the disabled, for starters.

Can you imagine if your family was subjected to this travesty?

I'm pretty sure my family won't starve me to death.  If they tried to, my hope is that society would step in to save me.

....there is no policy conclusion derived from the experience....

Au contraire, my friend.  Wait and see.

It powerfully focuses public attention upon the practice of killing the disabled, for starters.

For shame.

RIP. May she find in death the peace denied to her on Earth.

that everyone involved in this tragic case can find some measure of peace, rather than be consumed by the hate, anger and bitterness that have been swirling around it.

What is the policy conclusion?  Seriously, not playing dumb, what is it that we as a country need to do?

Obviously we disagree on how to characterize the events surrounding this case.  It still seems like an enormous jump to go from "the Court determined Ms. Schiavo would refuse medical treatment in these circumstances" to "the court ratified the practice of killing the disabled."  

This feels like a framing exercise - you guys are for executing the disabled, we err on the side of life - when that's just not the frame I see it in.  I certainly do not support any practice of killing disabled people, but I support everyone's right to refuse medical treatment or other care for themself.  I understand the politics behind this, I see the proxy fight, I get it, but when I see folks like you or Thomas say things like this, I wonder if I'm the one missing something.  Not that you guys aren't above cheap political points (who's not), but it's less frequent.

As if your value-judgment on the terminology is the final word on the subject.  Considering that every major disability-rights group in the nation disagrees with you, let me respond:

Heard, understood, ignored.

....the leftist obsession with "framing" these days?  Wasn't it Jonah Goldberg who observed that in the modern day, the right fights over principles, while the left squabbles over tactics?

In any case, you'll have to wait.  I'm drafting a long series on this very subject.

There's no movement for any change of laws governing end of life issues. A couple have been mentioned:

-- Krauthammer suggested that blood relatives should be given say in such issues, but I'm not sure anybody's interested in that.

-- Rejecting verbal wishes to family members for ending medical measures has also been mentioned, but I'm not sure that has any public momentum.

But you're right -- There's no groundswell for changes in the way we handle end of life.

Thousands of families face these issues every year. In this case various parts of the family disagreed, and those disagreements boiled to open hostility. That doesn't mean the process is broken.

same could be said of the right.  Given all of the word/definitional games the Bush admin likes to play, the right is just as obsessed with "framing" as the left is.

My "leftist" obsession with framing is that I'm tired of being set up where the principles I think I'm fighting for get twisted into something despicably different.  I.e., I support the ability of the Courts to determine Ms. Schiavo's intentions and it turns out I'm killing off disabled people because their life is unfit.  Instead of having two competing sets of principles, or even two mutual complimentary sets of principles, I end up holding the short stick before the argument even begins because you've framed me into defending the indefensible.  It's a great debating trick, a fine "tactic", but it doesn't ring true.  

"What is with the leftist obsession with "framing" these days?"

I think it's called "catch up".

Cheers -

It powerfully focuses public attention upon the practice of killing the disabled, for starters.

You're trying to make this a debate about how we treat the disabled?  Sorry, there's no polite way to put this:  What a load of crap.

There are two issues here:  The fundamental issue is how we define life.  That's the question of whether we believe Ms. Schiavo to have recently died as a disabled person -- or whether we believe that she's been dead for about fifteen years.  You imagine this debate -- the actual debate -- out of existence.  That's a huge mistake.

The secondary question, which you do address in part, is who decides the first question:  whether it will be "society" (as you posit) or the individual and his or her family (as I prefer) -- with disputes among family members adjudicated, when necessary, by a neutral arbiter.  Though this is essentially a procedural issue, it is still an important one.  Indeed, the rule of law is nothing more than careful adherence to procedure.

Incidentally, the fact that a neutral arbiter sometimes gets it wrong does not mean that the system is wrong.  Any system formed of humans will occasionally make mistakes -- though, strangely, this fact is sometimes lost on those who know God's will better than they know the opening pages of Genesis.    

Ok.  So, what do you seek?  Today, our 50 states each have their own laws which regulate how it is determined whether or not a patient is removed from various life-sustaining medical treatments.  Would you enact a federal law which supercedes the state laws?  If so, what would it say?

In a previous diary post you wrote about how your parents fought to get your brother treatment, when he was in a condition somewhat similar to Ms. Schiavo's, treatment which was happily successful

the effort justified itself, because human life is its own thing -- in whatever form it takes.

While certainly the effort to help your brother was clearly justified (the results speak for themselves), I disagree that this statement should be the principle for deciding all cases.  I suspect many Americans would.  Regardless, what are you proposing?  Are living wills not acceptable to you?  After all, 'human life is its own thing -- in whatever form it takes'.  Would you therefore thwart the written wishes of patients?  If you would allow some instances where life-sustaining treatments could be stopped, to whom would you give that decision-making power?  Would you remove the economic burden to the families of these patients, so that they not be bankrupted by medical expenses, particularly when they believe the person is dead, but the body lives?  Would you remove the economic burden from the hospitals and insurance companies?

....to legitimize the question as to whether capacity defines humanity.  It's also your choice to eschew questions of morality in favor of questions of procedure.  Monstrous and debased as these things are.

And it's my choice to respond, viz.: What a load of crap.

Moving on....

1.  Results are not justifications here.
   
   
2.  There is no right to suicide.
   
   
3.  Human life is not valued according to economic impact.

Is there a right to refuse medical treatment?

Especially when it is done to hasten death.

But a good question.  Give me some time on this.

It is difficult for many of us to conceive of a purely procedural position on this matter.  This does not mean your holding such a position is insincere -- but it does strike us as a willful moral abdication.  Supporting what happened in the Schiavo case by dint of its adherence to procedure is uncomfortably reminiscent of support for ethnic German self-determination in 1938, or the sovereignty of American states in 1860.  Both correct principles in themselves, of course....

For me to respond without descending further into ad hominem -- which reflects rather poorly on me.  Of necessity, I'll also be brief.

(1) Vis-a-vis capacity:  It's a red herring in this debate.  Indeed, your logic would require that we keep alive indefinitely a person who is brain dead and lacks the "capacity" to breathe.  

(2) It seems to have completely escaped your attention that, in many cases (including this one), procedure is morality.  Indeed, a free society is free only because it rigorously follows the processes that make it so (aka, the "rule of law").  Any time you abandon process to reach the result that you perceive is "right," you are cutting at the heart of the very thing that makes us good.

Or, let me say it in a slightly different way:  The ends do not justify the means.

Results are not justifications here.

Sloppy writing on my part.  I simply meant to say that I'm happy for your family that the treatment worked.  I didn't want my disagreement with your general principle to be interpreted as my not believing your family did the right thing.

There is no right to suicide.

Seems to be disingenuous response to what I was asking.  I quoted a statement from you which seemed absolutist, ie. 'life is its own thing - whatever form it takes.'  The courts in many (all?) states honor living wills if written within certain parameters.  Would you no longer allow states to honor living wills?

Human life is not valued according to economic impact.

Ok.  Judging from what you wrote to Von

It's your choice, of course....to legitimize the question as to whether capacity defines humanity.  It's also your choice to eschew questions of morality in favor of questions of procedure.  Monstrous and debased as these things are.

I take that to mean you feel that the consequences of imposing your moral values on our country are irrelevant to your arguement.  So, we'll leave that aside.

There is an absolute right to refuse medical treatment, and the cases where it can be breached is what is extremely limited.

Jehovah's Witnesses refuse blood transfusions all the time, and that can bring death. Christian Scientists refuse virtually all modern medicines, as do Mennonites. Thousands of people every day decide that they don't want to continue chemo/radiation treatments for cancer, knowing it will hasten death. I'm sure I could come up with dozens of other examples. Would you have them forced to do undergo treatments?

In Justice O'Connor's concurring in the Cruzan case she made a point that this type of nutrition -- operating on a person to put a tube directly into the small intestine -- is an invasive procedure that can be refused. That's been the law of the land for 15 years now, and I'm pretty sure it will stay that way.

With respect to this issue, please consider it mututal. I find your simplistic attempts to politicize this tragedy increasingly repugnant.

Gengisdom has said what I would say better than I can say it.  The right of individuals to decide their fate if they suffer unrecoverable injury has been confirmed by more than 30 courts.   Ms. Schiavo won that right for herself, though she never knew it.

One legacy I hope will come from this melodrama is that the shrill, vicious part of the Right to Life movement will realize just how very fringe it is.  The polls, in which most people always sided with Michael Schiavo, proved that.

This is absurdist and self-exculpating nonsense.  Procedure is a morally-neutral process that is as easily used for evil as good.  See here for examples.  What gives procedure its moral quality is its content and its ends.  We are assuredly not free "only because" of the rule of law.  Zimbabwe, Iran, Saudi Arabia and North Korea also enjoy the rigorous application of this principle.  The difference is in what the law does, and why.

. . . you should be ashamed of yourself for suggesting that trevino is attempting to "politicize" this issue.

Some people -- you included -- should get off your pedestal and acknowledge that most people have genuine feelings on this issue.

You're going to have great and lasting troubles in a participatory democracy, Brendan.

Procedure might encompass within it moral judgments. It might be the result of moral judgments. It might leave room for moral judgments. The two are hardly coterminal.

A free society is free only because it has a commitment to follow good procedure. One cannot deny that numerous statist dictatorships have followed procedure rigorously, and have been unerringly committed to that procedure. I could cite examples, but the big three of the Twentieth Century come right to mind.

If the process is flawed, in execution or in its underlying assumptions, it does not follow that cutting through that process is bad. Had we a process to enslave millions, breaching that process would be a feat of enormous moral goodness.

This is such a process.

The right of individuals to decide their fate if they suffer unrecoverable injury has been confirmed by more than 30 courts.

Well, that makes it right.  Quick, please do tell what the judicial record on slavery was.  Or segregation pre-1950.  Or on deporting Japanese-Americans.  Or on suppressing free speech in the First World War.

The judiciary as moral cover: contemptible ignorance.

Ms. Schiavo won that right for herself, though she never knew it.

Or exercised it.

....the shrill, vicious part of the Right to Life movement....

Yes, those meanies.  Being so pushy and rude in saving lives.

Good movie, though.

. . . about many of the people complaining about the "extreme fringe" of the right-to-life movement. I suspect that many of these complainers think that all right-to-life positions are extreme.

Care to discuss that? Using more light than heat?

No one can force a mentally competant person to have a medical treatment.

The question is not whether the government can currently force someone to undergo treatment, but whether the government should be able to do so.  

Josh seems to think that in many circumstances, people should be forced to undergo treatment(an "extremely limited" right to refuse treatment).  

Or at least, not entirely. I believe the sovereign has the right to compel you to take vaccinations when collective health is at stake, and no, I can't give the cite, and it's itching my craw.

As to what the Supreme Court has decided is a right: Pardon me if I'm not so impressed with their de facto legislation in this regard.

Justice O'Connor has an extremely skewed view of salus populi, and one that inures only when she seems to deem it fit. And please don't quote the Reynolds and Kopel article to me: They can't even get the Latin right.

Dick Morris  wrote an interesting article on the shrillness.  Money paragraphs:

Most of us will never have an abortion. We are either too male, too old, too inactive or too moral. The life/choice debate is, for us, a bit of a spectator sport. So is the focus on gay marriage. We may care about the issue, but, as Clinton would often put it, we don't have a dog in that hunt.

But we will all die -- and don't we know it! We can all see ourselves at the wrong end of a feeding tube, sucking out sustenance to sustain a life we might more willingly forfeit. We can not only put ourselves in the place of those most intimately concerned with Schiavo's fate -- her husband and parents -- but we can put ourselves right there in the bed, in a coma -- which the doctors call a "persistent vegetative state" -- with no hope and no life worth living.

