If Tom DeLay Were Your Dog . . .:
If Tom DeLay were your dog, you'd've put that fucker down a long, long time ago. When your old dog gets so lousy with disease, stinking of open sores, shaking when it walks, crazed with dementia, snapping at children, strangers, even you sometimes, shitting in its bed more than it shits outside, then you really have no choice but to load that dog into the family car and take the long ride to the vet. Sure, sure, it's understandable that you and the family would wanna cling to your dog as long as possible, no matter how disgusting and vile and flea-ridden it's become, no matter how much it befouls the carpets, and it's because you remember your dog in its prime, so loving, giving, obeying its masters, gladly licking its own ass.

But when you know when it's time, it's time, and that sometimes it's best for everyone, including the dog, to put it out of its misery.

Yeah, if Tom DeLay were a dog, it'd be easy. You'd say, "Here, Tom, here, Tom," and hug him and promise him treats to get in the car, and it'd be so sweet, because Tom DeLay would lick you, thinking you were taking him to meet with more cash-stuffed corporate lobbyists. Instead, of course, you'd take Tom DeLay to the kind, gentle veterinarian and the caring nurses, and surely you'd shed a tear as Tom DeLay was put to sleep, going to that big K Street in the sky where there's endless Lockheed-sponsored fire hydrants to piss on. You'd be sad, but at the same time, there's the sweet relief in knowing that Tom DeLay will no longer make you have to send the rugs out to be cleaned every week.

If Tom DeLay were a dog, this would have been a long, long time coming. You'd have tried everything you could. Early on, when Tom DeLay was shredding the cushions and gnawing the moulding in your house, you thought if you had him neutered it would calm him down. You thought if you took him to training it might work. Hell, you even tried a choke chain. But some dogs don't give a damn about neutering, training, electric shock, nothing. Some dogs are just naturally vicious to anyone who crosses them, who doesn't provide them with treats and water bowls and bones, all those wonderful gristly bones, to gnaw on and then bury. The worse thing about dogs like Tom DeLay is gradually everyone moves from love to fear, his unpredictability forcing others to stay out of his way. No one wants a sick, violent, near-rabid dog looking in his or her direction.

If Tom DeLay were a dog and this were the old days, the kind, gentle slumber of the vet's hypo wouldn't have been available for him. Someone would have had to drag Tom DeLay into the backyard or into the street and shoot him. This was brutal, though, and so wiser animal doctors created the sweet, rapid dreamland of sodium pentobarbital. Tom DeLay wouldn't even really know what happened.

If Tom DeLay were a dog, oh, sure, he'd fight it when you got him to the vet, trying to gnaw through his muzzle to bite the hand of the needle-carrying nurse. He'd have to be held down because Tom DeLay wouldn't go down without a fight and without hurting as many people as possible. Some might find that a noble quality, the fighter, the self-preservation instinct, and it might be, but here we're talking about if Tom DeLay were a dog, and a dog is gonna lose, no matter how many people he bites in the process.

But, alas, alas, Tom DeLay is not a dog. He is the Republican Majority Leader in the House of Representatives, very nearly a human being. And, like the last roach after the apocalypse, he will cling to his political life, assisted by those who cower in his shadow, until he has polluted the entire house with his stench.