Daily Ramblings:
Something Came Up Out Of The Sea ...06/15/2005 08:43:24 pm
When reading the actual autopsy report on Terri
Schiavo (copy saved on my server here), two things struck me - two
things which I didn't see in the plethora of
mainstream media stories prompted by this document.
1. Dr. Stephen J. Nelson's
analysis of her brain ends with this statement (on
page 20):
Neuropathologic
examination alone of the decedent's brain - or
any brain, for that matter - cannot prove or
disprove a diagnosis of persistent vegetative
state or minimally conscious state.
2. Cause of death (on page 2):
Complications of Anoxic
Encephalopathy
(Anoxic Encephalopathy is the original condition
of oxygen deprivation that afflicted Terri Schiavo in
1990.)
So there you have, firstly, a clear statement that
the relevant examiner is incapable of drawing a
conclusion on the key question of the
"persistent vegetative state;" and,
secondly, a loaded judgment that her death was due to
a "complication" of her condition, rather
than due to deprivation of food, and, in particular,
water.
None of what is in this autopsy, and especially in
the standard media spin that is being put on it,
changes the fundamental facts of Terri Schiavo's
death. She was an innocent woman who was not being
kept alive by a heart and lung machine, or other
extraordinary means. She was simply being supplied
with food and water, along with the kind of basic
care that a person would give to their pet hamster
(or risk the wrath of the ASPCA). She did not even
require a Koran, directions to Mecca, and culturally
appropriate dishes.
The State of Florida, as directed by the courts,
decided not to feed her anymore. Yes, there were
other things in play - the opinions of the husband,
the parents and other family members. Yet, someone's
right to basic nutrition when in a helpless condition
might have been assumed by many to be an overriding
factor in these kinds of disputes. So one would
think, but here we are. A nation where you can sue a
tobacco company because you decided to smoke for 40
years; a nation where Senators cringe in
"embarrassment" because murderous and
fanatical foreign enemies are kept confined in
Guantanamo Bay; a nation where beached dolphins are
fed through tubes; a nation where billions are spent
to follow safety and environmental regulations
designed to lengthen some impossible-to-determine
number of lives; a nation where convicted killers of
the most brutal kind evade their death sentences for
decades: In this nation a woman who committed no
crime was denied food and water until she was dead.
Of-course it's also a nation where a million innocent
and helpless humans are disposed of every year (those
that don't get eaten), because they are
judged inconvenient.
In the continuing battle over America's destiny as
a society - a battle whose lines can be traced from
the Declaration of Independence
and Trenton, through Dred Scott v.
Sandford and Gettysburg, and on through the 1964
Civil Rights Act and 1973's Roe v. Wade fiat,
the case of Terri Schiavo will linger as a defining
moment.
Along the dim Atlantic line
The ravaged land lies for miles behind
The light's coming forward and the streets are broad
All must yield to the avenging God
Addendum 06/17/2005
10:07:38 am: Michelle Malkin,
who has written so much good stuff on this case, also
looked in detail at the autopsy report and has some
interesting observations.
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