Congressional "Action"

Reading the news accounts of our leaders inaction - particularly this week - I continue to be reminded of a joke from a Gallagher (the comedian) tape I once watched - “If progress means moving forward, then what does Congress mean?”

The first of our leaders' "activities" is the opening of the Arctic National Wildlife refuge in Alaska to oil drilling and exploration. If you’ve read previous postings, you know my slant. The currency of oil, through the holdings of various people in the Administration and Congress, is dictating policy.

It’s not enough that we have to attack sovereign nations, get tens of thousands of the inhabitants of those nations killed and injured, put tens of thousands of our own sons and daughters in harm’s way on false pretenses, and have a body count of those sons and daughters exceed 1500 SO FAR, now we’re turning the assault to one of the very last undefiled, unspoiled sanctuaries on Earth in our insatiable need for oil.

And why is that? There is no doubt that someday, and depending on who you talk to it could be just a few decades out or it could be as much as a century, the oil will run out. No debate. No one suggests that there is a limitless supply. Not to mention the damage we are doing to the environment around us with the combustion by-products.

What does our forward-thinking leadership in Washington do in the face of this reality? Boldly challenge the country to come up with new energy alternatives by 2015 in the face of a looming disaster? Provide funding for basic research into the improvement of basic technologies required to support some of those alternatives?

No. Save the “Bold Initiative” speeches for the greatest entitlement of all - Social Security. It’s the ME generation taking care of itself. No, the response is to just go off and drill for oil somewhere else; somewhere that is so far removed from where most people want to go that there is no other financial payback possible for that land. And who cares about the wildlife up there - it’s only a National Wildlife Refuge.

If the same deposits of oil were to be found by drilling in Yellowstone National Park, do you think for an instant that anyone in Congress would be making such a proposal. Of course not. And why not? That land supports itself through tourism revenues.

The second issue of the week is whether to keep Terri Shiavo alive by reinserting the feeding tube that has been keeping her body functioning since she went into a vegetative some 15 years ago.

After a Florida judge allowed the feeding tube to be removed (for a third time through the entire ordeal) Friday, Congress re-injected itself into this debate by issuing subpoenas to Terri, members of her family, and some of those responsible for her care for the end of March. By doing so, Congress is trying to use its subpoena power to extend Terri’s life until it can enact legislation around a moral issue of choice. Didn’t that work so exceedingly well with Prohibition?

The aptly-named House Majority Leader Tom DeLay justified the action with the following statements. “Terri Shiavo is alive. She’s not just barely alive. She’s not just being kept alive. She’s as alive as you and I are.”

Is being alive and living your life to its fullest potential sitting in a hospice year-in and year-out in the same room, being fed through a tube some indescribable and untasteable mush, unable to move, unable to get out of bed in the morning and enjoy a walk around the house or neighborhood, having someone cleanup your diaper several times a day because you cannot make it to a bathroom and take care of business yourself?

That’s your life, Mr. Right Honorable DeLay? I hardly think so. People have rights, and one of those rights is to die with dignity. While there is no written Living Will in this case, Terri’s husband Michael is on record repeatedly as saying that Terri’s wish would not be to be kept alive in this state and under these circumstances. With all due respect to Terri’s parents, the conversations of two adults in a committed, loving, covenant relationship supercedes the selfish wishes to keep her alive with a feeding tube.

It also supercedes Congressional intervention. Rep. Henry Waxman’s comments perhaps best reflects upon the flagrant abuse of congressional subpoena power in this case. “Congress is turning the Schiavo family’s personal tragedy into a national political farce. The committee has no business inserting itself in the middle of an excruciating private family matter.”

Congress - get out of the Shiavo’s lives. Let Terri die with whatever dignity she has left, let Michael try to get beyond the loss of his mate and make something more of the rest of his life (whatever that might be), let the hospice bed be used for someone who truly needs it - someone with a terminal illness in the final days of their life that needs pain relief and a place to be comfortable and cared for, and let this country go of this narcissistic Congressional political theater we are all enduring.

There are no more important things for Congress to be doing than getting embroiled in this issue? What are you on the “Religious Right” afraid of - that Terri might get there before you and tell God what’s really going on down here?

Ask yourselves this simple question - if this were you, what would you want? If it were me, pull that feeding tube. No question. No debate. That’s not living, that’s barely existing.

What would you want?