Terri Shiavo

[StrawberryFields]

Originally posted by Snow@Mar 29 2005, 12:44 AM

I can prove anything, including that the earth is flat resting on the bosom Kate Smith and that the four winds are caused by her singing America The Beautiful if you accept whatever invention my mind can create.

Snow, I know you love a good argument but I am not the only one in America who believes as I do.

Your statement above also appears to be a rather arrogant opinion you have of yourself and your ability to prove anything. I for one do not accept your invention that your mind creates in the Terri Shiavo case. I thought that you Snow, would want to know all of the facts and not just the stuff that supports your position here.

[StrawberryFields]

To Clear Doubts, Schiavo Autopsy Planned...

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/na...ack=1&cset=true

[Outshined]

The funny thing is, her husband insists on the autopsy...

[StrawberryFields]

Originally posted by Outshined@Mar 29 2005, 10:19 AM

The funny thing is, her husband insists on the autopsy...

Maybe and maybe not... Could it be the Florida Law states that before any cremation can take place that an autopsy is required first? I am researching that now, so if anyone else is quicker then I am let us know okay? If this is true then Felos is raising another smoke screen that his client is the one being the good guy in the final hour. It may also be that enough questions are being raised about Michael¡Çs motives that Congress is insisting on the autopsy. The worst part is that an autopsy can only happen AFTER Terri has been killed.

If Terri receives an autopsy from a reliable coronor, who has not been bought off, I wonder if Michael will be available for questioning.

[Outshined]

The news this morning reported that it was his idea.

I am rather disturbed by the way so many otherwise reasonable people are rushing to condemn Michael Schiavo as some sort of monster. If there is someone here that knows the Schiavos personally, please weigh in, but I'm seeing a lot of personal judgement against someone by people who know nothing about him except what the rumor-mongers are putting out there. Too many are falling for the activist tactic of character assassination. They are accusing him of wanting his wife dead, or money, when both are nonsense. He's been offered a lot of money to walk away, as we've seen, and why worry about her being alive, when she could never be rehabilitated enough to speak (or at all, for that matter)? It's a bunch of sensationalist garbage.

People have to have a bad guy in this story, I suppose, so they've elected to trash the husband. Has it occurred to anyone that there isn't a "bad guy" or "good guy" in this case, but two parties that love Terri and want what is best for her? In my opinion, he is doing what he believes is right, just as the rest of her family is; unfortunately they want two different things.

[StrawberryFields]

Snow,

I did do the google search and typed this "Terri Shiavo received rehab¡É

This was the first link...

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Publ...03/306hhsrh.asp

I am respectably asking for the 4th time for YOU to SHOW ME where she received nearly four years of rehab.

I think that the above link tells the story in clear terms, of what has happened to the money allocated for Terri's rehab.

[Outshined]

Yes, Schiavo is the one who has requested the autopsy.

Terri Schiavo autopsy to be made public

Pinellas Park, FL, Mar. 29 (UPI) -- A Florida coroner will perform an autopsy on Terri Schiavo's body, and its results made public, in an apparent bid to dispel rumors she was abused.

Michael Schiavo, her husband, has asked both for the autopsy and its disclosure amid questions about why his wife suffered various broken bones after her 1990 brain injury

http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20...64638-2498r.htm

http://www.christiantoday.com/news/ame/326.htm

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/05088/479125.stm

[StrawberryFields]

Originally posted by Outshined@Mar 29 2005, 11:01 AM

The news this morning reported that it was his idea.

I am rather disturbed by the way so many otherwise reasonable people are rushing to condemn Michael Schiavo as some sort of monster. If there is someone here that knows the Schiavos personally, please weigh in, but I'm seeing a lot of personal judgement against someone by people who know nothing about him except what the rumor-mongers are putting out there. Too many are falling for the activist tactic of character assassination. They are accusing him of wanting his wife dead, or money, when both are nonsense. He's been offered a lot of money to walk away, as we've seen, and why worry about her being alive, when she could never be rehabilitated enough to speak (or at all, for that matter)? It's a bunch of sensationalist garbage.