He goes on to talk about how GW Bush was able to find where the people wanted to be prior to this case. And indeed he Bush has, after returning to DC from Texas, has stayed clear as much as possible. Morris goes on to say that Jeb is the loser here, offending moderates for doing too much and right to lifers by looking weak and ineffective.

But he agrees with you that shrillness of the right to life movement isn't a good thing when most voters are actually paying attention. It works OK with abortion because most people don't really care, but people do pay attention to end of life issues.

Abolition was not.

Interring the Japanese American community was popular.

"Watching" the German American community in World War I was too.

God save us all from policy made with snap polls.

Terri Schindler-Schiavo's brain was injured.  Not a soul on Earth fully understands what a brain injury can be, not even those who have suffered one.  No one can completely understand the human brain, and the maps are directionless.

Repeat it: Brain Injured.

If you don't understand it, kill it?  Because he brain was damaged, does this mean that she was less than human, so that those who dole out the pity can ooze self-righteous pathos as they say that she would be better off in a more peaceful place?

Tell me who has the right to make that choice?  Certainly not the brutish Michael, whom I'm convinced was merely a pawn in a larger death game.

Talk to Felos about ressurection.

This wasn't a game.

Consistently, the public shows a complete lack of dismay at torturing terrorists to death.

And respectfully, I'd note that the economic wing of the party is the one with the words Steeltariffs!! Farmsubsidies!! constantly pouring from their mouths with a sound like tearing brass plate.

How was keeping Terri Schiavo alive improving the collective health of our nation?

The Lord is the final judge on morality, Thomas.  Why do you believe He would not approve of what happened in the Schiavo case?  

How was keeping Terri Schiavo alive improving the collective health of our nation?

In public health, we use the phrase "emergent property" to describe an effect that results from a discrete act or acts, but is not necessarily apparent or logically deducible (deductible?) from that act.  In this case, the life of Terri Schiavo per se had no bearing in itself on public health (nor did it need any to be worth preserving, mind you); but the emergent property of her killing is to facilitate similar killings henceforth.  And that denigrates -- just as her saving would have improved -- "the collective health of our nation."

The Lord is the final judge on morality, Thomas.

Thomas needs no reminding.

Why do you believe He would not approve of what happened in the Schiavo case?

Christian orthodoxy is funny on these things.

Vaccination.

Suicide.

Pretty obvious, here, I'd think.

Those are examples of cases in which treatment can be forced.

But what, in your mind, are the circumstances in which it should be a right to refuse medical treatment?

You've said that the right should be "extremely limited" so it shouldn't be difficult to articulate those limits.

Our health is in our mores as certainly as in our body. Torturing a woman to death, even if we believe in a right to commit suicide, does a profound disservice to the body politic. It makes us mean, in the classic sense.

The Lord is the final judge on morality, Thomas.  Why do you believe He would not approve of what happened in the Schiavo case?

Well, I'm funny. I always thought the good Lord gave us clear guidelines so that we'd know where the bright lines are, and we could tell when we're stepping over them.

I don't think Christ held up crucifixion as a preferred end of life resolution method.

I agree with the note about vaccinations -- that's one of the extremely limited exception. However even that's not absolute. There was a case here in Kentucky about 2 years ago where the state court decided that the courts couldn't force a kid to have vaccinations to enter school if religious beliefs are at stake (can't find online reference on that. You'll have to trust me on this one...).

There are probably other exceptions where doctors can overrule parents in critical situations. Minors are often exceptions to rules.

As for the defacto legislation from the Supreme Court:  It seems to have stuck. Lots of states, including FL, have written legislation around end-of-life issues that enshrine the right to reject medical care, including feeding and hydration tubes. It may have once been only a court decision, but now it's generally accepted as the law we live by.

Such issues usually focus around abortion and euthanasia but this time we saw many pro-life activists wrongly attempt to equate the refusal of a life prolonging procedure with euthanasia.  

IMO if Josh Trevino's prediction that "this isn't over" has any weight, it could isolate pro-lifers from the mainstream the way that many pro-abortionists have isolated themselves on things like opposing parental notification for minors and supporting the practice of partial birth abortion.

I'm the one who should be ashamed. For suggesting that using the Schiavo tragedy to make broader political points is tawdry.

I'm the one on a pedastal. For saying that I don't know all the answers, and there are shades of gray here, and it's a complex and sad case.  

I'm the one who's going to have great and lasting troubles in a participatory democracy. Because I believe that in general I don't have the right to decide for others when life ends, and when treatment stops.

But I don't think I'm standing on procedure.  It's a two step process for me.  One, would Terri Schiavo have a right to declare via a living will what her desires were regarding this disaster?  Answer: absolutely.  That's not procedural.  Second, absent a living will, is a Court competent to examine evidence to determine her intent?  Right now, yes.  It's a law that can be changed, and I'm neutral as to the law so long as it is evenly applied.

Is this a nightmare of a case?  Yes.  It appears to be a very close decision, with mixed evidence of Ms. Schiavo's intent.  I am comfortable with people declaring the judge got it wrong - they do all the time.  But I don't think anything I've seen leads me to conclude the damning conclusion you seem to have reached - that the government declared Terri Schiavo unfit to live.  That just didn't happen, at all.  That wasn't the criteria at all, other than the examination of Ms. Schiavo's intent only occurred because she herself was rendered incommunicado.

Bottom line is that I'm fine with "erring on the side of life" if the policies proposed are to alter the nature of competent evidence and the manner by which it is brought before the Court.  Either way is actually fine by me.  I'm fine with the policy proposal that living wills should be abolished - I'll fight that, but I can understand the opposing side.  But I'm not in favor of "killing off our disabled," and I don't think the people that agree with me are either.  I don't think the result of this case supports that conclusion.

We'll see. The Florida Legislature has a lot on its plate right now, but I suggest that some stuff is gonna change soon.

A little birdy I trust tells me so.

I commented regarding a specific remark you made. Anything else is irrelevant to the fact that you implied that trevino was politicizing the issue.

You were out of line, and a graceful person would admit that.

I'm not sure of your point.

What the public thinks doesn't matter. My point, expressed much better by Morris, is that when a group gets so shrill in public they lose support.

And for the record, I would disagree that either steel tariffs or farm subsidies come from the economic wing of the Republican Party. Both are ill conceived attempts to buy votes in targeted states, both supported by small cadres from both parties. Economic benefits of either are less than 0.

Thank you for your kind words.  

I'm not picking on you by any stretch of the imagination.  But after working so hard a clever nick (at least to me), you are the 3rd or 4th person to call me Dom :-(.  Not sure why that is.

  I'd be be very surprised to see laws passed making more difficult to reject medical care for yourself. Hardly anyone wants that, in my opinion.

 What I could see happening would be laws making it more difficult to withdraw care from those who have not, for whatever reason, been able to express their wishes about the withdrawal of care.  But that is very different.

for that to come out so snarky.  I apologize for that.  

I do not believe the Lord gave us clear guidelines on extending the life of a person through artificial means.  How does the Schiavo case differ from a person on a respirator?  I don't see the distinction you are making between the two.  I should first ask if you are making a distinction between the two?

In my mind it is either always wrong to stop treatment if it is keeping a person alive or it isn't.  If it is sometimes right to stop a person's treatment then I believe the Lord gave us some responsibility to make that decision.  If he did indeed give us some responsibility to make that decision it seems to me you and I are disagreeing about when we get to make that decision and when we do not get to make it.  

If my many assumptions are correct, when is it right for us to make the decision to stop medical treatment and when is it not right to do that?

I doubt most folks will care. Internet denizens, sure, but we're a vocal and mildly amusing minority. Most folks will go on with their lives. Maybe they'll like what they see, maybe not. In my experience, folks hate even thinking of their deaths.

I was teasing about the shrill rejoinder of those who go after Bush for those things, not for invoking them as good. Especially given that his free trade credentials are impressive to say the least.

Due to one fact I would suggest that the polls in this case carry more moral weight than similar polls would have in cases like the internment of Japanese-Americans or slavery. In those latter cases the people being polled (the vast majority of them at least) would not, by definition, have been in the position of a slave or an internee. However in this case everyone is potentially a Terri Schiavo. Hence public opinion is neither morally "cheap" nor insignificant, but has a degree of self-relexivity about it. If people are willing to see PVS patients die from lack of nourishment then they are making that decision, hypothetically at least, for themselves as well.

(Before I wade further into this fight let me state that my own bias is in favor of life in these cases and I more or less agree with Charles Krauthammer, that in cases where the immediate family is conflicted family members who argue for life and are willing to assume guardianship should be allowed to do so.)

It seems rather difficult to me, although I note I don't find the Schiavo case particularly difficult.

Because I'm having difficulty remaining civil; so take this as a response to both you and Thomas:

We are discussing the procedures of the United States of America, here.  Your references to the procedures of other nations are irrelevant.

______

As a final note:  I will admit to being more than shaken by Trevino's allusion to John Brown.  John Brown, let it be noted, fought for good.  But, your attempt to elevate the will of the majority over the will of the family in this matter is not good.  Nor are the attempts to disturb the functioning of the civil courts.  Nor are death threats against judges.  More to the point, Ms. Schiavo's sad case certainly does not justify the tactics that may have been justified in the case of Mr. Brown.

Thus, insofar as your ill-considered allusion to John Brown suggests an adoption of Mr. Brown's tactics of armed insurrection in this case, understand the following:  I will be on the barricades.  And I used to be a pretty good shot.*

You want to change the law?  Use the processes available.  If you find that you can't convince a majority of Americans -- and I suspect, thank God, that you won't be able to on this issue -- do what every other minority group does in a democracy:  get on with your lives.

(I suspect that the whole "John Brown" bit is a bit of overblown rhetoric; if so, I mean the foregoing in the same spirit.  If it's not mere rhetoric, however, you're going to find that having "moderate" political positions is not the equivalent to a lack of conviction.)

von

*Granted, I was twelve and it was with a .22 rifle.  ;-)

is a public laughingstock down here (I live in St Pete). Expect no solonic miracles out of Talahassee! In 2003 the legislature was so incompetent it would not even agree on a memorial tribute to Mr Rogers let alone on a budget. In 2004 the session ended with the state Senate tying one on at happy hour and sneaking back into the Capitol building to toilet paper the state House chambers!

IMO, gov Bush should be proposed for sainthood for having endured that three ring circus all these years.

Also creep me out, von.  I hear them from time to time when people are working the great overarching analogy of abolition and anti-abortion.  Whatever nobilty Brown may have had in his cause does nothing to vindicate his terrible cruelty and violence.  Period.  He was a terrorist, in every sense of the word.

Re: More to the point, Ms. Schiavo's sad case certainly does not justify the tactics that may have been justified in the case of Mr. Brown.

John Brown was a terrorist. Even had his cause been ten times more sacred than it was (and certainly it was a good cause!) that could not excuse his tactics.

I don't know if I normally agree with you or not, but I agree with your post in its entirety.


Very well said.

To Trevino.

Note also the specific procedures being debated.  Broadly:  those of the United States of America.  Specific to this case:  The procedure by which the family -- not the government -- decides end of life issues.  (See also my above comments on the role of neutral arbiters in the process, and why it an error by one such arbiter is not necessarily a system-wide failure.)

linking this to killing the disabled.  We all saw that.  What I think he objected to was those here (& out there) who claim this is the same as killing the disabled.  You may make that argument but a large majority, a super majority if you will, of americans has clearly said it is not.  That is how the "politicizing" of the issue has played out.

Allowing her to finally meet her maker was the right thing to do.

