Yet if the "religious family-values party"
Posted By: sbMT on 2008-12-18
In Reply to: Bristol Palin's Due Date - Curious
had tried to hide her or condemn her you all would have been all over that too.
Everyone makes mistakes, God says to love them anyways. Get over it.
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Either way, it makes the family values party look bad.
Hiding it would have caused a major uproar, and giving them a standing ovation made the family values party look absolutely ridiculous. Using Sarah Palin's children as props throughout the campaign, made the entire Republican party look bad!
Family values....Obama's family can't even agree
@@
family values
She was left unsupervised at a very critical age (like the Down baby will be) and did not receive enough parental guidance to prevent this tragedy.
family values
Barack and Michelle have been married for years with not a hint of scandal. they have two beautiful age-appropriate children. Joe Biden has a beautiful blended family that truly loves each other. McCain dumped his gravely injured first wife for a beauty queen. Then he was pressured into picking another beauty queen with an Down infant who obviously needs a full time mother and pregnant teenager for his running mate. Family values, family values, family values.
So you are saying now that they have NO family values because their...
daughter is pregnant and not married? Are you REALLY saying that?
Yeah...that and family values!
Bush Family Values
Bush Family Values
MICHAEL DONNELLY | September 8 2006
It's astonishing to see how desperate our homegrown fascists have become. The entire cabal is in full-on media blitz mode with Rummy, Dick and Theodosius, er, Bush slamming their foreign opponents with the latest absurd tag Islamic Fascists; and, their domestic ones as Nazi appeasers. Or, in the deranged mind of Condi Rice; domestic opponents are tantamount to folks who would have stopped the Civil War and allowed slavery to continue in the South.
It's not just desperate; it's monumentally moronic, given the real history. This bizarre trip on the Wayback Machine demands a deeper look--though don't look to the mainstream media. Given the opening, one would think that everyone by now would be fully informed that the Bush Family took Nazi appeasement to far greater heights and were actually part of an American faction of documented Nazi SUPPORTERS.
We're also unlikely to see much mainstream media analysis of the new Islamic Fascist branding of those opposing the Empire's designs on the Middle East. As Sir Winston Bush gets a media pass as he tries to conflate fascism, communism and Islam while also trying to ironically tie his criminal wars to WWII and the Cold War, it warrants our own trip on the Wayback Machine to see just what the Bush family was doing during those earlier good wars.
Samuel Bush: arms merchant
George W. Bush's great-grandfather, Samuel Bush was charter member of the military/industrial complex. In 1918, he was chief of the Ordnance, Small Arms and Ammunition Section for the War Industries Board, with oversight responsibility for Percy Rockefeller's Remington Company. Rockefeller had helped get Bush's son, Prescott into Yale and Skull and Bones in 1916.
A 1926 Senate Munitions Inquiry (the Nye Committee) into the military/industrial complex's WWI windfall examined Samuel Bush's dealings with Remington as part of his War Industries Board duties. Virtually ALL of the records of Samuel Bush's efforts were destroyed by the National Archives to save space.
Prescott Sheldon Bush; George Herbert Walker: Nazi collaborators
George W. Bush's grandfather, former Connecticut Senator Prescott S. Bush was a Wall Street banker with Brown Brothers Harriman. (Averill Harriman was also instrumental in getting young Prescott into Yale and S&B.) Bush's maternal grandfather George Herbert Walker was the bank's first president. Walker built the famed Bush family estate at Kennebunkport on Walker Point. Prescott Bush joined W. A. Harriman & Company in 1926 and became its CEO.
Harriman Bank was the official Nazi financial conduit in the US. Closely tied to Fritz Thyssen, who proudly claimed in his 1941 book I Paid Hitler that he was the Nazi Party's first and greatest financial backer. The Union Banking Corporation (UBC) was a subsidiary of Harriman created by Walker and it was used for Nazi financial matters. Thyssen provided 100,000 gold marks ($10 million in today's dollars) to the Nazis in 1923 just prior to Hitler's failed putsch. By 1941, UBC held a private Nazi stash of over $3,000,000 ($36 million in today's dollars) in its New York vaults.