In my opinion, he is doing what he believes is right, just as the rest of her family is; unfortunately they want two different things.

I applaud your wanting to speak out and be heard outshined. :)

Sometimes it¡Çs much easier just to accept the facts clouded as they may be from the great and reliable source of the media.

Do you not believe that OJ got away with Killing his wife either? I was in a store where they where selling TV's when the verdict came in on OJ being found innocent of MURDER. I bet there were about twenty people gathered there and when the not guilty verdict was read the people shook their heads, before bowing them in disbelief. We all silently and slowly walked away. Our hands and voices were silenced but we all KNEW what had just taken place. Very sad, and now with Terri most choose to just look the other way and ignore what is really occurring here. Terri¡Çs condition does not affect most people personally YET.

[Outshined]

It's not that I don't consider this a tragedy, I'm just not willing to paint either party as having an ulterior motive in the case. I believe for now at least that her husband is trying to honor a promise to her. I see no gain he could get from her death, and a lot of pain being caused by those attacking him.

Her family is easy to sympathize with; it's their child and sibling we're talking about. Against all odds, they are going to want to keep her alive and hope against hope that she might someday get better. In the same case if I'd made a promise to my wife like that, I don't know if I'd keep it. Then again I love my in-laws and could not cause them so much pain.

[Guest TheProudDuck]

Biz -- Thanks for the kind words.

Snow,

Here my little rule of thumb, admittedly not a perfect guide but the validity of a position can be guessed by the number of crazies that flock to support it, (like the nuts trying to break in and give Terri water) or by the amount of dishonesty the proponents inject into it.

I myself was made a bit more uncomfortable with my conclusions on this issue when I saw the Terry Randall-style nuts lining up on my side -- until I noticed a "Young Communists League" lining up on the other side. Not only do hard cases like this make bad law (like the Congress' departure from federalist principles), but they bring out the extremists on both sides. A certain percentage of the people can't handle close calls, so once they've decided which side they're on, they try to mask the ambiguity by shouting. As for "dishonesty," there's also plenty of that to go around on all sides, beginning with the widespread characterization of Terri as "brain dead" and as having no measurable brain activity. (Higher brain activity, no; but a person with no brain activity at all doesn't move, make noise, etc.)

I've gone back and forth on this, but I've come down to this: No matter whether the law's procedures have been followed, as they apparently have been, it seems unjust to me that the people who care most about Terri -- her parents -- have to watch her nominal husband, whose new common-law wife and children have replaced Terri as the primary objects of his affection, bring about her death. To the extent the law demands this, the law is an as.s.

Maybe Mr. Schiavo and his relatives are telling the truth that Terri once remarked that she wouldn't want to be kept alive after suffering an (unspecified) brain injury. The law allows evidence like their recollections in this context because there's really nothing else to go on. But there's a reason that the law generally prohibits hearsay evidence -- hearsay statements are too easy to fabricate, or to be inaccurate recollections of statements the original speaker can't clarify. Accordingly, I'm less inclined to take Judge Greer's findings of facts as gospel truth. Given the conflicts in the evidence, and the alignment of Mr. Schiavo's interests, a coin flip would have been just as likely to result in the finding reflecting the truth as the Schiavo legal proceedings had.

It strikes me as absurd that as grave a decision as whether a person -- even an incapacitated person -- lives or dies should be made on such a rickety evidentiary basis -- a few hearsay declarations about the declarants' recollections of casual comments by Terri. Why, in fact, should those casual comments be conclusive evidence of a person's true wishes? Were the made after any significant consideration? I know that I've remarked offhandedly at times that I'd rather be killed outright than severely brain-injured. I wonder whether I would think the same way if I did get my bell rung and suffer such an injury, but retained at least some consciousness.

