To Terri's Parents - THE ROSE STILL GROWS BEYOND THE WALL

Near a shady wall a rose once grew,
Budded and blossomed in God's free light,
Watered and fed by morning dew,
Shedding its sweetness day and night.
As it grew and blossomed fair and tall,
Slowly rising to loftier height,
It came to a crevice in the wall,
Through which there shone a beam of light.

Onward it crept with added strength,
With never a thought of fear or pride,
It followed the light through the crevice's length,
And unfolded itself on the other side.

The light, the dew, the broadening view
Were found the same as they were before;
And it lost itself in beauties new,
Breathing its fragrance more and more.

Shall claim of death cause us to grieve,
And make our courage faint or fail?
Nay! Let us faith and hope receive:
The rose still grows beyond the wall.

Scattering fragrance far and wide,
Just as it did in days of yore,
Just as it did on the other side,
Just as it will for evermore.

by A. L. Frink

Quality of Life

To you who cannot see the value in a "damaged life" and who would judge "quality of life" for someone else, as the mother of a severely retarded son, I offer this:

> > An elderly Chinese woman had two large pots, each hung on the ends of a pole which she carried across her neck.

One of the pots had a crack in it while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water.

At the end of the long walk from the stream to the house, the cracked pot arrived only half full. For a full two years this went on daily, with the woman bringing home
only one and a half pots of water. Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments.

But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection, and miserable that it could only do half of what it had been made to do.

After 2 years of what it perceived to be bitter failure, it spoke to the woman one day by the stream.

"I am ashamed of myself, because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to your house."

The old woman smiled, "Did you notice that there are flowers on your side of the path, but not on the other pot's side? That's because I have always known about your flaw, so I planted flower seeds on your side of the path, and every day while we walk back, you water them. For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate the table. Without you being just the way you are, there would not be this beauty to grace the house."

Let's dump the tax code

by SCOTT BURNS / The Dallas Morning News

A modest proposal: Let's dump the entire tax code. Let's gather all the tax documents we can find, put them in a big heap and have a nationally televised Tax Code Burning Day. If the tax lobbies protest, well, let's toss them on the fire, too.

Good riddance.

Tax Code Burning Day is a new idea, and possibly a bit extreme, but the idea of chucking our income tax system has been around for quite a while.

When I suggested, 10 years ago, that we were all suffering from TDB - tax debate burnout - 5,000 readers agreed. They sent in letters and postcards in support of then-Congressman Dick Armey, R-Flower Mound, and his proposal for a simple flat tax.

Had we adopted the flat tax, we would have avoided a decade in which tax debate has become absolutely poisonous. We could have acted with unity in response to 9-11 and the recession. We might not have the acrimonious, divisive and future taxpayer-punishing tax cuts won by the Bush administration because we¹d already have a broad, lower tax rate. We'd be a healthier country, pulling together.

But that's all spilt milk.

Congressman Mr. Armey's flat tax would have exempted the first $13,100 of income (single return) or $26,200 of income (joint return). Each child would exempt another $5,300 of income. All income over these broad exemptions would be taxed at a straight 17 percent. No itemized deductions need apply.

It was, and remains, a great idea. You would pay no taxes until you had enough income to survive. After that, everyone would pay at the same rate. It's a graduated tax that would eliminate taxes for millions of households.

If reader mail is any indication, everyone liked it except our elected friends in Washington. They, regardless of party, hated it.

Those who make their living sucking up to them really hated it. They want to retain the right to create special tax breaks for left-handed residents of Idaho born under the sign of Aries. They also want to retain the ability to create special business tax breaks to make our air completely polluted, provided it is done with coal by electric utilities.

The only problem with the Armey flat tax proposal was that it didn't go far enough. We need to chuck the entire tax system - we need to eliminate the income tax, the employment tax, the corporate tax and the inheritance tax. We need to start over. Also online

About the Fair Tax

Americans for Fair Taxation

The Fair Tax Act of 2003

The reason for this is that our tax system is so complicated, so ridden with exemptions, special tax breaks and other results of years of highly successful lobbying that we can't have a reasonable conversation about what the real tax burden is and who pays it.

Regardless of which party is in power, we¹re always playing three-card Monte with Washington.

So consider the Fair-Tax proposal, known in Congress as H.R. 25. Houston-based tax reform organization Americans for Fair Taxation has proposed that we eliminate the existing tax system - every bit of it - and replace it with a national sales tax. We would no longer have a special tax on labor, the employment tax. We would no longer tax capital. Instead, we would tax consumption.

Live modestly. Spend little. Your tax bill will be tiny.

Live extravagantly. Spend lots. Your tax bill will be substantial.

Save and invest your money, and you'll pay no taxes. The money will be providing employment and helping the economy grow. Taxes are only paid when you withdraw the money from productive use and spend it on consumption.

Concerned about the regressive nature of sales taxes? Not to worry.

Every household would get a prebate - a monthly check from the government - of all the sales taxes they would pay on any expenditures they would make up to the poverty level.

As a consequence, millions of families would pay little or nothing in taxes. The rest of us would pay taxes in direct proportion to what we consume. We would pay it at a single rate of 23 percent when we buy new goods. Used goods would not be taxed.

What would that do for you and me? Lots.

It would end the fastest-rising and most regressive tax in America, the payroll tax. It would mean that Social Security and Medicare would be supported by a broad consumption tax on money from work, interest, dividends, capital gains and old capital - not just labor income up to $90,000.

It would allow us to focus on a single broad tax as the "price of a civilized society." It would end the ruthless game of divide and conquer that both political parties have been playing for decades.

It would allow us to focus on and debate the biggest unanswered question we face: How large a Social Contract do we want in America?

Scott Burns answers questions of general interest in his Thursday columns. Write Scott Burns, The Dallas Morning News, P.O. Box 655237, Dallas, Texas 75265.

Happy Easter

"Whoso stops his ears at the cry of the poor, he also shall cry
himself, but shall not be heard."

Proverbs 21:13

"If you forbear to deliver them that are drawn unto death and those
that are ready to be slain...does not he that ponders the heart
consider it? and he that keepeth thy soul, does not he know it?
and shall not he render to every man according to his works?"

Proverbs 24:11,12

"Jesus said 'For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty and ye gave me no drink;'...Then shall they answer him saying, 'Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or athirst...and did it not unto you?' Then he shall answer them saying, '...Inasumuch as you did it not to one of the least of those, you did it not to me. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment...'"

Matthew 25:42,44,45

I Want To Know Why

The President of the United States and Governor Bush have lost my respect and my support.

If they can explain why the President and/or the Governor can pardon criminals and save them from death row, yet they could not save Terri, I'll listen but I'll be hard to convince.

The Florida courts said that Elian Gonzales should stay in America yet Federal Marshals went in, at the order of the Attorney General and the President of the United States and sent him back to Cuba.

Why didn't the Federal Marshals do the same to save the life of an American citizen?

I want to know.

I've given my heart, my time, my faith and a heck of a lot of money to support the Bushs until now. However, I don't follow anyone blindly. And even the blind can see that both the President and the Governor had plenty of precedent to act decisively to save a life. And that, after all, is the most important thing anyone can do on this earth.

John 15:13 "Greater love hath no man than this: That a man lay down his life for his friends." And the President and the Governor didn't even have to lay down their lives. All they had to do was sign a little piece of paper.

Maybe the Bushes are weeds after all.

Go With God, Terri

March 24th, 2005

Dear Terri,

You don't know me and you never will. Unfortunately, I know a lot more about you than you could have ever imagined. I am not alone; there are millions of your fellow Americans who can say the same thing. The information I have been given about you is intimate, conflicting and disturbing. I try not to think about you, but the stories about you appear everywhere I look.

The more I learn, the more confused I become. The facts surrounding your situation are complex and hard to grasp. They have been reviewed, analyzed and parsed by every conceivable outlet, agency and personality. I have strived to get to the heart of it. Look for the critical thought paths and logic. Seek the building blocks of reason from which I can take a strong, immutable position.

I have listened to Constitutional experts from Georgetown University Law School. These are not light weights and I always admire the intellectual horsepower they demonstrate by analyzing very complex legal issues and defining them in lucid, easy-to-understand terms.

Somehow, their explanations in your case leave me cold and unsatisfied. I am not at all certain we have done the right thing here. I accept that we are a nation of laws deeply embedded in and flowing from our Constitutional heritage. I understand the inherent tension between federal intervention and states rights. But something gnaws at my psyche like an ulcerous sore. It seems as though we may be technically and
narrowly correct in the adjudication of your situation, but in doing so, have lost sight of a greater good and a time-honored tradition of going to the assistance of those whose lives are in jeopardy.

Many years ago, I was sent to a place called Vietnam. Many others went there as well. It was difficult and filled with instances in which Americans were wounded and for brief periods of time were totally incapable of taking care of themselves. Without hesitation, their comrades sprang to their defense and rescue. Many of the rescuers lost their lives in the effort or were seriously wounded. There was a deep
bond among all of us that said if you were hurt, I will be there to help you. Count on it. It was that trust that made going into harm's way more comfortable and reassuring. It was trust, Terri, that absent my own ability to decide my fate, I could count on others to give me a second chance.

The men and women who participated in these efforts could have hidden behind the rules and the process that said they shouldn't do it because it was too risky. No one would have blamed them. But, they didn't. They stepped out bravely and put themselves on the line and saved lives that surely would have been lost. They showed leadership and courage and took great risks. Their efforts are what help define our American culture.

You see, Terri, this is my experience with protecting life. If there's hope, if there's a chance, if there's a way then we should step into the fray and make it happen. The technocrats will always be there to criticize the efforts. They will sight laws and precedent and opinions. They always do. In Vietnam, they would have been the ones who said that the weather was too bad for the evacuation helicopter to fly into the landing zone where a young soldier or Marine was dying. Despite their
pessimism, a brave air crew took off, rescued them and saved lives that were surely lost if they had listened to the pundits.

