Perhaps a kick in the teeth, as well… Gotta love this one  from the Hill…  Anxious  Republicans fear another beating:

Nine months after Republicans were routed in the midterm  elections, campaign observers, K Street lobbyists and political experts say  there is little evidence the party can rebound in 2008.

The same bad news – the president's low approval ratings, opposition to the  war in Iraq, and the lingering taint of congressional scandal, from the Jack  Abramoff investigation to Sen. David Vitter's (La.) involvement with the alleged  “D.C. Madam” – leave observers skeptical that the GOP can dent Democratic  majorities, let alone reclaim power in the next election.

    “The only thing that has changed is that everything that  was bad got worse,” said Bernadette Budde, political director of the Business  Industry Political Action Committee. BIPAC supports business-friendly candidates  of both parties, though most of the group's donations go to Republicans.

If the election were held today, “We'd be lucky to hold our own,” one House  Republican said.”

Don't giggle with glee just yet – more below the jump…

Aside from the “facism creep” of the past few years, howzabout  the fact that they're wrong on just about everything?  Gorver Norquist believes thy can still pull it together if it weren't for that  Iraq thingie::

Grover Norquist, director of Americans for Tax Reform, believes the conservative coalition of anti-tax, pro-gun and anti-abortion advocates can still deliver elections, but only if Iraq does not remain the central issue in voters' minds.

So, by this (il)logic, America is still really a bunch of antitax, antichoice gun nuts, we're just a little miffed about the Iraq thing. Uh, okay. Oh, wait.. I get it… that vocal minority of Americans can still get their collective heads out of their asses and away from their Left Behind books and Ted Nugent gun videos to pull of one more for the Gipper. Say it again… uh, okay. Quite a big “only if”, dontcha think? Eh, hell with Norquist… I think this Grover's a lot smarter anyways:

Now, I'm not expecting thngs to turn around too quickly in '08, even if the Dems get more seats and the WH, which is a very real possibility. At least they won't get worse. It's just that there's still no bold, progressive agenda to be seen anywhere, and I fear the squandering of an historic opportunity which results in another backlash and then another 1994. Lest you think I'm being poopy on this, I fully realize that perhaps when the Republican minority is more minor (and the Lieberman problem is effectively neutralized), there's not the constant obstructionsm and they're busy licking their wounds or thier hookers' feet, perhaps some good positive change could actually happen (odds are even greater if Hillary doesn't make it to the WH). I'm still quite jaded, but at least “wait and see” is finally entering the brain dialog.

Now, this isn't just another cynical rant brought on by madness 12 hours alternating in the blistering sun and in my dank, dark crawlspace (see here for more on that..). The larger point I'm trying to make is that it's pretty likely that the GOP is going to be taken to the cleaners in '08, and we can't use that as an excuse to be complacent. We need to keep the pressure on the Dems, both for positive change and undoing the damage of the last 12 years of Repub rule. It's time to stop “practicing” democracy and start getting it right.

crossposted on five before chaos. Sorry.

I'm not kidding:

President Bush will undergo a routine colonoscopy Saturday, and will transfer power to Vice President Dick Cheney during the procedure, expected to take about two and a half hours, the chief White House spokesman said.

Let's hope nothing too serious happens.

( – promoted by JDRyan)

A few months ago, I let you know about the Farm Bill reauthorization that is going on in Washington right now. This is a very important bill that has huge ramifications for all farmers, as well as rural development issues and and nutrition. As the Times-Argus is reporting, there's some good and bad to be had in the new bill. A major issue that caught my eye was this:

The House Agriculture Committee voted Wednesday to ban federal subsidies to farmers with incomes averaging more than $1 million a year and stop farmers from collecting payments for multiple properties.

Only farmers whose incomes exceed $2.5 million a year are now disqualified from such aid. More below the jump.

If I'm reading this correctly, this is a substantial blow to Big Agribusiness who, putting aside whether the idea of any farm subsidies are good or bad benefit much more than a small or even mid-sized family farm.  Factory farms, in particular reap a huge windfall at the taxpayer trough:

Research by Tufts University has shown that from 1997 to 2005, the four largest broiler chicken companies paid $5 billion less than the cost of production for their feed — mostly corn and soybean meal produced by family farmers. The four largest hog companies (producing 50 percent of U.S. hogs) paid $3 billion less than the cost of production for their feed.