I suspect that Judge Greer, and many of the participants in the legal process, share the common assumption that a person in Terri's state wouldn't ordinarily want to be kept alive. That strikes me as presumptuous. People in the legal profession often are. I suspect that that assumption shaded their consideration of the facts -- that the conclusion was foreordained that Terri's treatment would be discontinued; it was just a matter of ordering the evidence into that preconceived framework so the matter of Terri's pesky parents could be put paid to.

As for Mr. Schiavo, I think his actions throughout this process have coincided with maximizing his financial interests. I'm not impressed by his "refusal" of offers to pay him money to "allow" Terri's parents to take control -- what everyone seems to have missed is that he couldn't legally do so. The courts' determination that Terri's feeding was to be stopped was based in part on Mr. Schiavo's requests and his testimony, but it was ultimately a determination that it was Terri who wanted feeding discontinued. Mr. Schiavo could completely reverse himself and name Terri's parents guardians, but it would be very unlikely if not impossible for Judge Greer's finding of fact that Terri wanted to be dead could be reversed. Judge Greer is apparently not known in the Florida bar for admitting mistakes, but it's a rare judge who is.

Outshined:

I see no gain he could get from her death

True, Mr. Schiavo doesn't apparently stand to inherit much of the malpractice award against Terry's gynecologist (an award which was itself a travesty of justice, as I see it); most of it has apparently been expended on attorney fees. (This case has been a full-employment act for Mr. George Felos, Esq., who is incidentally also a "right-to-die" activist who has described watching incapacitated people die as a kind of spiritual experience; I do wonder to what extent he's driven Mr. Schiavo to continue this case.) The fact that Mr. Schiavo has pledged to donate what remains to charity suggests to me there can't be much left. But that wasn't the case in 1993, when Mr. Schiavo first started the pull-the-tube proceedings. If Terri's parents hadn't gotten in the way, Mr. Schiavo would have inherited a boatload of money. He still may -- he hasn't stated the amount of the life insurance policy he apparently has on Terri.

At the very least, in other words, there is an appearance that Mr. Schiavo has been financially interested in seeing Terri shuffle off this mortal coil sooner rather than later.

[StrawberryFields]

Terri Schiavo: Judicial Murder

Her crime was being disabled, voiceless, and at the disposal of our media

by Nat Hentoff

March 29th, 2005 10:59 AM

For all the world to see, a 41-year-old woman, who has committed no crime, will die of dehydration and starvation in the longest public execution in American history.

She is not brain-dead or comatose, and breathes naturally on her own. Although brain-damaged, she is not in a persistent vegetative state, according to an increasing number of radiologists and neurologists.

Among many other violations of her due process rights, Terri Schiavo has never been allowed by the primary judge in her caseͧlorida Circuit Judge George Greer, whose conclusions have been robotically upheld by all the courts above himÍÕo have her own lawyer represent her.

Greer has declared Terri Schiavo to be in a persistent vegetative state, but he has never gone to see her. His eyesight is very poor, but surely he could have visited her along with another member of his staff. Unlike people in a persistent vegetative state, Terri Schiavo is indeed responsive beyond mere reflexes.

While lawyers and judges have engaged in a minuet of death, the American Civil Liberties Union, which would be passionately criticizing state court decisions and demanding due process if Terri were a convict on death row, has shamefully served as co-counsel for her husband, Michael Schiavo, in his insistent desire to have her die.

Months ago, in discussing this case with ACLU executive director Anthony Romero, and later reading ACLU statements, I saw no sign that this bastion of the Bill of Rights has ever examined the facts concerning the egregious conflicts of interest of her husband and guardian Michael Schiavo, who has been living with another woman for years, with whom he has two children, and has violated a long list of his legal responsibilities as her guardian, some of them directly preventing her chances for improvement. Judge Greer has ignored all of them.

