BillyVance 35 #1 April 6, 2005 I got this via email, and enjoyed reading it. It mainly makes light of the spectacle surrounding Terri Schiavo's predicament... ==================== Living will is the best revenge By ROBERT FRIEDMAN, Perspective Editor Published March 27, 2005 Like many of you, I have been compelled by recent events to prepare a more detailed advance directive dealing with end-of-life issues. Here's what mine says: * In the event I lapse into a persistent vegetative state, I want medical authorities to resort to extraordinary means to prolong my hellish semiexistence. Fifteen years wouldn't be long enough for me. * I want my wife and my parents to compound their misery by engaging in a bitter and protracted feud that depletes their emotions and their bank accounts. * I want my wife to ruin the rest of her life by maintaining an interminable vigil at my bedside. I'd be really jealous if she waited less than a decade to start dating again or otherwise rebuilding a semblance of a normal life. * I want my case to be turned into a circus by losers and crackpots from around the country who hope to bring meaning to their empty lives by investing the same transient emotion in me that they once reserved for Laci Peterson, Chandra Levy and that little girl who got stuck in a well. * I want those crackpots to spread vicious lies about my wife. * I want to be placed in a hospice where protesters can gather to bring further grief and disruption to the lives of dozens of dying patients and families whose stories are sadder than my own. * I want the people who attach themselves to my case because of their deep devotion to the sanctity of life to make death threats against any judges, elected officials or health care professionals who disagree with them. * I want the medical geniuses and philosopher kings who populate the Florida Legislature to ignore me for more than a decade and then turn my case into a forum for weeks of politically calculated bloviation. * I want total strangers - oily politicians, maudlin news anchors, ersatz friars and all other hangers-on - to start calling me "Bobby," as if they had known me since childhood. * I'm not insisting on this as part of my directive, but it would be nice if Congress passed a "Bobby's Law" that applied only to me and ignored the medical needs of tens of millions of other Americans without adequate health coverage. * Even if the "Bobby's Law" idea doesn't work out, I want Congress - especially all those self-described conservatives who claim to believe in "less government and more freedom" - to trample on the decisions of doctors, judges and other experts who actually know something about my case. And I want members of Congress to launch into an extended debate that gives them another excuse to avoid pesky issues such as national security and the economy. * In particular, I want House Majority Leader Tom DeLay to use my case as an opportunity to divert the country's attention from the mounting political and legal troubles stemming from his slimy misbehavior. * And I want Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist to make a mockery of his Harvard medical degree by misrepresenting the details of my case in ways that might give a boost to his 2008 presidential campaign. * I want Frist and the rest of the world to judge my medical condition on the basis of a snippet of dated and demeaning videotape that should have remained private. * Because I think I would retain my sense of humor even in a persistent vegetative state, I'd want President Bush - the same guy who publicly mocked Karla Faye Tucker when signing off on her death warrant as governor of Texas - to claim he was intervening in my case because it is always best "to err on the side of life." * I want the state Department of Children and Families to step in at the last moment to take responsibility for my well-being, because nothing bad could ever happen to anyone under DCF's care. * And because Gov. Jeb Bush is the smartest and most righteous human being on the face of the Earth, I want any and all of the aforementioned directives to be disregarded if the governor happens to disagree with them. If he says he knows what's best for me, I won't be in any position to argue."Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
livendive 8 #2 April 6, 2005 LOL - There are six threads between this post and a previous post (4ish hours older) with the same content. Blues, Dave"I AM A PROFESSIONAL EXTREME ATHLETE!" (drink Mountain Dew) Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rebecca 0 #3 April 6, 2005 Ouch. Not exactly funny, since it's so bitingly true. I'm so glad that poor woman is finally deceased - and for her sake, I hope she really did check out long before this whole media mayhem started. What a way to go. you've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel loquacious?' -- well do you, punk? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Kennedy 0 #4 April 6, 2005 OK, since this thread is basically DOA, I feel ok in asking... What's with the swirly wavy things? This some new dotcommer fad I haven't heard about? ¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤ If we weren't all crazy, we would go insane ¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤ so nyahwitty subliminal message Guard your honor, let your reputation fall where it will, and outlast the bastards. 1* Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rebecca 0 #5 April 6, 2005 Haha! No, BillyVance had them in his sig, so I asked and mnealtx provided! I just like it. you've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel loquacious?' -- well do you, punk? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mnealtx 0 #6 April 6, 2005 You should swap colors in the middle.... ¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,¸¸,ø¤Mike I love you, Shannon and Jim. POPS 9708 , SCR 14706 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rebecca 0 #7 April 6, 2005 Maybe later - for now, blue and orange are my thing!! War Eagle!! you've got to ask yourself one question: 'Do I feel loquacious?' -- well do you, punk? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
flyangel2 2 #8 April 6, 2005 I got one for you. QuoteI believe if properly witnessed and simply notarized, this would hold up in court; at least in Caleefohniah: >>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~> LIVING WILL I, _______________________ (fill in the blank), being of sound mind and body, do not wish to be kept alive indefinitely by artificial means. Under no circumstances should my fate be put in the hand of peckerwood politicians who couldn't pass ninth-grade biology if their lives depended on it. If a reasonable amount of time passes and I fail to sit up and ask for a cold beer, it should be presumed that I won't do so ever again. When such a determination is reached, I hereby instruct my spouse, children and attending physicians to pull the plug, reel in the tubes and call it a day. Under no circumstances shall the members of the Legislature enact a special law to keep me on life-support machinery. It is my wish that these boneheads mind their own damn business, and pay attention instead to the health, education and future of the millions of Americans who aren't in a permanent coma and who nonetheless may be in need of nourishment. Under no circumstances shall any politicians butt into this case. I don't care how many fundamentalist votes they're trying to scrounge for their run for the presidency in 2008, it is my wish that they play politics with someone else's life and leave me alone to die in peace. I couldn't care less if a hundred religious zealots send e-mails to legislators in which they pretend to care about me. I don't know these people, and I certainly haven't authorized them to preach and/or crusade on my behalf. They should mind their own damn business, too. If any of my family goes against my wishes and turns my case into a political cause, I hereby promise to come back from the grave and make his or her existence a living hell.May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds. - Edward Abbey Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
BillyVance 35 #9 April 6, 2005 I love it!! As for earlier questions about the wavy stuff in my sig line, I copied them off a friend's email sig line. It was too cool to ignore, and as far as I know, he's never registered or posted on here. But at least I admit it, I'm not the original... "Mediocre people don't like high achievers, and high achievers don't like mediocre people." - SIX TIME National Champion coach Nick Saban Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
