Sheryl McCarthy-"However Hard, Terri Schiavo Has to Be Let Go" This article is insane. It's also very honest. It says, yes, we're killing her and we're OK with that. Which is insane.

"What's happening in Florida resembles the vigils we often see prior to an execution. This isn't an execution though. This is the rational ending to a human being who all the medical evidence says can no longer meaningfully participate in or appreciate life."

A RATIONAL ENDING!!!! The stakes are so high, ending someone's life, that it's not rational to "end" someone based on "all the medical evidence" becuase the fact of the matter is, that "all the medical evidence" is in dispute by others with their own "medical evidence". McCarthy says:

"Her parents understandably are clinging to the hope that one day their daughter can be revived and can be taught to eat and swallow on her own. There have been cases where people emerged from comas after 19 years and progressively got better."

Idioten! If they are "understandably" clinging to that hope and there are such cases, then why should we kill her?

"This doesn't mean that as a society we condone murdering people because they're severely physically handicapped or mentally incompetent. Each individual case has to be decided according to its facts."

No...we don't support a policy of killing the mentally incompetent, just a policy of letting the courts decide whether to kill the incompetent.

"But while the Schindlers' supporters may rally in support of life and against what they charge is "judicial murder," Terri Schiavo's existence bears no resemblance to life as we know it. She's in a form of limbo, and ought to be allowed to pass peacefully from it."

No resemblance? None at all? Really? And if you really believe in killing her, why don't you kill her, instead of prolonging the expense of keeping her in a hospice? Is it perhaps because. in fact, her "existence" does bear some resemblance to "life as we know it" and you are therefore uncomfortable with ending it?

My first "fisking" and it feels darn good.