In February, Florida's Department of Children and Families presented Judge Greer with a 34-page document listing charges of neglect, abuse, and exploitation of Terri by her husband, with a request for 60 days to fully investigate the charges. Judge Greer, soon to remove Terri's feeding tube for the third time, rejected the 60-day extension. (The media have ignored these charges, and much of what follows in this article.)

Michael Schiavo, who says he loves and continues to be devoted to Terri, has provided no therapy or rehabilitation for his wife (the legal one) since 1993. He did have her tested for a time, but stopped all testing in 1993. He insists she once told him she didn't want to survive by artificial means, but he didn't mention her alleged wishes for years after her brain damage, while saying he would care for her for the rest of his life.

Terri Schiavo has never had an MRI or a PET scan, nor a thorough neurological examination. Republican Senate leader Bill Frist, a specialist in heart-lung transplant surgery, has, as The New York Times reported on March 23, "certified [in his practice] that patients were brain dead so that their organs could be transplanted." He is not just "playing doctor" on this case.

During a speech on the Senate floor on March 17, Frist, speaking of Judge Greer's denial of a request for new testing and examinations of Terri, said reasonably, "I would think you would want a complete neurological exam" before determining she must die.

Frist added: "The attorneys for Terri's parents have submitted 33 affidavits from doctors and other medical professionals,all of whom say that Terri should be re-evaluated."

In death penalty cases, defense counsel for retarded and otherwise mentally disabled clients submit extensive medical tests. Ignoring the absence of complete neurological exams, supporters of the deadly decisions by Judge Greer and the trail of appellate jurists keep reminding us how extensive the litigation in this case has been¡¦9 judges in six courts is the mantra. And more have been added. So too in many death penalty cases, but increasingly, close to execution, inmates have been saved by DNA.

As David Gibbs, the lawyer for Terri's parents, has pointed out, there has been a manifest need for a new federal, Fourteenth Amendment review of the case because Terri's death sentence has been based on seven years of "fatally flawed" state court findingsÍÂll based on the invincible neglect of elementary due process by Judge George Greer.

I will be returning to the legacy of Terri Schiavo in the weeks ahead because there will certainly be long-term reverberations from this case and its fracturing of the rule of law in the Florida courts and then the federal courtsÍÂs well as the disgracefully ignorant coverage of the case by the great majority of the media, including such pillars of the trade as The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Miami Herald, and the Los Angeles Times as they copied each other's misinformation, like Terri Schiavo being "in a persistent vegetative state."

Do you know that nearly every major disability rights organization in the country has filed a legal brief in support of Terri's right to live?

But before I go back to other Liberty BeatsÍÕhe CIA's torture renditions and the whitewashing of the landmark ACLU and Human Rights First's lawsuit against Donald Rumsfeld for his accountability in the widespread abuse of detainees, including evidence of tortureͪ must correct the media and various "qualified experts" on how a person dies of dehydration if he or she is sentient, as Terri Schiavo demonstrably is.

On March 15's Nightline, in an appallingly one-sided, distorted account of the Schiavo case, Terri's husband, MichaelÍØho'd like to marry the woman he's now living withÍÔaid that once Terri's feeding tube is removed at his insistent command, Terri "will drift off into a nice little sleep and eventually pass on and be with God."

As an atheist, I cannot speak to what he describes as his abandoned wife's ultimate destination, but I can tell how Wesley Smith (consultant to the Center for Bioethics and Culture)ÍØhom I often consult on these bitterly controversial cases because of his carefully researched books and articlesÍÅescribes death by dehydration.

In his book Forced Exit (Times Books), Wesley quotes neurologist William Burke: "A conscious person would feel it [dehydration] just as you and I would. . . . Their skin cracks, their tongue cracks, their lips crack. They may have nosebleeds because of the drying of the mucous membranes, and heaving and vomiting might ensue because of the drying out of the stomach lining.

