The deed is done

Those “in love with death”, to quote Peggy Noonan’s accurate but damning phrase, finally have their wish: Terri Schiavo has finally succumbed after two weeks of being starved to death. While her vile husband’s really creepy attorney (who has written of having virtual seances with people who are dying) continues to blather on about how “peaceful” it all has been, anyone with a scintilla of common sense realizes that she has probably been in agony during the last two weeks. At least that state-ordered torture is over!

But the myriad questions this case raises will not go away once her body is laid to rest. In particular, there are tremendous issues that this case highlights about the incredible arrogance of the judiciary. I keep hearing the excuse that “court after court reviewed her case and agreed”….yada, yada, yada! The huge problem with this argument is that NOT ONE of the appeals courts ever reviewed the FACTS of the case. In this, they all deferred to the ONE judge who determined that her adulterous husband’s hearsay claim that “she didn’t want to live this way” was the be-all and end-all that could never be challenged. The appeals courts NEVER re-examined the 10 YEAR OLD diagnosis that she was in a Persistent Vegitative State, which has been questioned by numerous other qualified doctors…especially since an MRI was never performed (Michael Schiavo would not allow it!) Faulty reasoning and faulty application of the law was then upheld time after time by an arrogant judiciary bent on “protecting its turf.”

Thomas Jefferson warned about the tendency of the judicial branch towards tyranny because of lifetime appointments. The original intent of this provision was to prevent undue political influence so that judges would be free to properly apply the law and the Constitution. Unfortunately, we have reached the point 200 years later where this protection from undue political influence has come to mean a total lack of accountability so that judges can legislate their personal preferences from the bench and the people have absolutely no recourse. We have seen it over and over again from Roe v. Wade to the recent court imposition of “gay marriage” in Massachussetts. The courts have decided that they are going to be our masters and we had better learn to like it. I think it is way past time we rose up and said “We’re not going to take this anymore!”

See: It Is Ended
Also: The Emperor’s New Robes

Food for thought

Martin Katz in AmericanThinker.com:
The essence of the Schiavo case is simple. All the ink and the hot air to the contrary. We as a society, the government and people of the United States of America have not managed, for whatever reasons, to permit a mother to put water onto the lips of her dying child, brain dead or not. Everything else, every legal, moral, theological, constitutional, philosophical argument is a sideshow diverting attention from the essential issue of this case. We have wounded our national character by our actions or inactions. We have placed ourselves one notch less above the Nazis. We as a people is have so shamed ourselves we can’t look Mary Schindler, Terri Schiavo’s mother in the eye and give her one good reason why we did not allow her to give water to her dying child. How we came to this shameful point in our national existence is a question that demands examination and rectification for our sake. For Mary Schindler and her severely impaired child, Terri Schiavo, it’s like too late. We didn’t find it in our collective hearts and souls, in our actions to have mercy on them.

Couldn’t have said it better

Chuck Colson’s column today captures the sad irony of Terri Schiavo’s slow death by starvation drawing nearer to its conclusion on Good Friday: Between Life and Death

Here is the heart of the matter:
What an irony this presents this year. Jesus died so that we could be free and saved. It was a noble death, if there ever was one. But another death occupies the headlines today, one that mocks the death of Jesus. It is Terri Schiavo who is being killed by judicial fiat. For what reason?
She is being killed so that society can get rid of a nuisance. She is being killed so her husband can be free to marry the woman he has lived with for years and who has borne his children. Her husband, allegedly, profited from the damages paid because of the medical injury to Terri. She is being killed so that medical funds can be saved.

May God forgive us all for this travesty!

The barbarians have returned

As a follow up to yesterday’s post on the Schiavo case, I would like to pass along some of the best columns I have come across on the subject.

For the legal and moral aspects…
** Schiavo Case Matters in Symbol and Substance (Cal Thomas)
** What Next? (Linda Chavez)
** Is Prosecution the Solution? (Andrew McCarthy)
** What If She Called 911? (Jack Dunphy)

As usual, Peggy Noonan absolutely nails the cultural issues, questioning the reasons for the “bizzare passion of the-pull-the-plug people” in a column titled In Love With Death.

Finally, here is a take on this issue from the perspective of the The Screwtape Letters which would have made C.S. Lewis proud: Screwtape Revisited (Meghan Cox Gurdon)

Sadly, it must be acknowledged that, not only have the barbarians returned, but they are now in charge… (of the court system anyway!)

What a piece of work!

Well, it appears that the leading candidate in the “Husband from Hell” competition (AKA Michael Schiavo)is about to finally get his wish. He is to be finally freed from his sworn responsibility to love, honor and care for his wife Terri because the courts have decided there will be no reprieve and that she will be starved until she is dead. Contrary to media propoganda, such as the recent ABC poll with it’s incredibly biased questions (see here), she is NOT brain dead, she is NOT on “life support” and she does NOT have a terminal condition, other than requiring food and water to live. Yet, the “gods in black robes” have decreed that she must die and so she will.

No, what we really have here is an unfaithful husband who wants his wife dead and out of the way so he can be free to marry the other woman he has lived with for the last 10 years, by whom he has had 2 children. This piece of work wants to maintain the legal and moral authority of being a faithful husband without the inconvenience of actually being one! If he wants to go on with his life without Terri…fine. But he doesn’t have to kill her. Her family is more than willing to take care of her, but he won’t let them.

It’s amazing how so many have gotten duped into accepting Michael Schiavo’s act that he is the longsuffering husband who “just wants to honor his wife’s wishes.” He conveniently “remembered” that she told him this AFTER he won a million dollar malpractice award for her care and rehabilitation. I think this is the real reason he won’t just divorce her and go on with his life. He wants the money. However, he may have outsmarted himself, in that, during the course of the 10 years he has been fighting to have her killed, the money has mostly been used up. I think it would be poetic justice if, when Terri’s court ordered torture is complete and she finally succumbs to death, there is very little money left for her ghoul of a “husband” to collect. I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes on judgement day!

3 down, 1 to go…

Well, we just finished the 3rd quarter of the school year. Hard to believe its gone by this fast… It seems like it was just yesterday that we were unloading our truck in 90+ degree heat and trying to learn our way around town. We just had a visit from a friend from “up north” over the weekend who was telling us how their winter this year just seems to never end. I just smiled and said “That’s why I live here now!” It was 76 yesterday and we cooked out on the grill last night. (Sorry to our friends and family back in Michigan!)

I’ve been invited to be one of the instructors at the Florida Division’s Music Conservatory this summer… a nice 6 week gig (for which you also get paid… yay!) It will be nice to be able to teach music to a little older group and pick up a little extra cash in the process. Anyway, more later…