You heretics. If people would have been allowed to pray indefinitely she would have been healed. :P

to be fair, remember that not all people who pray were in favor of continued life support, and not all the people who protested removing the feeding tube were praying people.

stereotypes are fun, but not always accurate, mmkay?

Some were politicians trying to score points with praying people, too.

from the Houston Chronicle

June 15, 2005, 8:10PM

What we knew but would not believe before autopsy
Neglected facts created turmoil over Schiavo case
By HAROLD Y. VANDERPOOL


The long, divisive controversy over the Terri Schiavo story did not have to happen.


Much of the side-taking, distrust and hostility could have been avoided had TV news channels, talk-show hosts, protesters and self-serving politicians sought out accurate information before they rushed out to inflame public opinion.

That information is summarized in the just-released results of Schiavo's autopsy. Her brain was profoundly and irreversibly damaged. She was blind. The damage made it impossible for her to respond to others in whatever ways we take to be personal. Consciousness was gone, but via medical technology her body was being kept alive. The autopsy affirms that no amount of therapy or treatment would have regenerated the massive loss.

Sadly and tragically, Schiavo's autopsy report confirms facts that were readily available prior to her death.

A few hours of searching the Internet and other information sources would uncover the following: The videos and pictures endlessly shown on television were, in fact, 4 years old. Even more misleading, these videos depicted only a few seconds from several hours of video taping — the seconds when Schiavo appeared to be conscious, but, based upon previous information and present autopsy results, was not.

The most frequently shown of these videos gives the impression that Schiavo is smiling at her mother. Upon close viewing, her blank but open eyes were looking past her mother's face. In another short segment, her eyes appear to trace the path of a balloon. We were not informed that several other attempts to get her to trace the balloon on the same video proved unsuccessful.

To be candid, the American public was deceived day after day by pictures that credited Schiavo with consciousness and that were being shown as if they were recent and representative, when in fact they were outmoded and unrepresentative.

Furthermore, the 2002 CAT scan of Schiavo's brain evidenced gross abnormalities — large areas filled with cerebrospinal fluid. Her autopsy reveals that her brain was half the size of a normal brain.

Drawn from 11 days of evidentiary hearings, these facts were summarized by the Florida Circuit Court in October 2002. The court concluded that the evidence overwhelmingly supported the view that Schiavo remained in a persistent vegetative state, which is consistent with periods of wakefulness and smiling as a reflex.

Neglect of the moral duty to first of all inform the public about the facts insofar as they were known created a vacuum that became filled with divisiveness and political grandstanding:

• Outcries over the brutality of starving Schiavo to death.
• Diatribes against her husband and the courts.
• Hand-wringing about disrespect for the sacredness of life.
• Accusations that this case is a slippery slope toward a Nazi-like policy of killing persons with severe physical and mental disabilities.
The most widespread and persisting opposition to the courts' decisions fixated on the permissibility of removing Schiavo's feeding tube. Led to believe that she was partly conscious, numerous persons decried how she was inhumanely and painfully starved to death. The just-released autopsy shows that this deeply poignant concern rested on false assumptions.

Given the enormous turmoil over the Schiavo case and the fervent and entrenched side-taking it generated, many persons who already have their minds made up may well not let the truth get in the way of fervently held former conclusions. Hopefully, members of the media who contributed to the misperceptions and deep social rifts engendered by this case will renew their determination to report and respond to accurate information.

That could foster renewed discussions about end-of-life decisions that many of us and our family members will have to grapple with. Fortunately, 30 years of hard-fought court battles grant us rights to make a broad range of personal choices.

Vanderpool is the Dr. and Mrs. Joseph T. Painter Distinguished Professor in the Institute for the Medical Humanities at the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston.

I'd like to get a bumper sticker:

Not all Priests are Pedophiles

Oh, looky, it's Mr Frist again.

This time its all weasel words about his stance on the Terry Schaivo case. Let's hear what he has to say, shall we?
So, it's "I'm a doctor, and in my opinion, those other doctors are wrong." Have I overstated his earlier position? I think not. Carry on.