Many of us disagree on this issue.  That doesn't mean you are or have a right to call anyone here murderers.

I usually like Krauthammer, but I wasn't impressed with this suggestion from him.

There's a reason that a guardian is appointed rather than a group of people. A single person to make decisions is preferable to getting a concensus from a group. Especially in trying times it's hard to get everybody to agree. Check with any family that's fought a bitter legal battle over who Gramps promised his prize rifle to.

The spouse is considered the default decisionmaker for people who can't make decisions, and that's a good thing. After the marriage the spouse becomes the closest relative a person has, outranking siblings and parents. The unintended consequences of giving blood relatives veto over decisions would be too great.

Re: I always thought the good Lord gave us clear guidelines so that we'd know where the bright lines are, and we could tell when we're stepping over them.

One big problem we have these days is that our technology is taking us into unexplored territory where there are no clear guidelines because the situations could not have arisen in the past. Cloning, and embryo research in general obviously comes to mind. Likewise with many of these end to life issues. 100 years ago Ms Schiavo would have long since died of natural causes (pneumonia or possibly gangrene) years before things reached this impasse. Unless the Lord decides to dictate new Scrotures to handle new circumstances we are going to have to do the heavy lifting of determing the ethical in this new world the hard way.

You said what I was too angry to say.  

...public opinion polls?  The methodology often varies from pollster pollster, the phrasing of the questions most certainly does.

When taking a life or death decision like this, should the arbitrer be influenced by the opinion of, say, 500 people randomly called at dinnertime, with any margin or error at all?

This was a case of a woman who had suffered brain damage.  Neurologists do not understand the complexities of the human brain nearly fully; how is a guy answering questions between commercials of a sitcom supposed to have it all figured out?

Life is to be valued, and innocent human life is to be protected.  Terri's brain was impaired to the point where she could not do many things, perhaps most things.  There are human beings alive today born with only brain stems.  Do we kill them?  There are people confined to wheel chairs since birth with brain deficiencies?  Do they die?  People are injured, and each brain injury is different.  Which die, which don't?  And who decides?

"That's why we have courts," frankly, is a frightening suggestion.

Not recently, but I think we've tried to rhetorically bounce some rocks off each other's heads before.  I'm one of those liberals who lives in a red state and posts at RedState.  

But that's all in good fun - and common ground is common ground, no matter where you may find it.

Re: the collective health of our nation.

Whenever word "collective good" (or "collective health") starts appearing in arguments on public policy it's a good idea to hide your wallet and keep your powder dry. For sure there's some sort of socialism sneaking in under the radar.

When it comes to Trevino I don't think that is one of the things we should fear.

the courts in this case feel just as good morally about it as you seem to think of yourselves.

I realize that casting stones may make you feel morally superior, but we don't agree nor share your opinion on that matter.

You don't have the moral high ground any more than we do.  But I don't expect you to agree to that.

Von, I think the attitudes of people like you are exactly what Trevino and others are, rightly, incensed at.  I think there is a reasonable position that differs from Trevino's, but your's isn't it.

The fundamental issue is how we define life.

This is a bit chilling (and I love understatements).  If you have a view that her spirit and soul left long ago that's one thing, but it's not the issue. The issue is what did Ms. Schiavo want and who gets to determine what she intended.

The secondary question, which you do address in part, is who decides the first question.

No. Wrong.  Whether she constituted a "life" was never an issue.  The issue was a) could she refuse treatment and b) who makes gets to make the call on whether she expressed an intent to refuse.




Faulty, and dangerous, reasoning like yours has partly caused the fiasco over this situation.  

to determine whether the person in question had an opinion as to their treatment.  No more, no less.  And the court can put that opinion into effect, on behalf of that person.  The Court decided nothing else.

Re: After the marriage the spouse becomes the closest relative a person has

In many cases I doubt the wisdom of a spouse being treated as next-of-kin. Modern marriage has become so weak an institution (and so easily dissolved) that this is fast becoming as foolish as giving a business partner such carte blanche over life and death matters. I have seen enough disastrous marriages to conclude that in matters not internal to the marriage (jointly held assets, children, etc.) blood family is more trustworthy on the whole.

of the old doctor joke: What's the difference between God and a doctor? God doesn't think he's a doctor.

Substitute "judge" for doctor.

I don't think Walt was out of line at all.

Trevino is linking the Schiavo case to "killing the disabled" and using it as a platform for future political activism.   That to me is what is out of line.

Trevino is the one that is out of line, and should be ashamed.  

...has been pulled by Trevino.

I don't feel good about it at all. I recognize that a mistake could have been made.  The court system is run by humans and it's imperfect just like every other human institution.  

We are discussing the procedures of the United States of America, here.  Your references to the procedures of other nations are irrelevant.

No on two counts.  First, you referred to procedure per se as a moral value.  Second, now that you are restricting your argument to American procedure, you're still wrong, for the exact same reasons enumerated above.  Merely replace Zimbabwe, et al., with Mississippi c.1960, as you prefer.

....your attempt to elevate the will of the majority over the will of the family....

I shouldn't have to point out that I am elevating what's right over the will of the family (by which you mean husband) here.  That what's right may be concurrent with the will of the majority -- which you go on, I note, to deny -- is irrelevant to my argument.

Thus, insofar as your ill-considered allusion to John Brown suggests an adoption of Mr. Brown's tactics of armed insurrection....

It's almost as if I didn't write that Brown "rightly" suffered the consequences of his actions.

....understand the following:  I will be on the barricades.  And I used to be a pretty good shot.

Oh, good God.

If you find that you can't convince a majority of Americans....do what every other minority group does in a democracy:  get on with your lives.

And cast down your bucket where you are!  Right.

At what point was this not a public policy matter?

Thanks for playing.

Wait, do you really agree with this statement, Trevino?

No. Wrong.  Whether she constituted a "life" was never an issue.  The issue was a) could she refuse treatment and b) who makes gets to make the call on whether she expressed an intent to refuse.

Because if you do agree with that statement, it's hard to see what this case has to do with protecting the disabled, or with abortion.

I tend to see things the way SouthernGent does, although I also think it's impossible to fully separate this casse from the question of what constitutes "life."

Whether we equate humanity with cognition (or the potential for cognition), seems relevant to our view of what happened here, though perhaps irrelevant to the legal issues.

I've read several of your comments, and my question is ... What is the system you suggest?

Medical treatments for people with brain injuries are withdrawn every single day. Sure, neurologists don't know everything about the brain, but they know enough to know when there's no hope. Families make heart rending decisions every day, not because they are unfeeling but because they come to the decision that a person wouldn't want to live in such a state and it's time to say goodbye.

You obviously don't like the current system where medical care can be withdrawn from people with horrific brain injuries. But I'm honestly asking what you would rather see. Is there ever a time that medical treatment can be withdrawn? Would a written directive make a difference? Does a person have a right to reject care on their own, or do you just object when a trusted family memeber makes the decision when the patient is no longer able?

I'm not trying to be confrontational here. I personally think the decisions in the Schiavo case were right or pretty close. I'd just be interested in your view what the system should be if today's laws and norms are that badly broken.

...public policy you're fighting for?

What exactly, are you advocating?

What, is the public policy, or policies, which should be debated, based upon the particulars of this case, for the good of the republic?

Would you have the law force treatment on me just because of your moral superiority?




I understand you are taking time on this. I think it's deserving of a separate story.

the court decided the life-or-death fate of this brain damaged woman.

'T is unsettling.

I don't buy into that at all. For the last milennia or better the relationship between spouses has been considered closer for a very good reason -- it's a chosen relationship.

We're stuck with the relatives in the family that the Good Lord places us. We live with the combination of genius and stupidity that afflicts all families.

Spouses are a personal choice. By making that choice we're saying that this is the person of above others that shares my concerns and that I trust to be one with me. The line of the traditional vows "Forsaking all others" is not an accident.

Granted, marriages are less durable than they once were. But this is not a reason to put it behind the blood relatives in importance.

she was allowed to die, there is a difference whether you like it or not.  And all we have to do to avoid that alleged slippery slope of killing handicapped people is keep that distinction clear

That was a very polite reply.  I hope we are able to be kind to one another, even with very contentious issues such as this.

A word I've written, have you?  

No on two counts.  First, you referred to procedure per se as a moral value.  Second, now that you are restricting your argument to American procedure, you're still wrong, for the exact same reasons enumerated above.  Merely replace Zimbabwe, et al., with Mississippi c.1960, as you prefer.

Read my original post.  I'm pretty sure I consistently referenced the procedures of "free society" throughout.  I never, ever stated that any procedure would do.

I shouldn't have to point out that I am elevating what's right over the will of the family (by which you mean husband) here.  That what's right may be concurrent with the will of the majority -- which you go on, I note, to deny -- is irrelevant to my argument.

You cannot possibly be this obtuse.  The current Florida procedures generally elevate the will of the individual and her family over the desires of the state.  Your preferred procedure would do the opposite, elevating the state over the individual.  

And, for the third time:  The fact that the system sometimes commits an injustice is not evidence that the system is unjust.  

It's almost as if I didn't write that Brown "rightly" suffered the consequences of his actions.

Re-read your original post.  Did you not write:

When the United States government executed John Brown -- who broke its laws and paid the rightful price -- it was not the end of the fight for the great moral cause of that era. It was, instead, a grim beginning. But that fight went on, and it was won.

How did the fight go on, Trevino?  How was it "won"?  How is that situation at all comparable to this one?

Oh, good God.

Good.  If you think that my rhetoric was idiotic and overblown, it's at least a tacit admission that you don't believe your own idiotic and overblown rhetoric.  

This is a bit chilling (and I love understatements).  If you have a view that her spirit and soul left long ago that's one thing, but it's not the issue. The issue is what did Ms. Schiavo want and who gets to determine what she intended.

Yes.  That's "how" we define life in this circumstance:  According to Ms. Schiavo's intentions and wishes.  If she would not call her present existence life, then it's not life.

So we're clear, because there's been a lot of unnecessary confusion:  "this circumstance" means a circumstance in which life is being prolonged by artificial means; there is brain function; and there are no reasonable chances for recovery.

No. Wrong.  Whether she constituted a "life" was never an issue.  The issue was a) could she refuse treatment and b) who makes gets to make the call on whether she expressed an intent to refuse.

You lost me on this one.

von

I meant to write, above:  "there is no brain function".  (Again, so we're clear:  With disputes determined first by the family, and second by a neutral arbiter.)

Apparently consists of setting up a well-funded checking account to pay other commenters to respond to his or other comments on their time, and to compensate their loved ones for the lost income that results.

If the process is flawed, in execution or in its underlying assumptions, it does not follow that cutting through that process is bad. Had we a process to enslave millions, breaching that process would be a feat of enormous moral goodness.

What do you do when your moral code and your oath conflict?

I quit my first job because following my oath in that circumstance would have violated elementary principles of justice. Could I not simply switch jobs, I would have resigned my license. Honor requires no less.

your moral code. If you cannot simultaneously uphold your oath of office, you resign your office. You don't get to alter your oath to reflect your moral code.

....you're forgetting what you wrote, viz.:

Indeed, a free society is free only because it rigorously follows the processes that make it so....

Discussing free society as an explicit product of procedure is not the same thing as addressing procedure only within the context of a free society.  Either way, I think my response stands.

I leave it to you to rediscover the differences between "the majority" and "the state."

As for your assertion that an unjust outcome is not evidence of an unjust procedure, it should be obvious we agree in this statement.  Where we disagree is in your contention that the procedure has its own moral content.  Again, this has been addressed.

So sorry the John Brown analogy disturbs you.  Perhaps you would prefer something from the annals of the African National Congress?  The 1960s-era civil rights struggle?