After the war, a Treasury Department investigation reported that during the two years after the Stock Market crash; Thyssen dedicated his fortune and his influence to the single purpose of bringing Hitler to power. In 1932, he arranged the now famous meeting in the Düsseldorf Industrialists' Club, at which Hitler addressed the leading businessmen of the Ruhr and the Rhineland. At the close of Hitler's speech, Thyssen cried, `Heil Herr Hitler'. By the time of the German elections later that year, Thyssen had succeeded in eliciting contributions to Hitler's campaign fund from all of the big industrial combines. He himself is reported to have spent 3,000,000 ($30 million today) marks on the Nazis in 1932 alone.
During 1933 Thyssen served as intercessor between von Hindenburg, von Papen, and Hitler. He brought them together at a secret meeting which laid the basis for the appointment of Hitler as Reichschancellor.
It was Thyssen, not Prescott Bush as some now claim, who was called Hitler's Angel by the New York Herald Tribune. He later fled Germany in 1939.
Even though Hitler had declared war on the US, it was still legal for UBC to conduct finances for the Nazis. But, after Pearl Harbor that outrage finally changed. After another ten months of Bush/Harriman/UBC work for the Nazis; in November 1942, under the Trading With the Enemy Act, all of the Harriman business interests were seized by the government, including UBC.
The assets were held by the government for the duration of the war and then quickly returned. Prescott Bush' interest in UBC consisted of One Share--worth $1,500,000 ($19 million in today's dollars) at the time UBC was disbanded in 1951. (The Harriman family garnered $4 billion!) It was the money used to start the Bush Family Texas oil empire.
Another Harriman subsidiary through Silesian Holding Co.; Consolidated Silesian Steel Corporation saw the Harriman-Bush group owning one-third of a complex of steel making, coal-mining, and zinc-mining activities in Germany and Poland. The other two-thirds were owned by Wehrwirtschaftsführer (Military Economy Leader) Friedrich Flick. Silesian Holding Company's president was George Walker and its sole directors were Prescott Bush and Averill Harriman.
Silesian Steel used slave labor from Auschwitz (even before the concentration camp was built there) in its coal, iron and zinc mining operations. At Nuremberg, Flick was sentenced to seven years for Silesian's role in building up the Nazi war machine. Harriman, Bush and Walker were never charged.
June 14, 1940, nine months after the Nazis conquered Poland, the IG Farben Company opened an Auschwitz factory and slave labor camp in occupied Poland, to produce artificial rubber and gasoline from coal. This was done in a partnership with Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company (EXXON).
The millions made off the labor of hundreds of thousands of Nazi victims were inherited by William S. Farish III, grandson of William S. Farish, the head of the IG/Standard cartel. Farish III is George H.W. Bush's best friend and the person who took over Bush's assets and managed them in a blind trust after Bush was elected vice-president.
Investigator John Loftus has said, As a former federal prosecutor, I would make a case for Prescott Bush, his father-in-law (George Walker) and Averill Harriman to be prosecuted for giving aid and comfort to the enemy. They remained on the boards of these companies knowing that they were of financial benefit to the nation of Germany.
I've yet to take the Wayback Machine back to investigate Rice's whopper that decrying the carnage of the U.S. Civil War meant supporting leaving Slavery in place. But, I'm pretty certain that the same unsavory links to what John Trudell calls, the colonial industrial class were just as odious in the 1860s.
Sex, Drugs and Oil - How's that for Family Values????
Oil man in office - SURPRISE!!!!
http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/10/news/economy/oil_officials.ap/index.htm?postversion=2008091015
What a hypocrit! Family values?
You think a man who has no problem with a baby left to die after a botched abortion has values of any kind?
Left to die in a bucket? Maybe you need to ask yourself what his true family values really are.
I do not think there will be anything negative from family values voters...
I do not believe they will react negatively to this. What kind of man would McCain have been to decide not to choose her just because her daughter was pregnant and not married. What if she was pregnant and married? This whole thing just reeks. Like Obama said...children should not be involved in politics and this will not affect her ability to function as governor or as vice president. At least one on the left is being decent about this.
Not swooning, just genuine family values.
Haven't seen those in Washington for a very long time. The family is beautiful, in my opinion. In fact, the more I read statements like yours, the more beautiful they become. Someone sounds jealous. Sad. 
