March 23, 2005

Sciavo 3: From the Email Inbox

Here, without comment, are excerpts of and in some cases entire emails sent to me regarding yesterday's post about the Terri Schiavo case.

John S. Ford, MD, MPH, an assistant professor at the UCLA School of Medicine, wrote: "You might appreciate my blog on a little science re: the Schiavo case. Especially since there's been so much abysmal misinfo in the MSM and the blogs."

Here's the link. Ford provides a discussion of just what "persistent vegetative state" (PVS) means in order to "help make sense of the multitude of conflicting and confusing statements propagating through the news media and the internet."

Armchair Genius writes: "Excellent post, and I agree with most your points. But for clarification sake, the law Bill Hobbes [sic] proposes to have Congress pass (a presumption of life) is already the law in Florida, and was applied in the Schiavo case. Here is my post." His post cites and quotes from the actual judicial rulings.

Chris Gaither, staff writer for the Los Angeles Times, wrote: "I'm writing a daily story about debate on the blogosphere over the Terri Schiavo case. Your musings on the subject and the comments posted in response were interesting. I'd like to mention it in my story. Do you have a few minutes for a quick phone interview?"

Unfortunately, I didn't see his email until this morning, and wasn't included in his excellent story today, which noted that

Mentions of "Terri Schiavo" on Web logs rose from fewer than 10 a day in December to more than 4,000 on Tuesday, according to Technorati, a search engine that tracks blogs. Another service, BlogPulse, found that online diaries made more mentions of Schiavo between Friday and Monday than they did of President Bush.

Joshua Claybourn, a thoughtful blogger who I admire a lot, emailed a link to his "constitutional, legal defense of the Congressional bill." I haven't read it yet but if Claybourn - a student at the Indiana University School of Law - wrote it, it is worth reading.

Jon Ravin wrote:

I am 62 years old; and I am a Jew, and pretty conservative, with libertarian leanings. 99% of the time I agree with the political/moral point of view displayed in your posts. However (you knew that was coming) we all reach our limit.

I don't care, frankly, that you may think that Congress has no juridiction. If it doesn't, it's f**king time to change the constitution, and I say this advisedly, since I hate what the Supreme Court has been doing lately, and the whole notion of a "living" constitution.

If Government ever has a reason for existence, this MUST be it - to protect those who are being given the shaft - ESPECIALLY those who are having it done to them "legally". Remember, Hitler was legally elected... (sorry, Mr. Godwin).

Churchill said words to the effect that if you are not liberal when you are young, you have no heart, and if not conservative when older, you have no brain.

This makes me want to add a 3rd phrase:...and if you can stand by when something like this occurs and just prattle about legalities, you have no soul.

Eric J. Fabrizio of the fabulously named AnkleBitingPundits.com emailed:

Markos Moulitisas (a/k/a "Kos" of the "Daily Kos") admits that the silver lining of the Schiavo case is the opportunity to bash Bush and the GOP. See here. Unfortunately he is just echoing the sentiments of many of the radical left, as is summed up in this picture, which tells 1,000 words.