So, although the bill also increases direct subsidy amounts (non-production related),if this subsidy cap makes it into the final legislation, it is a huge step forward in scaling back corporate welfare, although there's still a long way to go to keep local family farms functioning and not struggling so much. It takes on even more relevace when VT dairy farms have had one of the worst years in three decades last year.

Some other highlights from the article are  mixed bag, such as boosting support for fruit and vegetable producers, reauthorizing federal nutrition programs, including food stamps, increasing subsidies for some conservation programs that pay farmers to protect environmentally sensitive land,and providing loan guarantees for ethanol refineries. Personally, I'm not too thrilled about the ethanol subsidies… we're currently subsidizing it to the tune of 51 cents per gallon,  the increase in corn use is causeing food prices to go up, and there's a host other problems with the program, as well.  

The House may take action on it this year and there has been no action from the Senate as of yet. I'll keep you posted with any new developments I hear on this important bill. 

Nope, nothing about impeachment or the clowns known as the 'legislature' here.

It's safe to assume that all of our readers have at least a fleeting interest in politics, I mean, you're not coming here for recipies, right? And then there are others…they're like the Trekkies of politics, not just interested in the current events, but the actual history of politics. Well, my friends, I have something for you that I stumbled upon a few nights ago. The University of Virginia's Miller Center for Public Affairs has a great site here that is full of thousands of hours of recordings of presidential conversations, many secretly recorded… and it's not just Nixon:

Between 1940 and 1973, six American presidents from both political parties secretly recorded just under 5,000 hours of conversations. This site is designed as a service to the research community by making freely available all of the presidential recordings, along with relevant research materials, so that scholars, teachers, students, and the public can hear and use these remarkable tapes for themselves.

Lots of good stuff there, from the Nixon stuff to JFK discussing the pros and cons of withdrawing from Vietnam, even FDR speaking about African-Americans in the military. Yeah, I know, it's for the political diehards, but if you are one of those kinds, you can now have some junk food as well as get a great glimpse into little-known history. Enjoy. 

( – promoted by JDRyan)

crossposted on five before chaos.

Those of you who live in the Northeast Kingdom of VT are indeed living in a beautiful place… lots of friendly people, beautiful scenery and other quintessential Vermont goodness. The one big drawback you have is that the newspaper is the Caledonian Record, whose rabid right-wing op-ed pages are, more often than not, so mind-numbingly short on logic, and chock full of so many double standards, compartmentalized thinking, xenophobia, false 'patriotism' and plain ol' b.s. that they could pass for transcripts for right-wing talk radio…like this one I wrote about a while ago.

Anyways, an anonymous tipster led me to the revelation that not only are the editors of the C.R. op-ed severely intellectually challenged, they're also incredibly lazy. You see, it seems like some of the material from their op-eds come from a rather unlikely source… those stupid right-wing spam emails that your crazy Republican uncle sends you. I'm not kidding. More below the fold…

You know those emails.. usually containing something about God, lazy illegal brown people, terrorist brown people, Hillary Clinton Satanic lesbian conspiracies, etc. And as always, untrue. Well, it seems like the lazy hacks at the CR, like most far-right ideologues, can't be bothered to fact-check. Remember, their patron saint Reagan did say “facts are stupid things“. Here's a few examples.

On Feb. 1st of this year, the C.R. ran an op-ed called “Not 'Fonda' Hanoi Jane”. Yeah, I know, you've undoubtedly seen it on a bumper sticker somewhere, usually next to a “Bush/Cheney” or “Charlton Heston is my President” sticker. Frightfully original, I know. Anyways, it was in regards to some Barbara Walters special where Jane Fonda was selected as one of the “100 Women of the Century”. The C.R. rants about Fonda's well-known controversial visit with the North Vietnamese during the Vietnam War, but one passage stands out in particular:

“In one disgraceful traitorous act, Fonda went down a line of prisoners who secretly gave her scraps of paper with their identities on them to let their families know that they were alive. At the end of the line, she gave the papers to her North Vietnamese escort. Three of the men died from the beatings that followed this betrayal.”