Who cares if he has family values and loves this country!
Marital Fidelity and Family Values in Republican Candidates?
Should cut both ways, shouldn't it?
I'm providing the link to the article because I run the risk of posting profanity if I copy what some of these Republicans did, and as we all know, the words describing the deed is unacceptable, although the deed itself will be defended in Neoconville, as long as it's done by a Republican.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2006/0607.benen.html
Clinton and his party's values?
You refer to a morally bankrupt Clinton and his PARTY. I assume you mean the Democrats, all guilty by association. So then am I to draw the same conclusion that you believe that Foley and his party are also morally bankrupt?
I believe you have another post also generalizing the Democrats as all being sleazy, for lack of a better word. Perhaps I am wrong. I hope I am wrong.
Despite being a liberal, I feel that Foley is not representative of his party's values in general.
The "family values" party?
In one neighborhood in Los Angeles last night, every car and home that had an Obama bumper sticker or yard sign was spray painted with swastikas, racial slurs, and other messages of hate. Very similar to what is posted on this board by the rabid, right-wing, Bible-thumping Republicans. If racial intolerance, fire and brimstone, and seething hate is what "family values" is all about, count me out!!
Isn't the party line "good christian moral values" or something like that? sm
If they are going to espouse all that good moral values stuff, the least they could do would be to acknowledge it in their own loves. The GOP won the election (supposedly) on the stand that they would bring back all that good value bullcrap to government. So, I guess we're seeing it now, huh?
The "religious fanatics" thing is a cop-out.
nm
I agree too. I am tired of the "religious" right ....sm
touting their religion and beliefs to be the only way and injecting them into politics and government at every chance. Keep religion out of politics.
Yeah and guess what the Bush family has tight ties with the Bin Ladin family....
so give it all a rest would you.
I feel very sorry indeed for Sarah Palin and her family, she ran for VP, not her family, she should
on her experience, her political record, etc, period, no attacking children, and no one throwing stones at "sinner" daughters, that is what I mean, the media wants to put people on pedestals and then throw stones at them at they hunt down not just the public figure, but all their loved ones, I think it is disgusting, it is a HUMAN issue, has nothing to do with politics on either side, why twist my post that way?
Interview with Charmaine Neville, family member of the Neville musical family
September 7, 2005
Women were Being Raped, Babies were Being Killed, Alligators were Eating People, But Where the Hell was the National Guard?
How We Survived the Flood
By CHARMAINE NEVILLE
This is a transcription of an interview Charmaine Neville, of New Orleans's legendary Neville family, gave to local media outlets on Monday, September 5.
I was in my house when everything first started. When the hurricane came, it blew all the left side of my house off, and the water was coming in my house in torrents.
I had my neighbor, an elderly man, and myself, in the house with our dogs and cats, and we were trying to stay out of the water. But the water was coming in too fast. So we ended up having to leave the house.
We left the house and we went up on the roof of a school. I took a crowbar and I burst the door on the roof of the school to help people on the roof.
Later on we found a flat boat, and we went around the neighborhood in a flat boat getting people out of their houses and bringing them to the school.
We found all the food that we could and we cooked and we fed people. But then, things started getting really bad.
By the second day, the people that were there, that we were feeding and everything, we had no more food and no water. We had nothing, and other people were coming in our neighborhood. We were watching the helicopters going across the bridge and airlift other people out, but they would hover over us and tell us Hi! and that would be all. They wouldn't drop us any food or any water, or nothing.
Alligators were eating people. They had all kinds of stuff in the water. They had babies floating in the water.
We had to walk over hundreds of bodies of dead people. People that we tried to save from the hospices, from the hospitals and from the old-folks homes. I tried to get the police to help us, but I realized they were in the same straits we were. We rescued a lot of police officers in the flat boat from the 5th district police station. The guy who was in the boat, he rescued a lot of them and brought them to different places so they could be saved.
We understood that the police couldn't help us, but we couldn't understand why the National Guard and them couldn't help us, because we kept seeing them but they never would stop and help us.
Finally it got to be too much, I just took all of the people that I could. I had two old women in wheelchairs with no legs, that I rowed them from down there in that nightmare to the French Quarters, and I went back and got more people.