That"s what sticks in my craw, Terri. Globally, we seem willing to commit American lives to protect and save lives elsewhere, but right here under our noses, we lack the courage to step from behind the technical interpretation of law and personally ensure that everything has been done to protect yours. Just days ago, they ruled that your feeding tubes were to be removed.

Terri, I am a Dad and a grandfather. I try to imagine what it would be like for me if one of my three beautiful daughters were in your place. I try to imagine watching those tubes being removed and being powerless to stop it. I try to imagine what I would feel seeing you deteriorate each day as your body slowly shuts down because someone who probably never stood by your bedside, looking down into your eyes, made a purely legal call.

I know that I would be incarcerated by now, because I would force my way into your room, and hold you and hug you and cry the tears of utter despair as the flesh of my flesh slipped from my life; and it was all …so legal. I would be restrained firmly and gently by security guards,the ambivalence of their orders etched on their faces, as they dragged me from your room.

Soon, Terri, you will be delivered from all this. You will find peace in a place where the purpose of your life is not restricted by the laws of man nor debated by those who have chosen to ignore the primacy of life. You will be whole and beautiful again. When you reach that place, pray for us and forgive us.

Rest in peace, Child of God.

Semper Fidelis,

Dave St. John

In Love With Death

PEGGY NOONAN

The bizarre passion of the pull-the-tube people.

God made the world or he didn't.
God made you or he didn't.

If he did, your little human life is, and has been, touched by the divine. If this is true, it would be true of all humans, not only some. And so--again, if it is true--each human life is precious, of infinite value, worthy of great respect.

Most--not all, but probably most--of those who support Terri Schiavo's right to live believe the above. This explains their passion and emotionalism. They believe they are fighting for an invaluable and irreplaceable human life. They are like the mother who is famously said to have lifted the back of a small car off the ground to save a child caught under a tire. You're desperate to save a life, you're shot through with adrenaline, your strength is for half a second superhuman, you do the impossible.

That is what they are trying to do.

They do not want an innocent human life ended for what appear to be primarily practical and worldly reasons--e.g., Mrs. Schiavo's quality of life is low, her life is pointless. They say: Who is to say it is pointless? And what does pointless even mean? Maybe life itself is the point.

I do not understand the emotionalism of the pull-the-tube people. What is driving their engagement? Is it because they are compassionate, and their hearts bleed at the thought that Mrs. Schiavo suffers? But throughout this case no one has testified that she is in persistent pain, as those with terminal cancer are.
If they care so much about her pain, why are they unconcerned at the suffering caused her by the denial of food and water? And why do those who argue for Mrs. Schiavo's death employ language and imagery that is so violent and aggressive? The chairman of the Democratic National Committee calls Republicans "brain dead." Michael Schiavo, the husband, calls House Majority Leader Tom DeLay "a slithering snake."

Everyone who has written in defense of Mrs. Schiavo's right to live has received e-mail blasts full of attacks that appear to have been dictated by the unstable and typed by the unhinged. On Democratic Underground they crowed about having "kicked the sh-- out of the fascists." On Tuesday James Carville's face was swept with a sneer so convulsive you could see his gums as he damned the Republicans trying to help Mrs. Schiavo. It would have seemed demonic if he weren't a buffoon.

Why are they so committed to this woman's death?

They seem to have fallen half in love with death.

What does Terri Schiavo's life symbolize to them? What does the idea that she might continue to live suggest to them?

Why does this prospect so unnerve them? Again, if you think Terri Schiavo is a precious human gift of God, your passion is explicable. The passion of the pull-the-tube people is not.

I do not understand their certainty. I don't "know" that any degree of progress or healing is possible for Terri Schiavo; I only hope they are. We can't know, but we can "err on the side of life." How do the pro-death forces "know" there is no possibility of progress, healing, miracles? They seem to think they know. They seem to love the phrases they bandy about: "vegetative state," "brain dead," "liquefied cortex."

I do not understand why people who want to save the whales (so do I) find campaigns to save humans so much less arresting. I do not understand their lack of passion. But the save-the-whales people are somehow rarely the stop-abortion-please people.
The PETA people, who say they are committed to ending cruelty to animals, seem disinterested in the fact of late-term abortion, which is a cruel procedure performed on a human.

I do not understand why the don't-drill-in-Alaska-and-destroy-its-prime-beauty people do not join forces with the don't-end-a-life-that-holds-within-it-beauty people.

I do not understand why those who want a freeze on all death penalty cases in order to review each of them in light of DNA testing--an act of justice and compassion toward those who have been found guilty of crimes in a court of law--are uninterested in giving every last chance and every last test to a woman whom no one has ever accused of anything.

There are passionate groups of women in America who decry spousal abuse, give beaten wives shelter, insist that a woman is not a husband's chattel. This is good work. Why are they not taking part in the fight for Terri Schiavo? Again, what explains their lack of passion on this? If Mrs. Schiavo dies, it will be because her husband, and only her husband, insists she wanted to, or would want to, or said she wanted to in a hypothetical conversation long ago. A thin reed on which to base the killing of a human being.

The pull-the-tube people say, "She must hate being brain-damaged." Well, yes, she must. (This line of argument presumes she is to some degree or in some way thinking or experiencing emotions.) Who wouldn't feel extreme sadness at being extremely disabled? I'd weep every day, wouldn't you? But consider your life. Are there not facets of it, or facts of it, that make you feel extremely sad, pained, frustrated, angry? But you're still glad you're alive, aren't you? Me too. No one enjoys a deathbed. Very few want to leave.

Terri Schiavo may well die. No good will come of it. Those who are half in love with death will only become more red-fanged and ravenous.
And those who are still learning--our children--oh, what terrible lessons they're learning. What terrible stories are shaping them. They're witnessing the Schiavo drama on television and hearing it on radio. They are seeing a society--their society, their people--on the verge of famously accepting, even embracing, the idea that a damaged life is a throwaway life.

Our children have been reared in the age of abortion, and are coming of age in a time when seemingly respectable people are enthusiastic for euthanasia. It cannot be good for our children, and the world they will make, that they are given this new lesson that human life is not precious, not touched by the divine, not of infinite value.

Once you "know" that--that human life is not so special after all--then everything is possible, and none of it is good. When a society comes to believe that human life is not inherently worth living, it is a slippery slope to the gas chamber. You wind up on a low road that twists past Columbine and leads toward Auschwitz. Today that road runs through Pinellas Park, Fla.

Ms. Noonan is a contributing editor of The Wall Street Journal and author of "A Heart, a Cross, and a Flag" (Wall Street Journal Books/Simon & Schuster), a collection of post-Sept. 11 columns, which you can buy from the OpinionJournal bookstore. Her column appears Thursdays.

Citizens Against Government

Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) has named freshman Louisiana Rep. Charles Melancon (D-La.) Porker of the Month for fighting the President’s proposed budget cuts, opposing the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), and bringing home the bacon for his district. Rep. Melancon belittled the President’s attempts at deficit reduction, calling $15 billion in farm subsidies a "miniscule" part of the federal budget. A longtime leader of the sugar industry, Rep. Melancon chose his opposition to CAFTA, a treaty that would lift some restrictions on sugar imports, thereby lowering costs for domestic food processors and American consumers, as the topic of his first appearance on the House floor. Rep. Melancon also took credit for $30 million in pork-barrel projects included in the $284 billion highway authorization act. For resisting much-needed reforms in flawed and abused farm subsidy policies, for shielding the sugar lobby from the free market, and costing taxpayers and consumers billions, CAGW names Rep. Charles Melancon its Porker of the Month for March.

Good for Goose and Gander

An interesting part of the Pantano case is the media intimidation that is occurring.

Lt. Pantano, you may remember, is the Marine who is on trial for murder. He shot two Iraqi insurgents in Iraq, in a war situation, after warning them to stop. That kind of killing happens in war. It always has. John Kerry testified before Congress that he shot a Viet Cong in the back and that he murdered others whom he said were helpless and yet he didn't go to trial.

I plan to write a good deal more about this situation because of what I'm hearing about what is happening to others who have been writing about it. Unlike them, I have nothing to lose.

A fellow blogger was threatened with a lawsuit by a JAG attorney because of her posts about Pantano. She is sympathetic to his cause.

Another more famous name has written about this case with sympathy. Michele Malkin writes in her recent post titled LT. PANTANO UPDATE, "I should note that I have received correspondence urging caution on this story. Always wise. I just hope the Marines exercised as much caution as possible before putting Lt. Pantano in this awful position."

Mona Charen tells the story succinctly,"On April 15, 2004, "commanders dispatched Lt. Pantano's men to a house believed to hold insurgents and weapons. The Marines found bomb-making equipment and were removing it when two Iraqis tried to speed away in a sport utility vehicle, according to Lt. Pantano's account. The Marines stopped the SUV by shooting out the tires, apprehended the two (Iraqis) and placed them in flexible handcuffs. After setting up a security perimeter, Lt. Pantano took off the cuffs and had the two search the vehicle as he supervised." (Presumably so that any booby traps would not kill U.S. Marines.)
After a few minutes, the two suspected insurgents stopped searching and began to move quickly toward Lt. Pantano. Pantano's lawyer explained that "they started talking in Arabic and turned toward him as if they were going to rush him." Pantano shouted at them in Arabic to stop. They did not. He shot and killed both of them. He then placed a sign on the SUV repeating the slogan of Marine Gen. James N. Mattis, "No better friend; No worse Enemy."
Investigation later revealed that the vehicle held no explosives or weapons. By this time, Pantano had participated in the battle of Fallujah. A superior officer evaluated him as an "accomplished infantry leader. His actions during the fighting in Fallujah and Al Zaidon highlighted a solid understanding of tactics and an ability to anticipate the enemy. Leads from the front always and balances his aggressive style with true concern for the welfare of his Marines. Exceptional communication skills for a 2nd Lt. Organized, aggressive, focused and driven. Ready for increased responsibility. Retain, promote, and assign to challenging assignments."

