I don’t know what to think about the Schiavo case other than total sorrow. And now that the body of this poor brain-dead woman has become a playtoy for the ongoing culture war in this country, I am disgusted.
Congress is completely overstepping its bounds by becoming involved in this horror; Republicans using ridiculous tactics (subpoenaing the brain dead woman? please.) to make inroads with their fundamentalist base (funny, they don’t seem to have any problems with capital punishment, but balk at letting an already dead woman die). Majority leader Frist has overstepped his own bounds by claiming that he is qualified to diagnose her from only watching a videotape (even though every court-ordered physician actually examining her points out that her cerebral cortext is gone).
The Democrats… well, I’m not sure what they’ve done other than block this latest attempt, but I’m sure they’re playing the political game as well.
The situation as I see it is clear: Terri Schiavo died 15 years ago. By all accounts, the parts of her brain involved with being alive and human is gone, there is only liquid there now. Her autonomic reflexes are all that is left.
Her husband is, by law and morality, the person who speaks for her, and he has.
I fully understand how wrenching it will be for people to imagine her starving and dehyrated until her body succumbs. That just points out that sometimes euthanasia is a necessary evil — but evidently the right wing prefers that people suffer.
Let her body go, and stop using it to score political points. Her soul has been gone for 15 years.
