How come no comments on the Texas Futile Care Law, signed into law in 1999 by Gov GW Bush? I mean, its a law which says if you are considered terminal or unrecoverable and are unable to foot the total cost of medical care out of pocket, then your medical provider (hospital, hospice, old age home, whatever) can give you 10 days to find another provider to take your loved one. If they don't, then your medical provider gets to yank the plug on your loved one even if against your wishes!!! Where is the Christian Right? Where was the GOP? Oh, yeah...it was their idea! Supported by Bush!!!
Meanwhile, in the last week alone we had Sun Hudson, age 6 months. He was dying, yes, but might have lasted several more months. But since his mother is poor, his hospital yanked his feeding tube and let him die...Perfectly legal, thanks to Bush's Futile Care Law.
Or 68yr old Spiro Nikolouzos, who would be dead except his wife and kids got a temporary reprieve from an emergency appeal to the courts on Friday. Otherwise, his nursing home was going to yank his life support plug unless his family can guarantee that when his Medicare coverage runs out Medicaid will pick up the bill...

And speaking of Medicaid - there are thousands of seniors and disabled who are alive in long term care, nursing homes, hospitals, all of which is paid by Medicaid. They have no other source of income or coverage, and either no family or families too poor to pay for the medical care. Yet Bush is paying for his tax cuts for millionaires by cutting Medicaid, which will make situations like Schiavo more and more common. Will the GOP ride to the rescue for each and every one? And if so - why not just pay the full cost of Medicaid up front? Oh yeah...then you wouldn't get the political theatre, like the ethically challenged Tom Delay ranting and raving, anything to distract the public from his own legal and ethical problems...

National Review's, The Corner has some information about the bill that Gov. Bush signed.

Here's the link. Bush signed a bill that wasn't what he wanted, but improved a bad situation slightly.

But don't bother arguing with Zoomie, Mrs P. He's a troll who just slaps in Democrat talking points.

"Bush signed a bill that wasn't what he wanted, but improved a bad situation slightly."

Who is "slapping in talking points" now, John?

This morning Bush spokesman McClellan claimed "The legislation he signed is consistent with his views." (Bush's views in the Futile Care Act)..."The legislation was there to help ensure that actions were being taken that were in accordance with the wishes of the patient or the patient’s family."

But was it? Forget Dem talking points. Lets look at the actual language of the TX law, Section 166.046, Subsection(e):
"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 [elsewhere defined to include keeping a terminal patient alive when the patient or patient's family cannot afford payment up front]...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 …".

For an vivid example, as I quoted before, last week a 6 month child with a terminal illness who might have lived days or even weeks longer died after the hospital yanked his feeding tube and let him die, OVER THE OBJECTIONS OF HIS MOTHER!!! She is poor and couldn't come up with tens of thousands of dollars up front to cover the cost, so since its a certainty he was going to die, the hospital decided, AGAINST HIS MOTHER'S WISHES, to yank the feeding tube. He died! So where is the outrage??? Where were the GOP and the Christian Right??? Why aren't they demonstrating against a TX law that lets health care corporations make decisions when people will die based on cost??? WHAT HYPOCRISY!!!

Oh, one interesting correction. My original posting also mentioned Spiro Nikolouzos, who got a temporary reprieve thanks to a judge's TRO. Well, yesterday afternoon a hospice called his family and said they would take him, for whatever his family could afford to pay. Good news for the family, but they wonder why. You see, they contacted more than 90 facilities over the last week and all turned them down. INCLUDING THE HOSPICE THAT SUDDENLY, ON A SUNDAY AFTERNOON, CHANGED THEIR MIND!! Wonder if a check of the hospice's directors' phone records might find a call from Delay's office or the White House?

Oh, anyone catch ABC's poll on the Schiavo case?
1) Was it appropriate for Congress to get involved? 27% yes, 70% no.
2) Reason political leaders are trying to keep Schiavo alive:
- concern about Schiavo: 19%
- political advantage: 67%

Wonder how many of them heard about the GOP Senate memo last week advising GOP Senators that this was a good political issue for the GOP!

