And they've gone to these lengths for to placate the religious right, not out of concern for the patient. In short, this is all about politics:
ABC News obtained talking points circulated among Senate Republicans explaining why they should vote to intervene in the Schiavo case. Among them, that it is an important moral issue and the "pro-life base will be excited," and that it is a "great political issue — this is a tough issue for Democrats."If you read Daily Kos, you've already seen the most astounding revelation to come out of this controversy. In 1999, the governor of Texas -- a fella named Bush -- signed legislation containing this language:
If the patient or the person responsible for the health care decisions of the patient is requesting life-sustaining treatment that the attending physician has decided and the review process has affirmed is inappropriate treatment, the patient shall be given available life-sustaining treatment pending transfer under Subsection (d). The patient is responsible for any costs incurred in transferring the patient to another facility. The physician and the health care facility are not obligated to provide life-sustaining treatment after the 10th day after the written decision required under Subsection (b) is provided to the patient or the person responsible for the health care decisions of the patient...(My emphasis added.)
Asked about this embarrassment from the past, Scott McClellan said that the 1999 legislation was signed to make sure that "actions were being taken that were in accordance with the wishes of the patient or the patient's family." In fact, the wording makes clear that the law was intended to have precisely the opposite effect.
The six-month-old baby of a woman named Wanda Hudson was killed by doctors, against the wishes of the mother, as a direct result of the law Bush signed.
Of course, nothing we can say here will ever force Bush's fundamentalist supporters to see the reality of the situation. They will believe whatever they prefer to believe -- even if doing so requires ignoring the actual text of the 1999 law while accepting McClellan's re-write of history.
9 comments:
Yup...that bill that Governor Bush passed in Texas in 1999 is a scandal...particularly since GWB is doing the pro-life dance now. In fact, he's only pro-life if a patient can pay his hospital bills.
I did a pretty comprehensive report in my Ratfuck Diary yesterday (3/20/05) on the brain-dead patient in Houston whose family is trying to fend off the pull-the-plug law that Bush's 1999 legislation provides to hospitals when a patient can't pay his bills.
The worst of it is, of course, that the MSM hasn't mentioned a word about George W. Bush's 1999 law that says it's okay for hospitals to pull the plug if you're poor.
Life is sacred to President George W. Bush only if your hospital bills get paid. If your Medicare funding runs out, as it has for the brain-dead man in Houston, Bush says, "He's poor. His life is not sacred. Pull the plug."
http://ratfuckdiary.blogspot.com
granted the whole thing is a political scam, with high-pocriseas galore, but...
why would you assume the parents have more say in this decision than the husband?
the fact is, there is not a state in the union that actually allows for what you are saying; the spouse is the one to make the call. this is why the courts have repeatedly upheld the man's decision to pull her tube.
while it is the case that he has moved on to make a life for himself, with another woman who has mothered their children, it is still the case that he is married to this woman, and the law places the decision in his hands.
you may disagree with that law, but then you'd have to explain that to me, as well.
think of it this way: if you want to give the parents that power in this case, then you are giving the in-laws power to make such intrusive decisions as we resist our govenment making.
recipe for a sick sitcom, doncha thin'?
granted the whole thing is a political scam, with high-pocriseas galore, but...
why would you assume the parents have more say in this decision than the husband?
the fact is, there is not a state in the union that actually allows for what you are saying; the spouse is the one to make the call. this is why the courts have repeatedly upheld the man's decision to pull her tube.
while it is the case that he has moved on to make a life for himself, with another woman who has mothered their children, it is still the case that he is married to this woman, and the law places the decision in his hands.
you may disagree with that law, but then you'd have to explain that to me, as well.
think of it this way: if you want to give the parents that power in this case, then you are giving the in-laws power to make such intrusive decisions as we resist our govenment making.
recipe for a sick sitcom, doncha thin'?
I've got to disagree strongly about the parents making these decisions. A grown and able person does not have parents as such, but some close relatives from whom most adults separate.
In many families the separation does not go well, and in fact this includes most cases where children leave and hide from their parents; they cannot be together without going mutually nuts. People who go to such trouble over a daughter whose cortex is liquified, to me it seems like parents who never really let their fledgling fly away.
I was in that kind of relationship with my mother. I love my mother, I loved her a lot, but even so her death was one of the best things ever to happen to me. Almost immediately after that, at the age of 30, having never left home, I was living halfway across the continent, and by the end of the year was married.
The job of parents is, in a way, to stop being parents -- and instead be close friends.
My wife now is the person who speaks for me when I cannot speak. If she is unable, then the members of my childhood nest (since I have no children able to speak for me).
Huh? You "certainly believe the parents, not the husband, should make the ultimate decision in this case."? Certainly? WTF? Is she a little girl? Even the Christian Bible says married spouses should seperate from their familes, cleave to each other and form their own darn families. God forbid you should ever be in the same position, to have your rights as a mate pulled away from you. Methinks you'd be singing a different tune.
From what I've learned of the case, it seems to me that the husband may not have her best interests at heart. My thoughts here are pretty much the same as in capital punishment cases: Better to err on the side of life. I would, however, charge her continuing hospital bills to the RNC>.
The debate regarding husband vs parents only exposes one mroe layer of GOP hypocrisy in this mess. Why is it that they were pushing for a constitutional amendment to protect "the sanctity of marriage," but choose to disregard this principle when it becomes politically inconvenient? Granted, Michael Schiavo is not a very likable person, and yes, he is in a relationship with another woman with two children. However, he is still legally her husband, and if it were him arguing to keep Terri alive, the "sanctity" of this relationship would be part of their rallying cry.
Kim in PA
In response to the person who wrote: “Even the Christian Bible says married spouses should seperate from their familes, cleave to each other and form their own darn families.”
The bible says many things;
Matthew 25:44-45“They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’
“He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’
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