If you think that my rhetoric was idiotic and overblown, it's at least a tacit admission that you don't believe your own idiotic and overblown rhetoric.

This doesn't logically follow, unless you think us the epistemological Wonder Twins, forever bound in our common levels of intellectual credibility.

So much you could learn from reading the thread you're in, eh?

of the Schiavo case has reasonable people on either side. Those that found no problem with Greer's finding of fact of Terri's intent absent documentary evidence vis a vis current FL law - fine. Do realize there are reasonable people who disagree and thought in an area that may be a little rushed in considering Terri's right to life, rather than death, as default absent such documentary evidence.

And that's the rub for the families of the disabled and the profoundly disabled ... because to listen to creepy Felos and the pro-death Dr. Cranford, it was NOT about Terri's "rights" but about Terri's "quality of life."

When there are websites up mocking Terri's condition in the most vicious manner imaginable, then we again approach an arena in which a segment of our population is deemed "lesser than."

It is very disturbing and troubling.

Denial of food and water is "allowing" someone to die?  I suppose denying oxygen would be, too.  Willful starvation and asphyxiation as passive acts: the new morality.

Terri's case shines the light on what is a simple and correct solution:

When should a person stop being given water and food? After they are dead.

No one should be able to write a living will that denies themselves water and food until death. Nor should such a living will be enforced. We should not have the power to instruct others to kill us by withholding water and food until death.

We shouldn't be refering to wills to make a determination whether a person ought to live. We should determine if the person is alive.

If they are alive, they get water and food unless either will kill the person. If they are dead, withdraw the water and food.

In Terri's case, water and food kept her alive for 15 years. Withdrawing water and food killed her in 310 agonizing hours.

....to you or anyone else.  This doesn't mean I don't think there is an objective morality, nor that I should not advocate it.

if you had ended with something along the lines of "Do you understand me? Are you catching my drift? Or am I being... obtuse?"

We are moving away from stupid arguments - "state murdered her" "no it didn't" "yes it did" "your mom" "your mom's mom" and into the real world - living wills should not be able to do X thing, or we shouldn't have living wills.

Let me say I'd be really ticked off if someone made me take sustenance through a tube in my stomach over my objections.  That's the starting point for me on this discussion.

there is an objective morality that should be enforced by the state that would require SouthernGent to be fed by a feeding tube if necessary?  Even over his explicit, no question of fact wishes?

On "free society" -- nope, you've missed it.

On my "rediscover[ing] the differences between 'the majority' and 'the state.'" -- Yup, I screwed up.  I should have used the term "the state" throughout.

Where we disagree is in your contention that the procedure has its own moral content.  Again, this has been addressed.

Perhaps my point will be clearer in the context of a concrete example:  Providing "due process" is adhering to a particular procedure, and it has moral character.  (I use the term according to its original meaning, not according to present notions of "substantive" due process.)  So is the "Writ of Habeus Corpus."

So sorry the John Brown analogy disturbs you.  Perhaps you would prefer something from the annals of the African National Congress?  The 1960s-era civil rights struggle?

Yes, the analogy disturbs me because it's a disturbing analogy.  Had you chosen a less (or non-) disturbing analogy, I probably wouldn't have been disturbed.  

This doesn't logically follow, unless you think us the epistemological Wonder Twins, forever bound in our common levels of intellectual credibility.

Hmm.  I specifically acknowledged that my "to the barricades" rhetoric was overblown at the time I wrote it (again, reading my posts helps).  So I don't think our "intellectual credibilit[ies]" are particularly "bound together."    

exemptions for vaccinations.  Seventh Day Adventists as well as Christian Scientists do not get them, transfusions, or other outside medical care as an article of faith.  I am not aware of any state in the US which would force them.  You just have to fill out a form.

Personally I think the "state murdered her" conversations is already a step up from "husband murdered her" "no he didn't" that was so prevalent a couple of weeks ago.

force glucose & saline solution into people so we can keep their bodies alive indefinately?

I'm sorry but I don't think that jives with any faiths doctrine I know of.

Maybe you would like to explain your beliefs in detail....

that she died in this way (although I do believe that it was legal and nobodies business but that of the family and mr. schiav).  What I am saying is that it is foolish to say that this is in the same hemisphere as killing handicapped people.  Food and water were not withheld from her, they just ceased to be supplied.  Same with oxygen, it was neither witheld nor supplied, but had she been on a respirator,and been taken off, I would see it in the same light as the feeding tube.  Now I know a doctor has a responsibility to supply these things in emergencies or if they are asked for, but a patient has the right to ask to be taken off life support, and nobody accuses the doctors of killing the patient.  In the same vein, Terri Schiavo could not make a request one way or the other, but under the law her guardian could.  Change guardianship laws if you want, but don't pretend this was killing or that it is the beginning of any slide towards starving handicapped people.  

And I would prefer the state enforce it, yes.

As an initial matter, your conflation of morality with progress is ambiguous or at least circular at best. A free society is only free because it follows the procedures that make it free? What if it disregards a single one of those procedures? What makes it better than a society that unerringly follows objectively good, but less objectively free, procedures?

We were a free society from the founding, but to allege that application of our society's procedures inherently made our society a free (or by implication, good) is absurd. It is to elevate process over ends. While the ends may or may not justify the means, we don't seek means, we seek ends. No one files suit to experience the joy of litigation (and this from a litigator who likes his job); they file suit to get a result.

Procedure is never inherently coterminal, or even necessarily overlapping with, morality.

It is an historical truth, albeit a more than slightly disconcerting one, that Brown's death served as a rallying cry for the abolitionist movement, and was arguably part of the glue that held together the Union during the Civil War. Josh rightly notes that Brown deserved death. But let us not pretend that his death did not lend impetus to the end of that evil institution.

The current Florida procedures implicate the State in the resolution of the patient's desires. I don't care if it's the executive, legislative, or judicial, it is nonetheless a truism that invoking its power ultimately suborns the wishes of individuals to that of the State.

I disagree. When you say "water and food" that has the connotations of a steak and beer (or at least oatmeal and water) placed in front of the patient. What we're talking about here is a tube that goes directly to the small intestine (sorry Gengisdon, it goes to the intestine, not the stomach).

Is that invasive enough that it can be refused? I would say yes. That's the current state of the law. We as Americans have the right to reject such procedures for any reason or no reason. If you don't want to follow your doctor's orders you don't have to. I'm not sure many people would want it any other way.

But yes, there is an objective morality.

The State's enforcement of that morality utterly fails to unnerve me.

On "free society" -- nope, you've missed it.

If you say so.  Might want to explain it, given your, you know, actual words above.

Providing "due process" is adhering to a particular procedure, and it has moral character.

The provision of due process has a moral character, yes.  The due process does not.  See?  You're conflating act and method.

So I don't think our "intellectual credibilit[ies]" are particularly "bound together."

The point here is that the sentence was nonsensical.

Food and water were not withheld from her, they just ceased to be supplied.

What does one say to this?

it would have been illegal for the doctors to usher her to death more quickly through drugs, etc... but I bet they would have if it were legal.

We were a free society from the founding, but to allege that application of our society's procedures inherently made our society a free (or by implication, good) is absurd.

Thomas, I'm not positing anything controversial here.  The U.S. has remained a free (and good) society because it has followed certain procedural rules.  They include:

1.  Adherence to a tri-part government -- legislative, judicial, and executive (in many ways, the ultimately procedural safeguard).
   
2.  The requirement of due process before we take someone's life, liberty, or property.
   
3.  Adherence to the rule of law (which, really, is an aspect of #1 and 2):  that is, the person who "enforces" the law is not the same person who makes the "law" who is not the same person who "interprets" the law.

A society that fails to abide by any of the foregoing is a society, in general, is on the road to Hell.  Which, to toss in the old adage, is generally paved with good intentions.  (Again, there are exceptions to the above.)

I'd be even more ticked off if it went to my stomach, eh :-).

The state's will over the individual's will?  Please tell me you are not serious...

I can't imagine the distinction.

Does that objective morality mandate a feeding tube for SouthernGent, or me for that matter, if I make it explicit and unquestionable that I do not want that done?

Whether you think there is or isn't objective morality isn't important to me - what that morality tells you to do (or tells the state to do is.

Whether the state enforces your flavor of morality or not doesn't depend so much on your observance of its objectivity, but how many people you can convince to agree with you.  Which in the end makes it subjective in its application.

Support of the state's will over individual will.  That is absolutely ridiculous, this country was founded on the principle of individual freedom and freedom from state imposed will.  How can you possibly support the government determining what is "right" for you, instead of your or your guardian determining what is right for you?  Who do you think knows better, the government, or you/family?

That's my conclusion.




My more problematic dilemma is what to do when your oath to the Constitution conflicts with a superior court's ruling.

The provision of due process has a moral character, yes.  The due process does not.  See?  You're conflating act and method.

You're drawing an imaginary line.  The "act" is to follow the "method."    

Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness -- in what we can assume is an order-of-precedence listing -- is not equivalent to the supremacy of the individual will.

....I recognize no right to suicide.  Even by starvation.

Yes.  That's "how" we define life in this circumstance:  According to Ms. Schiavo's intentions and wishes.  If she would not call her present existence life, then it's not life.

No it's not how we define life. If you want to say she wouldn't want to keep her life in that condition that's closer, but to say that the issue is whether you definite it as a life is just flat out wrong.  If you feel that I'm wrong I would ask that you give me some source in the documents of the case that the issue was whether she was legally alive or not.




As to the second part I would say that I was unclear, and I think that's because your second question is irretrievably tied to the first question.

They might take issue with the requirement that one adhere to a "tri-part government -- legislative, judicial, and executive."

We gave due process to slaves. You may not like the process, you may think it was minimal, but we had laws for the import, sale, transmission, control, and manumission of slaves. Those laws were enforced and interpreted by courts (which satisfies 3. for you). I would respectfully submit that there was nevertheless an absence of goodness inherent there.

While I'm impressed with the succinctness of 3., I say again: What of the United Kingdom? Their executive is part of their legislative, and their courts derive their power (as I understand it) from Parliament. And the problem with 3. in our unique case is that we expect the three branches to be in conflict, lest the government accrete too much power to itself. Your exposition implies that they work in harmony. Why were the Founders wrong?

I'm intrigued: Do Article I courts violate number three?

Why should the state at any time determine how someone else should live or choose not to live their life?  I personally do not think that having a liquified brain is life, I do not think laying in a hospital bed for 15 years making involuntary movements is life.  

The bottom line is that the law determines that the guardian has say when the said person can't.  

do you claim to have to deny my personal wishes about my medical care? If I choose not to live in such a state, who are you, and what authority do you speak with to tell me what I can and can't do in regards to my medical care?

God gave us all free will. I won't infringe on others, but I will make my own choices. If they are wrong on this topic the only person I need to answer to is God, not to those who want to tell me how I can or can't die.

This procedure-morality point is extremely important, and I don't want it misunderstood due to a lack of clarity on my part.

Let's assume that Governor Jeb Bush decides that, from this point on, the procedure will be that the Governor (whomever he is) will "make," "interpret," and "enforce" the law.  The Legislator and Courts will serve as advisors only.  Can I get general agreement that knowing what we know about human nature, this procedure is not "good" -- i.e., it is inimical to a free society?

The will of the individual has nothing to do with it. There is no "right" to suicide. Assisting a suicide is illegal for precisely this same reason.

"Individual will" isn't a trump card that beats all others. I may will to kill someone, but the state has no right to interfere. Someone may have the will to commit rape, but that doesn't mean that the state should allow them to do so.

In this particular case, the will of the individual was not known. Heresay evidence isn't enough to convict a suspect in a capital murder trial, and sure as hell shouldn't have been enough to condemn an innocent woman to death.

