“I Kept My Promise”
I know I wasn’t going to blog about Terri Schiavo anymore, but that was because I naively assumed there wasn’t going to be any new news about her or Michael Schiavo. Silly me, I should have known better than that. Apparently, for St. Michael, it’s not enough just to get one’s way; one must seize every opportunity to rub more salt in everyone’s wounds whenever possible, even on her grave:
Isn’t that lovely? Everything, even Terri Schiavo’s grave, is about St. Michael. When his time comes, as inevitably it must for all (and no, strawtards, I’m not recommending that any of you go out and do anything to accelerate that process) I’ve got a headstone lined up for him, too. Just replace the name “John” with “Michael” and we’re good to go:
This story first ran at 10:47 PM EDT, a full two hours ago. Why the silence on the part of so many Michael Schiavo apologists?
UPDATE: I’ve razzed him on this issue in the past, but Joe Gandelman deserves credit where credit’s due. While other Schiavo apologists say nothing, defend the indefensible, or even twist the story around to make the Schindlers into the “disgusting, self-righteous ghouls” in this chapter of l’affaire Schiavo, Joe has the decency to buck his party line, calling a spade a spade and a cheap parting shot a cheap parting shot. Good for him.
UPDATE x2: Welcome, Patterico readers! And an especially hearty welcome to Richard “Cabeza” Bennett readers, assuming there are any. No, Sr. Cabeza, you don’t count.
UPDATE x3: Dean Esmay asks how much more like O.J. Michael Schiavo could possibly act.
June 21st, 2005 at 7:18 am
A: Because I’m not as obsessed with this story as you are.
B: It was a nice grave, in my opinion.
A: I guess there are only so many issues any one blogger can be obsessed with at any given time.
B: If this was a “nice” grave, I shudder to think what a nasty one would have looked like.
[-X]
June 21st, 2005 at 7:21 am
[...] sp;
RSS
6/21/2005
Somebody’s a Little Obsessed!! Let it go sweetheart.
Commen [...]
June 21st, 2005 at 9:13 am
I would not call your interest in the Schindler Schiavo case obsessive. Better more facts than less. And this is an important new fact.
June 21st, 2005 at 9:19 am
I notice that Schiavo doesn’t specify the nature of the promise and to whom it was made.
June 21st, 2005 at 10:09 am
I’m sorry, but what Michael Schiavo put on his wife’s marker doesn’t begin to equal the heinous displays by the loonies in front of the hospice.
People lived out the ends of their lives, surrounded by an ugly mob of freakish thrillseekers. Family members had to pass by them in order to visit, exacerbating what would be a trying time in the best of circumstances. At least one person was unable to get through fast enough, and wasn’t there when their loved one died.
Frankly, I don’t see anything wrong with the marker. I do see plenty wrong with the Schindler’s shameful behavior, and the horrible ethics of the people who have used them.
June 21st, 2005 at 10:50 am
“I kept my promise” should not be there, clearly; it’s his wife’s tombstone, and anything on it should be about *her*. The rest of it seems fine.
June 21st, 2005 at 12:07 pm
“I kept my promise” was definitely the worst part, but lying about her date of death wasn’t particularly classy, either, and separately listing the date of her real death as the day she became “at peace” is nothing but a gratuitous swipe at her family.
June 21st, 2005 at 12:35 pm
[...] eally hoppin’ mad over this inscription, insisting it proves what they’ve been saying about Mike all along, and some of Mike’s defenders aren’t pleased with it either [...]
June 21st, 2005 at 12:45 pm
It seems awfully distasteful to speculate at the meaning of what is on someone’s headstone. How would you feel if the inscription on your relative’s grave was picked up and throttled by the American public? If we can’t leave the case alone, we can at least save our venom for people who chose to be in the public eye and handled themselves poorly. For exaple, Senator Santorum used his visit to the Schiavo family to hold fundraisers. Talk about not “particularly classy.”
June 21st, 2005 at 12:58 pm
No one is “speculating” about anything. The message on the tomb isn’t exactly subtle. And what on earth does Rick Santorum have to do with any of this?!
