Jimmy Akin

What Terri Schiavo’s case comes down to is not the non-existent "right to die", nor is it "privacy" or a matter of due process or jurisdiction. What has not been addressed, by anyone directly involved with the case, is the legal fiction that a feeding tube constitutes extrordinary means of sustaining life. That is the crux of the matter.

At least, that’s what I thought. But it just occurred to me, while watching re-run video of a brave 10-year-old being escorted to a police van, that protestors were not carrying feeding tubes as they tried to approach Terri’s hospice. They were carrying perfectly ordinary cups of water. Surely not even the mind of a Judge would be so highly trained as to classify an ordinary cup of water as "extrodinary" medical care. Were the protestors threatening to professionally administer these highly complex cups of water? No, they were not.

It has been my understanding that Terri does have the ability, with assistance, to swallow both food and water, without the aid of a feeding tube.

WITHOUT a feeding tube.

So the feeding tube has, apparently, been a colossal red herring all along. It must be (and I want badly to read the Judge’s findings) that there is some kind of injunction barring Terri from receiving any food or water of any kind from anyone. In other words, "this person will be starved to death, by any means necessary, come hell or high water."

A couple of days ago, in an interview on Fox News, Terri’s brother said that this was America, that we just don’t starve disabled people to death here.

I’m now terribly afraid that he was wrong.

Recently I excerpted the Evil Overlord’s List (a classic of Internet humor). It consists of advice for evil overlords of the type you read about in sci-fi and fantasy. But ReasonOnline has some advice for real-world, third-world evil overlords.

I mean, you gotta feel for those guys. It’s hard to be an evil overlord in a world where democracy is on the march and the global economy has developed to the point that bone-crushing poverty is the exception rather than the norm. Today if you’re not careful, your people will start entrepeneuring their way to prosperity and then they’ll take a hankering to ideologies that are hard to square with evil overlordism, like . . . democracy.

No, the best thing is to nip this problem in the bud by keeping your people bone-crushingly poor. You need their per capita gross domestic production to be like Korea’s $1,000 or Cuba’s $1,700. Let them get up to America’s $36,200 GDP and they’re sure to overthrow you.

So here’s some advice from ReasonOnline’s evil overlord list for third-world dictators (and the imitators in more developed countries):

First, make sure that your country’s money is no good. Print money like there’s no tomorrow. Hyperinflation is one of the easiest and most popular ways to dismantle an economy. Another popular monetary gambit is to make sure your currency is not convertible. This guarantees that no one will ever want to invest in your country.

To further discourage investment, be sure to nationalize all major Industries. Nationalization has additional poverty-enhancing benefits. For example, it will ensure that the nationalized industries never improve technologically or become more efficient, and it makes workers pathetically dependent on their political masters, namely you.

Of course, you may find it too tiresome to nationalize everything, in which case it is very important that you establish high tariffs that insulate your country’s remaining private industries (usually owned by your cronies anyway) from competition.

In addition, your legal system should make it nearly impossible for anyone to license a new business, however small. This will offer opportunities for your bureaucrats to make a living through corruption and will protect your cronies from domestic competition. An added advantage is that most commerce will be made illegal and subject to arbitrary enforcement.

This leads to the point that property is critical. Once people start to own something, they invest in it and improve it, leading inexorably to the creation of wealth. Again, the legal system can help to make it impossible to issue clear titles so that your citizens can’t buy, sell, or borrow against their "property." Also, force your farmers to sell their crops to government commodity boards at below-market rates. This will discourage them from investing in anything more advanced than subsistence agriculture, and you will be able to sell whatever crops you do seize at low prices to keep the urban populations quiet.

Another popular policy is confiscatory taxes. This strategy, which allows you to claim that you are soaking the rich in the name of equity, has long been fashionable among the genteelly stagnating economies of Europe.

READ THE WHOLE ARTICLE.

Recently I excerpted the Evil Overlord’s List (a classic of Internet humor). It consists of advice for evil overlords of the type you read about in sci-fi and fantasy. But ReasonOnline has some advice for real-world, third-world evil overlords.

I mean, you gotta feel for those guys. It’s hard to be an evil overlord in a world where democracy is on the march and the global economy has developed to the point that bone-crushing poverty is the exception rather than the norm. Today if you’re not careful, your people will start entrepeneuring their way to prosperity and then they’ll take a hankering to ideologies that are hard to square with evil overlordism, like . . . democracy.

No, the best thing is to nip this problem in the bud by keeping your people bone-crushingly poor. You need their per capita gross domestic production to be like Korea’s $1,000 or Cuba’s $1,700. Let them get up to America’s $36,200 GDP and they’re sure to overthrow you.

So here’s some advice from ReasonOnline’s evil overlord list for third-world dictators (and the imitators in more developed countries):

First, make sure that your country’s money is no good. Print money like there’s no tomorrow. Hyperinflation is one of the easiest and most popular ways to dismantle an economy. Another popular monetary gambit is to make sure your currency is not convertible. This guarantees that no one will ever want to invest in your country.

