The last few days I have been fighting a rearguard action about what liberals and Dems care about in the Schiavo story. It is my view that that value Dem/liberals are fighting for here is respect for the rule of law. It was Congress' outrageous actions in running roughshod over the Constitution and the rule of law that has triggered our outrage. Hunter's series of posts, "Blood Sport," does not focus on the issue of who should have guardianship of Terri Sciavo, it focuses on the seeming lawlessness of the Extreme Right Wing of the Extreme Republican Party. But
Brooks can't have that, he has to make up the Schiavo position for "liberals":
. . . The core belief that social liberals bring to cases like Ms. Schiavo's is that the quality of life is a fundamental human value. They don't emphasize the bright line between life and death; they describe a continuum between a fully lived life and a life that, by the sort of incapacity Terri Schiavo has suffered, is mere existence. . . . Social liberals warn against vitalism, the elevation of physical existence over other values. They say it is up to each individual or family to draw their own line to define when life passes to mere existence. . . . The central weakness of the liberal case is that it is morally thin. Once you say that it is up to individuals or families to draw their own lines separating life from existence, and reasonable people will differ, then you are taking a fundamental issue out of the realm of morality and into the realm of relativism and mere taste.
Excuse me Mr. Brooks, how in the hell do you know what the social liberal's position is? The PRINCIPLE involved in the Schiavo case, the elephant in the room that is your column, the elephant you ignore, is the lawlessness exhibited by your Republican Party and your social conservatives - you know, the ones putting bounties on the heads of federal and state judges.
But Brooks' chutzpah knows no bounds. In a blatant attempt to change the subject, Brooks accuses liberals of - you guessed it, trying to change the subject:
You end up exactly where many liberals ended up this week, trying to shift arguments away from morality and on to process.
If you surveyed the avalanche of TV and print commentary that descended upon us this week, you found social conservatives would start the discussion with a moral argument about the sanctity of life, and then social liberals would immediately start talking about jurisdictions, legalisms, politics and procedures. They were more comfortable talking about at what level the decision should be taken than what the decision should be.
WTF? The whole freaking story was about the process. It was about what the Congress did. What a freaking liar Brooks is. He may have just noticed the Schiavo story, but it had been out there for quite some time, What is new in the story is the Republican LAWLESSNESS (not the "process" Brooks), and that is what Liberals have focused on, because it is what is important about this story now.
What I'm describing here is the clash of two serious but flawed arguments. The socially conservative argument has tremendous moral force, but doesn't accord with the reality we see when we walk through a hospice. The socially liberal argument is pragmatic, but lacks moral force. No wonder many of us feel agonized this week, betwixt and between, as that poor woman slowly dehydrates.
No, what is happening here is you are agonizing and spinning a meltdown and unmasking of the authoritarian tendencies of your political party. You lie in the process. Typical David Brooks.
Update [2005-3-26 15:51:45 by Armando]: Matt Yglesias plays right into Brooks' hands, turning outrageous lawlessness into a reasonable discussion of "morality." The fact that Brooks lied through his teeth about the Schiavo travesty is, of course, conveniently overlooked by Yglesias. Matt is very intelligent and very reasonable and he does liberals a disservice by treating Brooks' lies with such deference. I guess this brings up the reasoned discourse vs. tough words dispute into full light.