Giuliani Restates Support For Federal Intervention In Schiavo Case
Giuliani Restates Support For Federal Intervention In Schiavo Case
During a visit last week to St. Petersburg, FL, former mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) said he backed efforts in 2005 to intervene in the Terri Schiavo case and stop her doctors from removing life support:
He told reporters he supported government intervention to keep the severely brain-damaged Terri Schiavo alive after courts ordered her feeding tubes removed: “I thought it was appropriate to make every effort to give her a chance to stay alive.”
Politico’s Ben Smith noted that Giuliani “avoided comment” on Schiavo in 2005, and suggested his current statements are a “pander” to the cultural right. But a New York Post article from April 1, 2005, in the midst of the controversy, quotes Giuliani expressing the same position:
“I think the right decision would have been to keep the feeding tube in, under the circumstances of the case,” former Mayor Rudy Giuliani said.
Giuliani’s take on Schiavo reflects the same support for government overreach that characterizes his positions on a range of issues. Glenn Greenwald has documented similar cases, such as Giuliani’s belief that the President of the United States has the legal authority to imprison American citizens without any opportunity for review, or that the president has the authority to override Congress and mandate funding for wars.
Such extreme claims of executive power were also a hallmark of the right’s efforts during the Schiavo scandal. As federal appeals court Judge Stanley Birch, a Bush I appointee, wrote in his concurrence in a Schiavo case, their efforts were unconstitutional:
In resolving the Schiavo controversy it is my judgment that, despite sincere and altruistic motivation, the legislative and executive branches of our government have acted in a manner demonstrably at odds with our Founding Fathers’ blueprint for the governance of a free people — our Constitution.
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Giuliani needs to meet with the press dressed up in drag as an ugly Marylin Monroe > lol.
April 10th, 2007 at 12:49 pmWhatever happened to conservatives who wanted less government intrusion into people’s lives? Or who believed in the “rule of law”?
An extinct breed, I guess. At least on the national stage.
April 10th, 2007 at 12:49 pmCaption:
“waaaa, put my tube back in!”
April 10th, 2007 at 12:52 pmWhat was he thinking, they could keep her alive, send her to Iraq and count her as a soldier?
Gee Rudy, why don’t you just quit the race instead of trying so hard to self-destruct?
April 10th, 2007 at 12:56 pmrudy needs to find a nice job in the insurance business, before all this campaign stuff gets really, really embarrassing for him.
April 10th, 2007 at 12:57 pmkeep digging, rudy.
April 10th, 2007 at 12:57 pmGiuliani is trying to hew right on at least one so-called family-values issue. But this issue proved that the extremists were pulling the strings of the Republican party, in a badly miscalculated effort to score political points.
They over-reached. Americans did not appreciate the federal intrusion into a private, medical matter. Giuliani is painting himself into a smaller corner every week.
April 10th, 2007 at 12:58 pmgosh… it WOULD be so much easier if we had a dictator…
this arguing and fighting for basic constitutional principles is exhaustive…
whoddathunkit…
April 10th, 2007 at 1:02 pmYes, well, notice where he was when he made these comments…
April 10th, 2007 at 1:02 pmThere are probably more feeding tubes per capita there than anywhere else in the nation…
Giuliani’s position on the Schiavo case is purely a matter of transference.
His presidential bid is on life-support and he doesn’t want anyone to pull his plug.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:03 pmLooks like Rudy and McCain believe the road to the WH requires the support of the radical religious right.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:03 pmRudy’s attempts to court the evangelical vote will fail miserably.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:04 pmthe julie annie in drag is hardly what we should be discussing. while mayor he said “If you can’t beat em join em” in handing over the NYPD to the mafia. actually I think what he said was “If you can’t beat em, shoot em”
April 10th, 2007 at 1:04 pmIt’s always just a matter of time before Republicans get stupid and/or nuts. Someone needs to start a reality school so they can all attend and not be allowed to graduate until they see things as they really are before they destroy the world.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:04 pmAt least’s he remained consistent, unlike the waffling of Mitt Romney and John McCain.
Support Bill Richardson!
April 10th, 2007 at 1:04 pmA McCain-Giuliani ticket! Democrats win!
April 10th, 2007 at 1:07 pmDemocrat’s Dream Rethug ticket: McCain-Giuliani. Let’s hope.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:10 pmi look at that picture and think of this caption:
“ew… what’s that smell?”