There were groups of us, there were about 24 of us, and we kept going back and forth and rescuing whoever we could get and bringing them to the French Quarter because we heard that there were phones in the French Quarter, and that there wasn't any water. And they were right, there were phones, but we couldn't get through to anyone.
I found some police officers. I told them that a lot of us women had been raped down there by guys, not from the neighborhood where we were, they were helping us to save people. But other men, and they came and they started raping women and they started killing, and I don't know who these people were. I'm not gonna tell you I know, because I don't.
But what I want people to understand is that, if we hadn't been left down there like the animals that they were treating us like, all of those things wouldn't have happened. People are trying to say that we stayed in that city because we wanted to be rioting and we wanted to do this and, we didn't have resources to get out, we had no way to leave.
When they gave the evacuation order, if we could've left, we would have left.
There are still thousands and thousands of people trapped in their homes in the downtown area. When we finally did get into the 9th ward, and not just in my neighborhood, but in other neighborhoods in the 9th ward, there were a lot of people still trapped down there... old people, young people, babies, pregnant women. I mean, nobody's helping them.
And I want people to realize that we did not stay in the city so we could steal and loot and commit crimes. A lot of those young men lost their minds because the helicopters would fly over us and they wouldn't stop. We would make SOS on the flashlights, we'd do everything, and it really did come to a point, where these young men were so frustrated that they did start shooting. They weren't trying to hit the helicopters, they figured maybe they weren't seeing. Maybe if they hear this gunfire they will stop then. But that didn't help us. Nothing like that helped us.
Finally, I got to Canal St. with all of my people I had saved from back there.
I don't want them arresting nobody else. I broke the window in an RTA bus. I never learned how to drive a bus in my life. I got in that bus. I loaded all of those people in wheelchairs and in everything else into that bus, and we drove and we drove and we drove and millions of people was trying to get me to help them to get on the bus, too.
Charmaine Neville is a member of the third generation of New Orleans's legendary Neville musical family. She fronts the Charmaine Neville Band.
I am an independent....neither party is "my" party.
THis election cycle I believe the best man is a Republican. Do your research. John McCain warned about this in 2005, named Fannie and freddie by name, co-sponsored legislation to control them. Blocked by Democrats, led by Chris Dodd..same guy now trying to fix what he and the Dems broke. Chris Dodd, #1 on contributions list from fannie/freddie, followed closely by #2, your shining knight Mr. Obama. The chickens have come home to roost all right...or should I say the donkeys. :)
What values do liberals have?
While at a pro bush rally I knew I was surrounded by people who generally agreed with my morale values. I knew these people were pro life, believed in god, loved America, believed all nations and people deserved freedom, and finally supported our troops. I thought if the liberals generally disagree with the conservatives moral compass what do they believe?. They support the killing of children in there mothers womb, they have on many occasions attempted to rid god from the publics view, they opposed liberating the people of Kuwait and Iraq, and are quick to call our brave troops who would die for our nation war criminals.
Liberal values?
You asked about the values of liberals, so here goes ... at least from this liberal's perspective. I value people's inherent ability to make decisions about their own lives, barring medical issues preventing same (i.e., mental incapacity). I live by the Golden Rule. I value the choice for people to practice whichever faith they choose ... or none at all ... and really mean it! I accept people and their differences from the "norm". I believe 2 consenting adults with the required mental capacity should be allowed to marry - with no litmus test. And I sure don't care what people do in their own bedrooms as long as it is between consenting adults. Most importantly, I value the principles set forth by the Constitution of the United States since, first and foremost, I am an American.
That about sums it up. I hope it helps!
Our Endangered Values
By Jimmy Carter. A MUST READ.
In reading the book, I was reminded of the saying that people don't remember what you said. They remember how you made them feel. In this Carter succeeds. That said, don't pick up a copy of the book expecting to find well reasoned positions backed with unambigous references to reliable data and statistics.
In Our Endangered Values, Carter describes a set of American values: equality, liberty, justice for all, individual empowerment, inclusion, generosity, forgiveness, and leadership by example. This is framed by a narrative which is personal and focused on people finding common ground on which to build a better tomorrow.