Now, the lazy part. You're probably familiar with Snopes.com, a site that is dedicated to debunking and confirming certain urban legends, rumours, etc. If you're not, you should be. And Snopes spends a good amount of time dealing with those aforementioned right-wing spam email rumors. And in just five seconds, five seconds which the C.R. editors couldn't be bothered to take to fact-check, because they're too busy watching O'Reilly, Savage and Boortz and reading those crazy-uncle emails, Snopes set the record straight, and yes, it was one of those emails:

[The most serious accusations] that Fonda turned over slips of paper furtively given to her by American POW's to the North Vietnamese and that several POW's were beaten to death as a result, are untrue. Those named in the inflammatory e-mail have repeatedly and categorically denied the events they were supposedly a part of.

“It's a figment of sombody's imagination,” say Ret. Col. Larry Carrigan, one of the servicemen mentioned in the 'slips of paper' incident. Carrigan was shot down over North Vietnam in 1967 and did spend time in a POW camp. He has no idea why the story was attributed to him, saying, “I never met Jane Fonda.” In 2005, the Minneapolis Star Tribune reported that Carrigan is “so tired of having to repeat that he wasn't beaten after Fonda's visit and that there were no beating deaths at the time that he won't talk to the media anymore.”

Ridiculous? Yes. Surprised? Of course not. But wait, there's more.

It's pretty obvious that some on the far-right end of the spectrum are a bit short in the compassion department in regards to the whole Hurricane Katrina mess (might be that 'lazy brown people' thing). This one is about something that 'crossed the desk' of the op-ed staff at the C.R., in regards to understanding how large “a billion” really is.

• A billion seconds ago it was 1959.
• A billion minutes ago Jesus had recently died and Christianity was in its infancy.
• A billion hours ago our ancestors were living in the Stone Age.
• A billion days ago no one walked on the Earth on two feet.

Apparently one of them knows how to use a calculator because they then give a few examples of what one billion dollars could buy, such as 50,022 Subaru Outbacks and 43,478,260 seats at Fenway Park. They then point out how  Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA), is asking the Congress for $250 billion to help rebuild New Orleans, and then present us with these numbers:

• If you are one of the 484,674 residents of New Orleans (every man, woman, child), you each get $516,528.

• If you have one of the 188,251 homes in New Orleans, your home gets $1,329,787.

• Or, if you are a family of four, your family gets $2,066,012. 

Wow, from destitute and poor to millionaire overnight! What a country! Well, wouldn't you know that Snopes points out that exact same right-wing spam email with the same numbers, the only difference being the Snopes e-mail also has a witty comment at the end suggesting we should all flood our houses so we can be on the “big easy” street the rest of our lives, and the CR has a dig at the Senator about her love of earmarks. Ah, winger wit. Pathetic. And some of the math is wrong, I hear.  Oh, and there are no plans to disperse over 2 million dollars to each family of four, either.

So what is it? Stupid and lazy? Low expectations from the readers or perhaps they take their readers for granted? I can see a typical morning  in the pressroom, where C.R. “columnists” (and I say that with a very loose interpretation of the word), check their emails and whoever can come up with the biggest whopper gets a free donut. Either that or they just pull them off of Snopes, figuring that the readers that agree with them aren't going to be bothered to check the facts anyways. I hear that their next op-ed involves something about how the face of the devil really was in the smoke when the Twin Towers fell, or how huge alligators live in the St. Johnsbury sewers, where they grow to enormous size after being flushed down the toilet by pet owners who think they're getting too big.

So, if you'd like to give them a hand with their fine journalistic prowess, feel free to drop executive editor Dana Gray a line here with your tips, and also, why not drop publisher Mark M. Smith a line here and ask him why he thinks so lowly of the intelligence of the Northeast Kingdom residents he's supposed to be informing. And remember, if it has something to do with Hillary Clinton eating babies or Barack Obama praying in a mosque and firing an AK47 into the air while screaming “death to the infidels!” as he helps illegal gay Mexicans sneak across the U.S. border, be ready to see an op-ed about it shortly. Heck, maybe you'll get a job in the editorial room.