And a question for any conservative out there...just as you guys used to claim you were the party of "fiscal responsibility" (before you created the $10 trillion dollar turnaround in the economy and created the largest deficit in US history), did you used to claim you were the party of Federalism? That you complained Dems used the power of the Federal Gov't to beat up on states and communities and even individuals? Yet here you are - using Federal power to interfere in a family issue settled in state court...

...using Federal power to interfere...With all due respect Congress is not using Federal power to interfere. Congress is using Federal power to make sure a severly handicapped citizen who has been sentenced to death by a State court has recieved all due legal rights guarranteed in our Constitution. If you are so convinced this case has been properly handled by the State of Florida then you have nothing to fear but fear itself. Mrs. Schiavo will soon be dead.

Of course they are using Federal power to interfere! Just browse some of the conservative (traditionally, not Christian Right) or liberterian sites on the 'net and you'll fall all over bloggers angry at a GOP pandering to their fundie base, at the expense of Terry Schiavo and the state of FL.
Federal intervention is entirely appropriate when and if states are abusing or denying their citizens rights under the Constitution. But there is no evidence of that with Schiavo. Quite the opposite! Most Americans never get so many bites of the apple as the Schindlers have had. Terry Schiavo has had THREE guardian ad-leitum (?sp?) appointees over the last 7 yrs; her case has been heard at virtually every level of state courts in FL; there have been numerous tries to get it into Federal court, who repeatedly turned it away because there was simply no standing in Federal court (until Congress wrote a special supposedly one-time exception); at least a dozen neurologists have examined her and all agree she is in an unrecoverable PVS (unrecoverable because, as the CT scans have shown, a portion of her brain no longer exists - it has been turned into liquid, and brain tissue does not regenerate).
Indeed, the ABCNews poll found the following percentages of people who felt removing the feeding tube was the right thing to do: Democrats-65%, Republicans-61%, CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICANS-55%, EVANGELICAL CHRISTIANS-46% (vs 44% opposed). Or when asked do you support or oppose Federal intervention, the opposed were: 50% of Evangelical Christians, 63% of Dems, 58% of GOPers, 57% of self-described Conservative Republicans...Face it - most people recognize what this is and it ain't protecting one woman's rights. Its an abuse of power to pander to a small group of people, and most people in the US of EVERY GROUP think its disgusting!
By the way, remember this: "Medical decision-making should be in the hands of physicians and their patients."? or "We must attack the root causes of high health care costs by: ... putting patients and doctors in charge of medical decisions."?
These are the 2000 and 2004 GOP party platforms...So I guess they really meant they believe in the hands of physicians and patients, so long as they make decisions that the GOP's fundie base are in agreement with? But if not, count on Congress to charge in with the power of the Federal Gov't to intimidate, try to force you, to change your mind!
The Florida judge who has been in charge of this case for seven years is a life-long CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICAN, and an active church member in the local SOUTHERN BAPTIST CHURCH, who, according to most legal reviews, has strictly adhered to state law (FYI - for the last two years he's never out without a police escort curtesy of some of the "pro-life" types who have been threatening to kill him).

Today I notice Frist and Delay are pissed at the Federal judge because he refused to order a TRO on the feeding tube. But again - he was strictly following the law! Under the law, Michael Schiavo is presumed to be the legal voice to speak for his wife, and the Schindlers can only gain that right if they can show a valid reason why Michael shouldn't be her guardian. The weight is on them to prove their case, and the standard is that the TRO shouldn't be issued UNLESS they convince the judge their evidence is so overwhelming that they are LIKELY to win the case. The 12-page decision makes clear that they presented nothing, in the judge's opinion, that he felt was likely to supplant Michael as guardian. So failing to meet the legal test, per the law, he refused to issue the TRO.
I guess Frist and Delay think just moving it into Federal court is supposed to get them the result they were demanding...Fortunately, at least for the moment, we still have something called Separation of Powers, and Delay/Frist stomping their feet and whining doesn't change that!

