Judge for yourself

In Auburn, Wyoming:

An Auburn man was arrested and charged with nine counts of misdemeanor animal cruelty March 3 after he allegedly starved two of his horses to death at his property on 3rd West County Road, according to documents filed in Lincoln County Court.

In Van Buren, Arkansas:

A Crawford County couple was charged Friday with 17 misdemeanor counts of animal cruelty after sheriff's deputies found 54 animals suffering from starvation on their property.

In Miami, Florida:

Miami-Dade police arrested two people after officers found at least 50 puppies and several birds officers said were suffering from neglect. Officers said the animals, found at a property in the 19000 block of Southwest 200 Street in Redland, were malnourished and were being kept without water.

In Cross Lanes, West Virginia:

[Hubert] Wilmer was arrested for starving his pet dog Sunbear to death in Cross Lanes, West Virginia, just northwest of Charleston.

In Buena Vista, Tennessee:

Michelle Thompson, of Buena Vista, TN, plead guilty to charges of animal cruelty in General Sessions Court. Thompson had deliberately starved her estranged husband's Boston Terrier, Elmo, to death. Elmo was severely emaciated, dehydrated and full of intestinal parasites....

In Parkersburg, West Virginia:

[Russetta] Naylor and her boyfriend John Snider are both charged with five counts of animal abuse. Abuse that police say went so far [that] it killed two animals and left the other three in a critical state. "The three puppies were starving to death, had mange and their fur was falling off. The conditions were filthy," said Parkersburg Police Chief Bob Newell.

In Washington, DC:

The veterinarian's report showed that the pit bull was profoundly emaciated, with no body fat present whatsoever, and there was no food found in the dog's stomach or intestines. The owner was arrested and was found guilty in DC Superior Court for starvation of the pit bull.

The organization http://www.unchainyourdog.org/ reports on 35 instances of animal cruelty in the last 9 months -- many of them leading to arrests.

All of the above came from just 3 pages of Google searches -- not very hard at all to find. I'm sick of reading about these (and you probably are, too) or I'd post more.

Oh, one more description of a starvation, this one from Pinellas Park, Florida:

[After three of four days], the mouth begins to look dry and the eyes appear sunken. From days five to 10, respiration becomes irregular with periods of very fast and then very slow breathing. By the final days, kidney function declines, toxins begin accumulating in the body, and multiple organ systems fail from lack of nutrition.

Three minor variations on this one:

1. This is happening right now. We're in Day One as this is composed.
2. The legal system has sanctioned this.
3. The subject is not a horse, or a bird, or a cat, or a dog.

It's Terri Schiavo.