Now it's "But it wasn't a diagnosis." When I put these two together, I get "I'm a leader, I have important things to say. I'm an expert in this field, my specialized training factors into my conclusions. Listen to me, allow me to persuade you." Then when you add today's statement you get "Even though I said those things before, the reason I'm still right is because I never said it was a 'diagnosis'. Your conclusions about my statements and the fact that I'm doctor meant are your own. I never said this is my diagnosis as a doctor, that these are the medical facts as I see them. I never said that. Any conclusions of that sort were entirely presumptions on YOUR part, and I did nothing to contribute to those improper conclusions. See, I'm a doctor and a leader and you're not, otherwise you would have known better." How am I doing here? Putting words in his mouth do you think?

From there we move to this.

AndI understand his remarks this way. "I can't argue with the evidence available today. It is incontrovertable. Can we stop talking about this now?" The cynic in me says for him: "I could easily take any position on this issue, but no one is offering me any upside here, so I want to move on to some fresh meat. Plus, I was wrong and I don't want linger on this topic too much longer--it makes me uncomfortable to be shown to be wrong, even though I was right."

What are your thoughts?

Dr Timothy Johnson, a doctor and a minister, was very blunt and negative about Bill Frist's Schiavo comments. Dr Johnson, in a very unusually strong statement on ABC's Good Morning America, said Bill Frist should have known better than to make those comments.

Frist simply demonstrates how much about power corrupts - even intelligent thought.

Don't forget previous history of those who ignore science to pervert mankind with religious rhetoric. Those who donate a kidney to a transplant have committed original sin - the felony of sins in the Catholic Church. This decreed by a previous Pope after an American twin donated a kidney to save his brother's life. Invitro fertilization is a sin! This also from religious extremists who were silenced by pragmatic and intelligent, centrist humans; people who did invitro fertilization despite petty religious fanatics. And now we have lies about stem cell research killing human life. Those who oppose stem cell research doom more humans to disease and death. How Statanistic are these religious extremists?

Eliminate the spin to again observe a classic conflict even executed upon Galileo: religious myths desperately trying to impede both intelligence and science. The torture of Terry Schiavo's body by these same religious fanatics only demonstrates why Satanist rationalizations dominate religious extremist rhetoric.

What intelligent thought did Sen. Frist use to have an opinion? This fact reported by ABC News from his own spokesman: Demonstrates again that the Schiavo legislation was Satan loves religious extremists. Extremists created the Holocaust, Spanish Inquisition, and massacres in the Balkans. And if that is not enough, these religious extremists even celebrate (want) people like Ronald Reagan dying of alzheimer's disease.

which religion was in favor of packing jews into ovens?

Pretty much all of them except the Jews, wasn't it? Same ones that was a'gin it.

now back up a second - that wasn't a religiously motivated instance of genocide, that was ethnic. if it was religion based they wouldn't have cooked non-practicing jews. or gypsies. or poles. or artists. or homosexuals.

(I was attempting to humorously make the point that it wasn't a religiously motivated instance of genocide.)

sorry, the corona may have filtered the humor out somewhere between the cornea and brain.

Oh, good grief... "There must be something we can get him on!"

Good grief, indeed.Am I to understand from this exchange, that Gov Jeb Bush is staying up late, reading the court transcripts from 1992? And watching reruns of an television interview in 2003 (ELEVEN YEARS LATER). And that he then compared these two items with the timestamp on the 911 call. And that this "smoking gun" is cause for a fresh investigation by the State Attorney General?

Please, all you Republicans out there, in the name of mercy, run Jeb Bush for President in 2006. This man desparately needs a job. "Idle hands are the Devil's workshop!" At least if he's President, he'll be busy, and face it, he can't f*ck it up any worse than his little brother has.

Clearly you are thinking too logically. Therefore you must be a Satanist. Be very careful since such posts can be subject to investigation under the religious inspired Patriot Act. Opposing the political agenda of a mainstream religion means one must be investigated. Eventually they will get Schiavo on tax fraud. He did not conform to pagan Christian fundamentalist beliefs. Therefore we must use government to 'punish him for his sins'.

Good thing he did not donate a kidney to save a brother's life. Then Christian extremists would have more reason to investigate him.

I never read the Salem Witch Trials as a kid. No one could be so stupid - so extremist - as to prosecute using religious myths and propaganda. Clearly the Salem Witch Trials would never happen in my lifetime. But I was wrong. Even pedophile priests are protected by their church. Did not appreciate what Monty Python was prophesizing: