What the cons wish weren't so...

Namely, this part of the ABC/Washingon Post Poll:

The state of the Republican Party remains grim. Just 22 percent of those surveyed identified themselves as Republicans, near April's decades-long low point. Only 36 percent said they have a favorable impression of the GOP, with 56 percent saying they have an unfavorable impression. (Fifty-three percent said they have a favorable view of the Democratic Party.)

Obama has greater than 20-point leads over congressional Republicans in public trust on dealing with health care, the deficit, terrorism and the economy. The margin on the economy has slipped since April, but still remains a hefty 55 percent to 31 percent over GOP lawmakers.

And after all those efforts to make Obama look bad and to convince themselves that Obama was just a fluke since people really did like Bush's policies but they were hypnotized or something.

Bummer for them.

The ongoing real apology tour

They are making me mad again.

And no, I'm not talking about David Letterman caving to the far right's victim princess attention whore...twice. Although I think Letterman had nothing to apologize about, I understand a bit about television. The apology fits when you understand that TV is all about selling you stuff, making money and wrapping programming around that to accomplish those ends. Television - especially broadcast TV - tries to be edgy and controversial but not so much of either that they lose advertisers and income over it. Hence, the apology to the Alaska hillbilly sluts.

What is getting my goat now is yet another Democrat apologizing for telling the truth. Latest installment is the comment from the Democrats' CIA director about Cheney's increasing nonsense-spewing media tour:

"It's almost as if he's wishing that America
would be attacked again, in order to make
his point. That's dangerous politics."
-- CIA Director Panetta on Dick Cheney

Sounds like that to me too, Mr. Panetta. Way to go....no...wait a second. I spoke too soon!

CIA Director Leon Panetta doesn't really think former Vice President Dick Cheney wants to see his country attacked, the intelligence agency said Tuesday.

The CIA, through spokesman Paul Gimigliano, walked back a controversial statement Panetta recently made to The New Yorker while arguing that his quote was misinterpreted in the first place.

"The director does not believe the former Vice President wants an attack. He did not say that," Gimigliano said. "He was simply expressing his profound disagreement with the assertion that President Obama's security policies have made our country less safe. Nor did he question anyone's motives."

What the hell? The CIA felt the need to apologize to freakin' DICK CHENEY????

What is wrong with these people!

As Bartcop says, Why is my party so full of wimps?

Maybe it's time for something else

The blogs and news reports are buzzing with reports about how the anti-abortion women controller wannabes are still dancing with glee at the assassination of Dr. Tiller. The line essentially is The murder was wrong (politically correct part) but the guy deserved it! Even the brave "baby-saving" murderer Roeder, when he's not whining about how he's being treated in jail, basically says he'd do it again and others are planning on doing what he did too.

What's coming through loud and clear here is this:
They. Won't. Stop. Ever.

It just might be time to make them.

I know, I know....we can't be like them! That would be bad!

Screw that.

I'm getting my inspiration here from a program I watched on the History International Channel. Turns out that after the Civil War, the South didn't just quietly go off, accept their defeat, lick their wounds and cry into their mint juleps over their "lost honor and civilization."

Nope, a lot of them kept on killing US soldiers and blacks even after Lee's surrender. They even organized into terrorist groups to keep them nigras in line and not voting (something Southern blacks had the right to do after the Civil War and the ratification of the 14th Amendment) - they even had a kewl name for it, the Ku Klux Klan. Historians refer to this period of American history as the Second Civil War. I'd heard of the Klan, but this Second Civil War thing was news to me.

Oh, and this "terrorism doesn't work" bit? Well, it sure did then and even now - blacks stayed away from the polls in droves back then and so did the "yankees." Now, the family of the murdered doctor just announced that his clinic will not be re-opening. That leaves only two clinics in the entire country that are available if late term abortions are necessary.

Let me repeat that: That's TWO clinics for the whole United States of America.

What struck me most about the program was what worked as the best and most effective way it was responded to. People who wanted to talk and reason ended up dead. Blacks who tried to peacefully exercise their voting rights - dead. Oddly enough, when there were people who were just as willing to make the terrorizers as dead as their victims, only then did the killing stop.

Hmm, are we missing a lesson from history here? Might be!

If you really want the extremist anti-abortion terrorists to quit, start using their tactics against them. Picket their churches. Picket them at their homes. Show up at their rallies with pictures of dead Iraqi kids - most of the anti-abortion nuts think that's just peachy. Shout down their speakers. Disrupt their meetings. Show them there's a price for calling for murder and terrorism.

Peacefully, of course. God forbid that I should suggest that when they take down one of ours, take two of theirs. Got bullseye, Randall Terry? No, I wouldn't do that - that would be bad.

But they would deserve it.

Two Attacks on Americans

Yesterday there were two attacks on Americans on American soil that dominated the discussion, at least online in the email groups. One, of course, the assassination of 67 year old Dr. Tiller as he was handing out bulletins at his church in Kansas on Sunday, the second was the attack on a Navy recruiting station by a man who covnverted to Islam that killed two sailors and injured another. Two killers - one white, one black and both looking to be part of networks that urged them on to do what they did.

We don't know for sure about the networks - the terrorist doctor murderer looks to have been at least surrounded by people who thought killing a doctor who, among his other duties as an ob/gyn, did abortions was a good thing. The Navy attacker was being watched by the FBI on his return from Yemen, where he had been arrested. We don't know for sure if either of them were directed or even given the suggestion to do what they did by others but the possibility is there and strong.

Before anyone goes ballistic on my use of terms here (terrorist for the doctor killer, attacker for the Navy recruiter murderer), I suggest whoever that might be go to dictionary.com and look up the word "terrorism." It basically defines the term as violent attacks on civilians for political aims. Dr. Tiller matches that criteria, members of the United States Navy who are members of the US military do not. 9/11 was a terrorist act, the bombing of the USS Cole was an attack on a military target - both were attacks on Americans.

I'm not going to rehash the arguments about both here - they are more than available across the web. The real question is where do we go from here.

What's going to happen to prevent either or both of those attacks?

Unfortunately, not much.

The Obama administration will send out US Marshalls to protect healthcare providers and clinics but they won't be there forever. The anti-abortion extremist Christians will still call for attacks on "abortion doctors" and as long as they aren't directly involved in those attacks, they get to do that here under the First Amendment. It's been said that freedom of speech protections were put into the Constitution not to make it safe for speech we like - it was put in to protect speech we hate. The good news here is if the government can't outlaw speech we don't like, we have the option of using our right to free speech to condemn and shout the haters down.

In the case of the attack on the Navy recruiting station, I think that was a matter of time before that happened. Not because of what the Navy is - it is because of how easy it is to get the explosives, guns and ammo to commit such an act. Muslim extremists will still preach hatred against us and urge attacks on us regardless here and around the world.

We can discuss the motives and beliefs of both attackers, but the bottom line is that they were done by two guys with guns.

As a country, we can keep an eye on these people and hope we catch them before they act. We can speak out to see to it that the beliefs that ended in three deaths aren't given a free ride and are roundly denounced. Otherwise, we hope that works and wait for the next time it happens. Damn it.