DeLay knows an opportunity when he sees it

Easter marks the resurrection of Jesus Christ, but this Holy Week has been consumed with the passion play of Terri Schiavo, or, rather, that of her parents, their enablers and supporters.

Until last week the Schiavo case was a cable news sideshow, but after Congress took it up, it became something more ominous and troubling. The Republican-controlled Congress has usually reserved its knavery for economic issues and gains, but it stepped out 76-trombone-style into the culture wars, carrying the banner of Terri Schiavo, led by the House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, a man of many parts, most of them unsightly, wrapping himself in the white shroud of a savior, almost single-handedly hauling Terri Schiavo under the wing of the federal government.

DeLay looks at this as win-win: as a leaked Republican memo said, ''This is a great political issue,'' because the Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida is up for re-election, and he ''has already refused to become a co-sponsor and this is a tough issue for the Democrats.'' Terri Schiavo, either alive or dead, is good news for DeLay, his crocodile tears notwithstanding. This is what you get when theocrats, both fake and real, take over Congress and the White House.

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush had already crafted his state's ''Terri's Law'' for his pre-2004 election benefit, though it was quickly struck down as unconstitutional, but it had already done its useful work. Even Gov. Bush's appointed guardian ad litem concluded that Terri Schiavo was -- as so many had already asserted -- in a persistent vegetative state. snip

Medicine and its procedures can be an unholy bloody mess, which is why the Right to Life movement continues to gain adherents. When Jesus rose from the dead, it wasn't to have lentil soup in downtown Jerusalem: He shortly returned to His Father in heaven. Conservative Republicans would rather have Terri Schiavo on vulgar display for political profit, rather than to let her be at peace with her maker.

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