RIP, Terri Schiavo; Now, Bring on the Ghouls, Bring on the War
As you probably know, Terri Schiavo has died. I hope she rests in peace, and everyone associated with her makes it through a time of mourning and moves on with their lives while never forgetting the person she was. While her situation became extraordinary, her brain death and now physical body passing boil down to an essential core fact--many of us deal with the horror of a family member/loved one passing away much too soon, and it's a terrible human tragedy whenever it happens and this tragedy is multiplied even further when surviving family members argue.
None of this, of course, will deter people (shameless ghouls) who will take advantage of her (those who have been taking advantage of her up until this point) to further their causes, to create more divisions in this country, to launch a war that they've been chomping at the bit to start for years, a war which many have already been fighting for years, and they don't care how small their numbers are, how many people actually are against them. As Hendrik Hertzberg states in this week's New Yorker, she will become an unwitting martyr, and it doesn't matter what her wishes were or what the laws say.
The war is now on--officially if it wasn't already--to turn this country into a Christian theocracy. Where abortion choice rights will be gone, where gay marriage will be banned and gays further ostracized, where stem cell research will be eliminated, where the right to die will be abolished, where the government will intervene to tell you what to do with your lives, where everyone will be subject to a religious litmus test. It doesn't matter if any of this is actually in the Bible; it doesn't matter that caring for the poor and sick and not judging others are equal if not more significant Christian principles.
The extremists--such as the right-to-lifers willing to risk harm to their own children in violating this nation's laws--don't care. Their brand of Christianity operates in much the same way that the Taliban's brand of Islam does, in that it's a perversion of the religion and something that most people don't follow. However, much like Muslims who don't follow an extreme form of their faith like that advocated by the Taliban and terrorists, Christians in this country who aren't extreme, who are willing to love others and not judge others even if what other people are doing might conflict with their beliefs, who are willing to be reasonable and who genuinely want to help people and who have a strong distaste in their mouths watching what other so-called Christians are doing in the name of God, are never heard from. He who shouts loudest is the one who is heard.
Many of these Christian "extremists" I'm referring to are honest, decent people who think they are doing the right thing. But I think they are very dangerous, because they don't examine anything--particularly their own faith--but just pick up their torches and jump in with the mob calling for blood because other Christians or Randall Terry or Tom DeLay or FoxNews tell them to do it. They will be out there fighting a "cultural war," for the "culture of life," for any number of heavily financed agendas, and not even sure why they are truly doing it other than feeling that it's what they are supposed to and what God wants them to do (how can you quantify, in any way, what God wants you to do). I stop short at calling such people gullible sheep, but they are severely misled. More and more people will jump on this "culture of life" horseshit bandwagon they are touting, as Republicans and media blurt out half-truths and blatant lies with no counterargument as they have been doing the last 20 years on just about every issue.
More and more people will be convinced that it is right to intervene in your private affairs and make you accountable. Look at what's happened to Michael Schiavo. It's the equivalent of a public stoning and I'm sure the rest of his life has been ruined by this sad charade. This is what they will do to people who run counter to their agenda.
The true details from this case that should matter to people--the devastating effects of eating orders such as bulimia, the necessity of having living wills, the ridiculous costs of healthcare, the necessity of exploring stem cell research to help people in brain death or persistent vegetative states--will be lost and it'll all be about this wedge issue--this simplistic "life" vs. "death" argument that encompasses conservative sideshows such as abortion, stem cell research, and the right to die but, of course, ignores war, torture, the death penalty, providing adequate healthcare to those who need it so they don't suffer, having sensible gun laws--further dividing this country and pitting citizen against citizen, which is, in my view, what the conservatives in power truly want, because they love war because it always benefits them and they can't roll tanks down the streets just yet because that doesn't poll well.
These people, while the whole-feeding-tube-reinsertion-court-appeals-ad-infinitum spectacle was happening, have been, I'm sure, planning their subsequent moves. The courts, a high profile player in this and one of this country's checks against right-wing dominance, will be targeted, which works perfectly into the hands of Republicans seeking the "nuclear option" to end filibustering in the Senate which will allow all of Bush's court nominess to skate through unsullied.
