This Just In

This just in: it appears that Jared Lee Loughner, the man charged in the attempted assassination of Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), was a leftist... yeah, that's it... a loony leftist Communist Nazi with an obsession with grammar who attacked Representative Giffords Saturday for her grammar and support of Obama's far-left... wait, that makes no sense. I mean, Giffords was a moderate Democrat who... No, wait, um... Socialism! Um... Liberal Agenda! Er...

Back to you, Bret.

As the right-wing propaganda machine spins into overdrive in a feeble attempt to disassociate from its own rhetoric, let's think for a minute. What if we assume, and I know it will be difficult, but let's just assume they are correct, and that Jared Lee Loughner was a lone crazy with no political motivations. Maybe so. Maybe (koff, choke) FOX is right on the money with this.

Where did anyone ever get the idea that this had anything to do with right-wing politics?

That isn't a Glock pictured over the red, white, and blue? Is it?

Oh, wait... I think it could be.

Unarmed? I guess you're referring to people with disabilities or something?

Well, golly. Aren't those just surveyor symbols? Hm. Maybe.

Oh, right. That looks just like a (simulated) surveyor's transit. My bad. Funny, I've never seen anyone reload a transit before.

Michele Bachmann (R-MN) then: "I want people in Minnesota armed and dangerous on this issue of the energy tax because we need to fight back. Thomas Jefferson told us 'having a revolution every now and then is a good thing,' and the people -- we the people -- are going to have to fight back hard if we're not going to lose our country."

Michele Bachmann (R-MN) now: "My tears are flowing, and I am stunned and angered that Gabby Giffords was savagely gunned down while performing her congressional duties."

Armed and dangerous? Well, I suppose she did specifically say Minnesota, right?

In related news, Speaker of the House and noted crybaby John Boehner (R-OH) managed to remain composed while churning out standard boilerplate on the event. I mean, it's just some people who were shot, not a real tearjerker like, I don't know... cap-and-trade?

Glenn "Becky" Beck (R-FOX) said "the violence is going to come, and it's going to come from the left." Well, maybe. All those Subarus with bumper stickers saying "Coexist" are just a front. The automatic weapons are hidden under the bags of organic soy protein. What's that? The Democrats had a "target map" too? Well, I suppose. On the other hand, that map didn't put specific candidates in crosshairs. Maybe it was a call for liberals to begin carpet bombing New Mexico? I don't know.

So here's the deal. I'll give Republicans and Teapers every benefit of the doubt and far more charity than they deserve. We'll assume that Loughner was certifiably batshit loony and got his inspiration beamed directly into his teeth by little green men from Mars. Fine. Still, when things you have explicitly called for happen and people look in your direction? Well, sorry. Too bad. Think about that over the long weekend.

And remember, when three-named idiots express their opinions with a gun, it's not usually the conservatives that have to watch out.

Disgustedly Yours,

Porcupine

I Like Ike

As we enter a new age of Republican grandstanding, I am sorely tempted to spew a little venom and bile. Certainly, the newest crew of hypocrites and corporate shills deserves it. Though I won't rule that out for the future, I won't do that today. Rather, I'd like to remind us all what the Republican party once was, and ought to be still. A few words from the last Republican president who had not sold his soul.

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"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed."

"I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity."

"I like to believe that people in the long run are going to do more to promote peace than our governments. Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of the way and let them have it."

"When people speak to you about a preventive war, you tell them to go and fight it. After my experience, I have come to hate war. War settles nothing."

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist."

"It is far more important to be able to hit the target than it is to haggle over who makes a weapon or who pulls a trigger."

"The problem in defense is how far you can go without destroying from within what you are trying to defend from without."

"The world moves, and ideas that were once good are not always good."

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Perhaps it is too much to hope for that those Republicans who will read the Constitution from the House floor will actually listen to it as well. Imagine putting Eisenhower's words into the mouth of Bush, Cheney, or Boehner, or worse: Limbaugh or Beck. All you will get is a pathetic joke. That is the state of things today.

Those who would "restore honor" in Washington would do well to remember the last Republican president who had any.

Respectfully Yours,

Cricket