Rush Shares Personal End Of Life Story (MUST READ!!!)

RUSH: Here's Gary in Champaign, Illinois. Gary, welcome to the program. It's nice to have you on with us.

CALLER: I'm a Republican. I voted for Bush, all that stuff like in your commercials, but I have to disagree with everybody on this one, and let me tell you why.

CALLER: Six years ago my mother had a brain aneurysm, went through a surgery to repair it, had another operation, procedure and a few other things. Finally the neurosurgeon, the neurologist came and told us she was in a chronic or permanent vegetative state. And for nine months I convinced my five siblings to withdraw the tube feeding her and let her die naturally. We did not kill our mother, we let her die naturally. Now, I've seen film of this lady, I've seen the news reports, doctors have said she is in a chronic or permanent vegetative state. What that means is, you have very, very basic brain function. The part of your brain that makes you breathe still works, you may have some response to pain or other minor basic stimuli but they have absolutely zero cognitive function. That lady has no idea what's going on around her. She doesn't know the difference from night to day. She doesn't know who people are. She doesn't feel anything at all. The right thing for her to do is what her husband wants to do, and that is pull the plug on her and let her die a natural death.

RUSH: I know you don't want to think that. You let her die. You had the doctors remove the feeding tube so you didn't even do it. She died a natural death, starvation, on the basis that she couldn't feed herself, so she starved. I'm just going to go back to the first hour, and, you know, the New York Times ran a brilliant story on Sunday that starvation is painless, it's a very dignified way to go. We could rid the world of poverty by letting them all starve. They may not all be in a vegetative state, but they soon will end up in one after they don't eat or drink long enough. Just gonna let 'em die.

Let me tell you my own personal story. My grandmother, my maternal grandmother. To give you the short, down-and-dirty of this, she had a stroke and was sent to the hospital, and the doctors said, "We don't know how long she's going to live like this." She was not in a coma but she was not quite there. The doctors said, "We don't know how long she's going to live like this, but we're going to give you 48 hours, you've got to make up your mind what you want to do, pull the tube or send her to a nursing home and pay for it because we need the bed." So my mother, my father had passed away, my mother talked to my brother and I about it and she wanted to pull the tube. And I said, "Mother, you really want the burden of having killed your mother? You really want that?" Before the 48 hours had passed a decision had to be made, my grandmother had another stroke while nobody was there and passed away in the hospital. At least that was the story. I've always doubted it. Given that we were given 48 hours to move her out of there, I've often wondered. Nobody will ever know, so it's just speculation on my part. I don't know how many patients are actually killed already on the basis that they don't know what's going on, it's better for them, we need the bed, insurance isn't going to cover this, blah, blah, all these decisions.

Now, I know, Gary, that you don't want to think that you killed your mom, and this sort of thing, but the argument about this woman exists because I think your scenario of her circumstances doesn't jibe with what some family members are saying. Some family members are saying she does respond to stimuli, that she does know when her dad and mom walk in the room, this sort of thing. So I think that the way you have to understand this -- well, you, the audience, the way you, the audience, have to understand, because everybody -- well, 90% of the people on the phones waiting to talk to me disagree with me on this, and I think the culture of death is very seductive. We can tell ourselves that we're doing the best thing for the person that's going to die. And we do that to hide the fact that we don't want to be inconvenienced ourselves in some way, either financially or personally or a combination of the two or what have you. And individual case, okay, so Gary's mom died the way she did, that's not going to wreck society, a single instance, it's not going to, you know, sow the seed, fabric of destruction. However, when a culture of death overtakes a society, and we have one now, you know, we've gotten to a point where it's permissible and even heroic to abort babies.

In order to make that argument we've now started calling pregnancy a disease. Pregnancy is a disease, it's not a natural state for women say some abortion rights activists. Then on the tail end of the life spectrum we decide, "Well, this person wouldn't want to live this way." Even though they may never have said that they don't want to live this way we assume it for them because we project. We don't think we would want to live that way. "I don't want to see my family member suffer," or what have you. And I realize that each one of you that have been in this situation do not think that you have contributed anything but love and the goodness of your wishes to your family member in taking this action. But there are societal ramifications for all of these particularly as they accumulate and the cumulative effect of the culture of death is one of the things that takes us to where we are at now. And that is that we literally have divided up sides in this argument that perplex me, and they give me pause. There's an actual energized enthusiasm for this woman's death out there, and there's an actual energized enthusiasm to save her life. I can understand the energized effort and enthusiasm to save life. We're oriented toward that in so many areas of our society. Sadly, we're also oriented on the side of ending life, and there are a lot of people-- I hear all this talk, Democrats have all these accusations, Republicans have ideological attached to this. Let me tell you something, if you want to argue who's more ideologically at risk here by losing this, take a look at the left.

