What Terry Schiavo has taught me about today.

[elfs]

The Terry Schiavo case has made me aware of a couple of things:

I'm getting a living will. It may not matter, as the recent scuffle points out that my intimate and private decisions about the disposition of my own body can be overridden by Congress in a show of pure power politics. But I'm getting one anyway. I'm with PZ Meyers on this one: "In the event I am in a persistent vegitative state and a member of Congress threatens to interfere with my care, I hereby authorize my doctors to rewire my brainstem so my body can shamble over and rip his fucking head off." How does the whole "culture of life" thing deal with the undead anyway?

Bush continues to play the hypocrite. When was the last time the SCLM (So-called Liberal Media) told you about the Texas Futile Care Law? This is a law that then-Governor George W. Bush signed, that allowed hospitals to pull the plug on patients in Terry Schiavo's state if the hospital cannot find a private entity to fund the patient's ongonig care; the state will not be on the hook to hopeless cases.

The senate has lost all premise to principle. Pure sentimentality and a ruthless pandering to a perceived base have overridden any notions of personal automonomy or established family law.

Rick Santorum continues to be full of, um, santorum. Santorum spearheaded the legislsation, and this morning said that the federal judges who listened to the Schindler's appeals were "thumbing their nose" at Congress, since Congress's intent was clearly to tell the judiciary to put the tube back in first, then attend to the law second.

Republicans on this are not in touch with America. 70% of Americans think Terri should be allowed to pass; 87% of Americans believe that if they were in the same shape they'd want someone to pull the goddamn plug. And 67% of Americans think Congress is grandstanding. Between this and the Baseball Steroids hearing, could there be any more grandstanding?

Comments

[solarbird]

If you want to know who they're pleasing, all you have to do is go look at Focus on the Family, Concerned Women for America, and other fundamentalist political organisations who have regularly met with President Bush, Rick Santorum, and other Republican leaders over the last several years.

I'm not grandstanding - FotF is sending out daily urgent updates to their entire readership, plus running several articles a day; so is CWFA. They've got a great political math going; pass a blatantly unconstitutional law pandering to fundamentalists; when it's overturned, you've got more "fuel" for your "Judicial Tyranny" fundraising/fundamentlist-judge agenda. It's perfect! As long as you ignore things like honesty, integrity, the concept of judicial independence, separation of powers, Federalism, and everything else you pretend to care about.

[fallenpegasus]

Of course they're grandstanding. The Congress (both parties) are trying despirately get back into the center of the public perception of policial power, which means "domestic issues". And since the only domestic issues that really need to be worked out (social security reform, DOMA, etc) are utterly radioactive, they need something "safe" to grandstand about.