Big Government

The Senate and House passed, and the president signed into law, a bill that accomplishes nothing other than an egregious violation of Michael Schiavo's civil rights. Watch the Cornerites ejaculate.

UPDATE: Jamie Kirchick has a nice editorial on this subject. Money quote:

Last weekend, congressional Republicans rammed through legislation to allow Terri Schiavo's parents, Robert and Mary Schindler, to bring their case before a federal panel. This circumvention of the judicial system is something no American citizen, barring an act of Congress, can do. But an extra-judicial act that makes a mockery out of federalism should come as no surprise from this Republican Party. After all, it has no problem ignoring its supposed opposition to federal intrusion and has already demonstrated its disregard for the sacred nature of the Constitution by trying to pass a federal amendment banning gay marriage. National Republicans have simply taken a cue from their juniors in Florida, where in 2003 Gov. Jeb Bush signed "Terri's Law," which was passed by the Republican-dominated state legislature. This executive fiat voided a court judgment ordering that Schiavo's tube be removed and was later deemed unconstitutional by the Florida Supreme Court on separation of powers grounds.

One in five American children lives in poverty. AIDS is killing Africans at a genocidal rate. But never mind, for these concerns do not raise the ire of Republicans and the "right to life" movement -- unlike the case of an individual woman who has been kept alive for 15 years due solely to artificial means.

Jamie noticed a similarity between the way that the social right fetishizes the death of Jesus and the continued agonized existence of Terri Schiavo. But the question is, why is it that in one case, the object of their veneration is a death, and in the other, a life? Just what sort of life do they worship? The answers to those questions, I think, are the beginning of an understanding of what contemporary right-wing ideology has become.