Posted on 05/28/2007 9:33:12 AM PDT by wagglebee
The Christian attorney who fought to keep Terry Schiavo alive says the three leading GOP presidential candidates don't understand the important disability issues involved in the widely publicized 2005 case.
During a recent Republican presidential debate in California, the candidates were asked whether Congress was right to intervene in the Terry Schiavo case by attempting to prevent the state of Florida from removing the disabled woman's feeding tube. The answers varied.
Mitt Romney, former governor of Massachusetts, said he thought it "was a mistake" for Congress to get involved and the matter should have been left at the state level. Senator John McCain said Congress "probably acted too hastily." And former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani called the case a "family dispute."
David Gibbs III of the Christian Law Association says the United States gives greater due process to convicted murderers than to innocent disabled people. The former attorney for Schiavo's parents argues that Congress did the right thing when it intervened to provide her those rights.
"Many of the candidates are following the political wind, if you will, instead of showing leadership and saying, 'You know what? That was good public policy back then. We need to stand up for the disabled. We need to stand up for the senior citizens,'" Gibbs says. "We need to have that compassion for vulnerable people as opposed to taking the mindset that those people that just don't matter," he notes.
It is disingenuous, the Christian attorney contends, for candidates to claim they are pro-life but not be willing to grant due process rights to the disabled. "If you're pro-life, you have to be pro-life at every step," he says.
"Please understand: our founding fathers understood that you don't have any liberty, our Constitution doesn't matter, if you don't protect the innocent life of the citizens," Gibbs explains. "That's why they talked about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness -- your free speech, your freedom of religion, your right to own a gun or [receive] due process of law," he says. "If the government can kill you, you have no true liberty."
When Rudy Giuliani visited Florida he initially said he was in favor of assisting Terry Schiavo but later backpedaled from those comments, Gibbs points out. And in the recent GOP presidential debate, he says, only Kansas Senator Sam Brownback and Congressman Duncan Hunter of California got the issue right when they were asked about the Schiavo case.
And the end result was that an innocent woman was MURDERED and any of these candidates would allow it to happen again.
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Terri was tap dancing and juggling 6 oranges when her scurrilous husband shot her in the back of the head. At least that’s what I pieced together from reading these threads.
I’m going to get blasted for saying this, but this should have been left at the state level. It’s unfortunate. I’m not wholly happy with how it turned out. But individual states have traditionally dealt with this issue.
I’m going to leave politics wholly out of it, as this case has a way of setting people off in all number of directions.
"I wouldn't want to live like that so let's kill her" PING!
Romney’s position should come as a surprise to no one.
After all, he used his executive power to implement gay marriage in Massachusetts, even though there was no law or constitutional provision that allowed him, much less compelled him, to do so.
He’s a judicial supremacist, the most dangerous breed of elected official loose in the land today.
He is right that it was a political mistake, mostly in how it was executed. The GOP's chronic problem is am inability to articulate what it is doing, why it is doing it, and why it's good.
The Schiavo case was a classic example of what happens when they fail to do this: someone else (political opponents) fill in the blanks in a self serving way, and the GOP loses public confidence. Soon after, they lose political influence.
Should it have been left at the state level when the court was in clear violation of the Florida Constitution?
Did you support federal court involvement in the 2000 election when Florida courts violated their own Constitution?
Should state probate judges have the authority to ignore a Congressional subpoena?
Let's see if you still think it's a family dispute when one of our wives decides she wants your money instead of you. Oh, never mind.
If we are going to start deciding whose daily existence is pathetic and needs his/her miserable life ended by court-ordered starvation, I have a long list of candidates.
Don’t worry about it. Try taking a class in reading comprehension. It really helps to understand the written word.
They offer night classes for adults in our area.
Not just MURDERED It was worse than that. The poor Girl was starved to DEATH! ! ! !
We treat DOGS & CATS better than that.
LMFAO!
Well, it won’t be long before we are informed that we “don’t understand” because she was “brain dead” and had repeatedly stated that she would “want” to be starved and dehydrated to death and that the fact that her husband was legally estranged from her, living with another women who had his children, is not important because it was the “loving” thing to do.
It’s just a mattter of time before the other assorted trolls show up here.
Maybe not murdered, but certainly executed, because the state was the instrument of death.
Thing is, if Terri Shaivo was murdered, than it’s up to the state. The Federal government has no say over state criminal statutes.
It is possible to do the right thing in the wrong way, and that was the case in Congress involving itself in this case.
Also not helping is that in most of the nation, the laws aren’t clear in these kinds of cases.
