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<p>Yes, and their expertise in blogging is what got them hired in the first place.</p>
<p>Is Tom Delay running for President? I didn’t know.</p>
<p>By your logic, he’s more qualified, so maybe he should.</p>
<p>Jazzymom, if you are interested in going a little deeper than the MainStreamMedia, I would recommend Josh Marshall’s site. He is fair, well researched and not at all in your face. You can find him at talkingpointsmemo.com. </p>
<p>Huffingtonpost is another good site with a long list of contributors. Josh is moderate to left and Huffington Post is maybe a little more left. </p>
<p>I can’t speak for the blogs on the right although Andrew Sullivan is moderate to slightly right I believe.</p>
<p>A reader at Americablog made a good point today. If the jet that people think Pelosi “requested” is so unreasonably luxurious, why did the military have it in the first place? Who was using it? We know it wasn’t the president, vice-president or speaker of the house. </p>
<p>How does having a “pimpomojet” costing $22,000 an hour to operate fit in with our soldiers being sent to Iraq without proper armor because “you go to war with the Army you have, not the Army you wish you had”?</p>
<p>InterestedDad was right. The answers to those questions were going to be embarrassing to Republicans, so the White House put a quick end to the fracas. I think the same thing is going to happen with the Edwards fiasco. If the RW pursues it, it’s going to open up too many embarrassing questions for them about the people running their own campaigns…or why the Catholic league has as its president a person with a history of anti-Semetic remarks and remarks hostile to gays.</p>
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<p>The Boeing 757s are used when appropriate. It has two galleys, a cabin, dining area, conference table and pull out sofa bed for the VIP. It has a section for staffers. And a large section in the back for press seating. They also have the full array of secure communications, including video conferencing.</p>
<p>So it would be a typical plane to use when the VP or Sec State is on a foreign tour with a press entourage. For example, if a SecState is on a Middle East or European swing, the 757s would probably be the right plane. If the Sec State is just going to NY to meet at the UN, the Gulfstream corporate jet would probably suffice.</p>
<p>The Gulftream Vs are capable of international travel, too…but they only hold about a dozen people.</p>
<p>John Murtha has asked for logs of all the use of military planes. It’s going to be interesting to see how they were used, and how often defense contractors and big campaign contributors were on the passenger lists.</p>
<p>Liz:</p>
<p>Thanks for the suggestion. These days, I’m lucky if I can get to read the paper every day, but I’ll take a look at those two blogs. If anyone wants to suggest a blog from the moderate Republican pov, I’ll check that out too.</p>
<p>I like Obama well enough, but he’s soon going to find out that he has more impediments than a black skin and a thin political resume – namely that he has the misfortune of being a US Senator. The Senate is a very shaky platform from which to run for President. Same applies to Senators Clinton, McCain, et al.</p>
<p>In the entire history of the republic a sitting US Senator has been elected President only twice: Warren Harding and John Kennedy. It’s much better to be a governor.</p>
<p>That’s because Senators usually have a record. Governors are largely free to invent one, magically transforming penny-ante bureaucratic policies into sweeping grand initiatives.</p>
<p>Hard to say if these races will follow conventional wisdom. There are some unusual circumstances. No representative of the incumbent. Unpopular war. First woman. First credible black. Everyone in the race, Democrat and Republican, running against the Bush Administration.</p>
<p>Here’s what sjmom had to say (in another thread) about liberals: “Since you all feel so comfortable labeling conservatives as heartless, I’ll chime in and suggest that the only way a liberal would defend this nation is when it’s too late to do anything.” </p>
<p>It amazes me that the author of this particular bit of hate speech is now griping that she doesn’t think she should be lumped in with those right wingers who have smeared the other side.</p>
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<p>I know this is the “progressive community’s” plan of attack, as I have read the defenses of Marcotte which include it in left-wing blogs and comments.</p>