This case was a travesty, morally, ethically, and legally.

Why don't we have the right to suicide?  Why does every person need to be "saved?"  If someone wants to kill themselves, let them.  As Americans', we have the right to do whatever we wish, as long as it doesn't break any laws.  Last time I checked, suicide wasn't against the law.  As much as you might not like suicide, or feel that the person is committing a sin that can never be forgiven if that is your belief, it certainly is that person's right to do that if they wish.  This is why we all live in America.

a helpless woman yearning to live and being cruelly killed by the system or whatever you want to call it, so anything I say on the subject that actually deals with the specifics you'll just respond with "ugh". But there are distinctions here.  This was about her right to die.  Had you been her guardian you would have a say in this, but you aren't.

Re: We gave due process to slaves.

??!!?

Slaves did not become slaves because they were sentenced to slavery in a court of law, pursuant to laws that defined slavery as a penalty for criminal infractions. This was true in some cases of ancient and medieval slavery, but not in American racially based slavery. American slaves were slaves because they (or their ancestors) were kidnapped into slavery. This is not remotely "due process."

I'm not trying to be pedantic (although I have a sinking feeling that I am today).  Does that mean you support state intervention to stick a feeding tube into my small intestine over my explicit objection, whether those objections be verbalized at the time or preserved in the appropriate writing from some time prior.  This is where the rubber meets the road of objective morality and public policy.

And I apologize for being one-tracked on this one.

Personally my objective morality (wink) leaves me very conflicted on the issue of suicide, but fairly clear on the issue of refusing medical treatment.  The Schiavo case straddled my line on that issue, although it's pretty clear it was well to one side for you.

I've thought about that distinction a lot. It's definitely a distinction. The question is whether "it is distinction without a difference?" (hat tip, Marshall, C.J. circa 1813)

... the UK.  But, to be clear, I don't intend to suggest that other sets of "procedures" cannot also be "good."  My point is that we can talk about procedures being moral (or immoral).  The "how" you do something is, in some ways, more important than what gets done.  The means matter.

Re: I suppose denying oxygen would be, too.  Willful starvation and asphyxiation as passive acts: the new morality.

When a person is taken off a respirator they asphyxiate to death. Do you believe that every such case is "murder"? Even the strictest pro-Life organizations (e.g., the Roman Catholic Church) allow for the turning off of respirators in cases of brain death.

the cards?  Just because you don't recognize a thing, no one can do it?  Who made you God of all of us?  Or are you now our King?

If an individual desires to commit suicide, that in no way infringes upon my - or anyone else's - inalienable rights to life, liberty, and pursuit of property.  Thus, one's right to life implies one's right to deprive themselves of it.  Obviously, the other scenarios you mentioned (murder, rape) do necessarily involve the violent agression of a person's right to life and liberty and are therefore legitimately prohibited by the state.

Might want to explain it, given your, you know, actual words above.

See my comments to Thomas, below.  Failures in communication generally begin with the writer rather than the reader.  Mea culpa.

The will of the individual has everything to do with it.  As an American I have a right to do whatever I wish.  If I choose to kill someone that is my right, but I will have to suffer state consequences because it is against the law.  We do not live in "Minority Report" where you are arrested before you even break the law, nor do I wish to live in a society like that.  

In this particular case, the will of the individual may have not been written down, but the verbal confirmation was enough to satisfy the law.  That woman was condemned to death 15 years ago when she had a heart attack induced by her bulimia.

The only thing that was a travesty in this whole thing is how a private matter became a very public circus.  I am convinced if her parents had been better "guardians" when she was able that none of this would have ever happened.  How many 26 year old women have heart attacks that are healty and not participating in any behavior to contribute to it?  During this whole thing, many people seem to be missing the point that she was bulimic, which caused her heart attack.  She was starving herself to begin with.

Because then, arrogating power hogs that they are, the other government actors would try to do the same thing. Human nature's quite predictable, really.

I'm guilty of using loose language here.  On re-reading, I think your suggested formulation is indeed closer to what I mean:  "If you want to say she wouldn't want to keep her life in that condition that's closer[.]"

Okay, Josh and Thomas, I'll bite: what exactly is this objective morality of which you speak?  Where does it come/derive from, and who do I consult to find out the objective morality of an action (or inaction), taken or contemplated?  

Re: But yes, there is an objective morality.

I agree with this statement. Where I see a problem is in the propositon that we can have perfect knowledge of morality. In fact I am even skeptical that our moral knowledge is as good as our knowledge of, say, physics. The very fact that there are so many moral disagreements over issues suggests that our moral intelligence is not sufficient for perfect, or even highly accurate, knowledge of morality, else we would have at least as much agreement as we do on matters of physics and astronomy. This being the case I think it is wisest wherever possible and practical to move the locus of moral decision making as far down the social ladder as possible, all the way to the individual when we can. (In some cases of course where there is conflict between individuals it will be necessary to invoke some higher and binding authority to resolve the conflict.) Certainly there is no reason to believe that the state (which is really just shorthand for individuals who do the work of the state) possesses moral knowledge superior to the individual citizen. Indeed, history is full of examples which imply otherwise. And even in cases where the individual is not competent to make his own decisions, it would be preferrable for those closest to him to make them, not some distant authority. Of course exceptions exist, and the state has a role as a neutral (hopefully) arbiter. But I find any notion of the state as a superior moral authority to be completely unsupportable.

(By the way  Thomas, I am puzzled by your endless use of the phrase "the Sovereign". In the USA the only Sovereign is the People themselves, and the People exist as a reality only insofar as individual citizens do.)

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,

To say that because the right to Life precedes the right to Liberty it follows that you can be forced to stay alive in violation of your Right to libery has to be the epitome of a non sequitur.




If the founders were right and these rights are indeed inalienable then what moral authority would any government have to deny your right to liberty?




I would be happy to hear from treatises(perhaps the Bible??) on natural law and morality other than the Declaration if they support your thesis.

It seems to me a fundamental issue that has to be addressed in the context of this argument is in what class of cases does the the majority have the right to overrule the rights of the minority. So before we can answer the question of the specific cases in which the majority can overrule the minority in the context of medical treatments, we have to determine the general class of cases in which the majortity gets to make this decision.

You mentioned the specific cases of vaccination and suicide.  I think I can buy the argument on vaccination, as the failure to vaccinate has implications for persons other than the vaccinee (or, more accurately, the non-vaccinee).  I think on some prior post in the past, you argued for a right of quarantine.  Again, I understand and agree with that, failure to quarantine could have dramatic health implications for society as a whole.  I would also add that the decision to undertake an abortion is a decision that will result in harm to another life and society rightly should have a say in that decision.

Honestly, I'm scratching my head on suicide.  I realize the family and friends left behind by the persons who commit suicide may be financially and emotionally devasted, but we can say that about many other decisions a person can make as well.  In other words, whether a decision causes others emotional harm should not necessarily be a criteria in restricting the liberty of the decision maker.

It seems to me, at a very general and simplistic level, that if my failure to undergo a particular treatment or procedure (or my decision to undertake a particular procedure) will result in a substantial risk of physicial harm to others, society has a right to compel me to undertake (or not undertake, as the case may be) the procedure.  If, however, no such risk will arise from my decision, then society should have no right to restrict my liberty to make a decision about my own body.

In the context of the Schiavo case, Ms. Schiavo clearly had the legal right to have her tube removed, I also think she had the moral right to have her tube removed.  We can argue over whether in fact she made the decision to remove the tube, but it troubles me greatly that we would argue over her right to remove the tube.  I would also add that as a political matter I think it unlikely that a majority of Americans would approve of legislation taking the right to make those types of decisions from them.    

Because then, arrogating power hogs that they are, the other government actors would try to do the same thing. Human nature's quite predictable, really.

As some have pointed out in the Schiavo case, Courts do not have the means to enforce their orders.  Nor do Legislatures have the means to enforce their laws.  

I accept that, and I still think that some hold believe your previous wording and that's what's troubling people.  Or (different but same result) many think that's what a lot of people think and that's why they're troubled.

The Thomas Card, despite the source perhaps, is such a good term.

Where not only can you not own firearms you can't defend your home with a knife or even ring it with barbed wire for fear it may hurt an intrduer.




Slavery was a stain on our nations honor. The Founders chose to compromise on an issue that does not allow honorable compromise. We paid for that in the 1860s with thousands of lives(and continue to pay).  Thomas, you take issue with those who defend "state's rights" as clinging to a shadow of that conflict. Why can't you let go of a long ago sin?  To use slavery, ended over a hundred years ago, as straw man to attack our system of government is absurd.




Even though absurd, slavery is no indictment of our system but rather of the flawed people who put it in place.  It was a compromise that did not affect the structure of our (national level) government.  A war and an amendment fixed it without affecting the interplay of the three branches.

Might I suggest paragraphs? It makes posts much easier to read.

Food and water were not withheld from her, they just ceased to be supplied.

This precise point tilts the discussion toward assisted suicide, and opponents of assisted suicide have weighed in on those grounds.

Nader noted (1):

"Spoon-feeding is not medical treatment. This outrageous order proves that the courts are not merely permitting medical treatment to be withheld, it has ordered her to be made dead,"

Cockburn concurred (2):

I think Nader has it right. "Her parents want to take care of Terri. There is no state interest in letting her die. As far as the 'persistent vegetative state' is concerned, Terri is not on life support, heart pump or ventilator. If her biological family wants to take care of her, why should Michael Schiavo retain the power to pull the feeding tube from his spouse?

1. http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2005/3/25/133507.shtml
   
2. http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/2/2005/1098

in this case.  Taking away someones life support would be killing them if they didn't want it taken away.  If they did want it taken away, it would not be killing them.  Under Florida law, Michael Schiavo spoke for Terri on this issue, therefore under the law she did want life support to be taken away.  We can disagree with who should have the ultimate say, but I see only three options here, either Michael had it, or the parents had it, or the government had it.  I would have thought the final option would have been laughable in this crowd up until recently.

"We gave due process to slaves. You may not like the process, you may think it was minimal, but we had laws for the import, sale, transmission, control, and manumission of slaves. Those laws were enforced and interpreted by courts (which satisfies 3. for you)."

That's kind of like saying we currently give due process to DVD players.

I accept that, and I still think that some hold believe your previous wording and that's what's troubling people.

I don't think that my lack of clarity on that particular point is the problem; at least, that's not where my debate with Thomas and Trevino has gone.  But I appreciate your understanding in accepting my correction.

Assuming Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness were put in an order of priority by the Founders and that the founders were right:




It follows that when there is a conflict between two individuals with competing rights at risk of being inhibited then we take the risk in favor of the right that comes first.




Example: If a woman's right to Liberty conflicts with a baby's right to Life then we should prefer the baby's rights.

Values are always in tension, and sometimes a value that we consider to be a high one (ie. personal freedom) has to take a back seat to one that is objectively higher (ie. life). The whole framework of natural rights is based on the supremacy of life as a value - a state that does not value life can never be free, and without life property is rather meaningless. The most fundamental part of civilization is the recognition of the value of others.

Just as a building can't stand if its foundation is crumbling, society can't stand if respect for life is systematically degraded.

Or we would leave litigants in the pretrial phase forever.

There may be an argument that the orderly administration of process is more important than a single achieved end; but the idea that the how of an execution is effected than whether that death is rightly effected is perverse. Empty obedience of form does not trump objectively right ends.

Procedure, even with lots of appeals and jurors and press releases, is not good or bad, except that it yields just results. Our system is only good insofar as it produces objectively good results. Insofar as it fails to do so, it is not good.