Although Lt. Pantano is to go before an Article 32 hearing on April 25, Congressman Walter B. Jones, R-N.C., introduced a resolution Thursday expressing support for Pantano and calling on the government to dismiss the charges against him.

We can all help with that. Go here to write your congressperson to ask him or her to support HR 167.

It does seem to me that if we are going to punish our soldiers for action in this war, we should punish John Kerry retroactively for his action in the Viet Nam war ...and after, when he committed treason. What's good for the goose is good for the gander, they say.

Sneak-A-Taxes

by Herman Cain

April 15th marks a national springtime ritual that has nothing to do with April flowers. It's the official due date to file our federal returns for taxes we know about and those we never see coming until after they hit us.

Sneak-a-taxes are taxes buried in the 9-million-word tax code mess.

Some of these sneak-a-taxes start out as temporary, but Congress conveniently forgets to end them. Or maybe they just pretend to forget.

Consider the withholding of income taxes. Congress enacted automatic withholding in 1943 as a way to fill the U.S. Treasury coffers each month and mask the true cost of federal spending. Congress explained to the public that, since the United States was busy fighting World War II, automatic withholding was necessary to fund the war effort in a timely fashion.

Congress also promised that withholding would end as soon as the war was over. That war ended 60 years ago.

Automatic withholding is a sneak-a-tax. When you receive a refund check, it means yougave the government an interest-free loan. Many workers have more taxes withheldthroughout the year than they will owe on April 15th to avoid writing Uncle Sam a check or incurring an underpayment penalty. They then seem overjoyed that theyreceive a big refund check from the U.S. Treasury. We are so conditioned to celebrateour sudden windfall from the government that we forget that it is our money in thefirst place. [Ed note: and money you would have earned interest on had you placed it in a savings account.]

The alternative minimum tax is another sneak-a-tax that should have been repealed years ago. The AMT laws were enacted in 1969 by a Democratic-controlled Congress to sock it to the so-called rich. The AMT is a calculation that assigns an alternate tax amount due if your regular income tax liability is not as high as Congress would like it to be.

It is simply an unfair way of forcing people to pay more taxes, even if they follow all the rules and mandates in the convoluted tax code. Each year, the AMT bandit holds up more and more of the so-called rich.

In 2004, anestimated 2.6 million taxpayers fell prey to the AMT. By 2010 33 million, or an estimated one-third of all taxpayers, will be subject to the AMT. All because youand your spouse worked hard enough to earn at least $75,000, which in 1969 was considered rich.

The AMT does not consider inflation, a family's decision for both spouses to work, nor the promotion you received because you worked a little harder last year. The AMT punishes people for investing, working harder and growing their small businesses.

More sneak-a-taxes include corporate income taxes, which lead to higher consumer prices, the double taxation on dividends and corporate earnings, taxes paid on Social Security benefits, raising the maximum income subject to payroll taxes, lowering the maximum limit for certain taxable deductions, limiting the equipment expensing amount for small businesses, and the many taxes, fees, and surcharges hidden in your monthly phone bill.

In fact, one of the most ridiculous sneak-a-taxes is the Federal Excise Tax. The Federal Excise Tax, which is figured at 3 percent of your phone bill, was enacted in 1898 to help pay for the Spanish-American War. That war ended 107 years ago.

The federal tax code is filled with bandits, loopholes and limited deductions. Mostpeople can't afford to find all the loopholes and deductions, but the tax-code bandits find everybody.

The only solution to locking up the tax-code bandits and making sure they never escape is to first repeal the 16th Amendment to the Constitution, which gives Congress the "power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived."

Second, we must replace the federal income tax code with a national sales tax, also known as the FairTax.

Under the FairTax, all citizens will see an increase in their personal incomes and intheir ability to save and invest for their future and their children's futures.

Credit must go to President Bush for bringing long-overdue debate on overhauling the tax code mess to the forefront of the national political agenda. But Congress will not take action without a vocal and persistent demand from the voters in betweenelections, and not just on election days.

Let's put the tax code bandits out of business. Ask your members of Congress to replace the tax code with the FairTax. If they say no, or do nothing, then it's time to replace them.

And that will not be a sneak attack.

Herman Cain is chief executive officer of T.H.E. New Voice, Inc. and New Voters Alliance, and host of the nationally syndicated radio talk show The Bottom Line with Herman Cain. He is past chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, and past chairman and CEO of the National Restaurant Association.

Musings on Lies and Liars

When I was small, children were taught not to tell lies. In fact, I remember some switchings when I got caught in a "little fib." When we asked why we were told "because it's wrong."

That was easy enough to remember because we were taught a lot of things that were "right" and "wrong." It's right to help someone in need and to share what you have. It's right to take responsibility for what you do; it's right to tell the truth.

The other side of the coin was just as clear. It's wrong to cheat, no matter how much easier things would be if you did. It's wrong to steal -- either a person's possessions or his reputation. It's wrong to tell a lie.

Honor was important and not telling a lie was very much a part of honor. People should be able to trust you and your word. If you gave a promise you kept it.

My generation pretty much took that for granted. We expected to tell the truth and expected people to tell the truth to us and that worked pretty well until we began to notice, sometime in the '70s or '80s that there were quite a few people who didn't seem to function that way.

Then came President Clinton. He lied under oath -- an intentional, premeditated, out-and-out lie -- to a Grand Jury. An offense that, thirty years before, was a felony (A person is guilty of perjury, a felony of the third degree, if in any official proceeding he makes a false statement under oath or equivalent affirmation, or swears or affirms the truth of a statement previously made, when the statement is material and he does not believe it to be true) for which he would have been convicted, removed from office and sent to jail.

But the argument was that it was all right to lie under oath if it's on a private, personal matter.

So here we are. Terri Schiavo did not leave a "living will" instruction as to what she preferred in a medical situation like the one she has been in for 15 years.

In the early years, Michael Schiavo said they had never talked about such things because "I was young." But when she was awarded millions of dollars for medical care and therapy, he changed hs mind. With dollar signs in his eyes, Michael suddenly "remembered" that she had, indeed, said she didn't want to be kept on life support systems.

Somewhere in there is a lie. Michael either lied when he said she didn't or he lied when he said she did. So Terri is, in effect, murdered by a lie.

Today Michael says there's only $50,000 left of the millions but, of course, he's not counting the investments he's made and the dollars he's tucked away. The house he lives in far exceeds in value anything a part-time nurse could afford -- and that's what Michael is. A part-time nurse who couldn't keep a job because of his temper.

But back to more questions. I made a living will several years ago but I've asked that it be torn up because I now understand something I didn't know when I made it. That is, there's a difference between life support and life sustenance.

Life support is when they use machines to keep the lungs and heart going. Life sustenance is food and liquids -- something we all need to stay alive and must have every day. I prefer not to rely on machines to keep me alive; but I expect sustenance -- food and water -- if everything else is working.

Why, you wonder? Because I have seen such amazing progress in medical science in such a short time that I believe eventually every medical problem will be solved. I have seen people with half their brain removed recover so that they look normal, with perhaps the slightes ataxia (shaking) in one hand. I know that people who have been "vegetables" have recovered.

Most of all, I believe in life. It is totally wrong to judge a situation and say that it is hopeless UNLESS that situation is death.

Death is irreversible. When someone goes into death all their promise, all they are..is gone and can't be retrieved. With death there is no hope.

It is inexcusably wrong to kill an innocent, living human being. It is wrong to say that she is now what she always will be -- life proves every day that nothing stays the same and medical science continues to surprise us all.

A judge sentencing a living, breathing, laughing Terri Schiavo to death makes a lie of justice.

Who's Calling Whom A Nazi? If The Shoe Fits. . .

THE COURT-ORDERED DEATH OF TERRI SHIAVO

by William Federer

Even before the rise of Adolph Hitler's Third Reich, the way for the gruesome Nazi holocaust of human extermination and cruel butchery was being prepared in the 1930 German Weimar Republic through the medical establishment and philosophical elite's adoption of the "quality of life" concept in place of the "sanctity of life."

I ran into this the first time in the early 1970s. Our son had been diagnosed as severely retarded/autistic/hyperactive and to "put him in an institution and forget about it," a concept repulsive and foreign to us. So we were lobbying the Colorado state legislature for help with educational programs. One cold winter night I stood in the churchyard of the Littleton Presbyterian Church, arguing with State Senator Hugh Fowler, who told me it was a waste of money to try to educate people who would not grow up to be taxpayers. He eventually lost and we got our money, but I have never forgotten the shock of that moment and that attitude.

The Nuremberg trials, exposing the horrible Nazi war crimes, revealed that Germany's trend toward atrocity began with their progressive embrace of the Hegelian doctrine of "rational utility," where an individual's worth is in relation to their contribution to the state, rather than determined in light of traditional moral, ethical and religious values.

This gradual transformation of national public opinion, promulgated through media and education, was described in an article written by the British commentator Malcolm Muggeridge, entitled "The Humane Holocaust," and in an article written by former United States Surgeon General, C. Everett Koop, M.D., entitled "The Slide to Auschwitz," both published in The Human Life Review, 1977 and 1980 respectively.