And, in the end, somehow all of this will require another round of tax cuts; passage of Patriot Acts II, III, and IV; the elimination of all bare skin and all bad language on all television programs; more legislation that benefits corporations and the wealthy over the middle class and the poor; and it will all somehow be related to terrorism, obstructionist Democrats, and 9-11.
None of this, of course, will deter people (shameless ghouls) who will take advantage of her (those who have been taking advantage of her up until this point) to further their causes, to create more divisions in this country, to launch a war that they've been chomping at the bit to start for years, a war which many have already been fighting for years, and they don't care how small their numbers are, how many people actually are against them. As Hendrik Hertzberg states in this week's New Yorker, she will become an unwitting martyr, and it doesn't matter what her wishes were or what the laws say.
The war is now on--officially if it wasn't already--to turn this country into a Christian theocracy. Where abortion choice rights will be gone, where gay marriage will be banned and gays further ostracized, where stem cell research will be eliminated, where the right to die will be abolished, where the government will intervene to tell you what to do with your lives, where everyone will be subject to a religious litmus test. It doesn't matter if any of this is actually in the Bible; it doesn't matter that caring for the poor and sick and not judging others are equal if not more significant Christian principles.
The extremists--such as the right-to-lifers willing to risk harm to their own children in violating this nation's laws--don't care. Their brand of Christianity operates in much the same way that the Taliban's brand of Islam does, in that it's a perversion of the religion and something that most people don't follow. However, much like Muslims who don't follow an extreme form of their faith like that advocated by the Taliban and terrorists, Christians in this country who aren't extreme, who are willing to love others and not judge others even if what other people are doing might conflict with their beliefs, who are willing to be reasonable and who genuinely want to help people and who have a strong distaste in their mouths watching what other so-called Christians are doing in the name of God, are never heard from. He who shouts loudest is the one who is heard.
Many of these Christian "extremists" I'm referring to are honest, decent people who think they are doing the right thing. But I think they are very dangerous, because they don't examine anything--particularly their own faith--but just pick up their torches and jump in with the mob calling for blood because other Christians or Randall Terry or Tom DeLay or FoxNews tell them to do it. They will be out there fighting a "cultural war," for the "culture of life," for any number of heavily financed agendas, and not even sure why they are truly doing it other than feeling that it's what they are supposed to and what God wants them to do (how can you quantify, in any way, what God wants you to do). I stop short at calling such people gullible sheep, but they are severely misled. More and more people will jump on this "culture of life" horseshit bandwagon they are touting, as Republicans and media blurt out half-truths and blatant lies with no counterargument as they have been doing the last 20 years on just about every issue.
More and more people will be convinced that it is right to intervene in your private affairs and make you accountable. Look at what's happened to Michael Schiavo. It's the equivalent of a public stoning and I'm sure the rest of his life has been ruined by this sad charade. This is what they will do to people who run counter to their agenda.
The true details from this case that should matter to people--the devastating effects of eating orders such as bulimia, the necessity of having living wills, the ridiculous costs of healthcare, the necessity of exploring stem cell research to help people in brain death or persistent vegetative states--will be lost and it'll all be about this wedge issue--this simplistic "life" vs. "death" argument that encompasses conservative sideshows such as abortion, stem cell research, and the right to die but, of course, ignores war, torture, the death penalty, providing adequate healthcare to those who need it so they don't suffer, having sensible gun laws--further dividing this country and pitting citizen against citizen, which is, in my view, what the conservatives in power truly want, because they love war because it always benefits them and they can't roll tanks down the streets just yet because that doesn't poll well.
These people, while the whole-feeding-tube-reinsertion-court-appeals-ad-infinitum spectacle was happening, have been, I'm sure, planning their subsequent moves. The courts, a high profile player in this and one of this country's checks against right-wing dominance, will be targeted, which works perfectly into the hands of Republicans seeking the "nuclear option" to end filibustering in the Senate which will allow all of Bush's court nominess to skate through unsullied.
And, in the end, somehow all of this will require another round of tax cuts; passage of Patriot Acts II, III, and IV; the elimination of all bare skin and all bad language on all television programs; more legislation that benefits corporations and the wealthy over the middle class and the poor; and it will all somehow be related to terrorism, obstructionist Democrats, and 9-11.
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