June 21st, 2005 at 1:17 pm
I respectfully disagree with post 10. I believe that it is speculation. Messages on tombstones are intimate and personal and are not intended for public scrutiny. We’re not talking about a speech, a press release, or Congressional testimony here. Of course, there’s nothing to stop someone from talking about it, it’s just crass to do so.
And that relates to the Rick Santorum point: it seems valid to bring up a situation related to this case in which someone who chose, by running for office, to put himself out there, publicly inserted himself into her case and behaved opportunistically by holding fundraisers–while supposedly in the neighborhood to make a case for morality. A private citizen putting a personal message on a headstone, however you may perceive the meaning of the message, is small potatoes in comparison.
June 21st, 2005 at 1:20 pm
Jon H
So you’re horrifed by the “freakish thrillseekers” who kept someone’s loved ones from the bedside at death (albeit inadvertently). Well, I can see why you support Michael Schiavo - he sure wouldn’t do anything like that, much less exclude next of kin from a memorial service.
June 21st, 2005 at 1:58 pm
It is nobody’s business what people put on grave markers. If you went around and read what some people wrote there, you would proabably be a little freaked out. Get off it girl. Anyone who can read and analyze the facts of this case, including the medical information and still babbles about demonizing Michale Schiavo is insane. Lonely people with small unimportant lives have sought to draw attention to themselves on this issue. Go fight for people in Burma or Zimbabwe. What a waste of breath.
June 21st, 2005 at 3:23 pm
Michael Schiavo displays total lack of class here. But that was detectable all along.
No mention of “promise” until there was a payday. Don’t mind that elephant in the room.
Cordially…
June 21st, 2005 at 9:50 pm
How Much More Like O.J. Can You Get?
You know, I worked really, really hard to stick to it when I said “this is my last word on the subject,” but Jesus Christ on a pogo stick, how much more like OJ Simpson can you act? “I kept my promise?” On someone else’s tombs…
June 21st, 2005 at 9:53 pm
“Well, I can see why you support Michael Schiavo - he sure wouldn’t do anything like that, much less exclude next of kin from a memorial service.”
Um, no Michael Schiavo had some class, he didn’t whore himself out for every camera like the Schindlers and their religious buddies (who, I might add, don’t seem terribly Christian to me, the way they spread slanders. Friar costumes must come cheap.)
The Schindlers earned their exclusion from the memorial service. If they were told ahead of time, they would have made it a disgraceful publicity stunt.
June 21st, 2005 at 9:56 pm
No decent, caring, loving human being would ever have made up a tombstone like that even after an ordeal like this.
He’s a scumbag. And his defenders are in denial AT BEST.
June 21st, 2005 at 10:51 pm
Except when he went on Larry King and showed even more class than usual by proudly announcing that “we didn’t know what Terri wanted, but this is what we want.” But at least he isn’t religious, which seems to be all you care about.
June 21st, 2005 at 11:43 pm
I have been in the position–more than once–to have to advise “pulling the plug” on a loved one.
I also have had nightmares about being stuck on a respirator or somesuch and begging people to take me off life support, and being horrified that those around me won’t do the right thing.
I still cannot imagine behaving as Michael Schiavo has behaved.
For the first time in my life, as an atheist, I begin to wonder if certain Christians are not correct when they speak of “the culture of death.” I always thought it was hyperbole until now.
June 22nd, 2005 at 12:03 am
I predict that part of M. Schiavo’s legacy will be the invention of graveyard desecration insurance.
And no, I do not advocate such activity. I just have a feeling that a lot of people are going to “edit” that tombstone.
June 22nd, 2005 at 1:40 am
“I Kept My Promise”…to my girlfriend.