They've got two things they're going to lose on, if the judge here -- and he's a Clinton-appointed judge, and I have no idea what's going to happen in this case -- but if the left loses it, they lost twice. They're going to have lost because the Congress has exercised Article 3 and is exercising its authority over the judiciary. They can't stand that because that's going to send a bad signal over their filibuster of Bush judges. The second thing they're going to lose on is their base, the pro-abort, feminist base. I mean, they're as actively involved in this as -- "Well, Rush, this has nothing to do with abortion." -- no, it doesn't have anything to do with abortion. It has to do with the rights of individuals under the so-called declaration of privacy or what have you to terminate a life they'd rather not deal with. Which is what abortion is. That's all it is. I want to kill this baby, I don't want to deal with it. You come up with other excuses, "I don't want it born to poverty, oh, it's a sorry circumstances," da-da-da-da-da-da, but boil it down, that's what it is, and if they lose both of these -- and that's why they're panicked. They've got two ideological battles that they're fighting in this little battle here over Terri Schiavo, and they're afraid to lose both of them. But don't think they don't have an ideological stake here, either.

>"Do you have any real proof of this?"<
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"Terri Schiavo collapsed amidst mysterious circumstances at her home on Feb. 25, 1990, during a time when witnesses say there had been on ongoing situation of argument and strife and possible domestic violence. The only person at the home at the time of her collapse which resulted in a lack of oxygen to the brain, causing serious brain damage, was her husband.

Within 48 hours after she had been admitted to the hospital, her husband’s employer, the owner of a restaurant, arrived at the hospital. Daniel Grieco, also an attorney, consulted with Terri’s parents outside the Intensive Care Unit waiting room, recommending that they sign documents that would allow Schiavo to handle Terri’s medical affairs on the pretense it would expedite Terri’s emergency treatment.

The attorney’s rationale was since Terri was barely clinging to life, vesting Michael Schiavo with this power would expedite her medical care. Grieco did not mention that Schiavo would have exclusive power to dictate Terri’s medical treatment and the authority to control the release of any medical information concerning Terri.

Another Greer Contributor

Since there are no documents in Terri’s legal case files regarding this meeting with Daniel Grieco, that agreement may have been designed as a short term control solution. Notably, the document allowed Schaivo to conceal Terri’s hospital admittance records and the ability to filter all of the doctor’s information. (Daniel Grieco was a $300 contributor to the 2004 election campaign of Judge Greer)

As an example, on March 5, 1991, just 53 weeks after Terri’s collapse, a bone scan taken of Terri revealed a healed broken right femur bone and healed bone fractures in her ribs, pelvis, spine and ankle. The radiologist, Dr. Walker, concluded that “Terri has a history of trauma” and presumed “that the other multiple areas of abnormal activity also relate to previous trauma”. WALKER PDF & Bone Scan

Despite testimony and sworn affidavits by caregivers attesting to the alleged abuse, neglect and exploitation of Terri Schiavo allegedly at the hands of Michael Schiavo, Greer has steadfastly refused to consider any of the allegations.

An orthopedic surgeon, Dr. Hamilton, initially saw Terri a few months after she collapsed. Schiavo never disclosed this information to any of the Schinder family.

On June 18, 1990, after a conducted investigation declaring Terri incapacitated, a hearing was held in a St. Petersburg courtroom appointing Michael Schiavo as Terri’s legal guardian.

The St. Petersburg court files state that Terri’s parents were notified by mail of these events, including the hearing, and had no objections to Michael Schiavo being appointed legal guardian.

Terri’s parents emphatically state that they did not know of the investigation which concluded that Terri was incapacitated or the subsequent court hearing and were never notified.

Additionally, there is no evidence of any documentation in Terri’s legal case files verifying that Terri’s parents supported Michael Schiavo’s guardianship appointment, other than a reference that Terri’s parents were in agreement. It should be noted that during this 1990 time frame, Terri’s parents were in daily contact with Michael Schiavo and nothing was ever mentioned regarding these court proceedings by Schiavo or his attorney. The entire legal guardianship transaction was handled by attorney Daniel Grieco who later contributed to Greer’s election campaign as did each one of the attorneys representing Michael Schiavo."

Source:

Schiavogate---The Big Cover-up

By June Maxam and Ginger Berlin

© The Empire Journal

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That leads to the 6 ft. 6 inch, 250 pound problem: Michael Schiavo. The evidence compiled against him suggests a history and pattern of domestic abuse against Terri and other women that is strong and significant. An immediate criminal investigation is warranted.

