First Door on the Left

The line between church and state is growing dimmer by the day. Soon it will not exist at all.

FEMA Plans to Reimburse Faith Groups for Aid

After weeks of prodding by Republican lawmakers and the American Red Cross, the Federal Emergency Management Agency said yesterday that it will use taxpayer money to reimburse churches and other religious organizations that have opened their doors to provide shelter, food and supplies to survivors of hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

FEMA officials said it would mark the first time that the government has made large-scale payments to religious groups for helping to cope with a domestic natural disaster.

“I believe it’s appropriate for the federal government to assist the faith community because of the scale and scope of the effort and how long it’s lasting,” said Joe Becker, senior vice president for preparedness and response with the Red Cross.

Civil liberties groups called the decision a violation of the traditional boundary between church and state, accusing FEMA of trying to restore its battered reputation by playing to religious conservatives.

“What really frosts me about all this is, here is an administration that didn’t do its job and now is trying to dig itself out by making right-wing groups happy,” said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

Bush White House

In keeping with the conservative theme of “unite, not divide,” you conservative parents out there now have access to a children’s book designed specifically to help you indoctrinate your little right-wingers early in life…

This is not a joke. You can visit the book’s website here.

HELP! MOM! There are LIBERALS Under My Bed! follows the adventures of Tommy and Lou, two regular boys who dream about starting a lemonade stand in order to earn enough to buy a swing set. Then liberals like Congresswoman Clunkton, Mayor Leach and Mr. Fussman appear and demand that the boys pay half their money in taxes and serve broccoli with every glass of sugarless lemonade.

Teach them to hate and fill them with lies early!

In an effort to converve gasoline, George W. Bush today urged motorists to cut out any unnecessary travel. He also said that federal employees should carpool or take mass transit to work and promised government officials would not take any trips they don’t have to. (link)

One wonders if he will be taking his own advice. A 747, such as Air Force One, burns about 4,000 gallons of fuel per hour.

George could conserve a lot of gasoline just by staying home for a few days.

Air Force One

Sheehan arrested

She does not appear to be particularly upset about the whole ordeal, does she? I’ll have to admit, I am starting to have some doubts about this whole “Cindy Sheehan movement.” Why purposely get yourself arrested? (The police gave her three warnings.) Then, why appear to enjoy it so much?

Actually, that’s not quite true. I am not just now starting to have doubts. My doubts started when Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson got involved. I’ve never truly trusted the motives of either of those gentlemen.

(That dude on the left is going to have some explaining to do when he gets home to his wife tonight.)

New York Daily News gossip columnist Lloyd Grove reports:

Kerry’s not- so-amazing race, on film

I hear that John Kerry loyalists are kicking themselves for cooperating last year with filmmaker Steve Rosenbaum on “Inside the Bubble,” a potentially devastating behind-the-scenes look at the Massachusetts senator’s failed presidential campaign.

I’m also told that Hillary Clinton partisans are licking their chops to see the film, which “could end up being the silver bullet that kills Kerry’s presidential chances for 2008,” says a Lowdown spy…

It features, among other not-ready-for-prime-time moments, Clinton scowling and rolling her eyes over an apparent Kerry gaffe during a presidential debate; Kerry pretending to interview himself and babbling in Italian while waiting for a real interview to begin; Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.) cursing at reporters during a campaign stop, and Kerry message guru Robert Shrum confidently declaring a few days before the 2004 election: “Zogby [a prominent pollster] just announced who’s gonna win. Us!”

Know what? I don’t care. Kerry’s done — stick a fork in him already. Same for Edwards. They campaigned against the worst administration this country has ever known, and they lost.

Kerry-Edwards

If the Democrats decide to run either of them again, they can count me out.

Defenders of Iraq war counter-rally

WASHINGTON (AP) — Military families and others defending the war in Iraq claimed on Sunday their turn to demonstrate on the National Mall, a response to the massive protest against the war a day earlier.

Organizers acknowledged that their rally would be much smaller than the anti-war protest that drew nearly 100,000 according to police estimates. Still, they said their message would not be overshadowed.

“We are preparing for as many as 20,000 people, just to be on the safe side,” said Kristinn Taylor, a leader of FreeRepublic.com, one of the sponsors. “People have been fired up over the past month, especially military family members, and they want to be heard.”

Much smaller… would not be overshadowed… preparing for as many as 20,000 people… people have been fired up over the past month.

Four hundred people showed up. 400.

They were planning on 20,000. Four hundred came.

Ouch. Unbelievable. Even I am embarrassed for them.

Addendum: I thought the right-wing bloggers had been particularly quiet about their non-event in D.C. today, then I happened upon this:

But what really gets me about it, is that these thousands of people, who clearly have enough time on their hands to come to Washington, pretending to make a difference, did not go to Louisiana instead, to volunteer their time toward relief efforts, or stayed home to raise money for relief. Just this weekend I saw a yard sale in my neighborhood where all proceeds were going to Katrina relief… Perhaps the estimated 100,000 or so people who marched like mindless drones in the shadow of Cindy Sheehan could have done something more meaningful with their time.

