One of my best friends and I had an initial disagreement over the Schiavo case. She’s a very caring person. She works at a no-kill animal shelter and her family has been dealing with a member requiring care for Alzheimer’s Disease. So I could see how she would “err on the side of life”, so to speak. She heard some of the wild claims being made by the anti-abortionists on the Schindler’s side of the issue and was very shocked that I agreed with the husband’s right to determine his wife’s medical treatment.

But now she’s had some time to do some research, and I think she’s coming around.

Okay Russ,

I have read about as much as I can take on the Terri Schiavo case, and in this case I feel that yes….she should be allowed to die with dignity. BUT…I don’t feel that starving to death is any kind of death with dignity.

We agree on that. If we were any sort of rational society, we’d allow active euthanasia rather than this passive starve-her-to-death euthanasia. After all, the boy didn’t let Old Yeller starve, he put a bullet in the dog’s brain.

I think it is very morbid for these people to be so afraid of death. Death is a part of the natural order. And given their belief that a glorious afterlife awaits, why would they want to keep her here, trapped in a brainless body? Because God has a plan for everyone, and his plan for Terri is to suffer for fifteen years and then be a political prop for the anti-abortion movement. (Or as Tom DeLay, R-TX, puts it, “One thing that God brought to us is Terri Schiavo, to help elevate the visibility of what is going on in America,” referring to abortion, or perhaps referring to the Schiavo case deflecting attention from the investigation of his severe ethical lapses in Congress.)

SO I guess my newly formulated (and surely unpopular) opinion is that of euthinasia. I realize that society might not be ready for such undertakings, but when a patient is “brain-dead” as in the Terri Schiavo case with numerous doctors opinions (and yes numerous doctor’s opinions are needed in these cases so we aren’t apt to go on the findings of one or even two renegade docs) Then the family (in this case the husband) should be allowed the choice of letting her go in peace by a doctor painlessly stopping her heart.

I don’t know, it was a popular enough opinion here in Oregon to lead to the nation’s only assisted suicide law.

My #1 policy position has always been: if you do not have total sovereignty over your own body, you are not truly free. This policy addresses so many issues: abortion, suicide, prostitution, recreational drugs, steroids, privacy, gay rights, drug testing, and euthanasia. It’s why I’m glad the GOP has taken the lead in fighting for Schiavo; they’re showing their true colors as tyrannical zealots interested in micromanaging every citizen’s freedoms out of existence in service of a radical fundamentalist minority and corporate interests.

Unfortunately, it has also exposed the Democrats as spineless, poll-watching wimps. Only Barney Frank (D-MA) came out (pardon the pun) immediately to denounce the intrusion into a family’s private medical decisions. The rest of the democratic “leadership” had to wait until they saw polls indicating 70% of Americans opposed this overreaching by Congress. Here’s an idea: try standing for something… it’s what leaders do.

And yes…..I think that the spouse should have the legal say in the matter. If we opened up the choice to the family we are opening a legal can of worms – one can only imagine families who quibble over end tables and savings accounts being allowed to fight over pulling the plug or not.

I keep asking the anti-abortion crowd about that whole “sanctity of marriage” stance. Remember how in your holy sacred ritual before God (that matrimony thing you hold so precious that fags dare not defile it), the father of the bride ceremonially gives away the bride unto the husband? What was that part, all bullshit?

Still, my fear now is that Schiavo passes away on Easter Sunday. Geez, we’ll never hear the end of that, will we? Worse yet, just before she goes, she is miraculously able to utter one final word… “Rosebud.”

“Radical” Russ — or am I confusing movies and real life again?…