Terry Schaivo

She died this morning after 13 days without food or water because the courts ruled to take her feeding tube away.

American law has failed. The law is supposed to protect people from injustice. And the greatest injustice has just occurred. She died a painful death - perhaps the most painful of all - starvation.

If Terry Shaivo truly said to her husband that if she were ever in a vegetative state to simply die, I doubt she meant that during the last 13 days. A brain damaged person with no food or water lived for 13 days! To me, it's obvious she was struggling for her life as this is about the normal length for non-brain damaged people.

However, I had a recent experience where my pet cat just decided to not drink water or eat food. I tried to feed him but it was obvious he didn't want to live any more. I probably waited a couple days too long to put him down. So the question remains for Terry is: Was she dying prior to the feeding tube being removed? Because she'd been in that state for a couple years, I'd say 'No' she wasn't dying.

Maybe pets have it easy. When they get put down, they inject them with an overdose of anasthesia. If you've never had a general anasthesia before you simply don't know how wonderfully painless it is. Quite amazing really. I had a double dose when I had my wisdom teeth pulled. You feel a gentle rush coming up to your head and quietly, you close your eyes. It's really the best way to die, rather than suffer the immense pain of starvation. For those who die in their sleep, I guess they're lucky.

The Right To Die issue is a slippery slope. Where is the line drawn for the law to agree that a person has a right to die due to medical pain if they have stated so in a living will? If you had terminal cancer and it was very painful, do you have the right to choose to die? According to American law, you don't. As far as I know though, Terry did not have a living will, just her husband's word. Was it her choice? Her parents would say 'Definitely not.' But perhaps the time has come to draw the line, so the law doesn't fail again.

Many of you know, I'm a God fearing/loving person. But let's leave God out of this one for a moment. Say you're in an uncurable pain every moment and you simply don't want to live anymore. Do you have the right to choose to die?

Now, where do we draw the line between physical pain and mental pain? Maybe the person's physical pain isn't as bad as it is, and they use it as an excuse to relieve them from the mental pain they're feeling. So now is it suicide?

Suicide, in some cultures, is considered a noble act. Some, it is not. So who's right? What if all the bad people in the world decided to kill themselves for the benefit of mankind? Well, that won't happen. But what about suicide or kamikaze bombers?

I've heard of people who knew when their time had come and they go visit family and friends once last time, then the next day they're gone. I don't know about this. Then I hear they drank themselves to death or something - I guess its induced death then.

Survival is an animal instinct and humans are no different. While your body may be about to die, humans have had the tendancy to hang on and struggle for life no matter what. Death can be painful, and our instinct is to pull away from pain. It's a remarkable capability we have. Life wouldn't exist if it wasn't worth it to be alive.

Okay, so now let's bring God back into the issue. God, to me, is the energy force of everything - especially this instinct of life I mentioned. For this, we humans also need emotional, mental, and physical energy to live a good life. For Terry, she had loving parents who gave her that emotional energy at her bed side and they say she communicated it back to them. The feeding tube provided her physical energy. How a person feeds themsevles is irrelevant to the debate. The Pope is being fed in a similar manner right now. Now mentally, who knows what's going on in her mind, so I think it's best to assume that she had mental capabilities -- even if she was in a vegetative state.

The fact of the matter is that her husband was about to run out of the medical money to sustain her and he gave up trying for more. Interestingly, now that the money is gone, he came out saying that she wanted to die. May God have mercy on this man when his hour approaches, because for Terry in her last 13 days, the law knew no mercy as she was obviously struggling for her life.

The issue is simply: respect the life you are given and of the lives of others well.

Terry Schaivo is a hero, not because she's a martyr, but because she struggled to prove the most important thing -- life.

Snak's Intermittent Movie Review - "Following"

You like da black n white? Good. 'Cause it's better. Colour is so distracting isn't it? And how many characters do you need anyway? Well, only a few for this movie, and it works - to a point.

Think of this concept. You're a 20 something broke and bored writer living in a small flat in London. You need ideas for your writing, so you decide to start following people randomly examining their day-to-day proceedings. Then one day, one person you follow catches you and calls you on it. You deny. But your pathetic, so you fess up and tell the whole truth to this stranger. Then he tells you what he's been up to.

Oh yes, it's an intriguing movie. Have you seen "Momento"? Same good shit on a different pile. It's got one plot line, but once again, you're given bits of the future, the past, all rolled up into one and they're spit upon you cleverly. But that's the thing with only having a few characters in a weaving time plot, you can't make it too complicated. People are only so smart you know!

So the key to figuring out where ... um .. er ... I mean WHEN you are is to notice the lead character's hair. That's right, I said hair dammit!