Last month, I let you know about how so-called “independent Democrat”Joe Lieberman (I-but-really-an-R-CT) was helping with a fundraiser to re-elect Republican senator and Bush lapdog Susan Collins, of Maine. Well, there's some good news in all of that. Thanks to the efforts of Moveon.org, Lieberman's effort is helping raise cash… for Collins' opponent, as The Swamp reports:

The word went out from MoveOn Tuesday: Donate money to defeat Collins, who could face a tough re-election battle next year, it told members in an e-mail.

Within 24 hours, more than 5,600 members donated an average of $63 each, for a total of $355,000. 

MoveOn, knowing a good thing, decided to keep it going, and Wednesday sent out another e-mail.

“Wow,” the organization said. “In less than 24 hours, thousands of us around the country chipped in more than $280,000 to help anti-war candidates beat Joe Lieberman's pro-war fundraiser. It's amazing.

Must be that “law of unintended consequences” thing you hear about every now and then. Keep up the good work, Joe.

No, it's not a hit piece involving corruption or anything. It's not even a hit piece, but I'll bet it got your attention. Paul at Alien and Sedition draws a rather apt comparison to how the conservative movement reacted to Nixon and how the progressive movement could react towards a Hillary Clinton presidency:

All interesting enough. But a more instructive comparison for the progressive movement might be between Hillary and Nixon. The right wing, never particularly fond of Nixon, turned on him with a vengeance after he had been in office for a couple of years. If we wind up with a President Hillary, the progresssive grassroots/netroots could find itself in a similar state. After all we've done, why are we going back to this? Why are we going back to Bill Clinton and triangulation? Echoes of: Why are we going back to Eisenhower and Keynesianism and internationalism? What really makes the parallel amusingly complete is how Hillary's right-wing enemies, like Nixon's on the left, see her as the ebodiment of extremism, while her own party's activists view her as little more than a self-interested centrist.

It's a quick interesting read, and I've often asked myself the same questions in regard to a H.C. presidency being a HUGE step backwards for our movements. Check it out, it's worth a look and a ponder.

Last week, I wrote about some of the horrible energy legislation coming up in the Senate. A particular aspect, which has generated a lot of controversy, is Presidential hopeful Barack Obama's co-sposorship of energy legislation that contains huge subsidies for the coal industry, in the form of money for 'coal liquification', that is, making usable oil and gasoline from coal. Like many others, I believe Obama is showing an astounding lack of leadership on this issue, and it's making his statements that he is “serious” about global warming a bit hard to take seriously. More below the jump.

Coal-to-liquid technology (CTL), also called the Fischer-Tropsch process, has been around since the 1920's, and was used in Nazi Germany and South Africa, according to Neiman Watchdog. And it's no bargain:

The basic technology is expensive. The U.S. launched the multi-billion-dollar Synthetic Fuels Corporation during the oil-price shocks of the Carter administration to gain some protection against geopolitical blackmail like the Arab oil embargo and the emerging market power of OPEC. But after some $8 billion in spending, the Synfuels Corp. was dismantled during the Reagan administration, partly because it produced few results and partly because the price of oil dropped to levels where coal-to-liquids no longer had any commercial feasibility. The Reagan administration pointed with wagging finger to the episode as a lesson in why government should not intervene in free markets.

Coal-to-liquids costs more in energy as well as in dollars. It takes a lot of energy, both as feedstock and process heat, presumably in the form of coal, to make a small amount of liquid fuel.

Finally, coal-to-liquids technology, at the current state of the art, is no environmental bargain. It produces a lot more carbon dioxide (the principal gas causing global warming) than conventional petroleum or coal. The coal industry claims that this problem could be overcome by capturing and sequestering the carbon dioxide underground – but the technical ability to do this may be years away for most sites and is not provided for in the coal-to-liquids bill.

Industry advocates often refer to coal-derived liquid fuel as “clean.” But they are referring to the amount of pollution it emits, relative to conventional diesel or gasoline, when burned in a car engine. The real problem is the emissions produced in making the fuel in the first place.

We often heard Dick Cheney mention 'clean-coal technologies' in the Presidential campaigns. What an endorsement. Al Gore has called it a “terrible mistake”.