Malcolm Muggeridge stated: "Near at hand, we have been accorded, for those that have eyes to see, an object lesson in what the quest for 'quality of life' without reference to 'sanctity of life' can involve.... the great Nazi holocaust, whose TV presentation has lately been harrowing viewers throughout the Western world.
In this televised version, an essential consideration has been left out - namely, that the origins of the holocaust lay, not in Nazi terrorism and anti-Semitism, but in pre-Nazi Weimar Germany's acceptance of euthanasia and mercy-killing as humane and estimable....
It took no more than three decades to transform a war crime into an act of compassion, thereby enabling the victors in the war against Nazi-ism to adopt the very practices for which the Nazis had been solemnly condemned at Nuremberg."1

The transformation followed thus: the concept that the elderly and terminally ill should have the right to die was promoted in books, newspapers, literature and even entertainment films, the most popular of which were entitled Ich klage an (I accuse) and Mentally Ill.

One euthanasia movie, based on a novel by a National Socialist doctor, actually won a prize at the world-famous Venice Film Festival!

Extreme hardship cases were cited which increasingly convinced the public to morally approve of euthanasia.

The medical profession gradually grew accustomed to administering death to patients who, for whatever reasons, felt their low "quality of life" rendered their lives not worth living, or as it was put, liebensunwerten Lebens, (life unworthy of life).2

Or, as we have heard so often from so many lately, "I wouldn't want to live like that." And the question is...how do you know since you are not and have never been in that situation? You are making a judgement to deny life and hope to someone without actually knowing how to make that judgement. That isn't so for those who favor life because as long as there is life, there is the hope that therapy or science or even a miracle can happen. Death is final and irrevocable.

In an Associated Press release, published in the New York Times, October 10, 1933, entitled "Nazi Plan to Kill Incurables to End Pain; German Religious Groups Oppose Move," it was stated:

"The Ministry of Justice, in a detailed memorandum explaining the Nazi aims regarding the German penal code, today announced its intentions to authorize physicians to end the sufferings of the incurable patient.
The memorandum...proposed that it shall be possible for physicians to end the tortures of incurable patients, upon request, in the interest of true humanity.
This proposed legal recognition of euthanasia - the act of providing a painless and peaceful death - raised a number of fundamental problems of a religious, scientific, and legal nature.
The Catholic newspaper Germania hastened to observe: 'The Catholic faith binds the conscience of its followers not to accept this method'...
In Lutheran circles, too, life is regarded as something that God alone can take....
Euthanasia... has become a widely discussed word in the Reich....
No life still valuable to the State will be wantonly destroyed."3

Nationalized health care and government involvement in medical care promised to improve the public's "quality of life."4

Unfortunately, the cost of maintaining government medical care was a contributing factor to the growth of the national debt, which reached astronomical proportions.

Double and triple digit inflation crippled the economy, resulting in the public demanding that government cut expenses.5

This precipitated the 1939 order to cut federal expenses.

The national socialist government decided to remove "useless" expenses from the budget, which included the support and medical costs required to maintain the lives of the retarded, insane, senile, epileptic, psychiatric patients, handicapped, deaf, blind, the non-rehabilitable ill, and those who had been diseased or chronically ill for five years or more.
It was labeled an "act of mercy" to "liberate them through death," as they were viewed as having an extremely low "quality of life," as well as being a tax burden on the public.

The public psyche was conditioned for this, as even school math problems compared distorted medical costs incurred by the taxpayer of caring for and rehabilitating the chronically sick, with the cost of loans to newly married couples for new housing units.6

The next whose lives were terminated by the state were the elderly in institutions who had no relatives and no financial resources.

These lonely, forsaken individuals were needed by no one and would be missed by no one.

Their "quality of life" was considered low by everyone's standards, and they were a tremendous tax burden on the economically distressed state.7

The next to be eliminated were the parasites on the state: the street people, bums, beggars, hopelessly poor, gypsies, prisoners, inmates and convicts.

These were socially disturbing individuals incapable of providing for themselves, whose "quality of life" was considered by the public as irreversibly below standard, in addition to the fact that they were a nuisance to society and a seed-bed for crime.8

The liquidation grew to include those who had been unable to work, the socially unproductive, and those living on welfare or government pensions.

They drew financial support from the state, but contributed nothing financially back.

They were looked upon as "useless eaters," leeches, stealing from those who worked hard to pay the taxes to support them.

Their unproductive lives were a burden on the "quality of life" of those who had to pay the taxes.9

The next to be eradicated were the ideologically unwanted, the political enemies of the state, religious extremists, and those "disloyal" individuals considered to be holding the government back from producing a society which would function well and provide everyone a better "quality of life."

The moving biography of the imprisoned Dietrich Bonhoffer chronicled the injustices.

These individuals also were a source of "human experimental material," allowing military medical research to be carried on with human tissue, thus providing valuable information which promised to improve the nation's health .10

Finally, justifying their actions on the purported theory of evolution, the Nazi's considered the German, or "Aryan," race as "ubermenschen," supermen, being more advanced in the supposed progress of human evolution.

This resulted in the twisted conclusion that all other races, and in particular the Jewish race, were less evolved, and needed to be eliminated from the so-called "human gene pool," ensuring that future generations of humans would have a higher "quality of life."11

C. Everett Koop, M.D., stated:

"The first step is followed by the second step. You can say that if the first step is moral then whatever follows must be moral.
The important thing, however, is this: whether you diagnose the first step as being one worth taking or being one that is precarious rests entirely on what the second step is likely to be...
I am concerned about this because when the first 273,000 German aged, infirm, and retarded were killed in gas chambers there was no outcry from that medical profession either, and it was not far from there to Auschwitz."12

Can this holocaust happen in America?

Indeed, it has already begun. The idea of killing a person and calling it "death with dignity" is an oxymoron. The "mercy-killing" movement puts us on the same path as pre-Nazi Germany.
The "quality of life" concept, which eventually results in the Hegelian utilitarian attitude of a person's worth being based on their contribution toward perpetuating big government, is in stark contrast to America's founding principles.

This philosophy which lowers the value of human life, shocked attendees at the Governor's Commission on Disability, in Concord, New Hampshire, October 5, 2001, as they heard the absurd comments of Princeton University professor Peter Singer.

The Associated Press reported Singer's comments: "I do think that it is sometimes appropriate to kill a human infant," he said, adding that he does not believe a newborn has a right to life until it reaches some minimum level of consciousness.
"For me, the relevant question is, what makes it so seriously wrong to take a life?" Singer asked.

"Those of you who are not vegetarians are responsible for taking a life every time you eat. Species is no more relevant than race in making these judgments."13

Singer's views, if left unchecked, could easily lead to a repeat of the atrocities of Nazi Germany, if not something worse.

Add to that unbridled advances in the technology of cloning, DNA test which reveal physical defects, human embryos killed for the purpose of gathering stem cells to treat Diseases...and a haunting future unfolds before us.

President Theodore Roosevelt's warning in 1909 seems appropriate:

"Progress has brought us both unbounded opportunities and unbridled difficulties. Thus, the measure of our civilization will not be that we have done much, but what we have done with that much. I believe that the next half century will determine if we will advance the cause of Christian civilization or revert to the horrors of brutal paganism.

The thought of modern industry in the hands of Christian charity is a dream worth dreaming. The thought of industry in the hands of paganism is a nightmare beyond imagining. The choice between the two is upon us."14

In his State of the Union address in 1905, President Theodore Roosevelt stated:

"There are those who believe that a new modernity demands a new morality.
What they fail to consider is the harsh reality that there is no such thing as a new morality.

There is only one morality. All else is immorality.

There is only true Christian ethics over against which stands the whole of paganism.
If we are to fulfill our great destiny as a people, then we must return to the old morality, the sole morality....

All these blatant sham reformers, in the name of a new morality, preach the old vice of self-indulgence which rotted out first the moral fiber and then even the external greatness of Greece and Rome."15

In biblical comparison, Jesus showed mercy by healing the sick and giving sanity back to the deranged, but never did he kill them.

This attitude was exemplified by Mother Teresa of Calcutta, whose version of "death with dignity" is to gather the dying from off the street, and show compassion to these rejected and abandoned members of the human race, all the while knowing that they may only survive for another half hour.

Her "mercy-living" movement goes to great trouble to house, wash and feed even the most hopeless and derelict, because of inherent respect for the "sanctity of life" of each individual.

This attitude is summed up in her statement:

"I see Jesus in every human being. I say to myself, this is hungry Jesus, I must feed him. This is sick Jesus. This one has leprosy or gangrene; I must wash him and tend to him. I serve because I love Jesus."16

Will America chose the "sanctity of life" concept, as demonstrated by Mother Teresa, or will America chose the "quality of life" concept, championed by self-proclaimed doctors of death court decisions - such as in the case of Terri Schiavo - and continue its slide toward Auschwitz?

What kind of subtle anesthetic has been allowed to deaden our national conscience?

What horrors await us?

The question is not whether the suffering and dying person's life should be terminated, the question is what kind of nation will we become if they are? Their physical death is preceded only by our moral death!

---
1 Malcolm Muggeridge, "The Humane Holocaust," The Human Life Review, Winter, 1980. Ronald Reagan, Abortion & The Conscience of the Nation (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers, Inc. 1984; The Human Life Foundation, Inc.), pp. 85 - 87.

2 C. Everett Koop, M.D., "The Slide to Auschwitz," The Human Life Review, Spring, 1977; quoting from Leo Alexander, "Medical Science Under Dictatorship," New England Journal of Medicine, July 4, 1949, 241:39 - 47. (C. Everett Koop, M.D., originally delivered as an address to The American Academy of Pediatrics, on the occasion of his receiving the William E. Ladd Medal, the highest honor given to pediatric surgeons in America.) Ronald Reagan, Abortion and The Conscience of the Nation (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers, Inc. 1984; The Human Life Foundation, Inc.), pp. 61 - 63. Die Freigabe der Vernichtung liebensunwerten Lebens (Permission to Destroy Life Unworthy of Life) 1920. Adolf Jost, Das Recht auf den Tod (The Right to Death) 1895. Robert Jay Lifton, The Nazi Doctors (N Y: Basic Books, 1986), p. 27.

