The American View has published an exclusive interview with Bobby Schindler, the brother of Terri Schiavo. Host John Lofton asks Schindler to comment on a recent interviewed of Michael Schiavo by Dateline's Matt Lauer (more info).
One of the statements by Michael Schiavo that Bobby Schindler was asked to respond to concerns the reason Michael did not give up guardianship of Terri after he became engaged to a different woman, whom he was living with.
MS: Why do I have to divorce her? Terri was not an inanimate object to pass back and forth; just because your wife gets sick you give her back?Bobby's response is simply, "I don’t know quite how to comment on that." The logic by Michael is so remarkably twisted and disrespectful it is understandable that Bobby fails to find words.
You see, in dramatic courtroom testimony, Michael once said
I believe in the vows that I took with my wife. Through sickness, in health, for richer or poorer. I married my wife because I love her and I want to spend the rest of my life with her. I'm going to do that.However, most people believe that a central aspect of a wedding vow is faithfulness and that infidelity, which would include having children with another woman, is unfaithfulness. Although Michael suggests that his critics wanted him to "give" Terri back because she was sick, it should be apparent that he believed Terri’s disability released him from his moral responsibility to her. In fact, prior to his relationship with his present wife, and just months after winning a medical malpractice lawsuit that involved a large financial award, he gave this testimony (Nov. 19, 1993):
Q. Are you presently – you’re married to Terri Schiavo, correct?In the Lauer interview, Michael does not address his critics directly but instead offers an absurd straw man argument by implying his opponents view his wife as an "inanimate object". This is indeed ironic considering he inscribed Terri's grave marker with an assertion that she "departed" this world in 1990. Lauer never pressed Michael for an explanation about how guardianship of Terri was justified despite what amounted to a common law marriage to another woman.SCHIAVO: Yes I am.
Q. Are you presently involved in a romantic relationship with anyone?
SCHIAVO: Yes I am.
Q. Are you involved in an intimate relationship with this person.
SCHIAVO: Yes I am.
Q. Is this the first relationship that you’ve been involved in since your wife has been in a coma?
SCHIAVO: No.
It would also have been interesting, if not appropriate, for Lauer to ask Michael his response to his attorney, George Felos, who publicly likened Terri to a "house plant".
Finally, I also refer readers to the September 27, 1999 deposition in which Michael Schiavo said his reason for keeping guardianship of Terri was essentially to get back at her parents (the same reason he gave for writing his recent book):
Q. Have you considered turning the guardianship over to Mr. and Mrs. Schindler?SCHIAVO: No, I have not.
Q. And why?
SCHIAVO: I think that's pretty self explanatory.
Q. I'd like to hear your answer.
SCHIAVO: Basically I don't want to do it.
Q. And why don't you want to do it?
SCHIAVO: Because they put me through pretty much h*** the last few years.
Q. And can you describe what you mean by h***?
SCHIAVO: The litigations they put me through.
Q. Any other specifics besides the litigation?
SCHIAVO: Just their attitude towards me because of the litigations. There is no other reason. I'm Terri's husband and I will remain guardian.
After his attorney "talked" with him, Michael added, "Yeah. Another reason would be that her parents wouldn't carry out her wishes."
No, Michael's decision to retain control of his wife's destiny was not a sign of his faithfulness to her, despite his periodic and emotional outbursts of sentimentality. However, the fact that Michael was able to dehydrate Terri to death does reflect an inherent problem in our court system, which devalued Terri Schiavo and marriage vows to the extent that her husband, who had obvious conflicts of interest and had "moved on" with his life, was able to retain control of her ultimate fate.
Michael Schiavo is on a mission. In the book, Terri's Truth, Michael wrote his "displeasure" in a very negative way regarding Bobby on the night of Terri's collapse. He was upset that Bobby was not standing at Terri's side while the paramedics were working on her. Yet in the same breath he talked of how he walked away and was pacing in the living room as he couldnt stand to see all that was happening...but in turn, he wrote of his distaste at how BOBBY stayed in the kitchen. (He just got done describing that the paramedics cut open Terri's tank top to do CPR and her chest was exposed. I don't know ANY BROTHER that would stand around and watch. Anyone in the right mind would turn away as that had to be an excruciating and painful "private" kind of moment. Will he ever stop?