April 10th, 2007 at 1:15 pmNeither statement sounds like an endorsement of the Congressional intervention. I also think it would have been better to leave her feeding tube in, as much as I disagree with the idea that it is Congress’ prerogative to interfere.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:15 pmGuiliani is a Psychopathic Liar and a War Criminal.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:16 pmMost Americans opposed federal intervention in the Schiavo case. It’s hard to comprehend how a potential presidential candidate hopes to win election by opposing the majority view on major issues. Won’t work with McCain on Iraq, won’t work with Guiliani in the Schiavo case.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:16 pmI live in Florida near where the Schiavo drama took place. She had absolutely NO quality of life. Her brain had shrunk to almost 1/3 of what a normal human brain should be. She is better off now than in the “persistent vegetative state” she would have still been “living” in if her parents and Rude-y would have had their way.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:19 pmThe Schiavo crowd seems to be ignoring 17 month-old Emilio Gonzales who is having his life support terminated over the objection of his mother in Austin, Texas under the 1999 law Governor George W. Bush signed that allows hospitals to pull the plug in “medically futile” cases. The family is in court today.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:20 pmDan I thought the same thing. What about this little kid?
April 10th, 2007 at 1:25 pmAh, yet another reason why Rudy will NEVER be POTUS. He tried to get his mobster limo driver made a cabinet secretary, screwed up 9/11 very badly, and now as if we need any more… Thanks Rudy! Please, oh Please get the Repub nomination!
April 10th, 2007 at 1:29 pmNice going Rudy: there’s no better way to try and win an election than by dredging up old news of misguided fanaticism…
April 10th, 2007 at 1:40 pmWhat’s brain dead, on life support, and can’t survive without the aid of the federal government – is the GOP.
April 10th, 2007 at 1:54 pmHey Rudy, how did that intervention work out for the boys? You know Dubya, his brother, Tom DeLay, and Bill Frist…was it a good idea? You freaking moron.
April 10th, 2007 at 2:01 pmI can’t believe Judge Stanley Birch still has his job!
April 10th, 2007 at 2:08 pmWhere are the republicans on the issue of the 47 million, the working class with no health care – some of which are actually dying prematurely because of this?????
April 10th, 2007 at 2:22 pmFor how many years are the Republicans going to exploit the Schiavo Case for their political (gain???)? So pathetic.
April 10th, 2007 at 2:34 pmComment by not going to take it anymore — April 10, 2007 @ 2:34 pm
It’s a case of “Oh, look, SHINY!” Anything to get the American Public distracted from the deaths of American soldiers in Iraq.
April 10th, 2007 at 2:40 pmMr. Giuliani’s willingness to abase himself before the false idol of right wing fundamentalism knows no bounds, demonstrating why he should not be president.
Ms. Schiavo had lost half her brain; what remained was mush. There was no life to preserve. As the Right did with Ms. Plame, they turned Ms. Schiavo from a woman into an argument and a hand tool. Mr. Giuliani did again today.
April 10th, 2007 at 2:50 pmWell, Dan, there’s just NO moral equivalency between Emilio Gonzales and Terri Schiavo in the eyes of the Religious Right. Terri was a good solid white Christian woman; Emilio’s just another little brown kid.
April 10th, 2007 at 2:54 pm(sarcasm mode off)
#30
Studies show our lack of universal healthcare means the loss of 18,000 lives every year. Single-payer would SAVE Americans over $200 billion every year.
There are always about 20,000 in the country in the same condition as Terry Schiavo. Is the president supposed to intervene in all of them? That’s crazy. Didn’t Tom DeLay pull the plug on his father?
April 10th, 2007 at 2:59 pmI had thought that the Terry Schiavo case was “dead”, so to speak. But since Giuliani brought it up again…
I would like to say that I feel deeply sorry for Terry’s parents. I think that the hardest thing in life to bear is losing a child. BUT they were REALLY REALLY on the wrong side in this case.
I am a health sciences librarian. In the biz for 33 years. I have done countless literature searches and seen countless books on any health topic you can name, including neurology books. Neurology books show cat scans, PET scans, and MRIs, of normal brains, and brains with various normalities. Since I’m not a neurologist, when I see a scan of an abnormal brain, I can’t usually say what the precise abnormality is, but I’ve seen enough scans to know that a particular one IS abnormal, unless the abnormality is quite subtle.
Someone put Terry Schiavo’s cat scan on the Internet, and I saw it. It was GROSSLY abnormal. Cat scans show brains in gray and black. The so-called “gray matter” of brains shows as gray. All brains have areas called “cisterns” or empty areas which show up as black on a cat scan. Brains are also convoluted and the fissures between the gray matter also show up as black. All brains have sort of scalloped edges with black between those edges and the skull, but with normal brains those edges are very close to the skull.
