The entire Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals (sitting, as they say,
en banc) has
issued its ruling in the Schiavo matter:
A federal appeals court in Atlanta today turned down a request by Terri Schiavo's parents for an emergency review of a decision issued before dawn in which a divided three-judge panel of the court refused to order Ms. Schiavo's feeding tube to be reinserted.
The court did not immediately offer an explanation for its 10-2 decision, and the parents, Robert and Mary Schindler, had earlier said they would take the matter to the Supreme Court.
At the very least, now the right is going to have a much harder time claiming that a lone, instransigent rogue judge has derailed the Schindlers - though of course it's insane that we've even come to this point. And despite the fact that probably a few dozen judges have now had the chance to rule on this case, Jeb Bush is still going at it:
In Florida, meanwhile, Gov. Jeb Bush said he would ask a state court to restore the feeding tube, because a "renowned neurologist" who visited with Ms. Schiavo for an hour recently does not agree that she is in a "persistent vegetative state," as other doctors testified to the courts.
"If there is any uncertainty, we should err on the side of protecting her," the governor said at a news conference in Tallahassee.
If only these guys demanded such certainty in death penalty cases, I might almost believe them. In any event, this effort is almost certain to fail, as is any appeal to the Supreme Court. I pray that this circus soon draws to a close, so that the Schiavos might actually be afforded a little privacy and dignity at a very trying time.
Update [2005-3-23 18:30:1 by DavidNYC]: Jeb's motion was rejected by the state court judge. It's all in the same article linked above.