Yep, that’s where they were. All those pro-Bushies were at home holding garage sales so they could donate all the proceeds from those garage sales to the poor victims of Katrina. I most especially like the line about “the estimated 100,000 or so people who marched like mindless drones in the shadow of Cindy Sheehan.” Wow… is someone just a teeny bit bitter or what? Not only is anyone who disagrees with the Bush Bunch anti-American, it turns out they are also mindless drones. Amazing. (I’ll not link to the rightie site from which the above quote originated. They’ve banned me from commenting or backtracking to that site, anyway.)

penguin march

It really is a shame how out of touch many in the Republican party are with their fellow Americans. To them, “anti-Bush” equals “anti-American.” They simply refuse to stop and consider for a moment that they may be the ones displaying the anti-American sentiment.

Bush worshippers and rabid right-wing webloggers John Hinderaker and Mark Noonan are perfect examples.

About yesterday’s huge anti-war demonstration in Washington, D.C., Mark had this to say:

…about 100,000 aged hippies, anti-American socialists and assorted conspiracy-theorists gathered in DC for a hate-America fest…

Here’s John:

…yesterday’s anti-American protest in Washington…

Anti-American. The people who participated in the demonstration were not in agreement with the policies of George W. Bush and his administration, so it only follows that they are “anti-American.”

Mark and John and others like them need to stop and smell the roses. With a president whose approval ratings are consistently in the upper 30s and lower 40s, and with poll after poll showing that the majority of Americans do not agree with the war in Iraq or the direction in which the United States is heading, it is they who are un-American.

Elisabeth Kubler-Ross defined five stages of grief. The right wing of the Republican party is going to have to pass through them as they realize that their ideology is rapidly dying. These stages are denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. Right now, Mark, John and those like them are stuck on denial. I hope, for their sake, that they are able to move through to acceptance without too much trauma.

Update: The righties planned a “pro-war” demonstration in D.C. today to counter yesterday’s gathering. About 100 people showed up.

From the front page of tomorrow morning’s Washington Post…

Antiwar Fervor Fills the Streets

Tens of thousands of people packed downtown Washington yesterday and marched past the White House in the largest show of antiwar sentiment in the nation’s capital since the conflict in Iraq began.

The demonstration drew grandmothers in wheelchairs and babies in strollers, military veterans in fatigues and protest veterans in tie-dye. It was the first time in a decade that protest groups had a permit to march in front of the executive mansion, and, even though President Bush was not there, the setting seemed to electrify the crowd.

Signs, T-shirts, slogans and speeches outlined the cost of the Iraq conflict in human as well as economic terms. They memorialized dead U.S. troops and Iraqis, and contrasted the price of war with the price of recovery for areas battered by hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Riffs on Vietnam-era protests were plentiful, with messages declaring, “Make Levees, Not War,” “I never thought I’d miss Nixon” and “Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam.” Many in the crowd had protested in the 1960s; others weren’t even born during those tumultuous years.

Protest organizers estimated that 300,000 people participated, triple their original target. D.C. Police Chief Charles H. Ramsey, who walked the march route, said the protesters achieved the goal of 100,000 and probably exceeded it. Asked whether at least 150,000 showed up, the chief said, “That’s as good a guess as any.

“It’s their protest, not mine. It was peaceful — that’s all I care about,” Ramsey said.

Perhaps the best part of the whole story…

More than 200 counter-demonstrators set up outside the FBI building on Pennsylvania Avenue, and some back-and-forth yelling occurred as the antiwar marchers moved past.

More than 200?! Wow. Support for the Bush Bunch is really dwindling. The radical right has known about this protest for several weeks, and the best they can do is “more than 200.” That would be sad if it weren’t so funny.

The caption for this photgraph reads: “President Bush is briefed on Hurricane Rita at Peterson Air Force Base, in Colorado Springs, Colo., Saturday, Sept. 24, 2005. Peterson is the headquarters for NORAD and the U.S. Northern Command’s operation center. Bush is monitoring Hurricane Rita from an Air Force base in the Rocky Mountain foothills, seeing how the military is working with state and local officials battling the storm more than 1,000 miles away. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)”

Could he possibly be more useless?

Bush’s Crisis Itinerary at Mercy of Weather, Even Nice Weather

SAN ANTONIO, Sept. 23 – President Bush was supposed to land here on Friday afternoon on the first stop of a tour intended to make clear that he was personally overseeing the federal government’s preparations for Hurricane Rita’s landfall. But the weather did not cooperate.

It was too sunny.

Just minutes before Mr. Bush was scheduled to leave the White House, his aides in Washington scrubbed the stop in San Antonio. Scott McClellan, the White House press secretary, explained that the search-and-rescue team that Mr. Bush had planned to meet and thank here in San Antonio was actually packing up to move closer to where the hurricane would strike…

Another White House official involved in preparing Mr. Bush’s way noted that with the sun shining so brightly in San Antonio, the images of Mr. Bush from here might not have made it clear to viewers that he was dealing with an approaching storm.

The last paragraph just about says it all, doesn’t it?