Before I ay anything, let it be known that I find this entire affair profoundly sad and I undertstand, at least on some levels, the desperation and despair of the parents.
However, it is stuff like this that make it difficult for me to believe their credibility (or, at least, their objectivity) in this case.
Via the AP: Schiavo’s Parents Say She Tried to Speak
After a federal appeals court panel rebuffed them yet again, Terri Schiavo’s parents made another desperate attempt to keep their brain-damaged daughter alive, telling a judge that she tried to say “I want to live” just minutes before her feeding tube was removed a week ago.Pinellas Circuit Judge George Greer was expected to announce a decision by noon Saturday on the motion by Bob and Mary Schindler claiming their daughter said “AHHHHH” and “WAAAAAAA” when asked to repeat the phrase “I want to live.”
First, if she did, in fact, try to speak “just minutes before” they removed the feeding tube, why are we hearing about now? The tube was removed days ago. This assertion smacks of desperation. (Update: the claim in question is part of brief before Judge Greer’s court in Florida. A ruling is expected by noon today).
Second, the only people who hear her speak are those profoundly dedicated to the idea that she can recover. However, the best evidence that could be generated for court had no such speech, nor did it demonstrate evidence that Terri would even be able to respond to mimic speech.
Indeed, and it has been well documented:
Doctors have said Schiavo’s previous utterances were involuntary moans consistent with someone in a vegetative state.
This is a horrible situation, but can there be any doubt that at this stage the Schindlers are likely to hear what they want to hear?
If one were cyncial one might think that the goal here is to insert just enough doubt as to cause the courts to investigate. However, given the rather amazing number of attempts afforded this case in various courts, I am guessing that the appeals are essentially over.
Indeed, their deparation is quite clear, as evidenced here where Mr. Schindler criticized Governor Bush, who has been a steadfast ally:
Bob Schindler also pleaded with Gov. Jeb Bush to intervene by taking temporary custody of their daughter while court challenges are argued.“With the stroke of his pen, he could stop this,” Bob Schindler said. “He’s put Terri through a week of hell and my family though a week of hell. I implore him to put a stop to this. He has to stop it. This is judicial homicide.”
And this is ridiculous on a variety of levels:
Outside the hospice, eight more people — including a 10-year old boy and 13-year-old twin girls — were arrested Friday for trying to bring her water.
I am not certain a) why the police are arresting little children and b) what those chidlren are being told by their parents, since even if they could get a glass of water to Terri she couldn’t drink it. That’s part of the problem.
As a note, I heard about this supposed “utterance” a few days ago on the radio, so it is not really a new claim.
Comment by Brett — Saturday, March 26, 2024 @ 10:29 am
I had heard a similar claim from one of her past nurses, but this is the first time I have heard it in regards to recent events.
It just strikes me as odd that if such a dramatic happenig took place days ago, that it would just now be finding its way into legal briefs.
Comment by Steven Taylor — Saturday, March 26, 2024 @ 10:32 am
“Second, the only people who hear her speak are those profoundly dedicated to the idea that she can recover.”
That is not correct. There are affidavits from nurses that claim they were able to communicate with her. There are part of the public record.
I strongly encourage you to read them.
See link below
http://eyeontheworld.typepad.com/home/2005/02/a_nurses_testim.html
Comment by sytrek — Saturday, March 26, 2024 @ 1:41 pm
some nurses have testified sahe can take liquids orally.
and you should persoanlly look at the video of Teri aavailable at terri’s fight.
she smiles and makes noises in response to her environment.
i concluded she is as aware as an infant, at the very least.
do youassume your infant has no consciousness or soul!?
i do not.
terri is being MURDERED because LEGALLY all the court can order is the removal of her feeding tube, and the court cannot prevent her from being fed orally, YET THIS IS EXACTLY WAT GREER ORDERED!
Sad.
Comment by reliapundit — Saturday, March 26, 2024 @ 2:22 pm
WHY THE LEFT DEMANDED TERRI DIE -
Becasue, the Left is dominated by a materialist meme.
To the Left, the concept of a Human Soul is merely the syringe by which religion - “the opiate of the people” - is injected into the veins of the gullible.
To the Left, there is no Human Soul, only a consciousness which is strictly concomitant with a certain level of neural activity.
To the Left, if-and-when that neural activity is severely diminished, then consiousness stops, and personality and personhood disappear. And the “quality of life” for the consciousness-diminished person is nil.
To the Left, a person without personality and with no “quality of life” has “no reason to live” (and other people - even parents and siblings and children of the “brain-diminished” person - have no unselfish reason to make sure the brain-diminished person goes on living).
To the Left, this category of people - (people with no consciousness and therefore no personality or personhood, and no reason to live) - includes people with advanced dementia, brain-damage, and it also includes fetuses.
To the Left, these people are not persons, but merely cytoplasm - a mass of cells.
To the Left, if you have a fetus with Down’s, then it is preferable to abort it.
The Left valorizes the intellectual/ratiocinative capacity of people, and denigrates other mental, emotional capacities. Which is why the Left has consistently advocated “Politburos”, select commissions, and the rulings of judges over the Will of the People: the Left believes that an elite knows better what is right and good and proper and efficient; the Left believes that an elite knows better than you do what’s good and right for you.