Under the law hearsay is not admitted into court. I love how you quote an ABC poll of 500 people as fact. So what if people answering the telephone say they are Christians. How does this or the judge being Christian change any facts of the case? There is a dispute over ending the life of a severly handicapped woman unable to speak for herself among family members. There is no will stating her desires for care. Her husband is living in a common law relationship with another woman and may not be acting in his wife's best interest. If she died 15 years ago to him (as he has stated) why doesn't he relinguish his guardianship to her parents and make an honest woman of his girlfriend and give his kids legitimacy?

So your position is that the person Terry Schiavo chose to be her husband should now be disqualified to make decisions as her guardian because...??? Because her parents disagree? Hey, sorry, but the kids grew up and moved out. Parents have no standing to veto the wishes of the spouse UNLESS then can show a conflict. Shindlers have tried MANY times to do this and failed every time (it didn't help their case that every time they lose they suddenly find something new Michael Schiavo is supposed to have been doing wrong for years...makes it look contrived). Why should he relinquish anything to them? According to him, his wife had told him many times she wouldn't want to live like this. But now to please you he's supposed to just dump her? The Shindler's supporters have claimed hes only in it for the money - yet at least one website supporting the Shindlers also claimed Michael had refused a very large payment to turn over guardianship to the parents.

Here's a quote from Dave Davenport from the conservative Hoover Institute "When a case like this has been heard by 19 judges in six courts and it's been appealed to the Supreme Court three times, the process has worked - even if it hasn't given the result that the social conservatives want. For Congress to step in really is a violation of federalism."
Or how about Rep Chris Shays (R-CT) "My party is demonstrating that they are for states' rights unless they don't like what states are doing."
And doesn't Tom Delay bother you just a little here? I mean, yesterday he referred to a woman whose cerebral cortex has liquified as "...a gift from God!", and not in the traditional good sense. In fact, in just 4 or 5 sentences he compares her situation to his own (?!?!?!), and then uses her to "uncover" a vast left-wing conspiracy to bring him down!

And frankly I still don't see this as anything but using and abusing these poor people for political purposes (and if the ABC poll isn't enough for you, check the CNN poll, the Wall St Journal poll, or wait a week...they'll be a dozen more, all showing Americans are disgusted over Congress' behavior). Here's one quote that put it well "if the distinction among the cases is so fine-grained, it's hard to credit the sincerity of people who throw around terms such as "murder" and "Dachau" when talking about Schiavo but make no objection to the Texas law, especially since the Texas law specifically lists "artificial nutrition and hydration" as among the services that can be discontinued. "
Why is it all these oh so concerned "culture of life" people are oh so carefully ignoring the TX Futile Care Law Bush signed in 1999? I mean, while they were fighting in FL, 6 month old Sun Hudson died in Houston, in a hospital that removed his life support because he was terminal (but would have lived several more weeks) and because his mother didn't have cash to cover his bill, and no other hospital would take him. It wasn't with his mother's approval...she was totally opposed. But in Bush's TX, a child's mother doesn't trump hospital profits...the hospital gets to decide when a child dies who could have lived. In fact, if Terry Schiavo were living in Texas right now, she wouldn't! She'd be dead already, and no one would have lifted a finger. The simple truth is, if you think Terry Schiavo is being murdered in FL right now (as Delay and Frist have said), then you must also accept that Gov George W Bush signed a bill allowing murder in 1999, and that is still TX law today! And isn't it just oh so convenient the Bush has suddenly embraced this "culture of life", and insists when there is ANY doubt, life must win out? I mean, as Gov of TX he only allowed, what, 120 or 150 people to be executed? True, most deserved it. But there was serious doubt about 10 or 12 of them, yet the official Gov's Appointment book shows Bush never spent more than 30 minutes in review and consideration of clemency. Apparently he wasn't in the least bothered by the possibility he might be allowing some innocent people to die back then.

My position is that a brain damaged woman who is unable to fend for or defend herself is being starved to death by order of the courts of Florida. During the time of her illness her husband has taken a common law wife and had children. His evidence that "this is what Terri' wanted" is hearsay at best and a complete fabrication at worst. It would not be admissable in a court of law. There are relatives who want to bear the responsibility of her care. I don't care what polls say. There was a time in this country where a majority of Christians would have said slavery was ok too. There were church going lawyers who upheld the institution of slavery all the way up to the Supreme Court. You could have also polled a certain part of this country (the state of Florida and others) and propbably found a majority of Christians that thought the lynching laws were right as well. Church going judges backed those up too. Are you prepared to rethink slavery or lynching as a good idea because of what those Christians thought? I have news for you Christians can be fallible. So can courts.
As far a the baby in Texas, his case was terminal. I'm not approving what happened, I think it's ghastly and barbaric. But you see once we decide it's ok to end life this is what happens.