Are there plot twists? It wouldn't be good if there weren't any right? So yeah, there's plot twists alright, but you can't help but feel for the pathetic 20-something writer. One of the plot twists I figured out, but not the others.

However, that said, those other plot twists weren't presented as shockingly as plot twists usually are. I didn't go, "Holy crap, he sees dead people!" I was more like, "Well, isn't that cleverly typical, no?" So because of that, it drops a whole point.

Would I recommend this little greyscale British mind fuck? Of course! Would I watch it again? Nah. Would I watch Momento again? Of course!

Snakaramadingdong gives "Following" a 3.72 fits outta 5. Hey, did you know this film got a bunch of awards and shit? Well it didn't. Just a bunch of nominations.

A Comfortable Conservatism

The Conservative Party met in Montreal over the weekend for their "first" policy convention. I say "first" because the old Reform Party used to have these every two years and then the Canadian Alliance had one which brought forth some of the old Reform ideas, only not as well thought out. The old Progressive Conservative Party was a bit too top down for my liking and the Reform/CA party was too bottom up. With the mix of these parties now, we have a bit of both and I think it's actually where most Canadians sit as well. While I'm not big on linear political spectrums, this party sits closer to the centre on social issues, but has maintained its economic policy on the centre-right, while also not going too far on the democratic end.

I watched a bit of the convention on TV. I must admit, this new Conservative Party is basically EXACTLY where I like it to be on policy. Here's why...

1. No youth wing. As a former campus Reform Club president we fought hard to maintain the status quo. One youthful MP, Rob Anders, who actually helped me build the club to the largest one in the country, said, "Don't segregate the youth to a sandbox." I couldn't agree more. The youth wing of the old PC party was a party but they weren't treated as regular members. Equality doesn't mean creating all these wings of a party. Once you have a youth wing, you'll have all these other wings, which at this time in the party's growth, it doesn't need factions - it needs unity. This was maintained. Youth have and always will stay involved with the party. In fact, the Conservative caucus is the youngest in Canadian history. Yay on no youth wing.

2. No recall. I've never really agreed with this. If the MP is that bad, the party, media, and constituency association have means to remove an MP is so terrible. Why a party who wants to form government wants to allow recall isn't a smart move. By-elections are expensive.

3. Equal ridings. I'm siding with Peter Mackay and the old PC idea on this one. Each riding, no matter how many members, is allowed to send 10 delegates to a convention. Each riding has one MP, so this makes sense to me. One member - one vote (OMOV) is dangerous in signing up truck loads of people from one region to dominate. It's a national party that needs to act like one. It did.

4. Traditional marriage. I'm a firm believer that a stable male-female marriage for a family is the building block of society. The Conservatives proved they were actually conservatives this weekend. A gay marriage is certainly not a traditional one, but if homosexuals want to get married, go ahead - doesn't affect me none.

5. Abortion. The Party voted down a resolution to prevent late term abortions. While I agree with that idea, for a party to delve into these sticky issues circumvents the democratic principles of free votes - which if a bill like this came forward, likely a private member's bill, would simply be a free vote amongst all MPs - which is the way most votes should be anyway.

Overall, I'm pleased with the direction of the party. Paul Martin's Liberals voted a couple weeks ago to legalize prostitution, but when asked by the media, Martin said he wouldn't legalize it. What was the point of the Liberal convention then? Dither dither dither.

I think Canadians can now find palatable policies in the Conservative Party and Stephen Harper who has stymied the pundits by keeping this conservative movement together. Centre-right Canadians can now stop voting for a directionless gov't such as the Liberals, who have a leader that disagrees with his own party's policies and have no guts to cut taxes and waste.

Snak's Intermittent Movie Review - "Ladder 49"

So you're new to the troop/ fraternity/ team/ squad/ corps/ tribe/ company/ school/ department/ ward/ engine/ ladder/ terrorist group/ gang/ mafia/ etc ...

Goofy things then happen. Teasing, pranks and mild hazing of the rookie takes place. Then he gets his first crack at the big time and makes it. They celebrate. He sees a new rookie who was just like him and puts him through the "intiation" to keep the tradition going. He meets a woman who becomes his wife and mother to his children. He toils for years learning the ropes. He sees his best buddies get hurt and die. They get mad and frustrated with each other but the leader keeps it all together - that's why he's the leader and they're not.

The team then takes on a big job -- like bombing Germany, no wait, like taking a mass exodus of patients, no wait, like playing against the toughest team in the league, no wait, like conducting covert ops against a gang, well you get the idea. And when it looks likes the end for this lead character/hero/protagonist ... (well, I don't wanna give it away!)

