The Hub of Politics

Tom DeLay, Majority Leader in the House of Representatives, took a big gamble when he inserted the GOP House delegation squarely into the middle of the Terri Schiavo dispute. By reputation, DeLay is a smart, shrewd, somewhat ruthless politician - all the things we should look for in a Majority Leader. However, he also comes with more than a little baggage, some of which is pure bunk from his leftist enemies, but some of which is starting to look more than a little legit - as a recent Op-Ed from that leftist rag, the Wall Street Journal, (linked at the bottom of this post) points out.

My thoughts on the situation are best summed-up in this editorial from our local paper. Here's the money passage for me:

In his effort to pander to right-to-life groups, the ethically challenged House Majority Leader Tom DeLay has set in motion a chain of events that Democratic liberals are only too happy to exploit for their own purposes. There used to be a philosophical base to Republican congressional thinking - and action - that left to the states issues properly within their purview.

But it's difficult to remain philosophically pure and pander at the same so. Today too many congressional Republicans have abandoned any notion of state's rights, of federalism, of the appropriate role of government in their quest to score political points.

Now, the leftist dinosaur Barney Frankus Liberalus is leading a congressional charge to legislate end-of-life issues - under the guise of "disability rights". In the good-old-days, federalist Republicans (who could at least talk a good game not too long ago) could shut this down by (rightly) claiming that this was an issue best left to the states. Cannot rightly do that now, can we?

We can (with cause) scream all we want about the Demos hypocrisy on this issue - these new champions of "state's rights" have wasted no time in using the Schiavo case to try to expand the federal role in these decisions. But the fact of the matter is that our side has given them a stick to beat us with - and that is unforgivable in a party leader.

Add to this the little fact that Congress issued a subpoena for Terri that they didn't have the stones to enforce, and you are left with the conclusion that the GOP's (and DeLay's in particular) intervention into the Schiavo affair was both spectacularly stupid, nakedly hypocritical and demostrated the GOP as being willing to abandon long-supported principles (such as State's Rights and Federalism) to shamelessly pander to Christian Right.

It might be time to start looking for a new House leader. I find it impossible to believe that we cannot find someone as effective at "marshaling the troops" who doesn't have the Stench of the Beltway about him.