Terry Shiavo’s brain had HUGE empty areas between the brain and the skull, and more HUGE areas between gray matter. Her brain was GROSSLY abnormal, and shrunked to no more than half the size of a normal brain. Many of her neurons and axons, the latter being the transporters of nervous impulses, were just plain GONE. It was no surprise to me when the autopsy showed the brain weighing less than half of a normal brain.
People do come out of comas, sometimes being comatose for years. But there was NO WAY Terry would have done so. Her brain, particularly in the areas that covered higher cortical functions, was just gone.
Sorry for the long post, but I’m hoping that some of the lurkers will read this and understand that the people who hoped for a miracle here completely misunderstood the situation. And Bush and his minions had no right to intervene. They only made things worse.
April 10th, 2007 at 3:03 pmThe Redstate orcs have flatly denied any comparison to Schiavo and have turned the Emilio Gonzales story into a diatribe against “government health care”. The logic seems to be “this is what you get when the government gets involved in healthcare, this wouldn’t be an issue if this kid wasn’t on Medicaid.” Yeah, those lazy poor babies, why should they get to see doctors? I’m going to go throw up now.
April 10th, 2007 at 3:09 pmStudies show our lack of universal healthcare means the loss of 18,000 lives every year. Single-payer would SAVE Americans over $200 billion every year.
There are always about 20,000 in the country in the same condition as Terry Schiavo. Is the president supposed to intervene in all of them? That’s crazy. Didn’t Tom DeLay pull the plug on his father?
Comment by keith
I just heard story on Thom Hartman – a caller stated a father was arrested for robbing a liquor store for cash in order for his daughter to receive proper medical care. So sad.
April 10th, 2007 at 3:14 pmShane said, “What was he thinking, they could keep her alive, and send her to Iraq and count her as a soldier.”
Yes, that is a possibly as Ms. Schiavo could have served in Iraq. Not very likely, though. Zero chance.
Another possiblity is finding a second husband, or a third husband, if Ms. Schiavo should be unlucky in the love department. Not very likely, though. Zero chance.
Rudy is married to his third wife. I’m sure Rudy thinks Ms. Schiavo was marriage-material. Not very likely, though. Zero chance.
Ms. Schiavo didn’t find much romantic love in her sad life, but she had “loving” support.
As I view it, she had the wrong kind of love.
True, true, true, true, true love is NOT keeping a brain-dead person alive for years.
I THINK RUDY IS BRAIN-DEAD.
John
April 10th, 2007 at 3:34 pmGuess Rudy Kerik (strike that, I mean Giuliani) is still supporting his mobster bud, Bernie Kerik, too. Rudy’s numbers will plummet now that the ugly truth about how Giuliani’s own firm (which he co-owned with Bernie) actually helped construct the official application for Bernie’s quick ascent to head of homeland security. Uh-oh….
To boot, Ray told the CIA that Bernie had received nearly $200,000 renovation job on his trysty apartment thanks to mob connections….that was back in early 2000…Then enter Gonzales, who supposedly vetted Bernie for hours. Ironically, knowing all he knew from the CIA about Kerik, Gonzo still supported his nomination strongly. Hmmmmm…..something very sticky about that!
April 10th, 2007 at 4:19 pmWhy would Rudy be regressing back to Terry Schiavo right now?? Hmmm…pretty transparent. He wants to degray the negativity of his association with Bernie Kerik and trump up the “right to life” base….very calculating, Rudster…but….sorry, thanks for playing.
April 10th, 2007 at 4:21 pmPerhaps Rudy is making a more substantive connection here than we see at first blush….He’s showing that he knows from first-hand knowledge what it is to be “brain dead”.
April 10th, 2007 at 4:22 pmThe quotes seem consistent and everyone is talking as though Rudy is stumping on Terri Schiavo. Did he bring her up or was he asked? Given that he’s addressing Florida Republicans, who tend to be more conservative than their New York counterparts, and the talking point has been that hardline GOPers question Rudy’s conservative cred, this might have been broached by an audience member.
He’s just telling you what he thinks. You don’t have to agree and you can think what you want about him, but you can argue the merit of the issue without/rather than just calling him names.
April 10th, 2007 at 4:40 pmHey Rudy, how did that intervention work out for the boys? You know Dubya, his brother, Tom DeLay, and Bill Frist…was it a good idea? You freaking moron.