Now, Obama represents Illinois, which is the seventh largest coal producing state in the country, according to the U.S. Department of Energy, and nearly 32 million tons of Illinois coal were mined in 2005, generating nearly $1 billion in gross revenue. Those aren't small numbers. And look at what Obama and others want to give the coal industry (it's behind the Times Select archive, so I'm not linking):

Among the proposed inducements winding through House and Senate committees: loan guarantees for six to 10 major coal-to-liquid plants, each likely to cost at least $3 billion; a tax credit of 51 cents for every gallon of coal-based fuel sold through 2020; automatic subsidies if oil prices drop below $40 a barrel; and permission for the Air Force to sign 25-year contracts for almost a billion gallons a year of coal-based jet fuel.

Did you get that? Automatic subsidies if oil drops below $40 a barrel? Great use of your tax dollars, eh?

Now, Obama has defended this from the idea of 'energy independence', meaning that we should do this to wean ourselves of the Middle Eastern oil teat. Noble, sure, but incredibly short-sighted. As Eco-Geek points out:

The technology to convert coal to liquid fuel has existed since the 1920s. If congress were to mandate and fund its implementation America would begin to slowly gain energy independence, Peabody Coal's net worth would increase tenfold to roughly $3.6 trillion, the Appalachian Mountains would be destroyed and U.S. carbon emissions would double. This is a bad idea.

Unless, of course, you like your mountaintops looking like this:

Photo: Vivian Stockman/SouthWings

Is this the kind of vision Obama has for the Appalachians? All of the inspirational rhetoric in the world isn't going to make this any better.

Now, let me be clear here. I'm not writing this as one of those “my candidate is better” angles, because other than 'anyone but Hillary”, I don't have a candidate right now. This crap is par for the course, more particularly if one is a Republican, and  everything is measured by its worth in dollar signs and nothing else. But green issues are at the top of my list and Obama is failing miserably on this, and last I checked, he wasn't running for the GOP nomination. There's no way of spinning out of the fact that he's got Big Coal's back on this one. And this isn't doing anything, anything at all to help move this country to a sustainable energy policy. Zip. Zero. We need a leader who is going to lead on this, and that means thinking outside of the box, acknowledging that our habits will need to change, and acknowledging that certain industries' days are numbered. That takes some real courage. And the Netroots aren't happy about this, either. Stoller:

I just don't get it.  I really don't.  But I think a lot of this kind of nonsense has to do with a basic lack of responsibility among citizens.  Last week, I spoke to a friend who graduated from Harvard Law and just got done clerking for a high level judge.  He's smart and highly credentialled, and he supports Obama because he thinks Obama doesn't believe in American exceptionalism and will decolonize our foreign policy.  I walked him through the rhetoric which showed him that this was just not true, and he acknowledged that Obama's rhetoric was at odds with what he believed about Obama.  And yet, he just didn't care.  He just offered that Obama was saying this because he had to say it to get elected.

And this post, though about Obama, could be about any of them.  Here we have a clear example of how Obama just doesn't take global warming seriously as a Senator, pushing for billions of dollars of carbon spewing coal subsidies.  And yet he's going to go on and talk about a different type of politics, and blow away fundraising numbers and continue to have people talk about how he's this great progressive.  It's crazy.  It's like Hillary Clinton hiring a union-buster as her chief strategist, and the AFL-CIO and Change to Win being… silent.

And Alex UA at FutureMajority:

Why would Obama make such a brazen anti-environmentalist move, one that flies in the face of the cries for action on carbon emissions from the American Public and the World? Obama's excuse is that it is for energy independence, after all, if you don't support pushing us further towards environmental catastrophe then the terrorists have already won. Of course the real reason is the same reason that made me decide that I wouldn't go anywhere near politics as a young man: Obama's state is full of coal, and the powerful people who have given him the millions of dollars to run for Senate and the Presidency want payback.

My big question is do Democratic voters care enough about the Global Warming issue to make it a wedge issue for the election? Are people so lulled to sleep by Obama's pillow talk that they fail to understand how morally repugnant his actions are?

