From Bush Signs Bill That May Let Schiavo Live, the Associated Press, March 21, 2005:
President Bush signed the bill almost immediately after its passage early Monday, vowing in a statement to “stand on the side of those defending life for all Americans, including those with disabilities.”
“In cases like this one, where there are serious questions and substantial doubts, our society, our laws and our courts should have a presumption in favor of life,” he said.
From The Texas Clemency Memos, the Atlantic Monthly, July/August 2003:
On the morning of May 6, 1997, Governor George W. Bush signed his name to a confidential three-page memorandum from his legal counsel, Alberto R. Gonzales, and placed a bold black check mark next to a single word: DENY. It was the twenty-ninth time a death-row inmate’s plea for clemency had been denied in the twenty-eight months since Bush had been sworn in. In this case Bush’s signature led, shortly after 6:00 P.M. on the very same day, to the execution of Terry Washington, a mentally retarded thirty-three-year-old man with the communication skills of a seven-year-old.
RELATED: George W. Bush: The Death Penalty Governor, by Alexander Cockburn, Common Dreams
18 replies on “The Murderer Has Two Faces”
Soon I imagine Republican operatives will fan out across the nation knocking cigarettes out of people’s mouths as Federal Marshalls and the Justice Department shut down the tobacco industry and the DEA starts spraying the Carolinas with defoliants. The GOP Nanny-State has awoken. Prepared to be meddled with. But don’t worry, this is just establishing the State’s right to decide when you live and die, it still has no legitimate claim to tax your income, regulate corporations, or take your guns away.
the hypocrisy is mind-blowing….
Your juxtaposition perfectly demonstrates how inane this “culture of life” bull shit really is.
What? Bush is a hypocrite? But I thought God ordained him to be king and defend us from the anti-christ that the religion of Islam will produce.
This monkey’s goin’ to heaven,
This monkey’s goin’ to heaven,
First I gotta transfer in Atlanta!
Let’s face it, folks, this is just a snow job so nobody will be reporting about the majority whip’s lack of propriety & ethics. Mr. DeLay’s words about a father and a mother, a sister and a brother who believe their family member in a vegetative state for 15 years may yet be revived almost brought tears to my eyes. Almost. St. Thomas.
It’s nice to see that even when Bush does something positive we still have to find something else to bang on him for. It’s almost as if no one wants him to do anything right…
Yeah–let’s compare the killing of an innocent woman to the execution of a convicted murderer. Typical liberals. You fight to protect the lives of death row murderers and a bunch of caribou in Alaska and ignore the lives of a disabled woman and unborn babies. And you call the Republicans heartless.
four hypocritical words for ya:
Texas Futile Care Law
If you’re not in the media spotlight, they’ll pull the plug on your baby before you can blink.
K.B., which of the above actions is positive? Prolonging an inevitable death for the benefit of a strong Pro Life lobby and their cash?
Or is it the state sponsored murder of mentally challenged people?
I’m struggling here.
A different Jessica–you call Terri’s death “inevitable”. Well, it’s about as inevitable as your death. She is NOT on life support–she can breathe without a machine and her organs all work properly. The ONLY thing she cannot do for herself is feed herself. She is a severely brain damaged woman who has become a burden to her husband and now he wants to starve her to death. She has NO OTHER ILLNESS besides her brain damage. She would live a long life if continued to be fed through the tube. So don’t call her death inevitable. All of our deaths are inevitable.
Please. Maybe you need to go outside more, if you think fifteen years of sitting in a chair alternating between sleeping and looking is a “life”. You act like Brain Damage is a hangnail. IT’S A DAMAGED BRAIN, it keeps her alive and functioning.
Read an article, any of the hundreds that have assured everyone that there is NO HOPE FOR RECOVERY for Terri.
Her parents are torturing her in not letting her go. It’s hard, I’ve dealt with watching a loved one waste away in the hospital. Watching it for ONE YEAR was enough for me to pray for his death.
After my neighbor, Lara, was fired from the plant she couldn’t find work to buy food for her kids. They were perfectly healthy, they didn’t even have brain damage, but they couldn’t feed themselves. Representative Tom DeLay (R-TX)brought over a casserole every day and sat up with little Beakin and Shawn until late in the night reading them uplifting tales and teaching them useful skills.
I take everything back. Let’s keep Terri alive for a hundred years or more!
COREY wrote:
“Yeah–let’s compare the killing of an innocent woman to the execution of a convicted murderer. Typical liberals.”
Corey, you’re missing the point. The hypocrite we have for a president, who said yesterday
“When a case is as complex as this, we must err on the side of life”
had no problem condemning retarded people to lethal injections. He did not give clemency (mercy, compassion, forgiveness) to one single person on Texas death row in his stint as governor. That certainly is not “erring on the side of life”. Okay? Hypocrisy, get it? Why are none of these wonderful compassionate X-ians shedding tears for people who die in this country because they have inadequate health care?
Second point– these people just want to keep a body without a soul on life support so that they can keep racking up the medical bills.
Plus, Tom DeLay sounded so sincere, you almost forgot all his criminal activities and illegal fundraising and illegal trips and gifts he accepted.
actually, our president simply let there be a decision regarding this landmark case at a federal level.
now that the process is through, he has stated that he has taken it as far as he is willing.
you see, our government has a system of checks and balances. pretty cool huh?
Funny, same outcome as if he would have accepted the decision at the state level. Big waste of time and diversion from more pressing corruption issue that they don’t want the dumbed down public to acknowledge.
aaah, yes. the “dumbed down” public.
everyone in America at large is ignorant
EXCEPT: you and all your friends and everyone who likes what you like.
has it ever occured to you that maybe you have built up and deranged solpsistic perception of your surroundings? i suggest a road trip.
the people of America are not what Michael Moore says they are in his films. see “A Straight Story” by David Lynch and you’ll have a better feel for the people of America