3 New York Times, October 10, 1933, Associated Press release, "Nazi Plan to Kill Incurables to End Pain; German Religious Groups Oppose Move." Noah H. Hutchings, "Nazi Euthanasia" (Oklahoma City, OK: Bible in the News, published by the Southwest Radio Church, P.O. Box 1144, Oklahoma City, OK 73101, October 1996), Vol. 1996, No. 10, p. 16.

4 Koop, p. 70.

5 Ibid., pp. 61, 70. Muggeridge, p. 90. The World Book Encyclopedia 19 vols. (Chicago, IL: Field Enterprises, Inc., 1957), vol. 7, p. 2975.

6 Koop, pp. 61 - 63; Muggeridge, pp. 86 - 89.

7 Ibid,

8 Ibid, 9 Ibid, 10 Ibid, 11 Ibid,

12 Koop, pp. 67 - 70.

13 Peter Singer. October 5, 2001, comments at the Governor's Commission on Disability, Concord, New Hampshire. Harry R. Weber, Associated Press, Boston Globe,10/5/2001 17:46 "Singer gets respectful reception." http://www.boston.com/dailynews.

14 Roosevelt, Theodore. 1909. Noah Brooks, Men of Achievement - Statesmen (NY: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1904), p. 317. George Grant, Third Time Around (Brentwood, TN: Wolgemuth & Hyatt, Inc., 1991), p. 118. George Grant, The Quick and the Dead (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1981), p. 134. John Eidsmoe, Columbus & Cortez, Conquerors for Christ (Green Forest, AR: New Leaf Press, 1992), pp. 296-297.

15 Roosevelt, Theodore. 1905, in his State of the Union address. David, L. Johnson, Theodore Roosevelt: American Monarch (Philadelphia: American History Sources, 1981), p. 44. George Grant, Third Time Around (Brentwood, TN: Wolgemuth & Hyatt, Inc., 1991) pp. 118-119.

16 Mother Teresa of Calcutta. Statement. Bless Your Heart (series II) (Eden Prairie, MN: Heartland Sampler, Inc., 1990), 10.15. Muggeridge, pp. 91 - 92.

Other sources include: Fr. Virgil C. Blum, S.J. & Charles J. Sykes, "The Lesson of Euthanasia," The Human Life Review, Spring, 1976. A.J. Dyck, "The Value of Life: Two Contending Policies," Harvard Magazine, Jan., 1970, pp. 30 - 36. Henry Friedlander, The Origins of Nazi Genocide: From Euthanasia to the Final Solution (N.C.: University of North Carolina Press, 1995). Robert Jay Lifton, The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing & the Psychology of Genocide (Basic Books, 1986). William Brennan, Medical Holocausts: Exterminative Medicine in Nazi Germany and Contemporary America (Norland, 1980). William Brennan, Dehumanizing the Vulnerable: When Word Games Take Lives (Chicago, IL: Loyala University Press, 1995; 3441 N. Ashland Ave. Chicago, IL. 60657). Eleanor Schlafly and John D. Boland, "Word Warfare: Giving Evil a Tolerable Name" (Mindszenty Report, Cardinal Mindszenty Foundation, P.O. Box 11321, St. Louis, Mo. 63105), Apr. 1996, Vol. 38, No. 4. "Protection of Life" series, Sanctity of Life or Quality of Life, Law Reform Commission of Canada. Francis Schaeffer and C. Everett Koop, M.D., What Ever Happened to the Human Race? (1979).

So, to DocNo, who asked me in a comment to an earlier post, who are you calling a Nazi? I suppose the answer is: You and everyone else who value life so little that you can impose death on it.

What Did Michael Know and When Did He Know It?

Michael Schiavo has publicly stated that his goal in withholding treatment from his wife and removing her feeding tube (leading to death-by-starvation) is in accord with her wishes. During his recent appearance on the Larry King Show he gave a different story:

From the Larry King show (March 18, 2005)
M. SCHIAVO: Yes, I do. But this is not about them, it's about Terri. And I've also said that in court. We didn't know what Terri wanted, but this is what we want...
HT: Nickqueen via Blogotional

In a September 27, 1999 Deposition, Michael Schiavo said his reason for keeping guardianship of Terri was essentially to get back at her parents.

Q. Have you considered turning the guardianship over to Mr. and Mrs. Schindler?

SCHIAVO: No, I have not.

Q. And why?

SCHIAVO: I think that's pretty self explanatory.

Q. I'd like to hear your answer.

SCHIAVO: Basically I don't want to do it.

Q. And why don't you want to do it?

SCHIAVO: Because they put me through pretty much h*** the last few years.

Q. And can you describe what you mean by h***?

SCHIAVO: The litigations they put me through.

Q. Any other specifics besides the litigation?

SCHIAVO: Just their attitude towards me because of the litigations. There is no other reason. I'm Terri's husband and I will remain guardian.

After his attorney "talked" with him, Michael added, "Yeah. Another reason would be that her parents wouldn't carry out her wishes."

Others (namely her parents and brother) have contradicted Michael’s assertion that his wife would want her feeding tube removed. In addition, Cindy Shook, who had an affair with Michael shortly after Terri's incident, gave a startling deposition. Regarding what Terri would have wanted she claims Michael said,

"How the h*** should I know we never spoke about this, my God I was only 25 years old. How the h*** should I know? We were young. We never spoke of this."

Michael Schiavo has publicly stated that his goal in withholding treatment from his wife and removing her feeding tube (leading to death-by-starvation) is in accord with her wishes. He has testified that he loves his wife and is doing what she wanted. However, both legal records and Michael’s actions seem to tell a different story.


Michael was interviewed by Larry King on October 27, 2003. A caller asked him why not give up guardianship?

CALLER: Yes. My question is, why not divorce your wife, or turn her care over to her parents, or a third party allowing yourself to get on with your life?

KING: That's what we asked a few times. You're saying it's purely based on that promise?

SCHIAVO: Purely based on her wishes.

Yet, in a September 27, 1999 Deposition, Michael Schiavo said his reason for keeping guardianship of Terri was essentially to get back at her parents.
Q. Have you considered turning the guardianship over to Mr. and Mrs. Schindler?

SCHIAVO: No, I have not.

Q. And why?

SCHIAVO: I think that's pretty self explanatory.

Q. I'd like to hear your answer.

SCHIAVO: Basically I don't want to do it.

Q. And why don't you want to do it?

SCHIAVO: Because they put me through pretty much h*** the last few years.

Q. And can you describe what you mean by h***?

SCHIAVO: The litigations they put me through.

Q. Any other specifics besides the litigation?

SCHIAVO: Just their attitude towards me because of the litigations. There is no other reason. I'm Terri's husband and I will remain guardian.

After his attorney "talked" with him, Michael added, "Yeah. Another reason would be that her parents wouldn't carry out her wishes."

Others (namely her parents and brother) have contradicted Michael’s assertion that his wife would want her feeding tube removed. In addition, Cindy Shook, who had an affair with Michael shortly after Terri's "incident", gave a startling deposition. Regarding what Terri would have wanted she claims Michael said,

"How the h*** should I know we never spoke about this, my God I was only 25 years old. How the h*** should I know? We were young. We never spoke of this."While there is some room for various interpretation regarding testimony taken during litigations, actions speak louder than words.

In a 1992 malpractice lawsuit, Michael claimed a noble love for his wife:

Q. How do you feel about being married to Terri now?

SCHIAVO: I feel wonderful. She's my life and I wouldn't trade her for the world. I believe in my - I believe in my wedding vows.

Q. What do you mean? You want to take a minute?
SCHIAVO: Yeah.

Q. If the court would let us take a minute.

Q. You okay?

SCHIAVO: Yeah, I’m sorry.

Q. Have - you said you believe in your wedding vows. What do you mean by that?

SCHIAVO: I believe in the vows that I took with my wife. Through sickness, in health, for richer or poorer. I married my wife because I love her and I want to spend the rest of my life with her. I'm going to do that.

Yet, the very next year he gave this testimony during a Nov. 19, 1993 deposition:
Q. Are you presently – you’re married to Terri Schiavo, correct?

SCHIAVO: Yes I am.

Q. Are you presently involved in a romantic relationship with anyone?

SCHIAVO: Yes I am.

Q. Are you involved in an intimate relationship with this person.

SCHIAVO: Yes I am.

Q. Is this the first relationship that you’ve been involved in since your wife has been in a coma?

SCHIAVO: No.

So much for nobility and spending the rest of his life with his wife. In fact, within months of the malpracitce lawsuit he had already decided to end Terri’s life by "letting nature take its course." Medical records indicate that after receiving the proceeds of the 1992 Medical Malpractice Trial totaling close to one million dollars not a single day of proper rehabilitation or therapy has been given to Terri.
And in the spring of 1993, just a few months after this Medical Malpractice was awarded to Terri, Michael Schiavo, Terri's legal guardian, instructed caregivers not to treat Terri who had acquired a common but life threatening infection. This happened again in 1995. Note: Michael is the inheritor of this Medical Trust.

It is obvious that anyone who believes anything Michael Schiavo says about Terri has their head stuck in the sand.

Terri's Battle is Good Against Evil

Do doctors take this oath any more?

A.D. 1995 Restatement of the Oath of Hippocrates (Circa 400 B.C.)

"I swear in the presence of the Almighty and before my family, my teachers and my peers that according to my ability and judgment I will keep this Oath and Stipulation:

"To reckon all who have taught me this art equally dear to me as my parents and in the same spirit and dedication to impart a knowledge of the art of medicine to others. I will continue with diligence to keep abreast of advances in medicine. I will treat without exception all who seek my ministrations, so long as the treatment of others is not compromised thereby, and I will seek the counsel of particularly skilled physicians where indicated for the benefit of my patient."