These values are then contrasted against what is described as a general trend toward fundamentalism. The fundamentalism Carter argues against is not the adherance to a literal interpretation of secular texts, but the practice of intolerance regarding people of differing beliefs.
Intolerance, he argues, becomes particularly dangerous where people choose to recognize their leaders and institutions as masters rather than servants. Such leaders and their institutions tend to combine their beliefs and intolerance into agendas which exclude, dehumanize and punish.
From there, it is just a hop, a skip, and a jump to a laundry list of ways in which the actions of recent administrations and highly visible religious leaders are tipping the balance toward fundamentalism and endangering the values he holds dear.
In summary, it is well worth reading, and is relatively light reading at that. Some reviewers have come down fairly harshly on the book for religious and/or political grounds. I think they miss the point. Carter isn't mandating that you subscribe to his beliefs. He is asking you to look for common ground and tolerate the differences.
Speaking of values
Golly how many times are you going to bring this up about Clinton like it is truly important in the problems our world faces? It's like you are completely nutso about this, over and over and over and over and over and over and over......wow!
I think it is terrifying and heart-wrenchingly sad that with the genocide, starvation, astounding poverty globally PLUS this war we have created with how many hundreds of thousands of civilians killed including babies, pregnant women, children plus the US dead and countless with TBI and amputations....that the thing that you totally obsess over is Clinton and his sex and his lie to the court over something that should never have gone to court in the first place. JFK would have been in deep you-know-what had he ever been brought to task for his philandering....and he probably would have covered things up, too.
How pathetic that this nation is more interested in sex scandals than the multitude of catastrophic problems facing our population on this planet. It shows how shallow and value-less we can be.......impeaching someone over sex.....how about impeaching someone over the death of 1/2 a million people for dubious reasons and political gain.....
Nobody's forcing their values on you.
Nobody's making you to become gay. Nobody is forcing an abortion on you. Nobody is compelling you to join their church. Nobody insists you drive a Honda. I won't tell you what books to read. You can listen to any music you like. Nobody's requiring you to do anything, not even give your permission. If you think what you have is diminished by someone else having it as well, that's rather.... infantile.
Because Bennett's *values* match their own.
They must be very confused by the WH's response. Probably don't know what they're allowed to *think* about this.
My hunch, based on their own posts, is that at this moment in time, they'd all vote for Bennett because his inner prejudices and hatred match their own.
Then how come so many are being found out? What was that again about moral values? nm
:
Those small-town values are
EXACTLY what the big bad world needs to take it on. Resolute, firm in beliefs, freedom, country first.
No, some of us have values and common sense.
nm
On that morals and values question...
May I point out one way that Emanuel is most definitely NOT left wing liberal. On the issue of Israel, he is more to the right than even Bush is. To be honest, the idea of his being Chief of Staff to Obama is concerning for me in THAT regard. However, that post is a very broad one and I do not pretend to know precisely what Obama's motivations may be for considering him. What I do know is that Emanuel is only one voice in many that Obama will be listening to. I have not heard that Emanuel has accepted the position but I know that he has expressed his passion for the legislative branch, has his eye on the Speaker's position and has personal considerations of being the father of small children. This is in the wait and see mode. I feel I do not have enough information on him yet and am trying not to focus on what I consider to be a strong negative about him.
In terms of your fear, I will gently suggest to you that you might try broadening your base of information sources beyond O'Reilly, if you haven't already done that. It is not surprising that Bill O's guests are calling Obama a puppet. I hear none of that anywhere else but Fox. As difficult as it may be, a good dose of balance AND extreme viewpoints may be helpful in this respect. I hold my nose quite often and listen to Rush Limbaugh (ugh), Bill O and Hannity, though I confess I have a pretty low tolerance to them. I also tune into Lou Dobbs, Anderson Cooper, Wolf Blitzer, Cafferty, Joe Scarborough (not terribly fond of him either), Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann, Rachel Maddow, Amy Goodman, Juan Gonzalez, Naomi Klein and innumerable independent journalists. I find that approach very effective in soothing the fear factor and to be much more engaging.