"They feel the pangs of hunger and thirst. Imagine going one day without a glass of water! . . . It is an extremely agonizing death."

On March 23, outside the hospice where Terri Schiavo was growing steadily weaker, her mother, Mary, said to the courts and to anyone who would listen and maybe somehow save her daughter:

"Please stop this cruelty!"

While this cruelty was going on in the hospice, Michael Schiavo's serpentine lawyer, George Felos, said to one and all: "Terri is stable, peaceful, and calm. . . . She looked beautiful."

During the March 21 hearing before Federal Judge James D. Whittemore, who was soon to be another accomplice in the dehydration of Terri, the relentless Mr. Felos, anticipating the end of the deathwatch, said to the judge:

"Yes, life is sacred, but so is liberty, your honor, especially in this country."

It would be useless, but nonetheless, I would like to inform George Felos that, as Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas said: "The history of liberty is the history of due process"ÍÇundamental fairness.

Contrary to what you've read and seen in most of the media, due process has been lethally absent in Terri Schiavo's long merciless journey through the American court system.

"As to legal concerns," writes William AndersonÍ senior psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital and a lecturer at Harvard University¡¦a guardian may refuse any medical treatment, but drinking water is not such a procedure. It is not within the power of a guardian to withhold, and not in the power of a rational court to prohibit."

Ralph Nader agrees. In a statement on March 24, he and Wesley Smith (author of, among other books, Culture of Death: The Assault of Medical Ethics in America) said: "The court is imposing process over justice. After the first trial [before Judge Greer], much evidence has been produced that should allow for a new trialÍØhich was the point of the hasty federal legislation.

"If this were a death penalty case, this evidence would demand reconsideration. Yet, an innocent, disabled woman is receiving less justice. . . . This case is rife with doubt. Justice demands that Terri be permitted to live." (Emphasis added.)

But the polls around the country cried out that a considerable majority of Americans wanted her to die without Congress butting in.

A March 20 ABC poll showed that 60 percent of the 501 adults consulted opposed the ultimately unsuccessful federal legislation, and only 35 percent approved. Moreover, 70 percent felt strongly that it was wrong for Congress to get into such personal, private mattersÍÂnd interfere with what some advocates of euthanasia call "death with dignity." (So much for the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of due process and equal protection of the laws.)

But, as Cathy Cleaver Ruse of the Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops pointed out:

"The poll [questions] say she's 'on life support,' which is not true [since all she needs is water], and that she has 'no consciousness,' which her family and dozens of doctors dispute in sworn affidavits."

Many readers of this column are pro-choice, pro-abortion rights. But what choice did Terri Schiavo have under our vaunted rule of lawÍØhich the president is eagerly trying to export to the rest of the world? She had not left a living will or a durable power of attorney, and so could not speak for herself. But the American system of justice would not slake her thirst as she, on television, was dying in front of us all.

What kind of a nation are we becoming? The CIA outsources tortureÍÊn violation of American and international lawÍÊn the name of the freedoms we are fighting to protect against terrorism. And we have watched as this woman, whose only crime is that she is disabled, is tortured to death by judges, all the way to the Supreme Court.

And keep in mind from the Ralph Nader-Wesley Smith report: "The courts . . . have [also] ordered that no attempts be made to provide her water or food by mouth. Terri swallows her own saliva. Spoon feeding is not medical treatment. This outrageous order proves that the courts are not merely permitting medical treatment to be withheld, they have ordered her to be made dead."

In this country, even condemned serial killers are not executed in this way.

[DisRuptive1]

That article is very one-sided. Is that where you're getting all your information? From people who aren't able to write a fair review of the situation or explain possible reasonings for the other side that don't put him in a bad light? Your article holds no sway until you can bring forth one that offers the same information but presents the case and both sides of it in a fair light.

