Emailers have been advising me to weigh in on the Schiavo case, citing the surface absurdity of Congress subpoenaing a brain-dead witness. Ducks in a barrel, there, the brain-dead subpoenaing the--well, you get it. But beyond that I'm loath to go, despite the obvious cable-news-and-blogger code that you have to have an opinion about everything. Part of what's so dispiriting about this place at this time is the sense that, in a totally non-economic sense, the public sector is crowding out the private sector (almost a reverse of what the Administration is trying to do economically--see the BBC's report on the original plans for Iraq's oil, and try to find the good guys in that tussle between the neocons and the oil companies). Laci and Scott Peterson were private people having a private tragedy. Their lives were literally none of our business. Same with this family. I understand that in both cases, the stories were ginned up because they played into the social-conservative agenda, but that's no reason for everybody to jump in. So my lips are zipped.