You may be right to a certain extent about the morals and values. We are not living in the same world and our nations best interests will not be best served if we try to pretend we are. That is what the dynamics of change is all about. As a species, human beings have survived BECAUSE of their capacity to adapt to change. The internet and free trade act has transformed our country into a vital component of a global economic and cultural system. We must now take on the task of defining what role we want to assume within that context. The diversity of our nation's culture can remain a point of contention and division, or it can become a new source of our strength and pride. This choice is ours to make and I believe this election has been a mandate on where the younger generations stand on this issue. After all, they are the ones who have grown up in the midst of these population dynamics.
In this respect, it seems that our most basic and cherished values and beliefs do manage to endure as a nation, and what does not can always be elaborated in how we lives our personal lives. In the past, as a country we have managed to survive quite well during "liberal years." However, that is not what I believe is in store for us now. Whatever tectonic shifts we have undergone in the past (and we have had our share), never once have we been able to negotiate them against a backdrop of a house divided, as gourdpainter pointed out earlier. We unite, we rise to the occasion and we get past it.
I think part of our peek into the future will inevitably require us to place much more focus on new energies and phase out our dependence and relentless and, at times, fatal search for fossil fuel resources. I cannot think of a better way to diffuse the power that those "not so friendly nations" hold over us now. Jobs do not necessarily have to come from the oil patch and there are alternatives to trying to drill our way out of these problems as T. Bone Pickens so eloquently reminded us recently. Any new jobs creation will have that domino effect you describe.
Obama hardly is a one-issue candidate (tax) the way Bill O would have you believe. I will not spend my time trying to promote the president-elect, except to say you may find some comfort in at least reading his Blueprint for Change, whether you trust him to carry it out or not. He has put this is writing and no doubt the media and the electorate will be holding his feet to the fire with those words and promises. So it looks like we are back to wait and see again.
BTW, a good antidote to fear is hope and faith....and that does not necessarily mean Obama style hope. Being hopeful and drawing strength from faith is also a very personal choice one makes in life. It is not that hard to talk yourself into a more positive attitude. Just talk the talk and walk the walk and pretty soon, it becomes second nature.
Yes, this is sad. But hardly the core of *right wing* values. Puleeze. nm
.
Better McCain....at least he has basic American values still...
Obama is a radical socialist and that is the "change" he is talking about, and he "hopes" he can hoodwink America into buying that "change." And it looks like he is doing a pretty good job. Just be careful what you ask for...he has started already applying is black liberation theology plank of economic parity...redistribution of wealth. He has promised to do that. Windfall profit tax on oil companies (which will do NOTHING to bring prices down, will in fact send them up) and redistribute that income to people who did nothing to earn it. That is the opposite of what has made America great. I should not be surprised that so many believe him...but I am.
Obama values life of babies AND their mothers.
I am not in the habit of debating with brick walls, but I will address your issue directly just as soon as you come up with something that will convince me that McCain's air quotes demontrate high regard for human life. Kill the mom, save the baby, then watch while it pulls itself up by its bootstraps, lest we turn our beloved country into a welfare state. P-U.
Obama is criminally naive. "Upholding our values
Umm...and just who was being waterboarded prior to 9/11, Mr. Obama? Or, putting it more precisely, we know now from the 9/11 Commission that the attack on that day was in the making long before Bush even took office. So which of the numerous values that Clinton violated was it that led to that event?
Pathetic reasoning - a crime against your office, in fact. You obviously do not know the first thing about either terrorists or terrorism - or else you think we don't.
Impeach Obama now. Unfit to serve.
Obama is criminally naive. "Upholding our values
Umm...and just who was being waterboarded prior to 9/11, Mr. Obama? Or, putting it more precisely, we know now from the 9/11 Commission that the attack on that day was in the making long before Bush even took office. So which of the numerous values that Clinton violated was it that led to that event?
Pathetic reasoning - a crime against your office, in fact. You obviously do not know the first thing about either terrorists or terrorism - or else you think we don't.
Impeach Obama now. He is utterly unfit to serve.
Lying and the Culture of Life. What Moral Values by Junaid Alam...sm
Lying and the Culture of Life
What Moral Values?
By M. JUNAID ALAM
Strong moral values, decency, propriety, and honesty: conservatives long ago declared these ideals essential to their belief system, achieving political ascendancy with promises of restoring honor to a government they view as tainted by liberal immorality and excess.