"I will follow that method of treatment which, according to my ability and judgment, I consider for the benefit of my patient and abstain from what-ever is harmful or mischievous. I will neither prescribe nor administer a lethal dose of medicine to any patient even if asked nor counsel any such thing nor perform acts of omission with direct intent deliberately to end a human life. I will maintain the utmost respect for every human life from fertilization to natural death and reject abortion that deliberately takes a unique human life."

"With purity, holiness and beneficence I will pass my life and practice my art. Except for the prudent correction of an imminent danger, I will neither treat any patient nor carry out any research on any human being without the valid informed consent of the subject or the appropriate legal protector thereof, understanding that research must have as its purpose the furtherance of the health of that individual. Into whatever patient setting I enter, I will go for the benefit of the sick and will abstain from every voluntary act of mischief or corruption and further from the seduction of any patient."

"Whatever in connection with my professional practice or not in connection with it I may see or hear in the lives of my patients which ought not be spoken abroad I will not divulge, reckoning that all such should be kept secret.

"While I continue to keep this Oath unviolated may it be granted to me to enjoy life and the practice of the art and science of medicine with the blessing of the Almighty and respected by my peers and society, but should I trespass and violate this Oath, may the reverse be my lot."

* * *

Florence Nightingale Pledge

I solemnly pledge myself before God and in the presence of this assembly, to pass my life in purity and to practice my profession faithfully. I will abstain from whatever is deleterious and mischievous, and will not take or knowingly administer any harmful drug. I will do all in my power to maintain and elevate the standard of my profession, and will hold in confidence all personal matters committed to my keeping and all family affairs coming to my knowledge in the practice of my calling. With loyalty will I endeavor to aid the physician in his work, and devote myself to the welfare of those committed to my care.

* * *
The AMA has consistently condemned euthanasia. (At the rate we're losing this fight, that will probably change soon.)

"In light of this longstanding tradition and a universal consensus within the medical profession regarding the sanctity of human life, it is hard to fathom the change in attitude that has allowed large numbers of doctors and, reportedly, even a majority of the American people to decide that euthanasia is a legitimate option, and that "doctor-assisted suicide" is a basic human right. . .The evolutionary hypothesis holds that man is merely an accident of time and chance, that life is transitory, and death is final. With the systematic indoctrination of this concept, people’s thinking has shifted from the importance of living a full and meaningful life to the practical expedient of living life to the fullest and finding gratification wherever and however you can in whatever time you have left. Today, the "Get all the gusto you can" ethic dominates the popular culture.. .

"The Pro-Death Industry
According to Dr. Brian Clowes, a Catholic layman who has written extensively on the issue, the shift from a "sanctity of life" ethic to a "quality of life" ethic is the most profoundly evil step a nation can take. "Once they make this transformation," he says, "they can justify any atrocity by disguising it behind the alluring masks of ‘compassion’ and ‘realism.’" Any society that loses its belief that life is sacred and that only God can decide when to give or take a life has taken a risky step down the road to totalitarianism. In time, life in such a culture will become meaningless, and death will be incredibly cheap.

Dr. C. Christopher Hook, director of ethics education and consultation at the Mayo Clinic, describes how doctors in Nazi Germany began authorizing euthanasia for mentally ill and deformed individuals, then for other "undesirables," until they were able to rationalize the extermination of six million Jews, Poles, Evangelicals, and others deemed expendable by Hitler’s Third Reich.

"The American Medical Association has, thankfully, come out against euthanasia. In her testimony before a congressional committee on April 29, 1996, Dr. Lonnie R. Bristow, president of the AMA, made the following statement:

The AMA believes that physician-assisted suicide is unethical and fundamentally inconsistent with the pledge physicians make to devote themselves to healing and to life. Laws that sanction physician-assisted suicide undermine the foundation of the patient-physician relationship that is grounded in the patient’s trust that the physician is working wholeheartedly for the patient’s health and welfare."

So is Terri being euthanized? Not in any sense of the word if you look at the definition of euthanasia. Merriam Webster says it's "the act or practice of killing or permitting the death of hopelessly sick or injured individuals (as persons or domestic animals) in a relatively painless way for reasons of mercy."

Terri isn't hopelessly sick; she just hasn't been afforded the mediations and therapy she needs because her husband wouldn't allow it. And dehydration is not a relatively painless way to die.

I would be the first to say let her die if she were suffering or if she had expressed a desire or if there was no hope at all for medical science to come up with ways to help her. However, none of those things is the case here.

Murder is evil. Murder destroys a life and the lives of the people involved.

On the other hand, life is good and precious. In life there is hope.

Terri's battle is the ultimate one: good against evil.

Up Against the Rabid Monkeys Again - Support John Bolton

I had never heard of John Bolton until he was nominated for UN Ambassador. I still probably wouldn't have heard of him if suddenly John Kerry and Ted Kennedy hadn't started yelling about what a bad nomination that was and how he is just what the UN doesn't need.

Now John Kerry should have been hung long ago for consorting with the enemy while this nation was at war and Ted Kennedy should have been tried by a jury of his peers and convicted of the murder of Jo Kopechny, so these are two men for whom I have little (no...NO)respect.

So I decided to find out for myself just what all the brouhaha against John Bolton came from. Here it is, balanced against what his opponents have to say.

From AXIS OF LOGIC (whose title says a lot to us WWII babies):

those familiar with his record believe that there is no one in U.S. public life today more ill-suited for that position than Bolton. His nomination reflects nothing less than an affront to the American people, the diplomatic community and people of goodwill everywhere. It is not a matter that he is too conservative; rather, it reflects the concern generated by his stint as Under Secretary for Arms Control and International Security in the first Bush administration where he was demonstrably its most extremist member.

It's the second Bush administration and one of the things they're objecting to is Bolton's examination of the International World Court, which UN supporters taught without examining but Bolton examined. One thing he said, "one might assume that the ICC is simply a further step in the orderly march toward the peaceful settlement of international disputes, sought since time immemorial. But in several respects, the court is poised to assert authority over nation states, and to promote its prosecution over alternative methods for dealing with the worst criminal offenses.

"The Court's flaws are basically two-fold, substantive, and structural. As to the former, the ICC’s authority is vague and excessively elastic, and the Court's discretion ranges far beyond normal or acceptable judicial responsibilities, giving it broad and unacceptable powers of interpretation that are essentially political and legislative in nature. This is most emphatically not a Court of limited jurisdiction. Crimes can be added subsequently that go beyond those included in the Rome Statute."
And there's a lot more.

What opponents don't like about Bolton are the two things I like about him: 1)he speaks plainly and keeps to the point and 2) he does his research. You HAVE to like a man who does his research in a world that usually doesn't bother.

Back to objections:

By selecting an individual who has spent the last decade repudiating basic norms of international cooperation and civility, his appointment is tantamount to an absolute rejection of multilateral cooperation and U.S. accountability.

That's because he speaks the truth with passion and without decorating it with half-lies and compromises. Bolton can be bold. That kind of plain talk is just what the Germans, French, Italian, Spanish and third-worlders need -- and what they haven't been getting since Jean Kilpatrick (bless her forever) was UN Ambassador.
For example, Bolton horrified libs when he said, "I think if the conference can concentrate on the central issue of the flow of illicit weapons into areas of conflict, then I think there is broad room for agreement. But if it drifts off into areas that are more properly the subject of national level decision making, then I think there will be difficulties. And I mentioned several areas in the draft program of action that the United States will strongly support, and I mentioned several areas that we would not support."

He's a no-nonsense, don't-waste-my-time-with-trivialities kind of person and that's just exactly what the UN needs. Thank goodness he's not the Clinton style of do-what- they-want-and-make-it-look-good kind of diplomat. That's what his opponents want to see.

John Bolton has supported the Nicaraguan contras, supported normalizing ties with Taiwan regardless of its effect on China-U.S. relations, advocates "regime change" rather than negotiation with North Korea, led the effort within the State Department to "unsign" the U.S. from the Rome Statute (as referenced above), sabotaged a 2001 UN bio-weapons conference in Geneva by refusing to agree to unilateral arms trafficing, and publicly accused Cuba of having an offensive biological warfare program (which has been denied but not disproved). A man after me own heart.

The liberal Council on Hemispheric Affairs is hysterical:An Unforgivable Choice as UN Ambassador and every single exaggeration they scream points to a milder truth that underscores the very reason he should be confirmed.

I hope the first thing he does is triple the rent on the UN building and cut all US funds earmarked for the operation of the UN. Why can't Paris or Brussels make room for them? Let them harrass the Paris Police for a change.

From all I've read all over the internet in Mr. Bolton's speeches and interviews, he's EXACTLY what we need in the UN.

And since he is, the people who are frantic to get back into political power and who don't give a hoot about what happens to the United States as long as the world love us are jumping through the trees like a bunch of rabid monkeys. Too bad we have to fight them; it would be more fun to sit back and watch.

Michael Schiavo: Loving Husband or Monster?

by Bonnie Chernin Rogoff

As national pro-life groups and prominent leaders converged in vigils outside Woodside Hospice in Pinellas Park, Florida, Terri Schiavo is inside the building in her bed, still hooked up to the feeding tube that has been center-focus of this so-called "right-to-die" case for the past several years. Ms. Schiavo is profoundly disabled and cannot communicate with words at this time.

But she knows. She feels. There's expression in those eyes. Just one look at her in a video with her mother and everyone except the Scarecrow on his way to Oz knows it, too.

Recently, another presumed "brain-dead" woman made news in Kansas. In a coma after becoming the victim of a drunk driver, Sarah Scantlin snapped out of a twenty year silence and began to speak. Memories are now coming back to her. By legal definition, Miss Scantlin's life is valid. Yesterday, it was not. Was she ever in a persistent vegetative state, or PVS? She'd respond to questions by blinking once for no, twice for yes, but since she couldn't speak no one was ever sure she understood the questions.

