Hyerdahl wrote:
> In Texas, Critics Question Bush's 'Culture of Life'
> By Jeff Franks, Reuters
>
> HOUSTON (March 22) - President Bush's intervention for Terry Schiavo
> has opened old wounds in Texas, where death penalty opponents say his
> words of support for a "culture of life" ring hollow after so many
> executions during his time as governor of the state.
>
> Bush said he stepped into the Schiavo case because the United States
> should have "a presumption in favor of life," but there were 152
> executions in Texas during his administration, including some in which
> the convict's guilt was in doubt, critics said.
>
> "It's hypocrisy at a thousand levels," said University of Houston law
> professor and death penalty defense attorney David Dow.
>
> "I saw many, many cases where there was substantial doubt about whether
> someone was guilty or whether the death penalty was the appropriate
> sentence, but he never said anything," said David Atwood, head of the
> Texas Coalition Against the Death Penalty. "I really can't say he cares
> about life."
>
> "We all recognize there is a difference between an innocent person and
> someone who has committed a heinous crime, but to say one life is
> important and one isn't, that's politics," Atwood said.
>
> Bush has defended the high number of executions by saying he was
> confident everyone put to death in Texas was guilty because they had
> had a fair hearing in the courts he believed capital punishment was a
> deterrent to crime.
>
> He interrupted a Texas vacation and flew to Washington to sign an
> emergency law passed by Congress on Monday that forced a review of the
> Schiavo case in federal court.
>
> Schiavo, 41, has been in a vegetative state since a heart attack in
> 1990. Last week, a Florida court, at her husband's request, ordered the
> removal of the feeding tube keeping her alive, but her parents argued
> it should stay in place.
>
> "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," said Bush, who has spoken often of
> creating a "culture of life" by limiting such things as abortion and
> stem cell research.
>
> Death penalty opponents said Bush did not give the same presumption to
> death row inmates in Texas, where he used his power to grant an
> execution stay only once while governor from 1995 to 2000.
>
> In 2000, the state set a U.S. record with 40 executions, including that
> of Gary Graham, whose guilt was hotly contested and became an
> international controversy.
>
> "In the face of pretty substantial evidence that Gary Graham was not a
> murderer, George Bush didn't say anything about a 'culture of life,"'
> Dow said.
>
> Legal experts say Bush has not been totally consistent on the
> "right-to-die" issue because in 1999 he signed a Texas law similar to
> the Florida law under which a judge ordered the removal of Schiavo's
> feeding tube.
>
> The Texas law allows for life support to be stopped under certain
> circumstances at the request of a family member or other appropriate
> surrogate.
>
> "If this case had been in Texas the same thing would have happened as
> happened in Florida," said John Robertson, professor at the University
> of Texas law school and author of a book on bioethics called "The
> Rights of the Critically Ill."
>
> But, he said, Bush's support of the emergency bill for Schiavo was not
> "a direct contradiction" of the Texas law.
>
> "He's saying he thought it was good enough from the state's perspective
> at the time, and now he's saying there may be cases that might need a
> second look," he said.
>
> Diane Clemens, head of the Houston-based Justice for All victims'
> rights group, said death penalty opponents were not making legitimate
> comparisons.
>
> "This woman is an innocent, brain-damaged individual who has harmed no
> one. Killers are convicted murderers who have harmed many people. They
> have had a fair process," she said.
>
> "They have had the very process these people would try and deny Schiavo
> -- and that is a request for life at the federal level, in the federal
> courts."
>
> On Monday, White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the president's
> decision was based on principle, not politics.
>
> "It (Schiavo case) is a complex case, where serious questions and
> significant doubts have been raised," he said. "And the president is
> always going to stand on the side of defending life."
>
Really! Read a few psychology books. You expect
this kind of crap from a fascist authoritarian
personality type.

It is just typical of the kind of personality
strcture that *found itself* rather late after
some degree of failure. In bush's case repeated
failures in business leading to drunkeness etc.

Like the reformed smoker who goes around tellimg
everyone else what a disgusting habit it is and
that they should stop; the reformed religious
zealot similarly goes around ramming thier new
found wisdom down everyone else's throat.

Typically the authoritarian personality is
incapable of seeing other's point of view and
remains utterly convinced that his/her view of
life the universe and everything is
unquestionable. We see this in bush all the
time. Most typically it is exampled by his
mission to free & democratise the world when any
amerikan with their eyes open can see that the
US is neither democratic nor free.

D.


>
> 03/22/05 18:32 ET
>
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