In his brilliant book "Junk Politics: The Trashing of the American Mind," essayist Benjamin DeMott doesn't have a lot of nice things to say about the hysteria that passes for reasoned discourse these days in the halls of American power.

"What exactly is junk politics?" DeMott asks in the preface of his book. "It's a politics that personalizes and moralizes issues and interests instead of clarifying them. It's a politics that maximizes threats from abroad while miniaturizing large, complex problems at home."

One doesn't have to be a mind reader to imagine what DeMott would say about the moral triangulation, iron-knuckled calculation and egregious cynicism that transformed a Florida woman's wrenching medical tragedy into political theater on Capitol Hill over the weekend.

You know you've stumbled into America's political heart of darkness when House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex), whose legion of ethical lapses are extensively documented on the front page every day of late, is choking back moral indignation during the debate over Terri Schiavo's fate.

"It won't take a miracle to help Terri Schiavo," DeLay said, trying to drain the irony from his remarks during the emergency session that produced the improbably named "Palm Sunday Compromise" bill two days ago. "It will only take the medical care and therapy that all patients deserve."

Well, extraordinary intervention by an ideologically motivated Congress probably figures into the equation, too. But some miracles are more worthy of mention than others, I suppose.

Never mind the memo that made the rounds of the Republican Caucus identifying Schiavo's tragedy as "a great political issue" guaranteed to keep the Democrats off balance. We all know that DeLay and his ilk would never have anything to do with such blatantly Machiavellian maneuvering, right?

I wonder if Wanda Hudson of Texas is surprised by Majority Leader DeLay's sudden passion for "the medical care and therapy that all patients deserve?" That's exactly what she'd been trying to get for her 6-month-old son who was born with a rare form of dwarfism on Sept. 25.

When a U.S. judge allowed a Houston hospital to remove the breathing tube that kept Sun Hudson's tiny lungs from shriveling, there wasn't a lot of passionate debate in the halls of Congress about it. Oh, there was a pointless hearing on steroid abuse in Major League Baseball a day after Sun Hudson died, though. Why dabble in the tragic when the trivial is close at hand?

Wanda Hudson's pleas for extraordinary intervention on Sun's behalf fell on deaf ears despite the "pro-life" pedigree of that state's ruling political class. She believes Sun could've lived for many more months, giving her an incalculable measure of comfort. She invited the media to see for itself that Sun was still a viable person who responded to her despite expert medical prognosis, but the hospital cited "privacy concerns" for keeping the cameras away.

Too bad Congress didn't subpoena Sun Hudson the way it demanded a show by Terri Schiavo at the height of its shameless grandstanding last week.

Still, if I were Michael Schiavo, I would've granted Terri's family's request for guardianship of his disabled wife for however many years she has left. They deserve a measure of comfort denied to Wanda Hudson.

Though I agree that Schiavo's marital obligation trumps the parental interests of his estranged in-laws, their agonizing fight has created an opportunity for a mischievous Congress to overstep. Motivated by partisan advantage, this crew is capable of all sorts of draconian hypocrisy if the political moment allows for it.

Given President Bush's lofty words in defense of a "culture of life" when he signed the Schiavo bill, you'd think he never initialed a single death-warrant or declared wars that have killed thousands of civilians.

But as governor of Texas in 1999, Bush signed the bill that made it possible for judges to pull the plug on terminally ill patients even when family members like Wanda Hudson object. Morals may change, but politics don't.