[StrawberryFields]

Originally posted by DisRuptive1@Mar 29 2005, 04:24 PM

That article is very one-sided. Is that where you're getting all your information? From people who aren't able to write a fair review of the situation or explain possible reasonings for the other side that don't put him in a bad light? Your article holds no sway until you can bring forth one that offers the same information but presents the case and both sides of it in a fair light.

Disruptive....

What do you think the media does? It chooses sides and that is why some less then flattering things are kept out of the main stream media.

From Hawaii we have this news

http://www.hawaiireporter.com/story.aspx?5...96-e2824424b64c

If you look WAY back in this thread I said that I don't blame Michael for moving on with his life with this new family. I do blame him for being a sadistic control freak who has used the money that was provided for Terri's rehab for his own use. He "left" Terri along time ago and at that time should have divorced her and given the guardianship back to her parents. His motives are purely selfish and that is why so many people question him and do this rightfully so.

[DisRuptive1]

You are calling him sadistic, controlling, and a freak in addition to squandering money. Do you have any hard evidence or facts that show this?

[StrawberryFields]

Originally posted by DisRuptive1@Mar 29 2005, 04:53 PM

You are calling him sadistic, controlling, and a freak in addition to squandering money. Do you have any hard evidence or facts that show this?

YES I do, just check out the links I have already posted.

Also I am not alone in my synopsis of the kind of man Michael Shiavo is. If you don't believe me, Strawberry Fields of LDS Talk do a google search of Terri Shiavo.

[Outshined]

An advance directive to physicians or living will might not have helped Terri Schiavo at all.

Why?

Because apparently the statute allowing their use was not enacted until 1992.

Article

[StrawberryFields]

Originally posted by Outshined@Mar 29 2005, 05:15 PM

An advance directive to physicians or living will might not have helped Terri Schiavo at all.

Why?

Because apparently the statute allowing their use was not enacted until 1992.

Article

Outshined,

Thanks for the link. :)

My Living Will will state that if someone wants me dead and they have something to gain have their motives checked out BEFORE proceeding.

[Snow]

Originally posted by Strawberry Fields+Mar 29 2005, 07:19 AM--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Strawberry Fields @ Mar 29 2005, 07:19 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin--Snow@Mar 29 2005, 12:44 AM

I can prove anything, including that the earth is flat resting on the bosom Kate Smith and that the four winds are caused by her singing America The Beautiful if you accept whatever invention my mind can create.

Snow, I know you love a good argument but I am not the only one in America who believes as I do.

Your statement above also appears to be a rather arrogant opinion you have of yourself and your ability to prove anything. I for one do not accept your invention that your mind creates in the Terri Shiavo case. I thought that you Snow, would want to know all of the facts and not just the stuff that supports your position here.

The difference here is that you, not me, are fabricating absurd and irresponsible allegations, in fact slanderous and immoral accusations in order to support your argument. You may think me arrogant but I don't have to falsify the facts and invent attempted murder to make my case.

That others believe like you is no more persuasive than the idea that because lots of people think Michael Jackson is a good guy we should let our children sleep in his bed.

[Snow]

Originally posted by Strawberry Fields@Mar 29 2005, 08:39 AM

The funny thing is, her husband insists on the autopsy...

Maybe and maybe not... Could it be the Florida Law states that before any cremation can take place that an autopsy is required first?

Could be, but no, it's not.

If Terri receives an autopsy from a reliable coronor, who has not been bought off, I wonder if Michael will be available for questioning.

<span style=\'color:red\'>Bullcrap Alert!

Now you are INVENTING, read lying, that Michael Schiavo will, might or would bribe the coroner and that the coroner will, might, would take the bribe.

Again, if you have to fabricate to make a point, your point, obviously, ain't no good.

[StrawberryFields]

Originally posted by Snow@Mar 29 2005, 05:52 PM

The difference here is that you, not me, are fabricating absurd and irresponsible allegations, in fact slanderous and immoral accusations in order to support your argument. You may think me arrogant but I don't have to falsify the facts and invent attempted murder to make my case.