A fine notion, indeed, but one question lingers: what happened?
Barely a year into Bush's second term, the American political landscape is brimming with blatant examples of conservative deceit, dishonesty, cronyism, and hypocrisy.
Foremost among these examples is Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's right-hand man, who has been indicted on charges of perjury, obstruction of justice, and making false statements before a grand jury. Not that this is cause for embarrassment among conservatives--indeed, many are relieved, pointing out that Libby is in trouble only for lying. It seems conservative standards on morality have slipped a bit.
Of course, the Libby indictment is but the tip of the beast's horn. The larger case is about a vengeful administration that was bent on destroying an undercover CIA agent's career by leaking her name because her husband, Joseph Wilson, also a CIA agent, challenged shoddy evidence buttressing the case for war in Iraq.
Let us forget for a moment the value of simple honesty. Let us forget also the importance of not undermining the nation's intelligence services when one's entire platform is national security.
What does this event tell us about the oft-invoked conservative call to respect the culture of life, so often invoked in abortion debates? Let us not pander to fools: this war was, beyond a shadow of a doubt, based on manifest lies and exaggerations. Therefore, can anyone seriously claim that this administration showed even the slightest respect for the lives of the 2,000 American soldiers, or the lives countless Iraqi civilians now lost to the war's horrors? Most intriguing, then, is this culture of life--a culture which champions life when it does not yet exist, and abandons it when it does.
Surely, however, could the Republican Party not redeem itself through its philosophy of Christian compassion? Apparently not. Congressional testimony two weeks ago revealed that when FEMA's sole representative in New Orleans--who was there only accidentally--found thousands of Americans stranded without food or shelter during the hurricane, he issued a desperate call for help to FEMA chief Michael Brown. Brown's aide replied--several hours later--with the following instructive example of compassionate conservatism in action: It is very important that time is allowed for Mr. Brown to eat dinner. The locale of choice? Baton Rouge. Marie Antoinette would have been impressed.
Equally impressive is the Republican Party's idea of taking responsibility and not blaming others--a key conservative tenet--in the case of Tom Delay, the House majority leader indicted for pouring corporate money into Texas' 2002 state elections, which saw the reconfiguration of the state's congressional districts along even more pro-Republican lines. Censured three times in 2004 alone by the bipartisan House Ethics Committee, Delay nonetheless views the indictment as a kind of vast left-wing conspiracy, calling the prosecutor an unabashed partisan zealot. Heaven forbid.
It goes without saying that Republican contrition for any of the outrages outlined above is unlikely: the arsonists are running the firehouse, and they take great pride in fanning the flames.
We would be sorely remiss, however, if we ignored the role of the Democrats in this affair. They have sat on their firehoses and idled their fire engines on key issues, enabling Republican misbehavior to go unchecked. Most Democrats, it must be remembered, voted in favor of granting Bush unprecedented war powers. And it was the liberal New York Times, with its neo-con pseudo-journalist Judith Miller at the helm, who led the drumbeat procession to invade Iraq based on the thinnest of lies.
Naïve liberal Democrats were also quite pleased to see conservatives break ranks during the Harriet Miers debacle, taking it as a sign of some kind of impending right-wing implosion. They apparently forgot the basic fact that it was the far right--not what passes for the left--that tore apart Miers' chances for judicial confirmation. Now, a staunch conservative, Alito, has been nominated and the implosion has disappeared into thin air. As usual, we can soon count on the usual centrist Democrats--those Klan-minus-costume-crats and heirs to the Dixiecrat legacy--to help vote Alito onto the bench.
Thus, while conservative wrongdoing is obvious, liberals must take a long, hard look at their own party's role in producing the present state of affairs. Americans are told, after all, that there are two major parties, and that one is supposed to act in opposition to the other.
A fine notion, indeed, but one question lingers: what happened?
M. Junaid Alam, co-editor of Left Hook, can be reached at alam@lefthook.org
Being faithful to his family
You're kidding, right?
I saw a show on TLC about this family...
