The Binary Circumstance

Some of you might be watching the NBC series Medium, starring Patricia Arquette.  Arquette plays Allison DuBois, a woman with psychic powers living in Arizona, who works with the District Attorney’s office to solve murders.  The stories are supposedly based on the real-life experiences of a medium named Allison DuBois who lives in Arizona.

I enjoy the series because it is suspenseful and well-written.  Watching an episode is like watching Superman.  In both cases the main character possesses superpowers that allow them to see things that normal people cannot see.  Superman had X-Ray vision, Allison DuBois can see and talk to dead people.

In the TV show Medium, DuBois always finds the killer.  In real life this is not the case, as this article from MSNBC’s Abrams Report about psychics and the police shows.

In the recent search for missing 9-year-old Citrus County Florida resident Jessica Lunsford, investigators had to sift through 3,000 potential leads that came from the public and from other agencies.

[…]

Of the 3,000 tips that came to the attention of the authorities after Jessica’s disappearance, over 400 were from self-professed psychics or self-identified clairvoyants. Police say their information was vague and unsupported, not unlike most tips provided by psychics. But even though authorities questioned the value of such mystically-generated information, teams of detectives and FBI agents still had to be assigned to track down these leads, resulting in the use of valuable investigative resources (to no avail). 

This was also the case in the disappearance of eight month pregnant Laci Peterson where local authorities received hundreds of similar tips from individuals identifying themselves as psychics. One so-called psychic Website claims that its members specialize in finding missing adults as well as lost, "misplaced," and abducted children, pets, and jewelry.

Maybe Allison DuBois should get involved in the Terri Schiavo case…

Terri Schiavo died this morning, 13 days after her feeding tube was removed and fifteen years after the heart attack that left her in a persistent vegetative state.  The heart attack resulted from an eating disorder.

PINELLAS PARK, Fla. - Terri Schiavo, the severely brain-damaged woman who spent 15 years connected to a feeding tube in an epic legal and medical battle that went all the way to the White House and Congress, died Thursday, 13 days after the tube was removed. She was 41.

Schiavo died at the Pinellas Park hospice where she lay for years while her husband and her parents fought over her in the nation’s most bitter — and most heavily litigated — right-to-die dispute.

The feud between the parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, and their son-in-law continued even after her death: Franciscan Brother Paul O’Donnell, an adviser to the Schindlers, said they and their two other children "were denied access at the moment of her death. They’ve been requesting, as you know, for the last hour to try to be in there and they were denied access by Michael Schiavo. They are in there now, praying at her bedside."

David Gibbs III, a lawyer for the Schindlers, said: "This is indeed a sad day for the nation, for the family. Their faith in God remains strong." He added: "God loves Terri more than they do. She is at peace."

May she finally rest in peace.

It was so bizarre to watch a lawyer and a spiritual adviser for the Schindlers on TV this morning call Terri Schiavo’s death a murder while at the same time saying that the Schindlers had accepted that Terri’s death was "God’s will."

Sorry, but you can’t have it both ways.

If it is God’s will that Terri die this way, then those who made her die this way are saints rather than murderers, right?  Isn’t the theory that those who do God’s will are the good people and those who resist it are the bad people?

If it’s God’s will that Terri be murdered then it is murderers who are carrying out God’s will.

The Schindlers continue to demonize Michael Schiavo.  They fought with him over who had the right to be at Terri’s side when she died (he did) and now they will fight over where her remains are to be laid to rest.  That is his choice as well.

The Schindlers definitely have a big problem dealing with reality.  For them, religion is an escape from reality.

It is their ability to deny reality that has enabled them to reject clear evidence of Terri’s severe brain damage as shown on her CAT scan.

All flights from reality ultimately cause problems for everyone close to the escapee as well as the escapee him/herself.  The Schindler’s fifteen year flight from reality has created misery for many, especially Michael Schiavo, while costing the taxpayers a small fortune in legal fees.

Terri’s death is both very sad and a relief.  I am reminded of the words of Martin Luther King: "Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty I’m free at last."

Bob and Mary Schindler, Terri Shiavo’s parents, seem to have no respect for the truth or the rights of others.

This is a common trait among religious fanatics.

Three days ago, it was reported that Mr. and Mrs. Schindler were giving up their fifteen year legal battle to keep their daughter on a feeding tube.  Today we learn that another appeal was filed and that a federal appeals court has agreed to grant them a new hearing.

I don’t think it is a coincidence that this move comes after Michael Schiavo announced that an autopsy would be performed on his wife’s body after she dies.  The autopsy would lay to rest any doubts about the amount of brain damage she suffered after her heart attack and confirm what doctors have said all along–that she is in a persistent vegetative state and has no chance of recovery.

It would also prove that the Schindler’s and their religious fanatic allies have mercilessly force-fed Terri Schiavo for their own personal aggrandizement.

The force-feed-Terri-Schiavo camp has never produced any scientific evidence that Terri has the capacity to be aware or to recover.  They have engaged in this fantasy for fifteen years, even though every credible neurologist who has studied Terri Schiavo’s CAT scan says that the higher centers of her brain are completely destroyed and that she has no change of recovery.

The let-Terri-die-in-peace camp has provided evidence for their position and are willing to allow an autopsy to confirm their diagnosis after she is dead.

If the Schindler’s win this 11th-hour appeal the tube could be reinserted, prolonging Terri’s persistent vegetative state for an indefinite amount of time.  It will also allow the religious fanatics in our country to claim and that there has been a miracle and their prayers have been answered.  It will also mean that the confirmation of the scientifically-based diagnosis cannot be confirmed.

It will provide another opportunity for President George W. Bush, Sen. Bill Frist, M.D., and Sen. Tom DeLay to play to their political base which is largely comprised of religious fanatics.

Bush frustrated efforts to get to the truth that all of his reasons for invading Iraq were bogus.  We should not be surprised if they frustrate all efforts to confirm the truth about Terri Schiavo’s diagnosis.

After all, if the Terri Schiavo diagnosis is confirmed by autopsy, Bush and his allies will once again be exposed for the liar that they are. 

That would provide even more evidence, as if their wasn’t enough already, that Bush is a born-again Christian in name only, that he carries that cross for political purposes, and that religion is being used to manipulate large segments of the U.S. population.

As if to further illustrate my point, now Rev. Jesse Jackson, has added his name to the long list of those using this tragedy for their own personal aggrandizement.  I’m surprised it took him so long to join the party.

UPDATE 3/30/05pm:  This latest appeal was rejected.  However, the Schindlers have vowed to keep fighting.

""I’ve done everything the Bible says, even the stuff that contradicts
the other stuff." - Ned Flanders, from The Simpsons.

More quotes from The Simpsons.

(Thanks, Skip.)