 Preston DK at the enviro-blog Jetson Green:

But, recently, I've gone away from Obama, but not for any single issue.  Why, you ask?  Because it is clear he makes decisions based on money or popularity, or both.  Coal is big in his state, and the lobby is really strong.  But he capitulated to the lobby and made a decision that was unhealthy for the American people.  That's illustrative of character.  Who's going to be the politician that will stand up to the lobby and say, “I'm sorry, but that's not right for America.”  If we're going to be serious about bandying support for Al Gore's documentary, supporting coal-to-liquid is a blatant contradiction.  You can't support efforts to stop global warming and support coal-to-liquid (in its current form). 

Who, indeed? Now, as one who's never quite understood the Obama phenomenon, I'm not surprised by any of this. But to the Obama supporters out there, instead of trying to rationalize this away (as so many have), why not put some pressure on your man to change his mind and show some of that 'courage' that he seems to be so fond of talking about all of the time? A press release from Obama didn't really clear anything up:

“Today's incorrect story in CongressDaily 'Senate Debate Is Likely To Test Party, Regional Priorities,' misstates Senator Obama's position on the development of coal-to-liquid fuels.  Senator Obama recognizes that global warming is one of the most significant problems that we face.  He supports an 80% reduction in carbon emissions from all sources by 2050 and a 10% reduction in the carbon emissions of transportation fuels by 2020.  Senator Obama supports research into all technologies to help solve our climate change and energy dependence problems, including shifting our energy use to renewable fuels and investing in technology that could make coal a clean burning source of energy.  However, unless and until this technology is perfected, Senator Obama will not support the development of any coal-to-liquid fuels unless they emit at least 20% less life-cycle carbon than conventional fuels.  If an amendment is offered on the Senate floor that would provide incentives for – or mandate the use of – coal-to-liquid fuels without these environmental safeguards, Senator Obama will oppose the amendment.”

Howzabout opposing the bill, Senator? Last I checked, you were still a cosponsor.

Clem Guttata at WV Blue, the West Viginia Sopblox blog (and a state that has been devastated by mountaintop mining in more ways than one could count) calls for a time out:

There are many better alternatives to this corporate welfare–alternative that can help reduce America's energy dependence, start reducing our carbon foot-print, and produce high-paying technology-based jobs:

1. Invest that money in light rail, a smart electrical grid, energy efficiency, fuel efficiency, smart buildings, and the myriad of other American technologies to reduce energy consumption. For a top 10 list of good ideas, look no further than Al Gore's recent testimony to Congress.

2. Clean up coal first before giving the industry any subsidies: (a) require all coal-burning power plants to use the latest clean air technology, (b) solve the technical problem of carbon sequestration for CTL before approving any industry subsidies, not afterwards, and (c) end mountain-top removal forever more first.

3. What's the hurry to expand coal production today? Why not leave our coal reserves where they are for another 30-50 years? Let's wait until we figure out how to extract them without the devastating human, societal, and environmental damage caused by mountain top removal (MTR). The world may be all but out of oil by then, our coal will be worth even more, and maybe (just maybe) we'll have technology right to truly have clean coal.

I don't think we'll ever have 'clean coal. And like I said, even if we did, it's a non-renewable resource. We really need a candidate who is going to address these issues forcefully, and foreward thinking. I'm not convinced that there's one running at this point. And unless we hoot and holler about it, we're not going to get one.

 UPDATED: More on Obama's supposed about-face on this here. I'm still not clear, was the coal provison an amendment he's no longer supporting or is it part of the actual bill? If it's an amendment, then he did the right thing. But it still begs the question as to why he would have gotten on board in the first place, and the fact that it's still supporting a 20th century energy policy. 

A bit of enviro news for y'all, a shocking and enraging story from Deep Sea News. The military's treatment of the oceans are well known whether it be SONAR testing that harms ocean mammals or nuclear testing. It's just been revealed that the ocean is apparently a great munitions dump, as well:

“The Army now admits that it secretly dumped 64 million pounds of nerve and mustard agents into the sea, along with 400,000 chemical-filled bombs, land mines and rockets and more than 500 tons of radioactive waste – either tossed overboard or packed into the holds of scuttled vessels.”