That's the problem. No one is ever sure. The only ones who claim to know what's best for the profoundly disabled are those who seek to benefit the most by having them legally murdered.

On Monday, February 21, new hearings will commence before Judge Greer with regard to the Schiavo case. The Empire Journal reports that David Gibbs III, attorney representing Terri's parents Robert and Mary Schindler, will argue that new medical tests be ordered for Terri based upon a new brain imaging study published in the journal Neurology. These tests could determine whether Terri Schiavo is, in fact, in a PVS. Since Judge Greer believes she is, ruled to have her killed and has thus far refused the admission of any medical evidence that would save Terri's life, I'd be shocked to see him budge.

Greer has been acting in the dual role of judge and guardian ad litem. He previously denied a petition by Terri's parents that their daughter be given a swallowing test, and has denied them the right to visit Terri. He continues to promote the interests of Michael Schiavo by refusing Terri the right to independent counsel, a right which even serial killers like Ted Bundy received.
Whenever people discuss euthanasia, you'll always find those who will defend the odious practice. However, no one defends domestic violence. That leads to the 6 ft. 6 inch, 250 pound problem: Michael Schiavo. The evidence compiled against him suggests a history and pattern of domestic abuse against Terri and other women that is strong and significant. An immediate criminal investigation is warranted.

The main evidence comes from a bone scan taken on March 5, 1991. As Terri's guardian, Michael Schiavo denied her family access to Terri's records, the results of which were not made available until November, 2002. This scan indicated numerous broken bones in various stages of healing, including compressions fractures, a broken back, pelvis, ankle, bone bruises and ossifications.

Board certified radiologist Dr. Walker read the scan in 1991 and interpreted the results as abnormal, which he attributed to either an accident or earlier trauma. Based on the remodeling process of her bones, Dr. Walker stated in his deposition that a) the injuries indicated by the scan occurred on or around the time that Terri Schiavo collapsed; b) the abnormalities on the bone scan were not typical of someone suffering cardiac arrest and collapsing to the floor, and c) the fractures indicated by the bone scan are not typical of patients bedridden only thirteen months. As recorded in Dr. Walker’s November 21, 2003 deposition, Terri might have been the victim of foul play via a blow to her body, being thrown into a sharp furniture corner, or assaulted with a blunt object.

On October 24, 2003, renowned forensic pathologist Dr. Michael Baden was interviewed by Greta van Susteren on Fox News. He disclosed that with low potassium and no elevated enzymes, it would be extremely rare for a young woman to collapse as Terri did from a heart attack. When asked what the bone injuries suggest to him, Dr. Baden replied, "Some kind of trauma. The trauma can be from a fall, or the trauma can be from some kind of beating that she obtained from somebody somewhere. It's something that should have been investigated in 1991 when these findings were found."

Other medical testimonies are in agreement. One medical expert testified that a diagnosis of a heart attack was never made. Another testified that Terri's rigid neck indicates she may have been the victim of strangulation. Psychiatrist and expert witness Carole E. Lieberman, M.D., M.P.H. offered preliminary thoughts and provided a chilling profile of Michael Schiavo as an abusive husband.

Prior to Terri's collapse, there were serious financial problems in her marriage and her husband Michael tried to control her behavior. He was fired from six jobs in two years, some of which he held only two weeks. They often lived on her income, which Michael often spent on himself. He monitored her odometer and isolated her from her family and friends. On the day of her collapse, Michael and Terri had a bad fight after he accused her of spending too much money at the hairdresser.

Dr. Lieberman concludes: "He (Michael) should most definitely be investigated as the perpetrator of the 'incident' that caused Terri's collapse and her current condition."

Michael Schiavo insists that Terri stated early in their marriage that she never would want to be kept on life support. Even if that were true, Terri is not on life support; she breathes on her own. Since Terri has no written will, everything Michael Schiavo says is hearsay. He violated numerous Florida statutes and the Americans for Disabilities Act by failing to perform his duties as his wife's guardian, most notably by denying his disabled wife basic medical care as part of a malpractice settlement award he received.

Ed note: According to testimony under oath in a deposition given May 8, 2001 by a woman Michael Shiavo dated after Terri was hospitalized: Regarding Terri’s care, according to Cindy Shook, Michael Schiavo said "How the hell should I know we never spoke about this, my God I was only 25 years old. How the hell should I know? We were young. We never spoke of this."

However, of all Michael's offensive actions against his wife, what I deem most suspicious was his decision to have Terri cremated immediately upon her demise. In all the documentation on this case, there is not a single account of Terri Schiavo having ever expressed a desire to be cremated. Michael's excuse is to say that she wouldn't want a standard burial because she "doesn’t like bugs." I’m not buying. The likely reason is that Michael has something to hide - like the cause of her numerous bone injuries, perhaps? – and he doesn't want an autopsy to uncover any incriminating evidence.

So, what really happened on February 25, 1990? We know that Terri fell in her home and sustained serious injuries. We know that Michael Schiavo, who was trained in CPR, oddly did not administer CPR to his wife. We know for the past fifteen years his only mission has been to deny any rehabilitation for Terri.

Dr. Carole Lieberman observed, "If Terri were to be allowed to die, as Michael has been desperately struggling to achieve for years, it could help him escape detection. This would be a grave miscarriage of justice."

That’s exactly the way Michael Schiavo and the Florida judicial system want it.

Pantano's Loser Accuser

by Kit Lange

Who is 2 Lt. Ilario Pantano's accuser? Wouldn't you like to know? We all know his name: David L. Coburn. We all know he went from platoon leader to radio operator, although there's some question as to whether that was a voluntary move. Coburn says he didn't have a grudge against Pantano for the demotion.

What if you could hear from Coburn directly? What if you could engage in actual conversation, outside the "sworn statements" that have been released in the MSM?

Guess what? You may already have.

My first post on Pantano was dated 13 February.
(http://euphoria.jarkolicious.com/journal/2005/02/13/97/)

On 14 Feb, someone posted with the nickname "Marinethatknows". His comment (#7)
reads as follows:

"NOTHING that has been in the news about this case is true. The facts
are all WRONG!!! The Prisoners were never a threat and they had nothing on them. They were shot AFTER the car was searched. Long after. So before you start to talk trash about this case.Learn the
facts."

Now, here's where things get interesting. Note that this anonymous poster mentioned that "they were shot AFTER the car was searched...Long after." This was a fact that had not been released to the media yet.

The people commenting after Marinethatknows (we'll call him MTK), some of them other Marines, basically ridicule him and call him out, challenging him to explain where he's getting his info. He posts this on 17 Feb:

"Here's a little advice, before you make a stupid comment, get the whole story. All you people have read is HIS side of the story. I must say that the lawer(sic) was very smart in putting in a false statement. Now all the stupid people that think they know something about what happend will have his story in their heads and think that
he is telling the truth. What person that is up on charges is going to tell the truth that will put them away? They all LIE. How about you all wait till the Marine Corps makes their statement. Until that happens, I can not tell what I know. If you Know anything about the military, you would know that a service memeber(sic) is not authorized to make a statement unless authorized by the legal department."

I emailed MTK at the address provided by him in the email field of the comment form, and asked him to prove the veracity of his claims. My email went unanswered, as I had expected.

Now, pay attention. On 8 March, three weeks after MTK first posted on my website, the accuser of Lt Pantano was finally given a name by the NY Daily News: Sgt. Daniel L. Coburn.

Reading that article, something flipped a switch in my mind, and I went back to my comment log to look at MTK's email address. What was it? coburndl@aol.com.

Maybe all this is some freakish coincidence. Maybe Sgt Coburn doesn't have AOL. Maybe the person posting as Marinethatknows doesn't know a damn thing. But let's say he does.

If MTK is Sgt Daniel Coburn, then a few things are true:

1. Sgt Coburn is publically discussing an ongoing military investigation.
2. He released facts about the incident in Iraq that at the time of
his posting, were not yet released to the civilian public.
3. He publically called his commanding officer a liar.

Now, I ask you. What kind of person does these things? If Pantano were guilty, and Coburn the ungrudging angel that he would like us to believe, why would Coburn need to post on a blog, calling his CO a liar? Why wouldn't he simply sit back and be quiet, secure in the knowledge that he told the truth, and confident that he would be
vindicated in the end?

In my opinion, the truth is almost never simple. Maybe it went something like this: Coburn saw Pantano kill two Iraqis under circumstances that could be considered questionable if spun the right way. He pocketed this info for later, because you just never know when you can use a tidbit like that. Coburn actually isn't that great a Marine, and gets the task of carrying the radio around because of it.

Coburn's not too happy about this, and through two wires in his head somehow managing to spark for a moment, he gets the bright idea of turning in the LT for the incident from a few months back. Of course, the firestorm that ensues is a bit bigger than Coburn had really counted on, and he certainly hadn't expected the outpouring of
disgust from the general public and other military members for his actions.

So, after the case breaks and goes big, Coburn's looking on the internet at all the coverage, and happens to come across a blog that's trashing him while supporting Pantano. He gets a bit irate, and so he runs off at the mouth a bit. It's not like no Marine's ever done THAT. (I live with one, so I've seen this phenomenon.)

The problem is, Coburn comes off looking less like the wrongfully scorned whistleblower, and more like a whiny child who's ticked off that his tattling didn't result in more kudos for himself.

Bottom line is, if MarineThatKnows is just some random person with an axe to grind, great. So be it. But if it's Sgt Daniel Coburn, he didn't do a whole lot to help his case against Pantano.

NO. . .I WON'T LET THEM WIN

TERRI SCHINDLER-SCHIAVO’S FEEDING TUBE WAS REMOVED AT 1:45 PM EASTERN STANDARD TIME FRIDAY, MARCH 18.