Just not "substantive" due process. There were laws passed, ruled on, and enforced by the sovereign that either took it for granted that these people should be slaves, or left them in that position. There was no extrajudicial force applied. It was all done with suits and briefs and applications of law.

Of course, that kind of makes my point: Process is not a good in itself. Which is where I was going with that comment.

Taking away someones life support would be killing them if they didn't want it taken away.  If they did want it taken away, it would not be killing them.

If it's kiling in once instance it's killing in the other.


"Killing" is an action.  It is not based on moral judgments or intentions.  If you run a

(who dies as a result) you have killed them even though you may not be morally or legally responsible for their death.




 The Dictionary.com definition works.

I think there are perfectly good arguments about states' rights. I simply meant in that long ago thread that federalism doesn't just mean states' rights.

And I was addressing only the idea that a free society is made of men, and even the processes of a free society are not inherently moral.

Which is to say, I don't think we're in as great a conflict as you think.

she did.  And the court found that she had.  What is so hard to understand about that?  

The court did not decide that she was better off alive or dead.  The court did not decide on the value of her life.  The court decided that she had sufficiently expressed her wishes to not be kept alive as a permanent vegetable.  Something you are allowed to do in every state in the union.  

Is is so hard to believe that this woman might have told her husband that she wouldn't want her consciousless body kept alive for 15 years?  I know I have told my wife that.  Have you?

That's rather my point. Process is not by itself sufficient to make a moral case.

the statement above seems to deny Locke, et al..

(I'm the one who pointed it out.)

But legislatures fund both. And courts carry all too much moral capital with our society.

[ ] right to [ ] conflicted with [ ]'s right to [ ].




Care to fill in the blanks?

then when I go insane, get elected governor, read too much OBL on the AJ, and decree that objective morality now demands that men wear beards, you wont be able to stop me.

my point being that I agre that there is objective morality. However, there is subjective agreement on what that objective morality is.

In the Schiavo case?

"substantive" due process




Poor terminology for a conservative and a Court critic, no?

As he seemed to be saying that it was not substantive due process; I said it is due process, just not the substantive kind (insofar as such a thing exists, which it does, but not the way the Court means it). My larger point is that due process, at best, frames the moral issue; it does not answer it.

No one contends that "[p]rocess is ... a good in itself."

....he's no business of mine.

If someone wants to kill themselves, let them.

When is the next Objectivist Club meeting, anyway?

Piers Anthony.

No, seriously.  Think "natural law."

If it doesn't affect you, what concern of yours, eh?

I see school just let out.

To the charge of misreading, so please tell me -- you know me, I'm serious -- how this:

It seems to have completely escaped your attention that, in many cases (including this one), procedure is morality.  Indeed, a free society is free only because it rigorously follows the processes that make it so (aka, the "rule of law").  Any time you abandon process to reach the result that you perceive is "right," you are cutting at the heart of the very thing that makes us good.

Is not saying that

[p]rocess is ... a good in itself.

You are either saying that procedure is morality of an indeterminate content, but morality nonetheless, and that our society is free because it follows that morality, and that any end-around of that process is cutting to the heart of the moral indetermination that not coincidentally but not by force of its goodness makes us good, or you are saying that our process is a good in itself.

Or am I wrong?

As I recall the Samaritan wanted help.  What if the Samaritan had said "get the f@$% away from me you filthy Jew, I don't want help from you.  (ok, maybe not the greatest analogy, but you catch my drift).

I realize in the context of Terri Schiavo we can honestly debate whether she had told the rest of us to bud out, but assuming she had, we should.

Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11 (1905).


"...this court holds that as to an adult residing in the community, and a fit subject of vaccination, the statute is not invalid as in derogation of any of the rights of such person under the Fourteenth Amendment."




That it?

As an American I have a right to do whatever I wish.  If I choose to kill someone that is my right....

Preferred political ideology of idiots, six-year olds and psychopaths.

but I not sure this is responsive to the question.

I knew it involved Massachusetts. Thanks.

...that they do not.

In the parable I believe the Samaritan was the helper not the helpee...




If the man on the roadside had refused to be taken for help should the Samaritan throw him over his shoulder anyway?

Christ never said anything about waiting for consent to help the sick and dying.

I still invite you to give me a source (a document that recites it I suppose) of this natural law principle.  


I especially would like to hear a Biblical justification - as in chapter and verse.

I would indeed be wrong. But to what court can we apply for redress when teh courts themselves, guardians of process, are cast aside?

none - and the victim of injustice may know they are well and truly righteous, ut righteousness does little in and of itself to redress that injustice.

and thats where morality of process comes into play. Not all process is moral, but in teh search for objective truth as a guidance to policy, process is the best route (just as teh scientific method is teh best route for scienctific discovery. And participatory democracy is teh best route to governance. The other routes suck less.)

As I recall (and really my recollections are quite dangerous here), Christ chartered his followers to feed the hungry and heal the sick (among other things).  Did he actually address the issue of the incurably ill?  That is an honest question, because I don't remember from my reading of the Bible.

I suspect the answer is no, because of the implicit (explicit?) understanding that the followers of Christ had the power to move mountains and undertake miracles if only they had faith.  Though, I also thought Jesus taught his followers to pray "Thy [God not man's] will be done".  So, I am not sure the Bible helps us answer a problem that did not exist in first century Judea.

In other words, had it not been for modern technology, Terri would have assuredly died 15 years ago (i.e., for sake of argument, God's will was that she died until we dangerously and arrogantly interferred and played God).  Of course, you would respond (quite correctly) that God gave us brains to help figure out how to help people avoid death (teach a man to fish and all that).  But here is the rub, at present our brains have enabled us to figure out how to keep people in pvs alive, but they have not figured out a way in which we can restore them to a more functioning state.

Allright, I'm not sure where I am going with this other than to say, I don't think we can resort to quotes from the Bible to solve the complicated questions posed by Terri Schiavo type problems.  Of course, I'm a confused Deist, so don't trust me on this one : )    

My question goes unanswered.




On Christ: That lends itself to objective analysis.  I'm hoping that Trevino, or you for that matter, will give some Biblical justification for forcing treatment on someone or even the immorality of refusing treatment.

We can refuse salvation.  I don't believe Christ said anything about ignoring the wishes of those who do not want to be saved.  

Does Christ care more about our body than our soul?  

who determines where we find natural law?  Are we all born knowing it?  What if I think it know it, but I'm badly confused?

I believe the Bible said the second death was worse than the first.

With two different, albeit similar, sets of injunctions.

Admittedly, if one or the other must succumb to Death, it should be the body.

Decent, introductory primer.

"Indeed, a free society is free only because it rigorously follows the processes that make it so (aka, the "rule of law")."

I'm beginning to see that I may have inadvertently copied Wittgenstein on this one:  Not his brilliance (if any) or subject matter, but his ability to confound through tautology (e.g., "Whereof we cannot speak, thereof we must be silent").  To put that sentence into English:

A process can either be moral or immoral.  Thus, I'm not saying that "process is a good in itself" but that "process can be a good in itself."

Or, to put the implied assumptions into the first paragraph:

"[A] free society is free only because it rigorously follows the [good] processes that make it [free]."

It's much like the Constitution.  Modern technology was around at the writing of neither, but the principles still hold true.  That you don't choose to live by them is your business, but to argue against them due to age is specious.

Out of that list.

First, I made no quotation of the Bible. I spoke in the negative.

Second, leprosy was quite common, quite incurable, and, due to secondary infection, invariably shortened lifespans -- but was incurably ill in the sense you mean it.

Christ wasn't just talking to those he'd given the power to lay on hands.

Except that process is only good if it yields, within the range of human endeavor, good results. Like I said, otherwise, litigation would never leave the pretrial phase.

But even in conjunction, it doesn't answer the question of goodness, merely the limited question to which I was responding.

By the way, did not Christ essentially tell his followers to go and commit suicide by proxy on his behalf (ok, I realize that was unnecessarily provocative).

Jesus told his followers they would be persecuted for his sake.  I also think he also told his followers not to fear those who could kill their bodies, but those who could destroy their souls (ok, I'm probably botching that one a bit, but I think my basic point is right).  Jesus knew he was going to be killed on the cross; Paul knowingly preached the gospel realizing it possibly could (and eventually did) result in his death.

I realize these situations are not analgous to the issues raised by Terri Schiavo, but they do point out that Christ was the ruler of a heavenly and not eartly kingdom and death was not the worst thing for one of his followers.  So, I'm not sure, based on the biblical evidence, that Christ would have held it wrong for a Christian to ask that life support cease when there is no further hope of recovery.

it did not answer my questions.  Can you answer them?

Thou shalt not kill.


That's a start! (not sarcastically)


I don't see how, without an affirmative act, you are killing by declining to force someone to take treatment, food, water, etc.


And the other question is how, according to the Bible, is it immoral to refuse treatment (or food,etc.)?


I think the issue of moral, natural law, and/or Christian reasons for a) forcing treatment and b) the immorality of refusing treatment deserves an in depth treatment by an intelligent author like you or Trevino.

or are you just ignorant regarding natural law? ("ignorant" means lacking knowledge, it's normally not derogatory)

Or we would leave litigants in the pretrial phase forever.

You've lost me.  

Procedure, even with lots of appeals and jurors and press releases, is not good or bad, except that it yields just results.

Would you concede that some procedures are better than others?  For instance, would you agree that it is generally better (as in, more moral) to have some right to an appeal from a conviction, rather than no right to an appeal?  Or to have a rule that a mayor of a city can't seize your property unless he undertakes the process of going to a Court (i.e., another person) and being granted permission?

IOW, can't we agree that some processes are moral, even though they occasionally reach the wrong result; and that other processes are immoral, even though they occasionally reach the right result?  

... but that answer isn't entirely helpful.  Can I assume you mean St. Thomas Aquinas natural law moral theory, i.e. "the rule and measure of human acts is the reason, which is the first principle of human acts"?

Would you consider the Declaration of Independence's We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. an expression of natural law?

How does one resolve the inevitable conflicts between unalienable Rights in practice?  Who gets to decide what infringements on my unalienable rights are, in fact, acceptable, thus making the Rights quite alienable after all?

Elsewhere in this thread you indicated that you do not, for example, recognize any right to commit suicide, and that you're uncertain as to whether a right to decline medical treatment exists.  Do I get to do things that significantly increase the probability that I'll die prematurely, such as smoke, eat unhealthy food, ride a motorcycle without wearing a helmet, and so on?  

What is the distinction between the commands of natural law and those of the nanny state folks?

And please do note that I'm not trying to put you on the spot here, or even disputing anything you've asserted; rather, I'm genuinely interested in your (and Thomas') thoughts about this subject.

so why did you pick his comment to ridicule, when better (and, dare I say, more "nuanced") arguments were made by others along similar lines which would have required some time to construct a more thoughtful response.

I realize there are those who believe in natural law.  I also realize generally what it is supposed to be.  I just don't know who you determine what it is, if is "natural" law.  

where's the principle in the Bible that addresses Terri's situation?  Don't I have to interpret the Bible to determine, from a Christian perspective, how to answer the problems raised by Terri Schiavo's situation.  Since there is no case on point, so to speak, I have to argue from similar cases Jesus did address (to the extent there are any).  I suspect one could find a Biblical justification for decision of a person to cease life support, just as you could find a Biblical condemnation of it.

I'm not sure you are addressing my point.  Assuming for the sake of argument that someone drafts a living will that says if I am incurably ill and the only way my life can be maintained is to exist on a feeding tube, pull the tube.  Does Christian doctrine (a) forbid a person from taking such a step and (b) compel other people to ensure the tube is kept in notwithstanding the wishes of the dying person.

