Politics driving Schiavo row

Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert prepares to debate legislation that would give Terri Schiavo one last chance at life. Picture / Reuters

How is it that a debate over whether a single brain-damaged woman in Florida should be removed from life support has driven Congress to prepare a specific bill to save her and send President Bush himself scurrying back to the White House to sign it?

The answer is in part genuine belief but, in at least equal part, raw politics. The case of Terri Schiavo is unfolding in a country whose sharpest divisions are less economic or even social as cultural, where the dominating issues are not wages, deficits and jobs, but lifestyle issues such as abortion, gun control and gay marriage.

It is unfolding, moreover, when conservatives on all those issues are clearly in the ascendant - as George W. Bush's victory and the sweeping Republican Congressional gains last November only underscore.

Not since the case of 6-year-old Cuban refugee Elian Gonzalez in 2000 have national leaders so involved themselves in such a personal issue.

"I hope we're not turning this human tragedy into a political issue," John McCain, the Republican senator from Arizona, said yesterday. Some hope. For conservative Republicans, the case is a perfect opportunity to advance their cause, extending the pro-life argument into new terrain, and placing the Democrats squarely on the back foot.

Indeed, said the Washington Post, Republican strategists have circulated a memo among senators arguing that the Schiavo case offers "a great political issue" that could galvanise Christian conservatives before the 2006 mid-term elections.

The memo explicitly noted that Florida Democrat Bill Nelson, whose seat Republicans have targeted next year, refused to sponsor this weekend's emergency legislation.

For Democrats, agreeing to a limited bill to save Schiavo gives the party a chance to correct the public impression, that cost it dear in the election, that it is too liberal and out of touch with ordinary America.

Individual ambitions are also at play. The campaign to save Schiavo is being led in the House by Tom DeLay, a Republican embroiled in a fundraising scandal in Texas and alleged lobbying irregularities in Washington. For DeLay this is a precious opportunity to change the subject - and perhaps save his job. And the two Republicans leading the fight in the Senate - Bill Frist and Rick Sanatorium - are mulling presidential runs in 2008.

- INDEPENDENT