[This is the second entry of the day; the first entry is here.]

In 1992, Marie Zaza wrote, in a letter to yours truly, and I quote:

I'm sending the article I told you about. Be grateful you don't have a TV--you might not enjoy or have time to enjoy other forms of entertainment. I'm serious, TV is so obtrusive. I don't exactly agree with the writer, with the TV on it's hard to concentrate on anything, including the TV. A person is hypnotized, not concentrating.

I found this letter today as I was sorting and shredding old papers--ancient bank statements, rejected poems sent back from magazines, junk mail that got filed in a pile of papers that eventually got shoved into a drawer, etc. And I was really struck by Mom's quote about TV watching, because of something I read earlier today on a blog. I have been so agitated by the current political spectacle in Florida and Washington, and the ridiculousness of the Congress inserting itself into a family matter that has already been decided by the courts. I read an entry by Digby at his blog Hullabaloo about the Schiavo case. He lays out some facts, and then compares that to what's actually being said on TV:

By now most people who read liberal blogs are aware that George W. Bush signed a law in Texas that expressly gave hospitals the right to remove life support if the patient could not pay and there was no hope of revival, regardless of the patient's family's wishes. It is called the Texas Futile Care Law. Under this law, a baby was removed from life support against his mother's wishes in Texas just this week. A 68 year old man was given a temporary reprieve by the Texas courts just yesterday.

Those of us who read liberal blogs are also aware that Republicans have voted en masse to pull the plug (no pun intended) on medicaid funding that pays for the kind of care that someone like Terry Schiavo and many others who are not so severely brain damaged need all across this country.

Those of us who read liberal blogs also understand that that the tort reform that is being contemplated by the Republican congress would preclude malpractice claims like that which has paid for Terry Schiavo's care thus far.

Those of us who read liberal blogs are aware that the bankruptcy bill will make it even more difficult for families who suffer a catastrophic illness like Terry Schiavo's because they will not be able to declare chapter 7 bankruptcy and get a fresh start when the gargantuan medical bills become overwhelming.

And those of us who read liberal blogs also know that this grandstanding by the congress is a purely political move designed to appease the religious right and that the legal maneuverings being employed would be anathema to any true small government conservative.

Those who don't read liberal blogs, on the other hand, are seeing a spectacle on television in which the news anchors repeatedly say that the congress is "stepping in to save Terry Schiavo" mimicking the unctuous words of Tom Delay as they grovel and leer at the family and nod sympathetically at the sanctimonious phonies who are using this issue for their political gain.

This is why we cannot trust the mainstream media. Most people get their news from television. And television is presenting this issue as a round the clock one dimensional soap opera pitting the "family", the congress and the church against this woman's husband and the judicial system that upheld Terry Schiavo's right and explicit request that she be allowed to die if extraordinary means were required to keep her alive. The ghoulish infotainment industry is making a killing by acceding once again to trumped up right wing sensationalism.

Digby would be a great addition to anyone's daily online reading. Don't let anyone tell you about the "liberal media" and how slanted it all is. It is slanted, but it ain't liberal--not by a longshot.

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Edited at 6:15pm, 3/21/05 to add:
Another perfect summary of what's going on here is written by Scott Rosenberg over at Salon.com. I can only sigh deeply and agree with him when he says:

I keep thinking, in this dark time, that sooner or later Bush, DeLay & co. will cross the line of political propriety so blatantly and incontrovertibly that they will, like Senator Joseph McCarthy, find their ertswhile allies turning away from them in disgust. Maybe transforming the private conflict of a family dispute into grotesque public spectacle will be that sort of Rubicon for them. But I'm afraid that such an outcome would require a stiffer spine and a braver soul than most Democrats seem able to muster.