The main evidence comes from a bone scan taken on March 5, 1991. As Terri’s guardian, Michael Schiavo denied her family access to Terri’s records, the results of which were not made available until November, 2002. This scan indicated numerous broken bones in various stages of healing, including compressions fractures, a broken back, pelvis, ankle, bone bruises and ossifications.

Board certified radiologist Dr. Walker read the scan in 1991 and interpreted the results as abnormal, which he attributed to either an accident or earlier trauma. Based on the remodeling process of her bones, Dr. Walker stated in his deposition that:

a) the injuries indicated by the scan occurred on or around the time that Terri Schiavo collapsed;

b) the abnormalities on the bone scan were not typical of someone suffering cardiac arrest and collapsing to the floor, and

c) the fractures indicated by the bone scan are not typical of patients bedridden only thirteen months. As recorded in Dr. Walker’s November 21, 2003 deposition, Terri might have been the victim of foul play via a blow to her body, being thrown into a sharp furniture corner, or assaulted with a blunt object.

On October 24, 2003, renowned forensic pathologist Dr. Michael Baden was interviewed by Greta van Susteren on Fox News.

He disclosed that with low potassium and no elevated enzymes, it would be extremely rare for a young woman to collapse as Terri did from a heart attack.

When asked what the bone injuries suggest to him, Dr. Baden replied, “Some kind of trauma. The trauma can be from a fall, or the trauma can be from some kind of beating that she obtained from somebody somewhere. It’s something that should have been investigated in 1991 when these findings were found.”

Other medical testimonies are in agreement. One medical expert testified that a diagnosis of a heart attack was never made. Another testified that Terri’s rigid neck indicates she may have been the victim of strangulation. Psychiatrist and expert witness Carole E. Lieberman, M.D., M.P.H. offered preliminary thoughts and provided a chilling profile of Michael Schiavo as an abusive husband.

Prior to Terri’s collapse, there were serious financial problems in her marriage and her husband Michael tried to control her behavior. He was fired from six jobs in two years, some of which he held only two weeks. They often lived on her income, which Michael often spent on himself. He monitored her odometer and isolated her from her family and friends. On the day of her collapse, Michael and Terri had a bad fight after he accused her of spending too much money at the hairdresser.

Dr. Lieberman concludes: “He (Michael) should most definitely be investigated as the perpetrator of the ‘incident’ that caused Terri’s collapse and her current condition.”

Michael Schiavo insists that Terri stated early in their marriage that she never would want to be kept on life support. Even if that were true, Terri is not on life support; she breathes on her own. Since Terri has no written will, everything Michael Schiavo says is hearsay. He violated numerous Florida statutes and the Americans for Disabilities Act by failing to perform his duties as his wife’s guardian, most notably by denying his disabled wife basic medical care as part of a malpractice settlement award he received.

However, of all Michael’s offensive actions against his wife, what I deem most suspicious was his decision to have Terri cremated immediately upon her demise. In all the documentation on this case, there is not a single account of Terri Schiavo having ever expressed a desire to be cremated.

Michael’s excuse is to say that she wouldn’t want a standard burial because she “doesn’t like bugs.” I’m not buying. The likely reason is that Michael has something to hide – like the cause of her numerous bone injuries, perhaps? – and he doesn’t want an autopsy to uncover any incriminating evidence.

So, what really happened on February 25, 1990? We know that Terri fell in her home and sustained serious injuries. We know that Michael Schiavo, who was trained in CPR, oddly did not administer CPR to his wife. We know for the past fifteen years his only mission has been to deny any rehabilitation for Terri.

Dr. Carole Lieberman observed, “If Terri were to be allowed to die, as Michael has been desperately struggling to achieve for years, it could help him escape detection. This would be a grave miscarriage of justice.”

That’s exactly the way Michael Schiavo and the Florida judicial system want it.

Source:

Copyright 2005 by Bonnie Chernin Rogoff. All rights reserved.

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But she knows. She feels. There’s _expression in those eyes. Just one look at her in a video with her mother and everyone except the Scarecrow on his way to Oz knows it, too.

Recently, another presumed “brain-dead” woman made news in Kansas. In a coma after becoming the victim of a drunk driver, Sarah Scantlin snapped out of a twenty year silence and began to speak. Memories are now coming back to her. By legal definition, Miss Scantlin’s life is valid. Yesterday, it was not. Was she ever in a persistent vegetative state, or PVS? She’d respond to questions by blinking once for no, twice for yes, but since she couldn’t speak no one was ever sure she understood the questions.

That’s the problem. No one is ever sure. The only ones who claim to know what’s best for the profoundly disabled are those who seek to benefit the most by having them legally murdered.

