ABC News: GOP Talking Points on Terri Schiavo
March 21, 2005 — The following memo listing talking points on the Terri Schiavo case was circulated among Republican senators on the floor of the Senate.
This is an exact, full copy of the document obtained exclusively by ABC News and first reported Friday, March 18, 2005, by Linda Douglass on “World News Tonight with Peter Jennings.” … [mjh: follow the link above for full text; I’m excerpting 3 points.]
• This is an important moral issue and the pro-life base will be excited that the Senate is debating this important issue.
• This is a great political issue, because Senator Nelson of Florida has already refused to become a cosponsor and this is a tough issue for Democrats. …
• This legislation ensures that individuals like Terri Schiavo are guaranteed the same legal protections as convicted murderers like Ted Bundy.
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The Washington Monthly by Kevin Drum
TERRI SCHIAVO AND THE LIMITS OF CYNICISM….Via Think Progress, here’s a fascinating ABC News poll about the Terri Schiavo affair. It turns out that not only do large majorities favor removing her feeding tube and oppose federal intervention in her case, but huge majorities know perfectly well that Tom DeLay and his crew are in it solely for political advantage. When you drill down into the numbers, it becomes obvious that even people who support DeLay’s position don’t believe he has any actual concern for Terri Schiavo.
Now, I realize that in one sense this doesn’t matter. This whole thing isn’t about majority support, it’s about pandering to one specific segment of the GOP base. But here’s the thing: even evangelical Christians don’t support congressional intervention. Apparently the DeLay/Frist/Bush axis has dealt with this so cynically that even the people they’re pandering to are uneasy about being treated with such open condescension.
This is not an issue that will last in the public mind for more than a few days, but it’s still nice to see that even Bush’s own supporters see through him from time to time. Even the pandering cynicism of the modern Republican party apparently has its limits.
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The Daily Aneurysm at jabartlett.com
So it should surprise nobody that losing in federal court this morning doesn’t mark the end of anything. Nobody’s saying, “Well, we had our hearing, and that’s all we could hope for.” Nope. Rick Santorum has already thrown a hissy fit: “You have judicial tyranny here,” Santorum told WABC Radio in New York. “Congress passed a law that said that you had to look at this case. He simply thumbed his nose at Congress.”
To anyone not drunk on self-righteousness, however, it seems clear that judge James Whittemore did indeed look at the case, and his ruling is reasonable by the standards of the reality-based community, at least. He ruled that the 19 previous court hearings in the case have adequately protected Schiavo’s rights, and that despite the life-and-death stakes at this moment, he had no choice but to apply the law, and by that standard, he wouldn’t rule to reinsert the feeding tube.