I get it, all y'all: you don't wish cancer on anyone, and yet, you don't particularly care that Tony Snow's caught a resurgence of it. That, in and of itself, isn't unreasonable.
However, there's no reason to plunk your soapbox up there on the rooftop and scream:
HEY WORLD! I DON'T CARE THAT TONY SNOW HAS CANCER.
There's no reason to say that. However, there are tons of reasons not to (looks bad, unnecessary, etc.). The ultimate one, however, comes down to this: we should never become callous or even apathetic to another's terrible suffering--and a person's previous actions do not mitigate our responsibility to be empathetic.
Follow me for a moment: would it have been right to torture Saddam Hussein to death simply because of his prior actions? What about Pol Pot? Or Hitler? I don't know about any of you, but I'm not willing to put torture on a sliding scale (i.e. SOME is all right, just not TOO MUCH)--I believe it is always wrong. Same with the death penalty (personal belief). Conversely, I am not willing to reserve my concern for only the suffering of those who are innocent. Suffering that shouldn't occur is suffering that shouldn't occur at all.
Cancer is a terrible, undue burden to everybody who gets it. Last time I checked, is not limited to those who "deserve it" through past misdeeds. Thus, it is a terrible, undue burden for ALL thereby inflicted, not simply those we personally care about.
I believe that to be apathetic to terrible, undue burdens that happen to others, on the basis of unrelated qualities of their personalities, is to shirk one of our most fundamental moral responsibilities: empathy. We must never cast aside our empathy just because the recipient is someone we find to be morally questionable. How could we ever collectively act on behalf of the betterment of society if we can't transcend such petty selfishness?
Finally, for those of you who disagree with my above premises, I have to ask: why must it be stated that you don't care about Tony Snow? Is that truly a productive message to put forth from this forum? You may argue that our concern doesn't matter to others, and in some cases, you may be right. But an advocacy of casual apathy? That speaks volumes--because we don't get to pick and choose when to regard someone's cancer as horrible and undeserved. It always is. Casual apathy to a terrible, undue burden in some cases does not further our cause on any other issue. Rather, it shows us to be just as undeserving of the moral high ground in the long run.