An American Hero Responds

Jack Murtha has responded to the smear campaign led by Republicans. You can read his full response at The Huffington Post.

Jeralyn Merritt is also weighing in at TalkLeft as is Murray Waas at Whatever Already! There are also several diaries at DailyKos.

Republican Hate Groups Swift-Boat Murtha

Jane Hamsher at Firedoglake has written a four part article exposing the Republican led group behind the attempt to smear Jack Murtha. Like the Swift Boat Veteran hate groups that attacked John Kerry, the Republicans are gearing up a campaign to spread lies about Jack Murtha. This is a must-read if you want to educate yourself on the truth about just how low the Republicans will stoop to move the news away from the corruption and crime that plagues their party.

My guess is that Rove is about to be indicted and he wants to stir up as much trouble as possible to divert attention away from himself. As if!

Another Bush Failure - Medicare Prescription Drug Program

The Washington Post has the story. Raise your hand if you knew this was going to happen. Mr. President, if it isn't broke...don't fix it. If it is broke...don't fix it.

Let's see, there's the No Child Left Behind Act, the worst jobs record of any President since the Great Depression, the worst budget deficits ever, bigger and less effective government, an erosion in civil rights, illegal wiretapping and now our most vulnerable citizens are facing a nightmare getting the medications they need.

How many passes does George Bush get? His presidency has been one failure after another. That will be his legacy. He will go down in history as one of the biggest failures this country has ever produced. Democrats can take over the House, tack on some big brass ones and let's get moving on impeachment proceedings or we can pray the next three years move quickly and Bush doesn't get any more great ideas for his legacy.

Republicans Trying to Smear an American Hero

You had to know that when the news started getting bad for Bush the Rove machine would do their best to create news in an attempt to make Democrats look bad. In typical fashion the right has decided to smear a true war hero, Jack Murtha. The two people they march out to smear him are men who lost to Murtha in different elections. I'm sure neither harbors any bitterness. No, really!

Don A. Bailey is a lawyer who promotes himself as an "equal opportunity suer." He served in the US House from 1978 to 1982. He lost to Jack Murtha when their districts were basically combined after redistricting. According to Wikipedia:

In a strongly fought primary, Bailey lost. Interestingly, when the Republican nominee for the seat withdrew the same year, Bailey was seriously considered as a replacement; he came in a very strong second at the Republican nominating convention held that year. This underscores that he was viewed as a conservative Democrat.

Twenty-two years later, Bailey is still so bitter about the end of his political career that he provides an interview with Cybercast News Service quoting conversations that only he can substantiate. After losing to Murtha in 1982 Bailey was elected Auditor General of Pennsylvania in 1984. After that he lost races in 1986, 1988, 1992 and 1998. Do you think the people of Pennsylvania figured something out?

The next guy this "news" service trots out is actually so sick he can't trot. Hell, the man is so sick he can't even talk. That doesn't keep CNS from giving ample quotes from their "source". Harry M. Fox, who once worked for John Saylor (R-PA) is quoted heavily before the "reporter" actually admits that he wasn't able to interview Fox. He digs up old articles and other quotes without being able to substantiate them, because Fox is 81 and too ill to be interviewed. I tried to track down the quotes, but the Uniontown Herald-Standard doesn't have archives online before 1999. How convenient for the CNS "reporter".

I can find absolutely nothing on Harry M. Fox except what the CNS employee has conjured, but his boss, John Saylor, is described as a die-hard Republican. Oh, yes and Saylor died the year before Murtha was elected to Congress. You see when Saylor died Fox tried to replace him. He lost the special election to Jack Murtha. Are you beginning to see a pattern here? Only an absolute moron would say no to that question.

Finally, as if trotting out one man with unsubstantiated conversations and unsubstantiated quotes from a sick man who can no longer speak for himself isn't enough, CNS tries to paint Murtha as being involved in ABSCAM. The fact is he was the ONLY person who walked out of this scandal clean because he didn't do anything wrong. It's reported and discussed here, and here, and here, and here and any number of other places if you care to look.

