{"id":7672,"date":"2006-06-13T11:17:21","date_gmt":"2006-06-13T15:17:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/?p=7672"},"modified":"2006-06-13T11:17:21","modified_gmt":"2006-06-13T15:17:21","slug":"one-more-log-on-the-culture-war-fire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/one-more-log-on-the-culture-war-fire\/","title":{"rendered":"One more log on the culture-war fire"},"content":{"rendered":"

Depending on one’s perspective, [tag]Republicans[\/tag] in [tag]Congress[\/tag] deserve credit or blame for throwing plenty of red meat at its base lately. They’ve held votes on a constitutional ban on gay marriage and a permanent repeal of the estate tax, and a vote on an amendment to ban flag burning is on the way.<\/p>\n

Anything else on the far-right wish list on which the [tag]GOP[\/tag] can pander? Funny you should ask<\/a>. (thanks to reader R.M. for the tip)<\/p>\n

Congress was trying to pass a war funding bill and members were heading for a weekend recess when Sen. Sam Brownback held a rushed subcommittee hearing.<\/p>\n

The Kansas Republican, one of the Senate’s most socially conservative members, held the hearing to explore “the consequences of legalized [tag]assisted suicide[\/tag] and [tag]euthanasia[\/tag].”<\/p>\n

No assisted-suicide bill has been introduced in the Senate, and none is expected this session. Brownback held the May 25th hearing purely to publicize the issue.<\/p>\n

Republicans, confronting the possibility of losing control of Congress this November, are doing everything possible to mobilize their base of social conservatives, including a campaign emphasis on abortion, gay marriage and broadcasting decency. Now [tag]Oregon[\/tag]’s assisted-suicide law — and the threat of euthanasia — may join the list of issues Republicans hope will win them political advantage.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This issue was supposed to be done. In mid-January, the [tag]Supreme Court[\/tag], in a 6-3 ruling, upheld Oregon’s one-of-a-kind physician-assisted suicide law<\/a>, and rejected the Bush administration’s effort to punish doctors who help terminally ill patients die.<\/p>\n

And yet, here we have the states’-rights party bringing the issue up again. Brownback told the Oregonian that “doctor-assisted suicide can lead toward involuntary euthanasia,” so he, among other conservative lawmakers, are hoping to generate some renewed interest in federal action on the issue.<\/p>\n

Not surprisingly, the GOP [tag]base[\/tag] loves the idea.
\n<\/p>\n

“This would be something that our base is quite concerned about,” said Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America, a conservative Christian group.<\/p>\n

But unlike other social issues, assisted suicide hasn’t been at the forefront of national debate, creating challenges for Republicans who want to make it a campaign issue.<\/p>\n

“This would certainly resonate with the base, the evangelicals and certainly also with Roman Catholics,” said Lee Edwards, a Heritage Foundation scholar who has written 16 books on the conservative movement. “But I don’t think it is an issue that’s of enormous impact because I don’t think people understand all that’s going on.”<\/p>\n

For conservatives, Wright said, physician-assisted suicide and euthanasia are part of a broader range of “sanctity of life” issues. Those include embryonic stem-cell research and last year’s debate over Terri Schiavo, the Florida woman whose feeding tube was removed when she was in a persistent vegetative state.<\/p>\n

“It’s the concept of the scientific or the medical community treating people with less dignity, as expendable,” Wright said. “With physician-assisted suicide, life is treated as a burden, that people who don’t meet a certain standard, that it is somehow better off for them to be dead.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

By all means, let’s have the debate — again. Republicans and their base can take up the [tag]Schiavo[\/tag]-intervention\/ignore-the-will-of-the-voters side, and Dems can argue the opposite.<\/p>\n

The Heritage Foundation’s Edwards said euthanasia “might be something of a sleeper issue” that could have a bigger-than-expected political impact. My hunch is, if anything, the impact would hurt the GOP instead of help, but we’ll see what happens.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Depending on one’s perspective, [tag]Republicans[\/tag] in [tag]Congress[\/tag] deserve credit or blame for throwing plenty of red meat at its base lately. They’ve held votes on a constitutional ban on gay marriage and a permanent repeal of the estate tax, and a vote on an amendment to ban flag burning is on the way. Anything else […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7672\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}