Despite positing himself as Terri Schiavo's own personal governmental messiah, according to the Los Angeles Times, in 1988, DeLay's own father was in a similarly tragic situation with very dissimilar results. After being left brain-damaged and comatose following a freak accident, he was allowed to die by his family, without interference by the Governor, President, Congress or overzealous protestors.
Moreover, following the incident, the DeLay family sued the manufacturers of the tram that had crashed and injured his father. Of course, years later, DeLay would make a career of slamming "frivolous, parasitic lawsuits" that "kill jobs" and has worked to override state laws on product liability.
As reported in the Phoenix New Times, Republican State Rep Russell Pearce, a religious Mormon and co-chair of the Arizona House Appropriations Committee, doesn't seem to think much of first ammendment.
Pearce inserted language into this fiscal year's state budget that would eliminate funding for campus publications altogether because they have run articles and photos that he deemed offensive.
Though the New Times reported that insiders think Governor Janet Napolitano will use her line-item veto to remove Pearce's provision, this is not the first attack from religious conservatives on college papers in the state.
Previously, Ira Fulton, a very wealthy Mormon, complained to Michael Crow, the President of ASU, about an illustration in the campus paper that included a bared breast. Crow responded to Fulton by threatening to eliminate funding to the paper, the State Press.
Now, the university administration doesn't even have the spine to oppose Pearce's proposed legislation, instead it chose to, as the article states, "hint to Pearce that it would prefer he drop his effort to eliminate funding to campus publications."
Way to know that the administrators are standing up for their students' right to free speech.
I know a girl who got fired from her job for stealing office supplies - post-it notes, legal pads, Sharpies, a spool of blank discs. It sucks to be fired for commiting less than $30 of misdeeds, but that is what happens in the actual world where actual Americans have actual jobs instead of cushy sinecures.
Now if Paul Wolfowitz had stolen all those legal pads, he would probably be getting the presidential medal of honor.
Some critics seem to be suggesting that at least this is a good way to get Wolfowitz out of the Pentagon. But couldn't we have gotten him out just by firing him?
For future reference, perhaps a striped tie or engraved plaque might be a more suitable retirement present than handing off the World Bank, one of the most powerful (and troubled) financial institutions on the planet.
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