It seems to me a fundamental issue that has to be addressed in the context of this argument is in what class of cases does the the majority have the right to overrule the rights of the minority.

Wouldn't this be better stated as "government overruling the rights of a particular individual"?

Apparently the law now gives a husband the right to euthanize his wife.

Escbc  

...as are a lot of GOP opportunists.  I, for one, have a long list of Republicans for whom I will never cast a ballot.

The nature of man is to be flawed, so it follows then that a flawed people will still implement flawed laws, which is the case today.

We've been found out - we're acting on our beliefs.  I guess we'll have to be sneakier next time about the principles in which we support.

Greer was the sole trier of fact and he found, despite no documentary evidence, and despite conflicting testimony (Mike, his brother and brother's girlfriend vs Terri's mom and best friend) that Terri wished to be killed in such circumstances.

Not one court upheld that trying of fact, they never questioned it, only finding that Greer did indeed, cross his "t's" and dot his "i's".

The de novo trial/hearing was to revisit the facts, to see if Terri had been ill served by counsel (something one sees in capital cases) and if, indeed, Michael was the best guardian to oversee Terri's best interests.

While I accept that the court followed the procedures correctly, that doesn't dismiss the real questions on whether Terri's rights were justly served.

I say "no, they were not."

And the families of the profoundly disabled in this country have every right to be troubled.

We have moved from where a living will is one in which to exempt oneself from being kept alive in certain situations to where one needs a living will in order not to be put to death in questionable situations.

I there are circumstances where people are morally obligated to reject requests by others in assisting their suicide.  

Let's say that a good friend of yours lost his son in a car accident and he just found out that his wife is cheating on him.  He's very depressed and he asks you to help him kill himself.  In this case you are morally obligated to reject his request.  

We should deal with the issues of suicide and assisted suicide separately because they are not morally equivilent acts.

Re":  There was no extrajudicial force applied.

You have got to be kidding! The Africans who were kidnapped into slavery (generally by rival African peoples, sometimes by Berbers) were NOT enslaved according to the precepts of English Common Law (which would hardly have applied in the foreign lands of Africa). True, they were purchased by Europeans in accord with European law, but they had no status under it, so it's hard to argue "due process" even there. Their status was one of livestock or real estate. As for any "sovereign", the relevant soveriegn would have been whatever African king of Berber cheiftain initiated the enslavement. Certainly neither the King of England nor the American Constitution goverened West Africa in that era.

In times past dying people were often said to "Turn their face to the wall" refusing food and drink (which can be painful and sickening in some instnaces when the body is shutting down) until they died. In fact, even today this happens: I recall my mother, dying of liver cancer, refused to eat in her last days. I have never heard anyone make a moral argument that such people are committing suicide or that others have a duty to force feed them.

Re: If it's kiling in once instance it's killing in the other.

OK, how about this dichotomy: is a surgeon who cuts open a living person to remove a tumor committing an act of assault? Absent information about the motive of the act, it is indistinguishable from an assailant who knifes a victim in order to harm him.

I have heard such stories as well, and it does strike me as strange for people to condemn another human being for acting in such a fashion.

If motive and consent are irrelvant to moral category how in the world do you differntiate between an act of rape and the consummation of a loving marriage?

By ignoring motive, circumstance and result we are wading rather deep into the seas of reductio ad absurdum.

though the point is still the same.

"Live Free Or Die; Death Is Not The Worst of Evils." - Gen. John Stark

"Liberty must at all hazards be supported. We have a right to it, derived from our Maker. But if we had not, our fathers have earned and bought it for us, at the expense of their ease, their estates, their pleasure, and their blood." - John Adams

"Is life so dear or peace so sweet as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God. I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" - Patrick Henry

"Liberty is to the collective body, what health is to every individual body. Without health no pleasure can be tasted by man; without liberty, no happiness can be enjoyed by society." - Thomas Jefferson

I practice in this area and talk to people about these issues all the time (admittedly mostly folks in their 40s and older).

Not only can most of these people envision themselves in that bed, as Dick Morris puts it; but huge numbers of people have had loved ones in that bed - and they've actually had to make the decision about whether to withhold treatment.  And of the people I talk to (and I live in a very red part of a red state) most familiies who have had to make a decision on this issue have chosen to withhold or withdraw medical treatment, just as the Delay family did, with the primary treatment being withheld being hydration and nutrition. (Apparently there is not a lot else to withhold at the end stage of a whole host of diseases.) Pulling the feeding tube (or not putting one in) is a far more common occurrence than pulling the plug in my experience.

These people, and I am talking about your fellow Republicans and churchgoers, are not happy about being called torturers and murderers by the shrill voices on their tv screens.  And that is the way they are interpreting it.  I had a meeting with four women today in their 40s and 50s, all wealthy Republicans, 2 of whom are Catholics and 2 who are Southern Baptists, and they were outraged.  Apparently, our Catholic community is especially sensitive since a prominent Catholic family recently made the decision to let a 17 year old girl, severely brain damaged in an auto accident, die.  Her organs were donated and the entire Catholic community was behind the family in their difficult decision and now they feel like the extremists in Schiavo case are attacking by implication this family.  

My impression is that the average blogger here is male in his 20s or 30s. I thought you might be interested how a totally different demographic  is talking about this.  These women along with most of my clients don't know and don't want to know about steel tariffs, judicial nominees, Kyoto or who heads the World Bank.  Whatever Bush wants on those matters is fine with them.  But this is something they know about first hand.  It affects them and their families.  They care more than you know.

....not one of those men considered "liberty" to include the "right to die."

And I find that with the exception of the wealthy or the odd middle class, it's only the elderly (and frequently the on the brink of death ones) who get around to imagining this will happen to them with any seriousness.

Different geography and economic strata, I'm guessing, from what you're talking about -- almost exclusively poor and middle class, with a smattering of wealthy. Overwhelmingly evangelical and (using the term correctly) fundamentalist Christians. Some mainline Protestants, not many. I was one of four Catholics in town, including my wife and child. There may have been a Jew. Three Hindi, which is to say a man, his wife, and their newborn. They were too busy living to deal with end of life issues.

Not that your sample isn't representative; just saying mine might also be.

Generally, folks only think in these terms (ceteris paribus) when they have kids, or, more frequently, assuming they don't wait until 80, on their first brush with death.

You're confusing how the initial slaves got to be slaves with how they were treated as slaves while here.

American law concerning slavery and slaves was passed by competent legislatures, enforced by duly elected executives, and interpreted and ruled upon by judges in their full power. At every step of the way, the "rule of law" prevailed. There was due process.

And of course, the "rule of law" was in derogation of natural law, and was therefore obscene, which is why process is not in itself a good thing.

The people I know socially and professionally are probably best not used as a representative sample.  After all most of them don't know what a blog is ;)

That is a legal term.  The court.  It is entirely accurate.

You also can't toss out a term like de novo without defining the scope of the review.  There are two types of de novo review.  Legal and factual.  Trial courts are given great deference in questions of fact.  Why?  Because they get to actually see the witnesses.  They hear the testimony.  Legal issues are often afforded de novo review.  But to retry a factual case on appeal? Bringing in all the witnesses, bringing in all the experts again?  What would be the standard here?  What would trigger such a review?  

If you question the trial court's factual determination, you should question the Schindlers.  They were the ones who's story didn't line up.  Don't blame the judge.  Never in all my experience in reading, literally, thousands of cases, have I seen a case who's supposed error was more overstated than this.  Of course, the majority of this chorus of doubt is by those who are not even familiar with the evidentiary history of the case.  

Do you realize that right now, somewhere in this country another "victim" is being "tortured" to death in exactly the same manner?  Heck, Tom DeLay did it to his own daddy.  

Don't like the law in Florida?  Great.  Live somewhere else, or petition your congressman to change your Florida law.  Seriously.

Heck, Tom DeLay did it to his own daddy

You're not interested in the facts of this case at all.

And I'm being generous to you with that statement. Otherwise, if you cannot see the huge difference between the Delay and Terri cases, then YOU are the kind of person that the disabled have every right to fear.

who, exactly, am I prejudging?

My point with Tom DeLay was not to point out what a remarkable hypocrite he is.  Rather it was to bolster the statement directly preceding it.  That being that lots of people, many (like Tom DeLay's father) who did not leave a written living will, end up getting yanked off life support without having an opportunity to express their wishes about it.  Happens all the time.  The fact that it happened to Tom DeLay (who inserted himself as a player in this mess) merely demonstrates this.  One of our Republican Congressman, Dave Reichert, R-WA also had to make this decision, (though he voted against 'Terri's law.'  This is a difficult decision for a family to make.  When the family disagrees, it is a court's decision.  In most states, when the family agrees, the patient doesn't even get what Terri got, which is a Guardian Ad Litem (an independent representative).  

In Texas, doctors can pretty much make the call themselves as long as there is no prospect of recovery and as long as the family can't afford private care (which you can imagine is very very expensive).  Even if the family agree that the patient would have wanted their PSV body kept alive indefinitely the Texas doctor can and will pull the plug.  And they do.  

So you can pretend that the Schiavo case is some horrible anomaly, but it just isn't true.  What is unusual about this case is a family still holding out hope for the recovery of a PSV who has been in that state, unchanged, for 15 years, where brain CT scans show fluid where the cerebral cortex used to be.  That is unusual.  

Why do you suppose that 70 to 80 percent of us disagree with you?  Why have the Schindlers lost at every level of our court system again and again?  (please note that most of the judges who have heard this case are conservatives)  Why do a majority of conservatives disagree with you?  Could it possibly be that we are all evil, or wrong?  Or does it make more sense to consider that your position might be the one lacking in reason.  

Life is tough.  People die.  People get cut down in the primes of their lives by strokes, heart attacks, and aneurisms.  That's the breaks.  No one could save Terri.  She was already gone.  

a huge post and one that has inspired a lot of commentary, perhaps this "Letter to Terri" that I posted in my diary can serve to bring a new perspective. It was the reason it was created. I am sorry for posting here after it was posted before, but perhaps it can do some good here as well. Just to alleviate any future negative comments on this posting, I was for Terri's life being preserved.

Dear Terri,

Despite the best efforts of millions of caring and good hearted people, you have finally passed.

Please know that your life and your passing have not been in vain. Your plight has focused the eyes of a nation. What comes of that focus remains to be seen, but you have shown us that there has to be a better way.

You have endured more than anyone should have had to bear. If it truly was your wish to not be kept in this life, then I know that you are finally at peace, and at home with the Lord. Forgive us for prolonging this life when it was no longer desired.

If that was not the case, then I, on behalf of us all, plead for your forgiveness, in that we could not do more to save you. May you find forgiveness for those who worked against that wish.

As in so many issues, most people were supporting the side that they thought was right. Most were just trying to fight for what they thought best. We are human beings, thus we are not perfect.

We are all merely trying to find our way in this world and hope to fall on the right side, more often than not. If there were those with motives less honorable than that, then they will have to deal with that upon judgement. As will we all.

What this really came down to was not the right to die, or the right to live, but the fact that we didn't know your wishes. Without that knowledge it was impossible to make a truly informed decision. Doctors and judges were made to consider all facts except the most important one. What YOU wanted.

For your sake, for all those involved, and for all of us who took sides, I pray this was what you desired. Let us all mourn and begin a process of healing. There will be time for politics in the future, but for now, let's reflect on what this has meant to us all, and how it can be used to forge a stronger nation.

Terri, may you have finally found the peace denied you in life.

Sincerely,

All of Us

they would have considered having feeding tubes inserted into their abdomens against their consent "liberty"?

You cite the Declaration for support, but I have never read anything that would suggest to me that Jefferson would have been anything other than horrified at that notion.  This is the man who wrote:

"Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add 'within the limits of the law' because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual."

