quot

This is rather amazing:

A new national poll suggests that nearly three-quarters of all Americans support the plan to withdraw most U.S. combat troops from Iraqi cities and towns, even though most believe that the troop movements will lead to an increase in violence in that country.

But nowhere near as amazing as this:

"This plan has widespread bipartisan support," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "Seventy two percent of Democrats and 74 percent of Republicans favor this move."

Republicans support the drawdown in Iraq more than Democrats do. The difference is within the MOE, but it does put a big crimp in Cheney’s claims that Obama is making us less safe.

Oh and Iraq is really going down hill. I mean look at this violence:

The only ones that want us there is Dick Cheney and the rest of his war-mongering, draft-dodging friends.

All the Republican critics of President Obama’s handling of Iran have resorted to the old Gipper offense. Mostly what they are saying is Obama should “do what Reagan did”. Richard Cohen, and I can’t believe I am saying this, sets the record straight on this:

Some of Obama's critics have faulted him for not doing what Ronald Reagan (belatedly) did following the fraudulent election in the Philippines in 1986. After some dithering, Reagan virtually forced President Ferdinand Marcos into exile. How neat. How not a precedent for Iran.

Marcos was, to exhume a dandy Cold War phrase, an "American lackey." The Philippines itself was a former American colony. We knew the country. Hell, at one time, we virtually owned it.

The equivalent would be Obama having to break up a prison riot, and he should do what Reagan did to stop a school yard fight. There is no comparing the two items. But this is to be expected from a party that has raised Ronald Reagan to the level of a deity.

Republicans loved Chelsea Clinton. She instantly became their constant punch line. For example here is John McCain:

Why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly? Because her father is Janet Reno."

-- Sen. John McCain, speaking to a Republican dinner, June 1998.

And let’s not forget Rush Limbaugh:

it was Limbaugh who ridiculed Chelsea Clinton, then 13, as the "White House dog."

Now those aren’t jokes as sick as making one about raping a child, but that kind of joke wasn’t even made, but Letterman never made a joke about anyone being raped. Instead he simply said that the Palin’s daughter got knocked up by A-Rod. He didn’t even specify which daughter. It was the Palins who decided to make it about their 14 year old daughter.

But Republicans seem to forget that they loved the jokes when they were going against Chelsea Clinton. Even Palin’s own running mate was out there trying to get the chuckles. But today we have Republicans trying to say that never happened. Here’s Republican talking head John Feehery trying to say it never happened. Luckily Contessa Brewer brought her A-game and quickly shot him down:

So since there is all this outrage from the right over “leave the kids out of it”, will they start boycotting Rush Limbaugh, who never could do that? Hell no.

So how many out there have received one of these robo-calls to their phone saying “your car warranty is about to expire”? These things have been a total nuisance, and I have even received calls on my cell phone about it. Well it looks like the government has had enough of it:

Federal regulators filed suits Thursday against several companies they say are behind a national wave of spam "robo-calls" that warn people their auto warranties are expiring and offer new service plans.

Federal Trade Commission officials said they asked a federal court in Chicago to halt the illegal telemarketing campaign of "Your Car Warranty Has Expired." Officials say as many as 1 billion of the nuisance calls have been made to Americans.

The FTC named Voice Touch Inc. and Transcontinental Warranty Inc., which it called the telemarketer and promoter of the scheme, respectively, in the lawsuits. The agency is seeking injunctions forcing them to return allegedly ill-gotten gains.

FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz called it "one of the most aggressive" telemarketing schemes the agency has ever seen.

"I'm not sure which is worse, the abusive telemarketing tactics of these companies, or the way they try to deceive people once they get them on the phone," Leibowitz said. "Either way, we intend to shut them down."

I think a public flogging is in line for the assholes that came up with this scheme. I know that won’t happen, but it will be fun to watch them get their asses handed to them in a court of law.

