Let us separate two things. First, the "government" of Florida is not at all unanimous on this mad dash to seal the fate of Terri Schiavo. Governor Jeb Bush had interceded on behalf of Terri earlier, and pushed to get what was called "Terri's Law" through the legislature, and he signed the bill, which outlawed attempts to disconnect Terri's feeding tube. This law was appealed, and eventually found "unconstitutional" in the eyes of the Florida Supreme Court, which put the ball back in Judge Greer's court, where the order to disconnect the feeding tube was reinstated, which brings us to the present impasse. So the only part of the state government in Flordia that was ruling for the disconnection of Terri's feeding tube was and is the judiciary.
Secondly, because of the wide publicity given this case nationally, the Federal government, on the part of President George W. Bush, and the US Congress, meeting in both the House and Senate, passed a bill placing the review of this case in Federal court. At this point, only a minority are in favor of death for Terri by dehydration, and this may have already been reversed.
Terri should be pried out of the exclusive control of the spouse, Michael Schiavo, and independent assessment be made of her physical condition. If she is sentient and does interact with her surroundings, however badly, that destroys the argument that she is in a "persistent vegetative state", and makes what is being done to her all the more horrible. If in fact, her current condition is demonstrably shown to be PVS, then the merciful and humane thing would be to put her in a drug-induced coma, THEN withdraw sustenance. Or make things even quicker and give her lethal injection.
We do better for hardened criminals and animals.
We do better for hardened criminals and animals.