<p>I actually saw the show on which Donahue made the remark something to the effect that Hollywood secular Jews hate Christianity and love a*** sex. This was during a discussion about “The Passion of the Christ” in response to a man (I believe Christopher Hitchens) who repeatedly called the movie gratuitously violent, voyeuristic, homoerotic trash. I do believe Donahue got a bit riled up here in response to Hitchens. As far as I know, this is the extent of his anti-Semitic and anti-gay remarks. I haven’t seen the movie.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, Donahue and his one-man, 350,000 member “conservative” Catholic League is all we have in defense of the everyday, run-of-the-mill Catholic bashing which goes on in this country. For some reason (still in hiding due to the priest abuse scandal?) the Catholic clergy rarely comes forward in these cases. We take for granted that Catholics will simply not respond to the kinds of writings Marcotte did. The fact that Edwards would actually say the ladies didn’t mean to offend anyone is ludicrous. But as we know, there are people who believe they have permission to write/say these kinds of things because they feel they have the moral authority to do so because the church is simply ** wrong** on certain pc issues. Try substituting Judaism, Muslim or gays in the writings of Marcotte and try to imagine Edwards saying she didn’t mean any offense and deserves a fair shake.</p>
<p>You can shoot the messenger twenty times over, but the message still remains. Frankly, Donahue is all we’ve got and I’m thrilled he took a stand here, since few, if any, others would, I’m sure. I don’t think he’s going to let this one go:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.catholicleague.org/07press_releases/quarter_1/070209_look_Edwards.htm[/url]”>http://www.catholicleague.org/07press_releases/quarter_1/070209_look_Edwards.htm</a></p>
<p>This is how Newsweek covers the issue in their glowing story on “The Real John Edwards”:</p>
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<p>Oh, I see. He will be portrayed in the msm as a hero for standing up to religious conservatives. Got it.</p>
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First of all, I would not classify my comment as “hate speech.” It is simply my opinion, one which I was incited to share. I think of myself as a courteous person, one who tries to respond in an objective, non-personal way to most of the comments on CC and, indeed, in real life. I do try to maintain some dignity, even while my political views, religion and basic values in life are attacked, often in a pretty nasty manner. Once in a while, my irritation gets the better of me. However, even then, I don’t typically try to malign other posters in particular.</p>
<p>Conyat, I wonder how you found CC? Your posts always seem to be just on the political topics. Frankly, that makes me question your motives. I’ve participated on CC almost since its inception – I even remember when the entire forum hit the 10,000 post mark. Do you have a college or HS age child, or are you just here to present your political thoughts? It doesn’t matter, of course, since this is a public BBS. I’m just curious.</p>
<p>If it’s fair game to bring up what the bloggers wrote before their employment in order to discredit Edwards, it’s certainly fair game to bring up what Donahue has wrote and said, to see how selective his outrage is and whether he has the gravitas on issues of fairness. </p>
<p>This is what Bill Donahue had to say about the ruling by a court that victims of abuse by clergy were entitled to liquidate church assets to recover their damage awards: </p>
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<p>Isn’t part of having your day in court being able to recover what the court says is justice? And how is exactly the Church the victim? The children didn’t force the priests in this case to abuse them, and they didn’t force the bishop to cover it up. That Donahue thinks the Church was the victim in this case and that the adults who were abused as vulnerable children are “vultures” speaks volumes about his thinking. </p>
<p>He also went out of his way to trivialize sexual exploitation of an 18 year old college freshman by one of her professors. This is what happened, according to the National Catholic Reporter:</p>
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<p>In response, Bill Donahue issued the following press release, trying to trivialize the predation as a normal human foilble:</p>
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<p>Donahue’s anti-gay remarks were hardly limited to the controversy over Mel Gibson. </p>
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<p>On the AIDS epidemic:</p>
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<p>It’s extremely unfortunate that a person like this is being used to portray the public face of Catholicism. I mentioned former Archbishop of New Orleans Philip Hannan before. He would have been a much better choice, and I’m sure if Donahue had asked him to be in the limelight instead of him, he would have. He’s never been reticent about talking with the media about issues, and he’s putting together his own cable show.</p>
