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Michael Schiavo attempted to appear pious as he answered NBC Matt Lauer's question on what was Terri's wishes on end of life on Dateline Sunday evening. It was pure theater but what many viewers may have missed was the essence of Michael Schiavo's answer when he claimed Terri did not want to be a "burden" to anyone. Being a burden is why the court allowed her to be killed. Being a burden is now a mortal crime punishable by death.

Didn't America hear the argument that Terri did not want to be a burden? Was this not the crux of the argument that Terri's parents had presented to Michael, the courts and the nation that Terri was not a burden to them she was a beloved daughter and sister. Not, as Michael referred in the NBC interview, a "football" to be passed back and forth.

Michael's "wife in waiting" claimed in the Sunday evening NBC interview that their relationship had been more than ten years and two children in the making, and it seemed that her new husband Michael had not only moved on with his life, but he had made his decision about his disabled wife Terri's intention about being kept alive. Timing was everything, and with a recent court settlement from a malpractice lawsuit, he had to move Terri on permanently.

Sure this may only be conjecture on the part of most of us who speculate how a man who had given the appearance of being so deeply devoted to his wife could have changed 180 degrees from fighting for her lifetime of justified rehabilitation dollars to after the settlement having a new-found mental note concerning Terri's last wishes. Now comes Michael with his soon-to-be fiancé Jodi Centonze in tow to claim Terri's desire to not be a burden and his "Did I say that?" spiel almost as if it were a line taken from the 80s sitcom "Family Matters." And guess what? The court brought it.

Michael's interview showed his complete disdain for the Schindler family and a reserved special "hate" for Terri's brother Bobby, who had pleaded to be at his sister's dying bedside but was denied -- not because of Michael Schiavo's love for his wife but because of his hatred for Bobby. Did America pick up on this dark side of this attempted "choir boy" act? The jury is still out on that, but what is clear is that this charade was not for America's benefit but more of a get-even with Terri's family interview.

Perhaps the pettiness which dripped from his mouth when he talked about the Schindlers, the family which Terri was not going to be a burden to, and whom Michael claimed he knew Terri better than they was an alarming act of spite. What Michael's true possible "burden" was that Terri's mortal existence was presenting Michael with a burden because his long suffering fiancé and two out-of-wedlock children could not go forward with their lives as long as Terri had hers. So Michael began his journey down the pathway of the Culture of Death -- that way of life that embodies the circumvention of God's decision to give someone life or to take it away to a more arbitrary mortal decision of what is or is not "quality of life."

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