Compound Tragedy

 

In a disgrace to the very idea of balance of powers, the Florida legislature and governor have tried an end run around the courts. With lots more important things to do, both houses of the state legislature dropped ‘em, and voted aye on an emergency measure that gave Governor Jeb Bush the authority he asked them for to order that a feeding tube be inserted in the throat of a dying woman.

It’s so easy to cheer life. Most everyone, without thinking, wants to live forever, and would hardly deny such a possibility to anyone, which is rather short-sighted considering that some peoples’ lives aren’t really worth living, by any standards. Also, it’s not anyone else’s business to tell other people that they must extend their lives, regardless of the quality.

In the Florida case, Terri Schiavo has been living in a vegetative state for more than a dozen years. Her husband said his wife would not have wanted to be kept alive by artificial means. Her family has been fighting to keep her plugged in, however, and despite several court rulings that the woman had the right to die, somehow the elected hacks of The Sunshine State decided otherwise.

Said the Republican Senate President, "I keep on thinking 'What if Terri didn't really want this done at all?' May God have mercy on all of us."

Said Bush of the legislature’s act, "This is a response to a tragic situation. People are responding to cries for help and I think it's legitimate."

Horse-hockey, and let’s hope the courts, where the matter will be resolved, again, will tell him so.

Another legislative crime of the same stripe was perpetrated by the U.S. Congress, which voted out a bill the president has promised to sign that would ban the so-called partial birth abortion. There are only about a thousand of these procedures done in this country every year, performed on fetuses that would not survive after birth, for reasons such as their brains were outside of their skulls. It’s a terrible process during which a living fetus is killed as it is taken out of the mother.

Unlike some other early abortions, this tragic procedure is not a birth control option. It is a last resort that is devastating to the family. It is also a purely medical procedure, a fact the courts are likely to affirm.

A dissenting Democrat in the Florida legislature, "I do not believe the governor of Florida should be making a decision of life and death rather than the next of kin."

Nor should Congress.

And that’s SetonnoteS...I’m Tony Seton.

 

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