And we don’t have anyone running FEMA yet. But don’t blame the President or Democrats for that:

A Louisiana senator is stalling Florida emergency management director Craig Fugate's nomination as head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Fugate had sailed through his nomination hearing and Monday cleared the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee by a unanimous voice vote. Republican Sen. David Vitter said, however, that he'd blocked Fugate because of concerns he has with FEMA.

"I have a hold on the FEMA nomination because I sent a list of hurricane recovery questions and projects to FEMA, many of which have not been adequately addressed," Vitter said in a statement. "I'm eager to get full responses and meet with the nominee immediately."

Perhaps if FEMA was allowed to have a boss, then they would have someone to answer the questions Vitter has. Of course that makes sense and we are talking about a hooker loving, airport screaming hero of the right here.

"A sad day for Alaska yesterday when he was found guilty of seven felonies. But -- and now he needs to do the right thing, and the right thing is, as he's proclaiming his innocence and proclaiming, too, that he will go through the appellate process, OK, then he needs to step aside and allow our state to elect someone who will be supportive of those ideals of America: the free enterprise, the missions that we're on, to win the war, those things that have got to take place in order to progress this country. Ted Stevens has got to play a very statesmanlike role in this now."

That was Sarah Palin talking about Ted Stevens last October. Now she thinks that Mark Begich should resign so Alaska can hold another election, despite Begich wining fair and square.

I think what really gets me on this whole thing is how Republicans acted when the Democrats started talking about problems at the Bush Justice Department. Democrats were on a “political witch hunt” according to all those on the right. Now that the flaws of Bush justice has ensnarled one of their own, the Republicans want to declare a mulligan. Sorry, but this is the price you –pay for putting party loyalty above country.

Ok this is getting good. Yesterday Newt Gingrich had the audacity to go against core conservative values and state that he wants the president to succeed and “you’re irrational if you don’t want him to”:

Now we are on today, and Limbaugh isn’t happy about that:

"I'm frankly getting tired of talking about Newt. I mean, it's a pointless exercise," Limbaugh said of Gingrich's dismissal of him on Meet the Press. "I'm surprised by nothing when I'm dealing with people in the media who think they're in politics.... They are fly-by-night operators, and most of them stand for nothing until they see a poll about what the American people want, and then they go out and try to say one way or another what the American people want while trying to falsely hold onto an ideology at the same time -- and you can't count on them. You can't depend on them. They will sell you out; they will throw you overboard to save themselves, faster than anything. And they'll use you on their way up as often as they can at the same time."

How dare these people in the media, who think they are in politics say such things! You go Rush.

Oh wait!

Rush is in the media. Newt was in politics and still is. Sounds like someone better up Rush’s dose.

The fact that the stimulus isn’t seeing any Republican votes in the House and only three in the Senate isn’t a sign that it’s a bad bill, it’s a sign that it’s something against a far-right ideology that has plagued this country for too long. A perfect example of this is from the mouth of one of the Republican Senators supporting the bill:

"When I came back to the cloak room after coming to the agreement a week ago today," said Specter, "one of my colleagues said, 'Arlen, I'm proud of you.' My Republican colleague said, 'Arlen, I'm proud of you.' I said, 'Are you going to vote with me?' And he said, 'No, I might have a primary.' And I said, 'Well, you know very well I'm going to have a primary.'{[}]amp;quot;

What’s this mean? Well basically it shows that the Republicans are scared to death. They saw what happened last November and now their own political lives are on support, with someone ready to yank the plug.

{[}]lt;p>If you look closely at the remaining Republicans in Congress, they are from solidly red areas. That means beating a Democratic is really no big problem. After all, these areas went for McCain in the year of Obama. But when you talk primaries you open a whole new can of worms. The last thing they want to see if some conservative saying “Mr. X” voted for that huge bill of “government waste”.  That gets the neo-cons salivating, and that leads to Republicans having to spend more money to defend their seats in a primary.