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Renowned neurologist: Schiavo can eat with aid & is not in ‘persistent vegetative state’
Mar 21, 2005
By Joni B. Hannigan (Baptist Press)

PINELLAS PARK, Fla. (BP)--A doctor close to the Terri Schiavo case told the Florida Baptist Witness that the 41-year-old disabled woman could actually be fed orally if it were allowed.

"The important thing for people to understand is that she can eat and swallow right now,” said William Hammesfahr, a neurologist who has examined Schiavo. He is in many of the videos circulated through the news media showing that Schiavo is at times responsive and aware.

"They are truly withholding food from a person who is awake, alert, and can eat and swallow,” Hammesfahr said. After spending at least 10 hours with Schiavo several years ago, he told Florida Judge George W. Greer that she can improve with therapy.

Hammesfahr said his credibility had been questioned at the time, but he has since been vindicated in court and currently maintains a thriving private practice in Clearwater, Fla. Despite reports attacking him, he said he has never lost his license to practice medicine and currently is involved in litigation surrounding the ordeal.

Hammesfahr was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology in 1999 for his work in brain injury and stroke. He is a recognized expert in treating neurological disorders, having successfully treated thousands of patients using vasodilator therapy, which increases blood flow to the brain, thus healing conditions previously thought to be untreatable.

Standing with a handful of supporters outside of the hospice late in the evening Mar. 19, Hammesfahr told the Witness Schiavo previously has swallowed pudding and daily swallows almost two liters of water by virtue of being able to process her own saliva and sinus drainage.

"That’s liquid and that’s the most difficult thing to swallow," Hammesfahr said of her saliva. "If she can swallow that she can swallow food or pudding."

Other doctors who testified before Greer in 2003 had limited exposure to Schiavo and did not complete standard evaluations for brain injuries, Hammesfahr said. The court-appointed doctors maintained Schiavo is in a persistent vegetative state (PVS), with no chance for recovery.

"Terri’s not that bad," Hammesfahr said. "She is like a child with cerebral palsy. She can speak. At least when I saw her, she would speak very slowly. She would sort of form words, she would move her arms and legs at command. She could understand questions in English.”

Hammesfahr said there are at least 50 physicians he knows of, in private practice and related to medical universities who have said Schiavo is not in a PVS or in a coma.

...Her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, as well as family and supporters have argued that she could improve were she provided rehabilitation services. Michael Schiavo has refused to provide those services since around 1993, they say.

...Hammesfahr said that about 30 percent of his cases are more severe than Terri Schiavo’s, and that she most likely could improve, whether by his approach or another.

"You can get almost anybody with a brain injury or a stroke better," Hammesfahr said. "I think that’s the long and short of it.

"It’s not that [Schiavo simply] deserves a chance, she deserves rehabilitation," Hammesfahr continued. "She’s not going to get the rehabilitation if she gets killed off here."

Each day Schiavo is off the feeding tube increases the chance that she will end up in a coma, Hammesfahr said. He described what happens to the human body when it is deprived of food and water.

"People who die of starvation, their acid eats through their stomach, they develop infections in their body, their body starts to dissolve from the inside out, they develop seizures, [and] frequently it breaks their back," he said. "They have to have medications to essentially put them into a coma to not have their body break their back or something of that nature."

He explained that the process of putting someone in a coma after withholding nutrition and hydration is part of an "exit protocol" that involves delivering powerful drugs like Morphine and Valium to the patient when they are expected to die.

"The danger for Schiavo is that if she is in a coma, she will not have the type of monitoring that could help her recover if the feeding tube is reinserted.

"Putting a person in coma is very dangerous,” Hammesfahr said, and after 7-8 days she might end up in an irreversible coma or with further brain damage.

Angel Watson, a Pinellas Park, Fla., resident who works with the Caring and Sharing Center for Independent Living, said she once was considered to be in a PVS, after a skiing accident left her paralyzed, but that she made remarkable improvements because of her strong will to live.

Referring to the two other times Schiavo’s feeding tube was removed and surgically re-inserted, Watson said it is wrong to treat Terri as if she would not want to live.

Watson questions Michael Schiavo’s insistence that he loves his wife and cares deeply for her. Michael Schiavo, Watson said, has had ample proof that his wife wants to live.

"She’s the embodiment of a living will,” Watson said. "She is a living will. He’s tried to kill her twice and she has the will to live.

"What more [evidence] could you possibly want?"

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Any more stupid-ass questions?

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>"My ridiculous comment is equal toward yours."<

Your statement is one half right. The first three words...

Don't screw with me - I always have my facts straight.

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