June 22nd, 2005 at 2:15 am
Promises, Promises
Well, Michael Schiavo had a gravestone installed on Terri’s grave. “I kept my promise” is the sentiment enscribed on it. I wonder what happened to his ‘promise’ to love, honor and cherish Terri until death do they part? Oh, wait…
June 22nd, 2005 at 5:51 am
People I Don’t Like
I’ve been quiet for a while, but now I’ve just got a build-up of people in the news that piss me off. Dick Durbin’s apology — contrite, but sounds still like “Judge, I’m sorry my wife felt hurt when I…
June 22nd, 2005 at 7:28 am
No Apologies
After the Terri Schiavo autopsy results were made public, some were saying that those of us who are against what…
June 22nd, 2005 at 10:02 am
Jon H -
I’ve read that the court ordered that the Schindlers be informed of and allowed to attend any memorial service. Is that untrue?
Also - don’t think we don’t notice when you weasel on your statements when you are challenged. Your initial claim was that only monsters would prevent (even unintentionally) relatives from being present at the death of a loved one, not a memorial service. Because you know that Schiavo deliberately excluded the Schindlers from Terri’s presence at the time of her death, you now claim that they forfeited any right to be present at the “memorial service” because they “whored themselves,” a claim which xrlq has already addressed, and ignore Schiavo’s despicable conduct.
June 22nd, 2005 at 12:51 pm
Maybe the postscript should have been:
“I’m sorry about the 70 minutes.”
June 22nd, 2005 at 1:43 pm
Michael Schiavo: “I Kept My Promise”
xlrq wonders why several of us who supported Michael Schiavo in his right to decide the fate of his wife against state action have not condemned him for his rather smug inscription on Terri Schiavo’s tombstone:
Schiavo’s Remains Buried Am…
June 22nd, 2005 at 2:45 pm
“I Kept My Promise”
As in: “once the malpractice award was in the bank, I promised myself to snuff out that waste of oxygen and buy a nice big boat.”
Or so I believe. Promise my ass.
Cordially…
June 22nd, 2005 at 9:04 pm
[...] ’s part of a pattern. With Michael Schiavo, it’s always about him. P.S. Xrlq wonders why Schiavo’s defenders have been so silent about this despite the passage of several [...]
June 22nd, 2005 at 9:09 pm
Tackiest… guy… ever.
June 23rd, 2005 at 9:54 pm
Michael Schiavo: A-S-S-H-O-L-E
Boy, that Michael Schiavo is a real piece of work. Not satisfied with merely defying a court order by keeping the Schindlers from their daughter’s memorial service, Michael also had the gall to put this sick joke on her gravestone:…
January 22nd, 2006 at 6:50 am
2005 (Dis)honors…
For those who missed it, Cindy Sheehan won the no-brainer nod as 2005 Idiotarian. As if further confirmation was needed, ‘Mama’ Sheehan topped John Hawkins’ 2005 list of Most Annoying Liberals. Hawkins provides this abbreviated synopsis: As Sheehan…
March 12th, 2006 at 2:43 pm
Thank you for posting the photo of Terri’s stone. Michael Schiavo is a pig from hell!!! You are NOT obsessed.
January 20th, 2008 at 2:53 am
So many of you have made comments on Terri and Michael Schiavo as if you knew them. To the person who talked about ‘pulling the plug’….since when is food and water ‘life support’? Especially when you aren’t even allowed to ‘try’ to drink or eat (which by the way Terri could but Michael wouldn’t allow her that privilege to have therapy to improve. Also, how many of you know that Terri had multiple fractures? How did those happen? Surely not from dieting like MS stated was her problem. When do people pass out face forward with their hands under their chest? That’s how Terri was found on the floor. I think MS should be investigated thoroughly because there is no statue of limitations on murder and I think there are a lot of unanswered questions as to the injuries Terri suffered years before he starved her to death. Also, isn’t it strange that she is buried near a fountain .. especially since that is the one thing she was denied in life…water.
January 27th, 2008 at 1:58 am
It never ceases to amaze me to read messages from Michael Schiavo defenders that accuse the Schindler family of whoring themselves to the media. The entire inscription of that headstone might as well have been written in neon lights. Michael Schiavo used his wife’s grave marker for nothing more than his own personal propoganda tool. Never in my life have I heard of anyone else talking about themselves on a loved one’s tombstone. This speaks to epic levels of narcissism.