It's Over

Terri Schiavo has finally been permitted to leave this life and move on to the next, whatever she believes that to be. My thoughts are with the Schiavo and Schindler families. Look at what we’ve become that this woman’s death (which actually happened 15 years ago), can be referred to as "it." The "it" isn’t her death, of course. The "it" to which I'm referring is the clusterfuck of a media circus surrounding this unfortunate family’s tragedy. And it is nothing less than a disgrace on our nation. The talking heads make sure to preface each segment with how sad it is that this can be happening, and then positively drool as they dive into every last detail about what starvation is like, about the jugglers and religious nuts and the national guard outside her hospice, and dissect the latest lies by some suspect doctor who insists he can heal her or some psychic who insists he can hear her thoughts. Good god, people. Where has our dignity gone? Or at the very least, where is our shame?

In Salon today, Glenn Reynolds and Sidney Blumenthal write that in violating their core principles in order to pander to the religious right, the Republicans may have fractured the coalition that Karl Rove has built these last five years, undermining the GOP's stranglehold on the federal government. We can hope that they’re right – at least some good could come of this farce. But in Slate Tuesday, Bert Brandenburg has a theory that, from accidentally watching cable news for five minutes last night, I’m more inclined to believe, (and worry about). He wonders what this situation represents for the American judiciary. Last night on TV, the loudest bellowing from the right-wing psychos wasn't about poor Terri Schiavo, it was about the Satanic judiciary. I’ll take it a step farther than Mr. Brandenburg and suggest that this was the plan all along. Pushing a pro-life angle was a nice bonus for them, but just seeing the polls, they knew that was a losing issue. Most people agree with Michael Schiavo. But this allows them to frame the upcoming Supreme Court appointment battles in the strongest light possible. Even though most of the judges who heard (or repeatedly refused to hear the case, *ahem* Scalia/Thomas) are Republicans - Judge Greer is even a Southern Baptist minister – the right wing can rail against them, calling them cold-hearted, fag-loving, death-craving liberal activists. Without an apology to anyone in the Schiavo or Schindler families, the zealots have hijacked this tragedy in order to push a larger agenda to pack the courts with extremist right-wing religious freaks. All the while, the MSM is paving the way for them. I don’t know where these "reporters" came from, but they should be forced at gunpoint to attend at least one semester of journalism school again. They seem to have forgotten every last tenet of their trade.

Here’s something to send a chill down your spine – Justice Pat Robertson. Uggida-boogida...