I was ready to give Mitt the benefit of reconsideration with his proclamation regaridng cloning, etc reshaping his beliefs, but the more I read of this man's slick responses to pro-life issues, the more I consider his responses to be slick, not fundamental values. Slick is deceitful in the main.
With your dead soul perspective, I’m surprised you even bother to read Terri threads. But then MN is firmly liberal.
You got that right.
Terri’s rights as a disabled person were protected under the Florida Constitution and under the American’s with Disabilities Act. The federal government has every right to involve itself when civil rights are violated.
I'm sure the WAckos will have fun discussing it on their new anti-FReeper site.
If the government can force the artificial prolonging of life, based upon the religious beliefs of others, you have no true liberty.
Also, in this case the government killed no one. The closest family member decided to stop the artificial prolonging of life which had dragged on for several years.
It reminds me of the Clintons.
So, food and water are "artificial life support"?
The closest family member decided to stop the artificial prolonging of life which had dragged on for several years.
You mean the estranged and probably abusive husband who decided to starve and dehydrate Terri so he could spend Terri's money on his girlfriend and the illegitimate children they had together?
Nice try ... the ‘closest family member’ was living with and raising a child with another female yet the Florida greerghoul refused to remove the adulterous husband from control over Terri’s life. You strike me as the type who thinks that’s just peachy. Says a lot about you and nothing about the case you fail to comprehend.
The whole Terri Schiavo case was surreal. The courts literally thumbed their noses at congress and didn’t allow a reprieve or review of the case..just a hasty march to killing an innocent patient like she was a convicted felon. Terri’s family was ignored and devastated too.
“Vengeance is mine, I will repay saith the Lord”. Romans 12:19b
Very true.
Actually the government helped hold Terri still so she could be killed. They helped a lot with a complicit judge and police and SWAT teams so she could die according to the judge's order.
Meanwhile, I just finished my own artificial life support, a sandwich, which included a drink of water. The LE's guarding Terri at that time did not allow her a drop, not one drop of water for that thirteen days.
Glad you brought this up. Maybe some new visitors will find out what really happened. The "closest family member" wanted her dead many years ago, just kept at it until with help from friends he could get the job done.
Hey, watch it! If such things were kept at the state level, then there might be some consistency in pro-life arguments over Roe v. Wade and there might be some hope of making abortion illegal in some states. And that might put some anti-abortion activists out of a job, so just hush!
Did you get a picture of that? I've never seen one!
You forgot the part about how all these FReepers knew her better than her husband.
That’s right. This woman was allowed to be murdered by the cowards of our system; not by our Constitution. They also allowed that worthless sack of you know what husband and his attorneys to get away with murder.
Remember, Michael, what goes around comes around 10 fold and I have never seen it fail.
Whether he did was living with this other person in the beginning or not does not matter. He did and still maintained control over Terri which is probably a conflict of interest. He should have relinquished control. I do have a question though, how can you expect an immoral person to make a moral decision?
I comprehend that this was a difficult and controversial case, influenced by particular religious beliefs and legal opinions - both of which being not always the best way to solve a problem.
Our medical technology is developing to the point of keeping a great many brain injured, etc. patients alive for extended periods of time. The consideration here is that the cost of doing this will prevent medical care from being available to those who could use it more practically. How do you decide who rates the excessive cost of staying alive with no normal life activity and who gets healed and returns to a normal productive life. At some point that decision will have to be made. The more the government gets involved in this, the more socialized medicine will result. If this is what you want, Hillary is your candidate. Try comprehending that.
ROFL
I don’t know what the newest anti-FReepers are calling themselves, nor do I really care, but WAckos seems appropriate.
My mother had the same argument, and my husband agreed with it. I told them both that if the only things keeping me alive were food and water (like right now), they'd better not decide that I don't need 'em.
Um, you're facts are in error. You need only check for how long the adulterous husband has known Jodie to see that you are spreading a false premise. [HINT: as soon as the monies form the court case were awarded, the sleazy husband had an 'investment' arrangement with a Jodie connected insurance/annuity program.]
Your willingness to post such a false notion is disturbing. If you don't know the fatcs, just read along without posting.
I've got a newsflash for you, FOOD AND WATER IS NOT "MEDICAL TECHNOLOGY" AND WE ALL NEED IT.
I tend to agree, hence my ROFL.
But that doesn't count because her husband actually went on with his life and neglected to sit by her side and grieve over her condition for years on end, expecting that any minute she would regain consciousness.
I had just volunteered on the Romney for President website the day before he made these remarks. He lost my vote in the primary and my active support if he makes it to the general election. Liberals and RINO's don't comprehend the depth of this issue or it's lasting implications for the disabled and our nation, or for their own political futures.
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