The right to nutrition

I was reading The New York Times on the latest developments in the Terri Schiavo case.

For those not familiar, she's a seriously brain damaged woman who's lives in an vegetative state. She told her husband she didn't want to be kept alive by artificial means but her parents sued to force her to be kept alive by artificial means. Her husband is fighting to have her wishes respected.

It’s often seen as a euthanasia (mercy killing) case but it’s not. I’m fairly uncomfortable with mercy killing and its likely social ramifications, even if I won’t go so far as to make any blanket statements. That said, allowing nature to take its course according to their expressed wishes is significantly different than actively killing them or artificially facilitating their demise. It’s a tricky case, though, since what’s in question is not extraordinary medical intervention but simple nutrition.

Now, Congress is getting involved. "We should investigate every avenue before we take the life of a living human being. That is the very least we can do," said House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, who's also a proponent of state-sponsored murder (ie: the death penalty). The case has become a cause celebre, particularly among religious conservatives.

But what caught my eye is this passage:

Top lawmakers in both the House and the Senate said they hoped to pass the compromise bill as early as Sunday. They said it would allow Ms. Schiavo's parents to ask a federal judge to restore her feeding tube on the ground that their daughter's constitutional rights were being violated by the withholding of nutrition needed to keep her alive. [emphasis mine]

First, I REALLY don’t like the idea of passing laws to deal a single person. Law by anecdote often results in some really bad precedents being set.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but aren't conservatives usually ATTACKING those who find "invented" constitutional rights around every corner? I wonder why gays being subject to the equal protection clause is an "invented" right but disabled having the "right" to nutrition is perfectly legitimate? Does this new "right" to nutrition mean conservatives are going to push for massive federal funding of soup kitchens?

Inquiring minds want to know.