Apparently, dolphins have washed up on shore with mustard gas burns and such, it's not a pretty sight. It seems the military's path of destruction isn't limited to the just the Middle East. It would be nice to think that heads will roll over this, but I'm not holding my breath, as 'accountablity' isn't in the current regime's vocabulary. Have a look. There's even maps that show where the dumps occured.

crossposted at five before chaos.

I was originally starting this off as a post on Sam Brownback, but chances are, if you follow the doings of the theocratic wingnuts, you probably already know about crazy Sam, and it's not like he has a chance in hell of getting the GOP nomination anyways, so why bother wasting anymore pixels on him?

Anyways, I was over at the Anti-Sam Brownback Blog and caught wind of this piece over at RedState.com called “They All Suck”. Yep, for once they were actually correct about something – the sorry state of the current GOP roster of presidential candidates. But a look through the comments was rather revealing as to how clueless these people at RedState really are. They really do have theat Krazy Konservative Kool-Aid running through their veins. Hop below the fold for some choice excerpts as we take a laughable… and sometimes frightening journey (cue ominous music here) … into the Conservative Brain Stem!

First off, we know that many cons have to construct their own parallel universes so their worldviews can actually exist… Apparently this parallel universe also has its own set of lefty blogs….

• (on Newt Gingrich) – “I pick up on a lot of the liberal leaning blogs that Newt is their perceived general election winner.“
• “I always read Daily Kos to see what's going on in la la land, and apparently quite a number of them are pretty scared of Huckabee. They were saying things like, “He nailed it on John Stewart last night” and “He might be a wingnut, but he camouflages it well.”

Keep an eye out for my upcoming piece on why we all need to fear the upcoming and very real possibility of Tom Tancredo not only getting the GOP nomination but the White House itself. Brown people, beware.

In RedState world, machismo still rules supreme, coupled by a pants-pooping fear of ‘the jihadists’. It’s really all about supporting the guy who talks the most like a tough-guy badass (and almost certainly has never served in the military).Or at least someone who's not afraid to remove someone from a theater:

• (on Giuliani) – He was inspirational after 9/11, even while he, himself, was greiving the loss of personal friends. He never wavered on terrorism, even before 9/11. He did throw Arafat out of some concert in 1995.
• Rudy gets it when it comes to what this country faces and he IS America's mayor. We have to have someone with the moral authority lead 60% of this country in the war and neutralize the left. Bush has lost is ability to do that and I'm not even sure Rudy can pull it off but he has the best shot in the lot. As long as 60% of the country remains bliss to or in denial of the threats we face we're doomed to a fate far worse than 9/11.
• Cheer up. The candidate we get may not be as conservative as you like — particularly on social matters. But, by far, the most important thing facing us right now is the jihadist threat.

And of course, there’s those that are truly clueless. It’s amazing they know how to even turn on a computer:

• Brownback! And, why is Jeb (Bush) never mentioned? I know it sounds dynastic, but who could deny he has everything? He's right on social issues and fiscal issues. And many of our wavering Senators would see him as a savior to look forward to.
• Has Jeb absolutely said he won't run? Couldn't we draft him?
• I would also love to see Lynn Cheney in the hunt for either top office! Wouldn't you love to see that? All the focus and courage of her husband, but with twice the eloquence and none of the baggage.
• Who says an older white guy can't have a “compelling life story”? I'd say that Fred Thompson pretty much qualifies in that regard and would be a darn sight better than some of the announced candidates. If we can't persuade Big Fred to run, then Haley Barbour would be an excellent choice.

I can see it now, another Bush/Cheney ticket, this one being Jeb and Lynne. All of the corruption and incompetence that you’ve come to know and love from the Bush family brand, and as an added bonus, the “focus and courage” that is synonymous with the name “Cheney”!  We’re talking landslide, here, folks, a Gore/Obama ticket wouldn’t even break single digits against Bush/Cheney: The Sequel. And I can’t wait to hear about Fred Thompson’s “compelling life story” as a second-rate actor and a hardcore K-Street lobbyist! We’re talking some serious stuff here, maybe even TV-movie-of-the-week, if there’s a lot of details about his wife, who’s old enough to be his granddaughter.

I’ve always avoided the righty blogs for various reasons, mostly they’re wrong about everything (aside from the homophobia, warmongering, racism, theocracy, etc.). But who knew I was missing out on so much humor?!?