Dennis Roddy, a real reporter for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette said it best:

Soon the Swift Boaters will be afloat, suggesting that Mr. Murtha's Vietnam service was a charade (he won a Bronze Star), and that his Purple Hearts were undeserved. The Purple Heart gambit has been played before, first in 1982, then just last year. The answer to this nonsense will be the one that gave Mr. Murtha such cache as both a candidate and a member of Congress: big wound or small, he got it in Vietnam. He was there. They were not.

The second brick destined to crash through the Murtha family parlor window is Abscam. Mr. Murtha was one of eight members of Congress lured to a Washington townhouse by a team of FBI agents posing as representatives of a fictitious Arab sheik. They handed out briefcases filled with $50,000 in return for helping the sheik gain residency in the United States.

Mr. Murtha is on videotape telling the agents, "Not interested," but inviting the sheik to invest a few million in his struggling hometown, where unemployment reached 25 percent.

The Republicans can call up all the dead, sick, bitter people they want. They can dig up 30-year-old scandals that only show Murtha had the character to walk away from a bribe, not take it. They can do all these things in any combination they want and it won't change one simple fact. Jack Murtha is a true American hero.

UPDATE: The Washington Post picked up the story today 1/14/06. Funny, they don't bother to mention that CNS didn't actually interview Fox. Oh, and Don Bailey says he's not bitter. He just says that Murtha called his injury a scratch on the cheek. Bailey, use your fucking head. Murtha's the type of man who would look at more severe injuries and make that comparison. That doesn't mean he didn't earn the Purple Hearts or that he doesn't deserve them. Not bitter, my ass.

Racist Kate and Why she Hates Smart Women

Kate O'Beirne hates smart women. It's an unavoidable fact. She hates smart women who have careers and earn an income to help support their families. She hates smart women who feel they walk on even ground with men. She hates smart women who recognize that we have traditionally been and continue to be paid less than men for the same work. She especially hates smart women who are determined to do something about it.

I don't recommend her new book, but If you're curious just read enough interviews of O'Beirne and articles by her and you'll know that the book can't possibly be worth your money or your time. This is the woman who blames the poor reading habits and abilities of young men on feminists. You see with O'Beirne and her ilk the problem is always someone else's fault. It couldn't possibly be that young men have been encouraged by their parents for oh so many years to spend more time on the ball field than in the library. It must be the feminists fault.

It isn't always what is included in a book that is important. What is excluded can also tell an important story. If you look at the cover of O'Beirne's book something immediately stands out. Kate O'Beirne thinks that all feminists are white. This leads me to only one conclusion. O'Beirne is a racist. She is such a racist that she has excluded from the cover of her book every single woman of color who has advanced the cause of women. Not one was deemed important enough to include.

Here is just a brief list of the amazing women who were not credited for the hardships they endured to advance the cause of women: Phillis Wheatley, Fanny Jackson Coppin, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Edmonia Lewis, Susie King Taylor, Sojourner Truth, Harriet Tubman, Ida B. Wells, Bessie Coleman, Jovita Idar de Juarez, Mary Church Terrell, Madame C.J. Walker, Zora Neale Hurston, Mary McLeod Bethune, Augusta Savage, Ella Baker, Gwendolyn Brooks, Shirley Chisholm, Septima Clark, Aretha Franklin, Ella Fitzgerald, Althea Gibson, Fannie Lou Hamer, Lorraine Hansberry, Barbara Jordan, Rosa Parks, Marian Anderson, Leontyne Price, Wilma Rudolph, Maya Angelou, Mae C. Jemison, Toni Morrison, Faith Ringgold, Alice Walker and Oprah Winfrey. This is just a sampling.

There are so many wonderful women who sacrificed so much for the rest of us. We can get an education, earn an income, wear pants, vote and even publish a book all because other women paved the way. O'Beirne seems to forget that she owes her education, her right to vote and her ability to be published to the brave, strong, pioneering women who made her road so much easier. She also seems to forget that these pioneering women weren't all white.

