Arizona: Republican Party

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The Affordable Health Care for America Act was supposed to be the first time since Medicare was enacted in 1965 that health care was reformed to move the country closer to universal medical coverage for all of its citizens.

Instead, the bill was hijacked by anti-abortion activists to enact the most regressive anti-reproductive freedom of choice for women provision in the past 30 years. Apparently conservatives in both political parties don't want government run health care except forwomen so that government can dictate their reproductive health care choices. (Also to dictate all of our end-of-life decisions, aka"death panels" and Terri Schiavo government intervention).

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

How do you take the textbook definition of a "safe" Republican district (a Democrat has not represented the region since 1854), a no-brainer that the Republican will win by default against token Democratic opposition, and lose the seat for the first time in 155 years? By caving in to pressure from the far-right extremist fringe Teabagger Taliban and the Mighty Wurlitzer of right-wing conservative "entertainment" personalities.

Blue Dog Democrat Bill Owens, the token opposition, won a stunning victory in the special congressional election in New York's 23rd congressional district only because the GOP Taliban and the conservative "entertainment" personalities declared civil war against GOP moderates and the GOP establishment, demanding ideological purity to conservativism - as they have defined it.

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

New York Times columnist Frank Rich has more on the GOP civil war in the NY-23 special election for Congress. There will be no "winner" in this race. The big loser, however, is the Republican Party. The G.O.P. Stalinists Invade Upstate New York:

[P]reposterous as it sounds, the real action migrated to New York’s 23rd, a rural Congressional district abutting Canada. That this pastoral setting could become a G.O.P. killing field, attracting an all-star cast of combatants led by Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, William Kristol and Newt Gingrich, is a premise out of a Depression-era screwball comedy. But such farces have become the norm for the conservative movement — whether the participants are dressing up in full “tea party” drag or not.

by David Safier

Last week I broke tradition and put my Explorer column on BfA, the one about Jefferson's "Tree of liberty" quote that is beloved to lots of wingnuts.

Over at the Explorer, I got more comments than I think I've ever received, and none of the commenters are all too fond of me. I'm sure week after week they think I'm a liberal idiot (liberal with my idiocy?), but this column struck a nerve.

Here are some of the comments, excerpts or the whole thing. I'm sure these folks will say I'm quoting them out of context, which I am, but anyone can go to the column (which, unfortunately, disappears into the ether on Wednesday) and read the comments in all their glory.