To further discourage investment, be sure to nationalize all major Industries. Nationalization has additional poverty-enhancing benefits. For example, it will ensure that the nationalized industries never improve technologically or become more efficient, and it makes workers pathetically dependent on their political masters, namely you.

Of course, you may find it too tiresome to nationalize everything, in which case it is very important that you establish high tariffs that insulate your country’s remaining private industries (usually owned by your cronies anyway) from competition.

In addition, your legal system should make it nearly impossible for anyone to license a new business, however small. This will offer opportunities for your bureaucrats to make a living through corruption and will protect your cronies from domestic competition. An added advantage is that most commerce will be made illegal and subject to arbitrary enforcement.

This leads to the point that property is critical. Once people start to own something, they invest in it and improve it, leading inexorably to the creation of wealth. Again, the legal system can help to make it impossible to issue clear titles so that your citizens can’t buy, sell, or borrow against their "property." Also, force your farmers to sell their crops to government commodity boards at below-market rates. This will discourage them from investing in anything more advanced than subsistence agriculture, and you will be able to sell whatever crops you do seize at low prices to keep the urban populations quiet.

Another popular policy is confiscatory taxes. This strategy, which allows you to claim that you are soaking the rich in the name of equity, has long been fashionable among the genteelly stagnating economies of Europe.

READ THE WHOLE ARTICLE.

While I was gone for the wedding, a bunch of kindly folks sent me links regarding Terri Schiavo. Given how desperate things are becoming, I don’t want to stretch out the time of posting in order to give me time to read and comment on them, so here are the raw links:

SECRET AGENT MAN: The Due Process Scam.

PAPAFAMILIAS: Fasting For Terri.

WILLIAM FEDERER: The Court-Ordered Death Of Terri Schiavo.

MARK SHEA: E-mail the President & Governor!

EMPIRE JOURNAL: Darth Greer Is Legally Blind (In the Literal, Not the Metaphorical Sense: I.E., He’s Disabled.)

BARBARA WELLER: My Last Visit With Terri.

NEW SOWELL TRILOGY! ONE! TWO! THREE!

Cowboy hat tip to all who sent links!

Happy and Blessed Easter to one and all. My post on Queen Camilla generated some great comments, so I thought I’d do a follow-up:

I know precious little about the British monarchy, but it does seem interesting. I think that tales of palace intrege would be particularly interesting. Could you recommend a book or two on the subject? Thanks!

Unfortunately, I don’t know of a general history I can recommend (suggestions welcome!). I do recommend focusing on particular individuals or houses that interest you and look for books on that narrower focus. One such historian, who has written a number of books on British royals, is Alison Weir, although I disagree with her conclusion that King Richard III is the most likely murderer of his nephews, the princes in the Tower. Sure, he’s a prime suspect, but the traditional case against him is far from conclusive. (Indeed, I think one of the reasons he has persisted in the popular mind as a villain is thanks to Shakespeare’s play, which Shakespeare probably wrote at least in part to please Tudor England.)

The monarchy never really recovered after Henry VIII–yes, yes, I’ve heard of Elizabeth, and even Victoria. But Henry was the most destructive man in English history. It just takes some things longer to disappear than others, once they’ve been mortally wounded.

True enough, although there were moments of greatness, as another reader recounts:

I like to think of the Queen Mum stepping over the rubble left by bombs in wartime London. The reign of the Royals of the ’40s (after the Duke of Windsor and Wally sailed off in their yacht), and the gov’t of Winston Churchill, by inspiring London during the Blitzkrieg and overseeing Britain’s "finest hour," represented one of the few bright spots in the dull to dumb to slapsticky British history that Henry VIII and his apostasy begat.

If only there the moments of greatness were extended to generations of greatness….

Just skip over Charles and go straight to William.

Were that the case, I would again be a fan of the Windsors (at least for a while). However, although I cannot find confirmation of this online, I believe I’ve read that Charles has already indicated that he has no intention of stepping aside for William. Hard to blame him, as he’s been the twentieth-century’s Edward VII (Queen Victoria’s son); but stepping aside would be the noble thing to do.

The elimination of the monarchy poses an interesting political question – if the royalty were eliminated, what would the United Kingdom and the other countries do to fill the "Head of State" position?

Since my interest is in British history, not British constitutional law, I don’t know; but I assume the prime minister would become the head of state. For all intents and purposes, he already is anyway. Queen Elizabeth II is a great lady, but really a figurehead monarch.

The traditional response would be to look for a better royal house, as was done with the Bloodless Revolution in 1688.

No thanks. The so-called "Glorious Revolution" ousted the rightful king and last Roman Catholic monarch, James II, in favor of his Protestant daughter and her husband. Indeed, the "Glorious Revolution" was also responsible for the Bill of Rights 1689, which ensures that no Roman Catholic or royal married to a Roman Catholic will ever again ascend to the British throne.

I also thought I’d never say this, but . . .

GO RALPH NADER!

Excerpts:

The courts not only are refusing her tube feeding, but have 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, it has ordered her to be made dead,"
Nader and Smith assert.

(Cowboy hat tip: Southern Appeal.)