<p>As a military chaplain assigned to a paratrooper unit during WWII, Hannan parachuted with his unit and helped free a German concentration camp for women. He was in the rectory with Archbishop Rummel when extremists were burning a cross on the lawn in protest of the integration of Catholic schools. He agreed to take on the archbishop position in New Orleans when the city was still reeling from Hurricane Betsy, and now the octagenarian retired archbishop is working in Katrina relief efforts. And oh yeah, his 40 year tenure as archbishop? No scandals. The archbishop is a man of unquestioned faith, integrity, and moral authority.</p>
<p>If Donahue were truly the best the church had to offer, it would be a sorry state of affairs.</p>
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<p>Nice try, SJMom. I am no VoxDei or higherlead.</p>
<p>You know as well as I do that there’s a function where you can see what posts people have made. If you had consulted it instead of “questioning my motives” without getting the facts, you would know that I came to this board when my child was going through the application/admissions process, and after that I stayed for the parent’s forum. She is currently a college freshman.</p>
<p>I don’t post only on political topics. I do post mainly on political topics though because I’m a lot less qualifed than other posters on this board to give advice about college counseling, financial aid, and the like, and I’d rather not risk misinforming people. I just have the one child, and her circumstances were pretty unusual. But I do post on other topics when I have experience, such as my experiences working with children with disabilities, or other knowledge that’s relevant.</p>
<p>Why do I post on political topics as much as I do? To combat this kind of misinformation and ad hominem attack.</p>
<p>But if it offends you to have people who haven’t been here from the beginning posting things you disagree with (as opposed to people like VoxDei who seem to have been incarnated to carry the water for the conservatives), just say the word, and I’ll bow out.</p>
<p>Donahue is by far NOT the best man the Church has to offer, as you well know. However, he seems to be the ONLY man the Church has to offer, for reasons too complex too go into now.</p>
<p>To focus on Donahue, as the left is predictably doing, in the face of the vulgar, blasphemous hate-filled anti-Catholic bigotry of Edwards’ new campaign members, McEwan and Marcotte, is, in my opinion, typical. You may fool some of the people (mostly those on your side already), but as Mary Katharine Ham says, you can’t fool 90% of the people. </p>
<p>Even Catholic lefties like Russert and Matthews are not amused; therefore, Edwards has created a little problem for himself here, I think, for the long term.</p>
<p>Marcotte’s comments are vile and vulgar period. Comparison to someone else’s comments is not relevant, it is only a diversion from discussing the substance of Marcotte’s comments.
Edwards made 3 mistakes with this:
- Hiring her
- not firing her
- not realizing that 1 and 2 were mistakes.</p>
<p>Conyat, thank you for informing me. As I said, I really was just curious, and certainly didn’t mean to attack you. Somehow, I don’t think I have the power to ask you to “bow out” in any case. This is an opinion forum, and both you and I are free to share our thoughts. Isn’t that the essence of democracy?</p>
<p>Hey con man</p>
<p>I don’t think I ever used the term Madam Speaker. If I did, I’ll stand corrected. I respectfully ask though that you point out to me where I did.</p>
<p>On the other hand even if I did I would argue that it’s a sign of respect rather than a shot at her. All that being said you have to admit that comments about her plastic surgery are fair game since she’s the one who decided to stand up in the public square. Have you called out those who like to refer to Mr. President as Alfred E. Neuman or something more derogatory?</p>
<p>Didn’t think so.</p>
<p>I like women by the way. Married to one with daughters in the mix as well. </p>
<p>You still sound “whiny” to me.</p>
<p>See you later. It’s time to go to church.</p>
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<p>Name calling. Nice. I see all I am doing is cranking up the smear machine into higher gear, so I guess I will bow out. Enjoy the record-breaking national debt.</p>
<p>I had no real problem with Madam Speaker, but then I also have no problem with Alfred E. Neumann. Conyat–Don’t take offense. Like our president, Vox has a fondness for nicknames. Mine happens to be “doo,” which I find quite dear, in an odd sort of way.</p>