And that’s why the Left deplored the Congressional and Presidential intervention into the Schiavo Affair, and applauded the blatant disregard of Congress and the President by the judges: popularly elected officials are not as smart as judges; to the Left, judges are part of the elite. The will of the people (as expressed by the legislature and the executive branches) is not as valid as the learned ratiocinations of a judge.
This is the ONLY count upon which the Left is correct: judges are part of an elite - a nearly UNACCOUNTABLE elite.
But not ENITIRELY unaccountable. Judges can be impeached. I suggest that we get the Congress to hold the judges who deliberately REFUSED to hold de novo hearings on the Schiavo Case IN UTTER CONTEMPT OF CONGRESS, and then perhaps IMPEACH THEM. Judges are not above the law; no judge is above the law. And the Judiciary is not above the other two branches. (The “gay marriage” decisions of many courts underlines the Judiciary’s disregard for the legislative branch and for the importance of legislating laws as opposed to making law by what is essentially UNDEMOCRATIC JUDICIAL FIAT.)
It is important to uphold the concept that each and every person - regardless of their ratiocinative capabilities - has a WHOLE Human Soul because if we do not we are condemning the weakest and most vulnerable and most dependent among us to “non-human” status, to people whose life-or-death makes no matter, to people whose death might actually be better (and in the public interest) because their life diminishes the “quality of life” of the other people in their lives (pointlessly costing them and us money, for example). This is the type of reasoning that led to the evil eugenics policies of the NAZIS and others. And it’s as fundamental to the Left’s meme now as it was to the Leftist-NAZI then.
Like our Creator-endowed inalienable rights to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness the, Human Soul is inalienable from each human life: The autist has no less a soul than the artist, the quadriplegic has no less a soul than the track star, the brain-damaged or demented have no less a soul than the elitists of the Left.
To the Left, the “right to die” - and to euthanize non-human/”no-longer human” human beings - trumps the “right to life.”
NOW: I know that some of you Leftists out there will argue that all the court decided was what Terri wanted, BUT THIS IS FALSE. First because Terri was NOT TERMINAL, and the feeding-tube WAS NOT NECESSARY, and the court ordered removal of the feeding-tube alone is not what’s killing her! What’s killing her is the UNLAWFUL order of the court to prevent anyone from giving her food and water orally!
Terri’s SUPPOSED desire to die (rather than live as she has been living) is SOLELY based on testimony from Michael Schiavo and his brother Brian Schiavo and Brian’s wife, who gave HEARSAY testimony to the effect that Terri ONCE said that she would not want to be kept on life support if she had a terminal condition.
BUT TERRI’S CONDITION IS TECHNICALLY/MEDICALLY NOT TERMINAL - BECAUSE SHE COULD LIVE FOR ANOTHER 40 YEARS IF SHE ONLY GOT FOOD AND WATER, WHICH WE ALL NEED TO LIVE!
And in 40 years, perhaps her condition could be cured.
I defy anyone to look at the videos of Terri and her mom - which are available at TERRI’S FIGHT - and tell me that her smiles and moans in response to her mom’s attentions are not reminiscent of what we have all seen from infants as they are attended to by their mothers and fathers. Terri’s smile to her mom is pure love: of her mother, and of life. It is obvious to anyone seeing that love, that Terri wants to live.
OH I CAN HEAR THE LEFT NOW: The Lefties out there saying that you cannot tell what Terri is feeling by looking at the videos. OH NO!?!? Well, that’s EXACTLY what Judge Greer did, and why he argued that Terri was not responsive; he said that her responses were “random.” BULLSHIT; THIS AN OBVIOUS LIE TO ANYONE WHO HAS SEEN THE TAPES
Anyone who has seen the tapes can see that Terri still has a Human Soul, and a capacity for love, and a desire for life. That’s why what is happening to her is MURDER.
And it’s a crying shame.
God Bless her soul - her whole, intact beautiful Human Soul - and please God: soothe the suffering of her loving family.
Comment by reliapundit — Saturday, March 26, 2024 @ 2:30 pm
In no particular order:
1) I am aware of te affadavits, and have read a few of them. However, I am skeptical of them, given the lateness of their arrival on the scene, judicially speaking. Further, what is in the them does not comport with the evidence that can be empirically verified.
2) I was referring to the utterance in direct relation to the feeding tube.
3) I never said she didn’t have a soul, quite the contrary.
4) The actions on the video are consistent, as I understand it, with PVS.
Comment by Steven Taylor — Saturday, March 26, 2024 @ 3:54 pm
Let me put it this way: I find the whoel thing tragic, and I hardlt celebrate her death.
However, I am convinced that 1) she is beyond recovery, 2) there were serious attempts to get her tharapy that failed and 3) it has been established that she wouldn’t have wanted to continue in this state.
Why is that so evil/hard to understand?
Comment by Steven Taylor — Saturday, March 26, 2024 @ 3:57 pm
BTW, I hardly speak for the Left, but I don’t recall anyone there, or elsewhere, “demanding” that Terri die.
Comment by Steven Taylor — Saturday, March 26, 2024 @ 3:58 pm
Disliking both sides of an argument
For most of the Terri Schiavo controversy, I’ve sided with the Schindlers. The ideal outcome, given that the daughter had the medical problems to begin with, would have been to let the parents take custody of her and have Michael…
Trackback by Signifying Nothing — Saturday, March 26, 2024 @ 5:53 pm