Thats all you have to say about TX??? A child dies before his time SO SAVE MONEY, OVER PARENTAL OBJECTIONS...Where were the "culture of life" right-to-lifers?? No where! Gone! Vanished under the carpet! Why? Because its a bill that became TX law when their sainted George W Bush signed it into law!
The same can be said of the "life protecting" Gov of FL, Jebbie, who kept interfering in the personal life of the Schiavo's needlessly and improperly. At the same time as he was proclaiming how we must do EVERYTHING possible to save even one life, he tossed 107,000 kids out of the State's minimal health insurance program for poor kids. Per the Kaiser Institute, people (including kids) are twice as likely to die from treatable illess/injury if they have no health insurance than those with insurance. Where were all those protector's of life when he did it? One could even apply the same view to the GOP's bankruptcy law last week, which refused to recognize being forced into poverty/bankruptcy due to catastrophic illness, or even due to identity theft when a company fails to protect your personal financial info. But hey - they made sure the Democrat amendment to close the loophole that lets millionaires legally hide millions in Protective Asset Trusts...

And FYI - when a person is unable to speak for themselves, there is longstanding legal precedent which predates our Constitution to English Common Law which says if the person is a minor, the parents speak for the child; if an adult and married, the spouse speaks for him/her. Passing on the wishes of your spouse is not legally "hearsay", and is certainly less hearsay than the claims the Shindlers have been making for the last 7 years.
Nor is this case in any sense of the word a precedent. In fact, this sort of thing happens literally thousands of times annually in various forms. That is why all the courts - state and Federal - have been so insistent on keeping out of it. The process is well established. What is virtually unprecedented is the GOP attempt to force their fundie base's religious/moral values onto a family that didn't want them.

While this is all a tragic event, the two things that I see as a silver lining to it are (a) people are finally realizing how important it is to have a written will, or some other declaration of intent should something similar happen to you (most of America always assumed their loved one - husband, parents, family - would be left in peace to decide for them. Now they realize how tenuous that is in this age of the cheap political maneuver. And (b), Democrats have not made an issue of this, basically quietly sitting back and letting the GOP run rampant. This has been great, as it has backfired big time on them. As predicted, more polls out today find the % of Americans who think the GOP should have minded their own business, and only intervened for cheap politics, is if anything worse for them than the ABC poll was. A CBS poll, which dramatically oversampled GOPers (48% GOP, 28% Dem, 24% Ind), still got over 70% disapproval of the GOP. Old saying - when your enemy is self-destructing, do nothing to prevent it!

Just a quick followup...

1) Read the Shindler's filing this evening, in which they say "If Congress meant to give the federal courts the power to let her die..." then passing the law "would be little more than a cruel hoax." And yet, as Bill Frist said on before and after the Senate passed the bill Sunday night, that is EXACTLY what they passed! Did Frist or Delay ever tell the Shindler's they were NOT ordering the Courts to reinsert the feeding tube? Apparently not...a cruel hoax, played by the GOP on the Shindlers!

2) On CNN, Randall Terry was just on saying the GOP fails to save Terry Schiavo they will have "...hell to pay..." for cynically using the pro-life movement! He went on to accuse the GOP of using the religious Right for political gains, but then doing nothing for them when in power. This is the GOP problem - they have to invigorate their extremist base in order to win elections, but then the only way they can repay them is with actions most Americans find objectionable and repugnant. If they pay the base, the almost evenly split majority shifts to the Democrats (last week House GOPers were passing around, reportedly, an internal poll that said it is "likely" they will lose upwards of 25 seats in 2006 and loss of the House, though it could just be a ploy or bad polling); if they do what the majority want, they risk their base just staying home in 2006.
A win-win for Democrats!