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Republicans eating their own

Latest news: Appeals court backs tube removal

Nine GOP Senators who voted against the a state law designed to interfere with Terri Schiavo’s stated wish to die are facing a backlash from their base.

Security has increased at the Capitol to deal with protesters.

"I had a bunch of them in my office last week and they were very loud and wouldn't leave," said Sen. Jim King, R-Jacksonville, who wrote the state's death with dignity law and leads the bloc of Republican senators who don't want it changed.

King has had a Florida Department of Law Enforcement agent posted outside his door since the Senate vote on the Schiavo matter.

An FDLE employee using his state e-mail account sent a message to legislators urging them to keep Schiavo alive. Scott Granger later said he regretted using his state computer to do it. FDLE is looking into the matter, according to a spokesman.

The protests appear to have backfired, strengthening the resolve of the so-called Republican Nine. Few senators appear to be wavering, according to Republican and Democratic leaders.
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Besides King, the Republican 9 are Sens. Dennis Jones of Treasure Island; Nancy Argenziano of Dunnellon; JD Alexander of Frostproof; Michael Bennett of Bradenton; Lisa Carlton of Sarasota; Paula Dockery of Lakeland; Evelyn Lynn of Ormond Beach, and Burt Saunders of Naples.

After lunch, Alexander stepped away from a committee table momentarily only to be surrounded by a trio of people, including a man identifying himself as Dr. William Hammesfahr, a Clearwater neurologist who examined Schiavo for her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, and testified that Schiavo tried to follow simple commands and that her eyes fixed on her family. A judge called him "a self-promoter" in a court order.

Alexander told the group he had read some of the court documents.

"But they're full of misinformation," Hammesfahr said. "I've got the videotape. Can I show it to you?"

Alexander shook his head and said he wasn't interested. As he pushed his way into a senators-only side room, Hammesfahr tried to follow. "You can't come in here," Alexander said.
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For days, Argenziano's voice mailbox has been clogged with angry messages.

"One person told me they hoped I died from cancer, another said my family members should rot in hell," Argenziano said. "They are the most awful, venomous, un-Christian things you have ever heard."

But Argenziano said she won't change her position and had harsh words for Gov. Jeb Bush, whom she accused of inciting ill will against the Republican Nine.

"I feel like my political party has been hijacked," Argenziano said.

The NYT has more (via Eschaton)

"My party is demonstrating that they are for states' rights unless they don't like what states are doing," said Representative Christopher Shays of Connecticut, one of five House Republicans who voted against the bill. "This couldn't be a more classic case of a state responsibility."

"This Republican Party of Lincoln has become a party of theocracy," Mr. Shays said. "There are going to be repercussions from this vote. There are a number of people who feel that the government is getting involved in their personal lives in a way that scares them."

I admire these politicians for taking a strong stand against loud, rude and bullying opposition, but really, what did they expect when they climbed in bed with the religious right? As Molly Ivans would point out, you gotta dance with them what brung you, and The American Taliban, the Talibornagain, will not be satisfied until the constitution is in tatters, replaced by a theocracy in which religious law trumps all.

The Muslim fundamentalists use a provision of Islamic law called "bringing to account" (hisba). As Al-Ahram weekly notes, "Hisba signifies a case filed by an individual on behalf of society when the plaintiff feels that great harm has been done to religion." Hisba is a medieval idea that had all be lapsed when the fundamentalists brought it back in the 1970s and 1980s.

In this practice, any individual can use the courts to intervene in the private lives of others. Among the more famous cases of such interference is that of Nasr Hamid Abu Zaid in Egypt. A respected modern scholar of Koranic studies, Abu Zaid argued that, contrary to medieval interpretations of Islamic law, women and men should receive equal inheritance shares. (Medieval Islamic law granted women only half the inheritance shares of their brothers). Abu Zaid was accused of sacrilege. Then the allegation of sacrilege was used as a basis on which the fundamentalists sought to have the courts forcibly divorce him from his wife.

Abu Zaid's wife loved her husband. She did not want to be divorced. But the fundamentalists went before the court and said, she is a Muslim, and he is an infidel, and no Muslim woman may be married to an infidel. They represented their efforts as being on behalf of the Islamic religion, which had an interest in seeing to it that heretics like Abu Zaid could not remain married to a Muslim woman. In 1995 the hisba court actually found against them. They fled to Europe, and ultimately settled in Holland.
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One of the most objectionable features of this fundamentalist tactic is that persons without standing can interfere in private affairs. Perfect strangers can file a case about your marriage, because they represent themselves as defending a public interest (the upholding of religion and morality).

Terri Schiavo's husband is her legal guardian. Her parents have not succeeded in challenging this status of his. As long as he is the guardian, the decision on removing the feeding tubes is between him and their physicians. Her parents have not succeeded in having this responsibility moved from him to them. Even under legislation George W. Bush signed in 1999 while governor of Texas, the spouse and the physician can make this decision.
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But the most frightening thing about the entire affair is that public figures like congressmen inserted themselves into the case in order to uphold religious strictures.
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In other words, the United States Congress acted in part on behalf of the Roman Catholic church. Both of these public bodies interfered in the private affairs of the Schiavos, just as the fundamentalist Egyptian, Nabih El-Wahsh, tried to interfere in the marriage of Nawal El Saadawi.
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Republican Hisba will have the same effect in the United States that it does in the Middle East. It will reduce the rights of the individual in favor of the rights of religious and political elites to control individuals. Ayatollah Delay isn't different from his counterparts in Iran.

More on the Terri Schiavo circus.