The U.S. House of Representatives and Senate have each passed different versions of bills that would give the Schindler family the opportunity to have their claims that their daughter’s starvation violates her federal constitutional and statutory rights heard in a federal court. To become law, however, the same version must pass both houses.
Accordingly, National Right to Life is calling on constituents immediately to contact their Senators and Representative and urge them to do whatever is necessary to resolve the differences between the chambers and get a bill that will save Terri Schlinder-Schiavo to the President’s desk before it is too late.

To Send a Message to Your U.S. SENATORS AND REPRESENTATIVES, click here!

Chairman Sensenbrenner’s Carefully Crafted “Protection of Incapacitated Persons Act of 2005" Would Safeguard Federal Rights of Those with Disabilities to Food, Fluids, and Lifesaving Treatment.

Text of House-passed bill

Text of Senate-passed bill

Statement by President George W. Bush

IF YOU’RE FROM FLORIDA, Here’s How You Can Help Save Terri!

Besides Contacting Your Legislators, More Things To Do To Help Save Terri

NRLC SAVE TERRI HOTLINE 202-378-8850

TERRI SCHINDLER-SCHIAVO MYTHS vs. REALITY

Of Ducks and Shattered Heroes

If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's not necessarily a duck. It may be a goose in disguise.

Now that Terri is off of life sustenance (life-support is machines making body organs work to keep someone alive -- sustenance is the food and drink we all need for life), I'm looking around to see who REALLY respects life and liberty for citizens of America. Or, in other words, who are the ducks and who are the geese?

Goose number one -- remember, they have to be disguised like ducks (Michael Schiavo, his sttorney Feros, judge Greer et al are not disguised; they wear their goosehood for all to see) -- has to be Harry Reid, Democratic Whip in the Senate. This from the Democratic Party platform, 2004: "We recommit to the ideal of people helping one another, an ideal as old as the faiths we follow and as great as the country we love. To those who are threatened we pledge protection, to those who are victims we promise justice, to those who are hopeless, we offer hope."

That's the quack of the duck for sure.

Here's a really misleaading quack: "I am pleased Senator Frist and I were able to pass the bill that protects the life of Terri Schiavo by allowing her parents to go to federal court. " But here's where we see goose feathers: the bill and the statement are irrelevant to the case at hand. There was plenty of time to do that AFTER Congress assured that Terri would be kept alive long enough. They refused to tackle that issue at all. So Reid is congratulating himself for doing nothing to help.

The House of Representatives passed a bill that would have helped Terri. Reid and my FORMER hero Bill Frist passed one that allows her to die. Reid's statement then goes on to blame the House: "If the House Republicans refuse to pass our bipartisan bill, they bear responsibility for the consequences." That Dawg won't fight, Sen. Reid -- the House bill would have saved Terri. Yours kills her.

So. First two geese -- Harry Reid and Bill Frist. (Frist breaks my heart because he's been one of my heroes. But as you'll see, my world this morning reverberates from heroes crashing from their pedestals.)

Obviously part of the battle here is between the judiciary and the legislative. The Federal legislative branch should have more power than the local judiciary -- but they obviously are afraid to take it, thereby giving more power to local judges!

But here comes the goose that REALLY hurts: The President of the United States.

I thought he was a duck. He walks like a duck. He talks like a duck: "The Declaration of Independence proclaimed that all Americans are endowed by the Creator with the unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. On National Sanctity of Human Life Day, we celebrate the sacred gift of life. We have a responsibility in America to defend the life of the innocent and the powerless," the President said in his proclamation for National Sanctity of Human Life Day, 2005.

But so far he's ducking the issue -- that makes him a goose.

Comes now the United States Supreme Court. Or, more accurately, doesn't come now. In refusing TWICE to hear Terri's case, they make the phrase "Equal Justice Under the Law" a sick joke. This is America, folks -- fight your own battles down there in the muck of the American hinterlands; don't bother us with cases that have to do with life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. So now we have 9 geese in ducks' clothing.

It's getting crowded in my barnyard of shattered heroes.

Add my own Senator, Sam Brownback, who co-sponsored the Senate bill. It never occurred to me that he would sponsor something so destructive to the process of saving Terri! Put aside the duck suit, Senator -- you've been "outted."

Where's Attorney General Gonzalez? If Reno could go in with Federal Marshals and get Evian why can't Gonzales go in and rescue Terri. Maybe he's mad because we sent Evian back to Cuba. That, at least, makes sense even if it's no excuse.I bet former Attorney General Ashcroft wouldn't sit there and do nothing. Or, maybe he would -- the way all my heroes are turning out with clay feet, he might, too.

You see, Terri functions as well now as our 38-year-old retarded son has all his life. When he was dying of pancreatitus (a 10% chance to live) a doctor asked if we would go ahead and let him die. They would see that he didn't suffer, he said. We said, without hesitation and in spite of the problems and expense he has meant in our lives -- "No. We don't make the choice of life or death. If we have to, we choose life." He recovered and is living a happy, comfortable (but still seriously disabled) life. He has -- and does -- mean everything to us.

Well, folks, I'm depressed and saddened. Heroes are crashing all around me, Terri is dying of starvation and dehydration and, frankly, my heart is broken.

I think I'll go take a nap now. I don't know when I'll want to come out from under the covers. Obviously everything I believe in -- the right to life, liberty et al -- is truly meaningless. Wake me when the Nazis leave.

Sending the Petition to the President

I'm shutting down the petition at Ipetition.com and sending it to the President tonight. Since I posted it on March 22, 1,075 people have signed it, asking the President to step in and save Terri. Since tomorrow is the 18th I will fax it to the White House tonight.

Thanks to all who signed. The messages are lovely and I hope the President will have someone actually read them. The petition is a touching tribute to America and Americans, athough it was intended only to save Terri. I wish you all could read it; my love for Americans is even deeper tonight.

Thank you, one and all.

Sunnye

Save The FFTF. It's Important.

by Dale Robinson

The article you find if you click HERE is highly informative, and addresses some common concerns. The Q & A, questions and answers, toward the end of the article provide good scientific answers to questions many people have about nuclear research.

Time is our enemy, we need more people to become involved. I encourage everybody to join the battle, and to join the group to stay informed, as discussion and exchanges provide valuable insight at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SaveFFTF. As well as ALL people who are involved in this battle, to share their input and knowledge with others to educate and enlighten them in this field.

We must succeed in stopping the DOE from "killing" the FFTF. Which is appearing to be "in part" their own cover-up for "deactivating" the Reactor in the early 90s, and robbing the American People of much needed Medical Isotopes, and Medical Research. They would have to accept responsibility for the many lost lives. Now, the United States has taken a back seat to Europe in cancer treatment, and England is getting ready to expand their efforts and build a Reactor, while the United States ELIMINATES it's own abilities. Just because they (DOE) made a huge mistake, is no reason to eliminate the largest, most versatile, best equipped Reactor in the Entire World.

Since Medical Isotopes have a lifespan of a few hours to a couple days maximum, Europe is not a good source, and our dependency for 90% of our Medical Isotopes from Canada proved "fatal" when supply was disrupted after 9/11. And maintains being "skeptical" depending on our relations with Canada. While Europe is surging ahead with Isotopes and other "new science," the United States is apparently "self destructing" and moving into a new "Dark Age" in the Medical field. With the destruction of the FFTF, we would be placing ourselves at the mercy of the rest of the world. A position we would NEVER recover from. It is truly a "Fatal" move and decision.

Currently, by signed agreement, our only source for "testing" is with FRANCE! O'Reilly should love this fact. Write him at oreilly@foxnews.com. Make it "Pithy." Tell O'Reilly to contact Michael R. Fox Ph.D. at foxm011@hawaii.rr.com for information and more contact sources.

WHAT THEN? And France's Super Phenix Reactor is already decommissioned, and dead. As hard as I worked to get Bush re-elected, I am writing him on this topic, and I urge you to join me. Writer to president@whitehouse.gov. I do not believe Bush realizes, or is aware, what the DOE is doing. We need to tell him.

It is also of importance that there are no medical isotopes being currently produced by the French Reactor.

A great many environmentalists are in favor of Nuclear. Check out the Enviromentalists for Nuclear Energy website at http://www.ecolo.org.

For the opposing "greenies," FFTF is their biggest "trophy kill," and they are sparing no means to inflict this onto the American public. We need to mount up against them, and the DOE.

The Washington Senators and Congressmen are doing NOTHING to help this issue. After investigating, I have reached the conclusion that there is one word to define why. "GREED."

Washington is still financially down at 6.2% unemployment. The decommissioning of FFTF will provide an estimated 2 BILLION DOLLAR contract for dismantling and clean-up. It appears the Senators think they have an inside track on this and can keep the contract in-state, rather than it going to an out-of -state contract. This is putting basic greed ahead of doing the "right thing" for National Security and National Interests. They have also about run out of things to tax in Washington. Keeping in mind that both Senators are Democrats. We need to put forth a Nation Wide Outcry against decommissioning FFTF. Please write our Senators with your input. These are the links to fill out email form on the Internet.

Senator Patty Murray http://murray.senate.gov/email/index.cfm

Senator Maria Cantwell http://cantwell.senate.gov/contact/index.html

Doc Hastings is Washington's Congressman from the 4th District. You cannot email him with a zip code outside of the 4th District. But, you sure can write/phone/fax him. And The two Washington Senators claim that Doc Hastings has to get "back on board" in order for them to give support to saving FFTF. The incredible world of Politics. Doesn't anybody just do what is right for the people anymore?

Tri-Cities Office
2715 St. Andrews Loop, Suite D
Pasco, WA 99301
(509) 543-9396
Fax: (509) 545-1972

Please post and forward to all of your groups and email lists. They may contain valuable people to help in this battle.