So much one could say about the entire Schiavo mess — How can the GOP support this anti-federalist measure without any hint of shame? How can the same GOP that says federal power should be seen through he lens of a limited Commerce Clause and shrunken 14th Amendment claim that Congress has the power to act here? How can anyone care so much more about the feeding tube in a person with a liquefied cerebral cortex than about the feeding of hungry children both at home and abroad? And what about all the people who die for lack of medical care? Is the Schiavo bill a bill of attainder? Does the insertion of the Congress into an ongoing judicial matter violate separation of powers? — but other people are asking, or will ask, all these questions.
So here's my own addition to the pile: Why didn't the Senate democrats take advantage of this bill to add a rider to it? Say, a requirement that the CIA not use any methods of torture abroad that would be cruel and unusual punishment at home? Or anything else that ought, in principle, to be uncontroversial but would cause Rovian heartburn? Why just roll over without charging a price for quick action?
