Terri Schiavo 'Right To Die' - The Biggest Story 2005

There are so many big stories that people around the country would consider the biggest one of 2005. However, for me the biggest story of the year or the decade, for that matter, is the Terri Schiavo, right to die, case in Florida. The actions of the Congress and President Bush have turn me, a long Republican into an Independent, which before the Schiavo case hit the news, I thought was impossible.

I've been a Republican since I was in high school back in the 1970's. My parents were both yellow dog Democrats and for a long time I was a big disappointment because the first person I really loved in politics was Ronald Reagan. Even before I could vote, I was passing out those little red "Reagan for President" buttons all over my little Texas panhandle hometown of only three thousand people.

It was the Terri Schiavo case that made me reevaluate my party loyalty and look closely at what my Republican Senators and President were doing to this poor family in Florida. They turned their family tragedy into a national disgrace, just in time for Easter and they were able to do all this without one U.S. Senator casing a "REAL" vote.

I remember President Bush was spending Easter weekend at his ranch here in the Waco area, when he had to rush back to Washington to sign a bill that was only for one person, Terri Schiavo, in an attempt to make the Florida Court system look bad and take attention away from Tom DeLay's legal troubles.

I wrote emails to President Bush and both of my Republican Senators here in Texas, but they were unmoved by my feelings that the Republican party should stand for staying out of family decision like this. I even got the party line reply message by postal mail from them that when in doubt they feel like it's best to err on the side of life.

Oh, please, cut me some slack with those kind of comments. What they were really doing is trying to err on the side of religious conservatives who they thought would be ecstatic with their late night, last minute law to save this brain dead woman's life.

In reality, what happened was that almost 75% of Christian conservatives and almost 90% of the public in general, thought what they did was wrong and they should have stayed out of the matter. However, months later I haven't heard one of these politicians admit they made a mistake with this action and until they do, I will never vote for anyone that took part in this Terri Schiavo national disgrace of a law.

The truth is that a family member dying will always bring out old problems that have been just under the surface for years. It's not uncommon for families to disagree and fight when a persons death is imitate. It's critical that the Congress and White House know that this family area should be avoided by them at all cost in the future. We have a court system, that while not perfect, is much better able to handle these kinds of family issues that a bunch of pandering politicians in Washington D.C. and state capitals.

A couple of weeks after Terri Schiavo's death, I was watching some of the political pundits on FoxNews talking about the long term impact of the Republicans stand on this issue and all of them said we, the party loyalist, would forget all about the Terri Schiavo law before the next election. Well, maybe most people will forget what happened last Easter, but I won't and I have a feeling that many other true, life long, Republicans will not forget either after our party leaders abandoned all small government principles with that crazy Terri Schiavo law.

Related: Presidential Horse Race

Biggest Story - 2005

Daily Archives: | 02, 04, 07, 10, 13, 16, 19, 22, 25, 28