Comment by kasinca — April 10, 2007 @ 2:01 pm
Absolutely dead-on correct, and I always love to see the biggest smack to the face the far rightwing has suffered in it’s modern-day history being used as a “selling point” of all things
Smart move Rudy, pander to a group overwhelmingly rejected by the US public on this issue, and overwhelmed to the point they STFU and don’t talk about it much anymore
Like the classic abuser/enabler relationship, both the GOP and Giuliani are using the other’s vulnerable points to further their own agenda-Giuliani by pushing a stand clearly unpopular with the voters, the GOP’s far right base getting Giuliani to tell the party it was so correct and so pretty to turn what should have been a private, family affair into a neocon version of “Bread & Circus”
Oh yeah, running hard on the Schiavo affair, very smart move for the GOP and Giuliani, especially in light of how successful this same far rightwing meme was back in 2005
Never,
EVER
doubt the blinding stupidity and sheer hypocrisy of the far right GOP supporters and so many of its media whores and W quislings
April 10th, 2007 at 4:47 pmGet ready for a police state if this f^cker is the pres.
April 10th, 2007 at 4:51 pmI forget which blog I read it on, but even tho I can’t credit it accurately, I think it’s on-target and worth passing on.
Guiliani can safely state he’s pro-abortion because he can prove time and time again that he’s a woman-hating authoritarian bully, and it’s THOSE characteristics that motivate the base.
April 10th, 2007 at 5:19 pm“Wascally Wabbit” Rudy Giuliani IS SHAKING AFTER HIS CLOSE CALL AT THE white house EASTER EGG ROLL WHERE HE AND DAFFY DUCK(tm)McPAIN ALMOST GOT THEIR ASSES HANDED TO THEM BY THE GUN-HAPPY “SCARECROW OF Mitt Romney MARSH”—-HENCE THE FOOLISH STATEMENT ABOUT THE POOR Terri Schiavo, WHO IS BEING DUG UP FROM HER ETERNAL SLEEP TO BE USED AS A TOOL BY THE DASTARDLY rightwingnut crank religious right base APPEASERS LIKE Giuliani, McPAIN and Romney, THE UNHOLY THREE fudge-pachyderms of the
April 10th, 2007 at 5:25 pmG(houlish) O(pportunistic) P(edophile) party!!!!! DESPICABLE KNAVES, HEARTLESS COWARDS, UNPRINCIPLED BOMBASTIC IMBECILES, I WILL SEE TO IT THAT ALL THREE AS WELL AS ANY OTHER fudge-pachyderms OF THE G.O.P. WHO DARE RUN IN 2008 WILL RECEIVE BOTH BARRELS OF CONCENTRATED VITRIOL AND VENOM FROM MOI, YOURS TRULY, RAY THE RIPPER!!!!! HAH!!!!!
Where are the republicans on the issue of the 47 million, the working class with no health care – some of which are actually dying prematurely because of this?????
Comment by goehl
Not to mention that American soldiers getting unnecessarily killed or rendered handicapped because of lack of proper body armor!
April 10th, 2007 at 5:46 pmHere we have a republican that says that he fully supports the government in intervening in a case that was already decided by the courts. And yet Deamonte Driver, who’s parent had no insurance dies from a bacterial infection caused by an abscessed tooth and not a peep
April 10th, 2007 at 6:38 pmfrom our delusional president or his would be replacement. Shame on them both.
How low can he go?
April 10th, 2007 at 6:47 pmHe would support the morons in the rethuglican party who intervened for political purposes into a private family affair.
He’s a cross-dressing, gay associating, big Government, thrice-divorced, abortion-supporting, New Yorker. How can he possibly lose the Republican nomination?
April 10th, 2007 at 7:13 pmThe Schiavo crowd seems to be ignoring 17 month-old Emilio Gonzales who is having his life support terminated over the objection of his mother in Austin, Texas under the 1999 law Governor George W. Bush signed that allows hospitals to pull the plug in “medically futile†cases. The family is in court today.
Comment by Dan — April 10, 2007 @ 1:20 pm
#
Probably Emilio doesn’t have insurance that can be milked, whereas Terry did…
April 10th, 2007 at 8:11 pmDoes he care when Kerik’s mob connections kill? When Bush kills?
April 10th, 2007 at 9:39 pmNanny State 101, lecture by Giuliani.
Dictator 2.0.
April 10th, 2007 at 9:46 pmGuiliani has become a complete moron.
Schaivo resurrection is probably meant to offset his pro abortion and marital history.
Pandering to the religious right in such a shameless way.
April 11th, 2007 at 1:15 pmRudy is the bomb! He knows what is right and isn’t afraid to say it! He knows what the TS case was really about and gets it. He did doesn’t rely on psuedo journalism for his facts.
May 8th, 2007 at 8:52 pm