Snak gives Ladder 49 a big ol' 2.94 fists out of 5. Although a typical formula movie, not bad, but not great, it did make me reflect on my life and how little money these firefighters make. Women will cry. Men won't. Okay, now I gotta get back to office work and get the new guy to make coffee. Cheers.

Why I Like The Number 33

Some of my favourite basketball players wore the number 33 -- Larry Bird and Kareem Abdul Jabbar. Both were All Stars and soon to be Hall of Famers. They both won the NBA Championships many times. Larry is white. Kareem is black. Kareem was in Edmonton the other day to give a speech and got paid $33,000 to do it. Too bad he was an asshole. Larry was born in a town called French Lick. It’s in Indiana. Larry went on to coach the Indiana Pacers. He won Coach of the Year. He doesn’t coach there anymore. Kareem was in the movie Airplane as a pilot. When little Billy was in the cockpit, he told Kareem that his dad thought he was lazy on the court. Kareem got mad. Kareem was also in a Bruce Lee movie doing karate. He looked funny trying to kick little Bruce.

Jesus supposedly died when he was 33. Conflicting histories say that he was at least 40 when he was crucified. East Indian mythology says that he didn't die on the cross, was nursed back to health and then he and his mother Mary went to India to a town now called Muree, and Jesus stayed and taught until he was over 80! Yet other stories say that both Marys went to what is now France. They say Mary Magdelene was pregnant with Jesus' child and thus started the bloodline of Christ - the Holy Grail (Sangraal) if you will. But the story of the Holy Grail wasn't published or known until about the 12th century when a guy named Chretien de Troyes wrote it. There are many other versions of the story. It then kind of morphed into the story of King Arthur - drawing from history that occurred at the end of the Roman Empire. I liked the movie Excalibur. First Night was okay, but Richard Gere is a shitty actor. Too contrived he is.

33 is one of those numbers where both digits are the same. Remember how cool it was when you were 11, or 22? Okay, maybe not.

But at 33, you're supposed to be married with children, right? Wrong! But I liked that TV show. Al was so funny. I remember when he couldn't afford to go on a holiday, so he stayed at home and cordoned off the couch and TV area in his living room. Everyone pretended he wasn't home and ignore him. Then he pretended he was in an airplane landing and he even had his luggage! When he got out, his family was waiting to greet him. They were so happy. Great show.

So, um, yeah, 33 -- not a prime number, but an odd number, nonetheless. When I was 16.5, I was entering Grade 11. Ten months later, I got my first job as a produce clerk at Superstore. I got the job because I played rugby. You see with high school rugby, we won the city championship that year. I played second row. I ended up working at Superstore for six years. I took a buyout package because I was making too much money I guess. I didn't know when my last day was, so I just stopped going to work. I remember in the backroom we all talked about what we were going to do on our last day. I said I was going to eat all the kumquats - because they're so expensive and filled with vitamin C. One guy said he was going to ride one of the hand jacks around the store during the day running into people. When you picture that, it's pretty funny. We used to do that during night crew but there was no one to run into. But it was fun regardless. Fucking unions.

Canada lags behind U.S. in standard of living...

Here's an article on how the recent federal budget only puts Canada further behind the U.S. in terms of standard of living.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20050303.wxrliving03/BNStory/Business/

I would also like to make a correction to my previous article on the recent federal budget in regards to tax cuts. It's not $250/per that we're getting back, it's ... check this out ... I know you're excited .. a whopping .. yes, here it comes, .... a ... whole $12. That's right, I'll spell it out -- twelve dollars per year. I know Boobie will be able to buy that one extra CD he complains he never has enough money for. I can buy a mickey of CC.

What a fucking joke this Liberal gov't is! They think that as more and more money is put into social programs that they're helpling the people they tax right out of the middle class! Well they're not. People who earn $10,000 pay taxes, then are supposed to get it back anyway in social programs. Talk about waste. Talk about slowing productivity and preventing money from really flowing in the economy. Talk about preventing people from earning their potential, from paying down their debts. Canadians are in debt more than ever before and this stresses them out, which is at a high, which is not good for one's health. See the cycle? Income and payroll taxes are the cause of all of life's problems. And the one's creating it are the federal Liberals.

I'm so sick of these greedy bastards with their "surpluses". They're not surpluses - they're simply taxing us too much. Rest assured, I hope in the fall, that this minority gov't gets defeated and we're back at the polls to put in place a real budget that seriously eliminates and cuts taxes, say by thousands in a year, not just a meezly $12.

You too Klein! Get your fucking act together.