I'm no Jefferson scholar, but the way I read this and what other of his writings on liberty I have seen, Jefferson would consider life to be a right, not an obligation.

And though I don't know if he refused food or hydration at any point (I'm having trouble digging up a detailed account at the moment), Jefferson seems to have chosen the date of his own death.  Perhaps he would have opted for life-prolonging care at the very end, but I am pretty sure he would have insisted that it be his choice, not the state's.

I am sure many people shared similar sentiments.  I know that I said a prayer for her and her family when I heard that she died.

Since the entire nation is up in arms about one women who had to bear the painful death of starvation, here's something to think about:  Everyday THOUSANDS of children die of starvation all across Africa.  Everyday.  What does it say about our society that we care so much about one woman's "right to life" because she happens to live here and because of what it may mean for our future decisions in terms of precedent, yet as a nation we do practically nothing to alleviate starvation for all those thousands of poor children?  

I am not saying that the US is not generous because we are and we give alot, but people are still starving.  I've thought about Terri Schiavo everyday for the last week, yet I rarely think about the starvation that has gone on in Africa for decades.  I plan on checking into sponsoring a child.

peace,

dude

...in this life. If one believes in the Lord, our duty is not to live this life for us, but to live this life in service to Him. If this past few weeks has served to make some people aware of that fact, then her life and death were not in vain.

We can never change the past, we can only take from it what we have learned and use it to affect change in the future. Such is our lot in life; but still a pretty good one.

Your thoughts on giving are well placed, since you are thinking of someone other than yourself. It does not matter what country or victims of hunger you are thinking of giving to, it only matters that you do what you can. Personal choice is what makes giving so rewarding.

t1dude, I know not your political affiliation, and really, it doesn't matter, because I realize that you have seen what was meant to be seen in this posting. Regardless of what our agreements or disagreements might be in the futre, I'll see you around on the blogosphere, and when I do, I'll think kind thoughts.

strac, I feel the same way about you and your post.  thanks for sharing your truth.

peace,

dude

A lot of people do have an opinion over this. From what I've heard that opinion is "Congress and the Pres. shouldn't have gotten involved, it's a matter for the family."

This is all about sound bites, making the cable news channels and making friends that can help you keep your job (re: voters).

You want to be kept alive on life support? Then it's up to you to take the necessary steps on the chance that it comes to that. If you don't want to shoulder the responsibility why should everyone else?

To me, this is the most dispickable part of the whole issue.  The politicians practically trippin over each other to make sure that they are seen at Terri Schiavo's bedside on camera.  Its sickening.  Truly, it makes me want to vomit.  If these people gave one iota about Terri Shiavo, they could have passed a law that would have really made a difference, but they didn't care about actually making a difference as much as appearing so.  If they truly wanted to pass a law that would have kept her alive, all they had to so is pass a law that said its illegal to allow people to die who are in a Persistent Vegetative State.  Similarly, they could have passed a law that said that there is a presumption that the spouse is no longer acting in the self interest of the patient if the spouce is know to be in a new romantic relationship.  They could have passed a law that made it possible for the parents to take custody.  There are endless possibilities.

Surely, all of these measures would have been overruled by the Supreme Court, but it would have bought them several more months (maybe years) and would have kept Terri Schiavo alive during that time.  The bill that they did pass was blatantly insincere and opportunist.   ...a disgusting display of blatant grandstanding at the expense of Terri Schiavo and her family.

peace,

dude

I don't doubt that opportunity was the keyword in the minds of many of the politicians that did vote for this legislation, but perhaps it was because that was all they knew they could actually pass.

Just perhaps, the ones who did truly feel for Terri were acting in desperation and knew that they couldn't have passed a real piece of legislation, so they opted for what they could get through both houses quickly.

I know that this theory seems quite apologetic, but maybe it's true. We do live in a constitutional democracy, and such are the limitations of that type of government. Things are meant to proceed slowly, so as to prevent a majority tyranny. Maybe this was one of those occasions where a "tyranny" might have been good.

Just playing devil's advocate (something I don't like to do) with that last theory, but that might have been one cause for Congress not taking a more decisive and bold action. Factor in the polling data which has come out on this issue and it's no surprise that the legislation was as "weak" as we saw.

yin and yang isn't a delineation between opposites. in fact it's the exact opposite. it represents coalescence. the cirlce they form holds the true meaning of their pairing.

sorry to get off topic. reading about eastern culture/tradition is a hobbie of mine.

I'm pretty sure of your answer, I just don't want to presume...sorry.

argumentation SUPPORTED slavery from the days of Aristotle on down to Vatican pronouncments as late as the 1860s. There are sound moral reasons to reject the validity of the peculiar institution but natural law is not one of them.

The Vatican began condemning slavery in Papal Bulls in the sixteenth century.

And we're discussing two different kinds of slavery here.

Because when someone can't respond with an actual answer they resort to name calling and insults.

Again, when a person can't come up with a logical argument against what someone is saying, they resort to name calling and insults, and I'm the six-year old....ha.

Re: And we're discussing two different kinds of slavery here.

Nonsense. The specific legal details may have differed a bit, but then this is true of something like slavery across any variety of cultures. Migh tas well say that we are discussing two different marriages if discussing the ancient institution vs. the modern. Even the racial component of American slavery is not wholly alien to ancient thought on the matter, as it conencts up very well with Aristotle's contention that some men are born "natural slaves," or indeed with the general belief among the Greeks that certain peoples were inherently servile.

Renaissance Roman Catholic disapproval of slavery represented a brief (and sadly ineffectual) flowering of a humanitarian liberalism (the heritage of late Renaissance humanism) which the counter-Reformation would soon send packing.

Papal bulls. Excommunication. Slavery. Go to work.

The right to life is not endowed by the government, but from the Creator, circa July 4, 1776.

The gov't doesn't give life, and except for times of war, it shouldn't be taking them either.

Not that I disagree with the substance of your point.  That the government shouldn't be killing people and what not.  (we obviously disagree on whether the government killed Terri S., but that is beside the point)

I do have difficulties with the Declaration of Independence being cited as a source of American law or right.  It is an important piece of American History no doubt.  But it is not the law of the United States nor was it ever.  It was a document written by British subjects to their King telling him to get bent.  It was never ratified by any state.  It has no authority.

Our rights are derived no more from the Declaration of Independence as from the Articles of Confederation (if not less so).  Just FYI.  Our rights are outlined in the Constitution.  

The Declaration of Independence didn't CREATE the truth that the right to life is endowed by our creator; it merely RECOGNIZED that fact.

Likewise the Constitution doesn't grant us our right to life. We were already endowed with it.

While you ponder whether the judiciary issued an execution order for Terri, we must determine if dehydration killed her. What are the words I'm looking for -- yes, it did.

Anyone with a grade school education understands that if you withhold water and drink from someone, they will die as a result. The judge's order greatly hastened Terri's death. He knew it would. Ergo, Terri was intentionally killed. Executed. Murdered, because Terri had committed no capital crime.

No one doubted Terri would be killed if water was withheld long enough, and indeed she was.  

If the Schindlers were Christian Scientists or Jehovah's Witnesses, and refused to allow doctors to place a feeding tube inside her, and a court allowed this, would that be State sanctioned murder?

Because for many religions, the act of surgically forcing food into the stomach of a person like Terri is 1) a defilement of the human body, and 2) a denial of God's will.

or

Suppose that Terri's Christian Scientist parents convince the court that their daughter was also a christian scientist despite what the husband says.  In obeying their wishes, is the court committing murder there?

Face it.  This isn't about Terri.  This is about her parents.  If the parents agreed with Michael, there would have been no problems here.  This case is truly unprecedented.  No one has ever given half a sh-t about any of the thousands of Vegetables that have had the plugs pulled over the years.  You have all been led to this case, like lemmings to the sea, for reasons you can't even articulate.  

I am still curious as to what sort of law you would like to see put in place to ensure that this type of situation never takes place.

who makes the call?

who pays?

for how long?

how do you define PSV?

who decides when groups disagree?

what levels of medical heroics are required?

in exchange for what benefit?

i.e. would you give a PSV a needed heart transplant?

on and on and on.

No law is perfect.  We do the best with what we have.  

So let me get to the bottom line.

One way to avoid what is in front of us is to ask ourselves so many questions that we reach the point of confusion. In that state of dilemma, we can throw up our hands and then choose anything.

Psychologically when we are in that state we can tell ourselves whatever we've chosen is okay. Because there were just so many ramifications to whatever choice we make that we can't be held accountable. In other words, our self-induced complications assuages our guilt.

Your many questions also highlight why my approach works better. All the answers come back to the same thing: if the person is alive and unable to feed themselves, feed them and give them drink.

When they are dead, stop feeding them. Why? Because we are endowed by our Creator to the inalienable right to life, endowed not by our Constitution or by the Declaration of Independence. To intentionally hasten an innocent person's death is murder. This is true whether sanctioned by a government authority or not.  

All the answers come back to the same thing: if the person is alive and unable to feed themselves, feed them and give them drink.

Does this include a feeding tube?  

If the answer is yes, what do we do about those people with religious beliefs which will not allow a feeding tube?

On rare occasions religious practices disagree with the law. e.g., poligamy.

If the person has a feeding tube, use it.

If they don't have an abdominal feeding tube or there is an objection to feeding abdominally, use the type used on the Pope.

If using the nasal tube contradicts the person's religion, too bad (see poligamy reference.)  

In all cases, don't use either if its use would hasten the person's death.

What I have noticed is that some people don't care for direct answers, such as you have here. They want all sorts of wiggle room added as well as a lot of hand holding.

I'm not good at that with a typewriter. But then there is no wiggle room in this type of case, because as soon as it is added, it breaks down into a million amoebas writhing together in a climate of "everything goes" and situational ethics.

It has also resulted in the execution-style murder of Terri Schindler: "Who do we ask for permission to kill this woman?" The answer is quite simply, "No one!"

It is possible that this is all they thought they could get passed, but to my knowlege, nothing else was even contemplated or proposed.  The way Congress works, someone drew up the legislation, but I have not heard who.  It was the brianchild of someone.  The family didn't go asking for this, I would bet.  Knowing who wrote it and who proposed it and when they started working on it would say alot, but we will probably never know these things with the crappy media that we have.

peace,

dude

and to think all these years, I thought the world was a pretty complicated place.  Thanks for clearing that up for me.  

I didn't post those questions to complicate the matter.  It is actually far far far more complicated than that.  You can pretend this is an easy issue, but unfortunately, we live in a society where things cost money.  Where people's time costs money.  

Since we also live in a place where money is not infinite, we have to make decisions.  It's called policy.  Look into it.  You'll see that laws are filled with cost / benefit analyses, judgments, and conclusions of efficacy, etc. etc.

My guess is that you haven't even read the Florida statutes that doomed Ms. Schiavo.  You have no idea how much care and attention to detail went into trying to create a set of standards that took into account the interests of all parties:

the patient

the family

the providers

the tax payers

other patients

the state

So to simply say, 'feed until dead', does not get it done.  Who are you even talking to when you say 'feed until dead?'  Me?  The President?  Carol Channing?  No offense, but your unwillingness to roll up your sleeves and craft a viable alternative to the statutes in Florida can only be one of two things:  laziness or inability.  

cheers

At least I don't have to watch this crap on the news every day anymore. Don't republicans and democrats have anything better to do? Last I heard SS and medicare needed fixing.

Both of your responses completely miss my point, and I'm not sure how to be more clear than my original post.  Read it again.

That poor shell of a woman has been laid to rest and the insanity can stop. Until the next republican wedge issue is invented.