To each his own, especially if you're footing the bill yourself, but this family is just uplain creepy. The children are all homeschool and virtually isolated from any other children other than another family or two who share the same nutty religious convictions. They even have their OWN church at home. The girls all wear these horrid sad-sack Little House on the Prairie identical plaid potato sack dresses that look like they were made from discarded curtains and when asked their only aspirations are to have lots of children and to be a mother. The boys also dress identically in little Leave it to Beaver short-sleeved dress shirts. It's called Full Quiver parenting, as in having as many kids as you get before you get to menopause or your uterus falls out, whichever comes first. I find the whole thing rather odd, but who am I to judge I suppose.
Your family will be in my prayers. nm
nm
Are you the one who has been threatening him and and his family?
and I commend you and your family
You are to be honored, and I do honor you all.
According to the bin Laden family sm
They disowned Osama a long long time ago. In fact, the bin Laden family owns probably the largest construction company in the Middle East. They built the new U.S. military installation in Saudi Arabia. I am thinking they were allowed to leave for fear of retribution by Americans. That was always my thought and I never really questioned it because I knew of the alienation between Osama and his family.
Horrible for her family...
and hearing the candidates' (both sides) reactions to it have been interesting. All have the similar thread tho...must preserve democracy in Pakistan.
I think they had a family discussion ...
and they decided as a family to go forward. And this would not be an issue had there are those judgmental among us who decided to make it one. In this day and time for the Dems here, of ALL People, to act all holier-than-thou and act like being pregnant not married still carries some kind of stigma just stinks to high heaven. These same people who have told us to go back to our churches and not push our morality on them. The hypocrisy is staggering. The very people they called judgmental are the ones surrounding this family to support them, not ostracizing them like they had announced their daughter was a pedophile or a serial killer.
I would put the judgment here much MORE in question than Sarah Palin's, and I think a lot of people out there in America whose lives this very thing has touched will do the same.
And I would say that regardless of what party affiliation she has too. If that was a Democrat running for VP and people wre bashing her in this way I would be yelling foul just as loud.
It just amazes me the depths some will sink to for political purposes. INcluding fileting a 17-year-old. Just because her mother made the announcement did not mean poeple were obligated to attack..that was a choice and it taking that choice says a lot about character...or the screaming lack thereof.
there is for their family to decide ... and ..
apparently they did just that. What is right for them very well may not be right for others.
I just think it's a shame people won't let this go and focus on the issues!
Palin family...
They looked great to me. Cindy McCain reached for the child, it wasn't handed off to her. Bristol looked anything but terrified. She looked proud of her mother. And well she should be. She is running for VP of the United States. I thought it was especially sweet with the little girl licked her hand to smooth down the baby's cowlick. Circus freaks are the last words I would use to describe this family.
My family affairs are none
of your business. I am being viciously mistreated by the press. Wait, film this. It will get me some votes. Watch me bravely send my first born off to the endless war my political party started.
I have family in Alaska and they
think very highly of S. Palin. FYI, people don't like her JUST because she is likeable. She's smart, courageous, well-grounded with good morals for starters. She doesn't flip-flop to appease the public (like Obama/now for drilling), and she is NOT self-serving (gave up her plane, personal chef, etc etc that came with the job). She is and has been SERVING THE PEOPLE, not playing politics; McCain has the same history, and together they ARE the party of change. p.s. when was the last time Obama had any part in giving money BACK TO THE PEOPLE like Palin did in Alaska? Look at the facts. You have 2 track records of standing up for the people on the McCain/Palin ticket and pretty talk along with old party politics on the Obama/Biden side. It really scares me to think of Obama winning, with his demonstrated lack of judgment and lack of record, poor associations, etc. p.s., if there is a revolution/take-over of the USA it could only be under Obama. notice too, that now his future position in the white house is challenged, he keeps changing his tune to sound more middle-ground. He's a wolf in sheep's clothing; beware.
I'd want the money but not from that family. sm
The poor have more morals and principles. They make most of their money off of misery, lies, deceit, and thievery. They fund both sides of war conflicts and founded the central banking system, which is robbing everyone blind. She met her husband at a Bilderberg conference.
She did support Hillary and then endorsed McCain, but said she did not trust him because he came off like too much of an elitist. Bizarre statement from someone who is a member of a family who possesses more than half the world's wealth since the early 1900s.
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