I am not fabricating anything. I did not write these articles which BTW are plentiful.

WHO is falsifying facts? You are just simply choosing to view only statements which support your views, the rest you call propaganda.

[StrawberryFields]

Originally posted by Snow@Mar 29 2005, 05:58 PM

The funny thing is, her husband insists on the autopsy...

Maybe and maybe not... Could it be the Florida Law states that before any cremation can take place that an autopsy is required first?

Could be, but no, it's not.

If Terri receives an autopsy from a reliable coronor, who has not been bought off, I wonder if Michael will be available for questioning.

Bullcrap Alert!

Now you are INVENTING, read lying, that Michael Schiavo will, might or would bribe the coroner and that the coroner will, might, would take the bribe.

Again, if you have to fabricate to make a point, your point, obviously, ain't no good.

Snow,

I could be offended but I am not. :)

Can you answer me a question to the best of your ability though? The courts ordered 750,000. for the rehab of Terri and we BOTH know that this money never went to her rehab. Where is the money now?

[Snow]

Originally posted by Strawberry Fields+Mar 29 2005, 04:25 PM--></span><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td>QUOTE (Strawberry Fields @ Mar 29 2005, 04:25 PM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'> <!--QuoteBegin--Snow@Mar 29 2005, 05:52 PM

The difference here is that you, not me, are fabricating absurd and irresponsible allegations, in fact slanderous and immoral accusations in order to support your argument. You may think me arrogant but I don't have to falsify the facts and invent attempted murder to make my case.

I am not fabricating anything. I did not write these articles which BTW are plentiful.

Yes you did. You said that Michael Schiavo tried to kill his wife. That is a lie. That other people are also lying does not excuse you.

WHO is falsifying facts?

That would be you Strawberry. I know you are trying to imply that it is me but I challenge you to find even one thing that I said that is not factually true.

I'll wait.

[Guest TheProudDuck]

Yes you did. You said that Michael Schiavo tried to kill his wife. That is a lie.

Isn't "lie" a bit strong here? I think it's very unlikely that Michael Schiavo tried to kill his wife, and apparently the Florida authorities think so, too, but is it so conclusively established that an opinion to the contrary must be a "lie" as opposed to a misguided opinion? (Even when someone -- can't remember who -- spouted some nonsense about how the World Trade Center was supposedly demolished on purpose by the eviil GW so he could start a war for oil, I didn't call him/her a liar. A freakin' moron with no common sense or understanding of physics, maybe, but not a liar.)

How common is it, anyway, for bulimics (as opposed to anorexics) to have potassium imbalances so severe that they go into cardiac arrest? I'm probably revealing my ignorance of eating disorders here, but my understanding is that anorexia is far more dangerous than bulimia as far as getting your minerals out of whack and getting malnourished. Terri's sudden collapse is unusual enough that I'm not surprised some people are going "hm."

[Jenda]

Originally posted by TheProudDuck@Mar 29 2005, 06:44 PM

How common is it, anyway, for bulimics (as opposed to anorexics) to have potassium imbalances so severe that they go into cardiac arrest? I'm probably revealing my ignorance of eating disorders here, but my understanding is that anorexia is far more dangerous than bulimia as far as getting your minerals out of whack and getting malnourished. Terri's sudden collapse is unusual enough that I'm not surprised some people are going "hm."

I would say that bulemia is worse in that sense. Anorexia is just refusing to eat significant amounts because of a mistaken body image. Bulemia is eating and purging. It is the purging that deprives the body of potassium because it is being expelled faster than it is taken in. The fact that most anorexics are also bulemics makes it worse. They eat next to nothing, then purge what they do eat. So many of these problems are intertwined.

[DisRuptive1]

Bulemics get some nutrition however. Their stomach does absorb a little bit when it hits their stomach and not everything comes out. Anorexics barely put anything in.