The book is not an important work. It's obvious from the cover that it was written simply to incite, not to inform. It doesn't contain serious research and O'Beirne in typical fashion will tell what people think without giving any specific references for documentation. The cover does its best to portray feminists as ugly. This was the immediate cause for some furor. She and her artist have included ugly caricatures of Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Hillary Clinton, Jane Fonda and Sarah Jessica Parker. If O'Beirne thinks she's taking a lot of heat for this cover, imagine the furor if the cover had included Maya Angelou or Oprah Winfrey. O'Beirne simply doesn't have the mammaries to take that kind of heat, but it would have been fun to watch.

Update: I completely failed to explain why Kate O'Beirne hates smart women as promised in my title. I guess I thought it was obvious. Kate hates smart women because she is jealous. She has the intelligence of a tape worm.

Update II: While I have calmed down a bit from my initial anger caused when I read Kate O'Beirne's claim that the educational failure of boys (and just about everything else) is the fault of feminists, I continue to believe that this book is not a substantive work. Mrs. O'Beirne may not be a racist as I first felt, but as evidenced by the cover of her book she doesn't believe that African American Women made important contributions to the feminist cause. Mrs. O'Beirne has put herself out in the public as a spokesperson for the anti-feminist cause. She is educated as a lawyer and is a career person. This is something that would not have been an option for her without the work of feminist activists.

I think that Mrs. O'Beirne acts irresponsibly when she writes her opinion as if it were fact. In making claims against feminists and their fight for equal treatment under the law she minimizes their accomplishments and puts a huge roadblock in the future of all little girls. I have two of them at home and I don't want them stuck fighting the same battles I've had to just because they lack a penis.

I'm still not certain about Mrs. O'Beirne's intelligence. Maybe she is a bit smarter than a tapeworm. I don't really know. I don't find much that is intelligent in her writings. That's just my opinion. I stand by my assertion that this book was written to incite and not to inform. The choice of cover art would have been completely different if this were intended to be a serious work. I am simply appalled that a woman who owes so much to the women who went before her would slap them down after they paved the way.

I'll do another update after I have completely finished reading this vile excuse of a book. After giving a knee-jerk reaction to the cover I decided it wasn't fair to write this without reading the book. I purchased it used. I'll be happy to lend it out if I haven't heaved all over it. Then it will simply have to be burned.

Rohrabacher Kissing Abramoff's Ass

Can Dana Rohrabacher get his head any further up Jack Abramoff's Ass?

Makes you wonder what he doesn't want Jackie telling the feds, doesn't it?

Newsweek's Isikoff Likes His Kool-Aid

Newsweek's Michael Isikoff has posted an article on how the Abramoff scandal will impact Washington. While he provided a decent rundown of the scandal, he really didn't inform us of anything new. I found myself nodding along thinking that Mikey had turned away from the Kool-Aid and was tired of his WhiteHouse steno gig until I see this:

But the public is likely to remain appropriately skeptical of both parties. According to a Gallup poll taken last month, some 49 percent believe "most members" are corrupt and are about evenly divided over who is more corrupt, Republicans or Democrats.

Please, Mikey, please! I know there are some Democrats who have made me less-than proud at times, but I have yet to hear that one has been indicted or even targeted with an investigation recently. What do you mean that Americans are appropriately skeptical of both parties? Which Democrat has given you cause for skepticism? Can you please give us specifics? Oh, and I want recent specifics, not something that happened ten years ago.

I really am trying to find a reason to read Newsweek. So far, I think reading it online for free will have to do because I'm simply not paying good money for that crap.

The article was also written by Holly Bailey and Evan Thomas.

Give 'Em Hell Harry

Senate Minority Leader is heading into some red states to raise money for fellow Democrats and spread the news of culture of corruption in the Republican Party. Go, Harry, Go!

The article is at the Washington Post.