RockThrower

Judge Taylor Gets "Fringed."

No, Judge Anna Taylor Diggs did not vote for Ned Lamont.  Apparently she has done something even worse.  She had the audacity to defend the Constitution of the United States of America, ruling that President Bush’s “terrorist surveillance programs” were illegal and a direct violation of the first and fourth amendment, not to mention the FISA legislation passed by Congress.

But rather than challenge her ruling on the law, in a tone similar to that used by the President in describing “islamo-facists,” the Republican Party immediately labeled her a “liberal Democrat judge.” Trying to make political hay, the RNC website screamed the headline  “Liberal Judge Backs Dem Agenda To Weaken National Security.” Conservative bloggers were quick to call her an  “Icon of the Lamont Party” and we soon learned that Judge Taylor had been appointed by that liberal “nut-ball” Jimmy Carter. The administration’ mouthpiece Rush Limbaugh weighed in saying she was “as dangerous as the enemy,” accusing her and Carter of “traitorous” behavior.  Immediately, the dirt began to fly with a report zooming across the Internet that Taylor’s former husband, a congressman name Charles C. Diggs had been indicted and convicted on charges of taking kickbacks from his staff.  Worse, it seems that Taylor had been a supporter of the civil rights movement and Martin Luther King. No doubt about it, she was a member of the liberal fringe, and probably a “commie” to boot.

All this ire is aimed at a 73-year-old woman who has been a respected federal judge for nearly 20 years.  One of the first female African American graduates from Yale Law school, (as many thoughtful conservative websites point out – “a two-fer”) she has had a distinguished legal career serving as a county prosecutor, assistant US attorney, and as an attorney in other government agencies and private practice, eventually rising to become Michigan’s first Black Female Federal Judge. As to her involvement in the civil rights movement, she is apparently guilty as charged.  It seems she participated in such nefarious activities as registering voters in Mississippi. 

But in ruling against what she called the administration’s assertion that the President “has been granted the inherent power to violate not only the laws of the Congress but the First and Fourth Amendments of the Constitution itself ” Judge Taylor, “Terrorist Sympathizer” that she is, has apparently crossed the line. She has joined the fringe.

As one conservative blogger wrote, her ruling is “a shocking reminder of why Democrats must never be entrusted with power at any level.  Apparently, he has a different interpretation of the Constitution as well.

But it gets worse.  The conservative blog-way spewed forth to call her an “Unpatriotic,” “America Hating,” “Crazy Bitch,” “Jihad Judge,” who should be “immediately impeached.”  She is “insane” and must be a “black” or “fucking a sand nigger.” Judge Taylor deserves, as one blogger writes, “to have the first bomb that comes here dropped on her head.”

And from the outlying edges of the real fringe comes this, as reported by the Huges for America Blog citing comments from Free Republic: “ This traitor should be taken out back and SHOT. Period. Not a joke, not sarcasm. I'm tired of this terrorist-allied judicial legislators. (Note: That’s not in the Constitution either.)

As for the President Bush, he say’s “Those who herald this decision simply do not understand the nature of the world in which we live.”

He is right about that.

Notes from the Angry Left Fringe

Lamont Win Shows it's Bush and the Republicans Who are Really Out There

I would have written sooner, but I just couldn’t drag myself from the redwood hot tub.

My wife and I, her lesbian lover and six or seven of our friends and acquaintances were just having such a great time.  Who would have thought that group sex would be so hot in our fifty’s.  It must be the Pilates.

But the Marijuana is gone so I might as well say a few words about the implications of the Connecticut Senate Race.  And besides, George McGovern is coming over and somebody’s got to let him in.  And you can’t hear the doorbell from the hot tub.

It seems that my “liberal” friends and I who supported Ned Lamont in the Connecticut Senate race have been encouraging Al Qaida terrorists, so much so that they immediately hatched a plan to rush onto jumbo jets and light their Gatorade on fire.  If I had only known, I would never have dared to express my constitutional rights at the voting booth.  I’ve thought about trying to change my vote, but I figure if it’s really important, George or Dick will change it for me anyway.  Maybe they can just throw it out.

Apparently by supporting Lamont, some Democrats are sending a message that America is in danger of being taking over by an “angry left fringe” who apparently is planning to give Osama Bin Laden the keys to the Capitol.  Gee, I just thought that I was agreeing with the 60 percent of American people who think that maybe going to war in Iraq for bogus reasons wasn’t really such a good idea and disapprove of the President’s job performance.  And I’ll be honest with you, like more than half of Americans, this gig in Iraq and the war on terror aren’t really making me feel a whole lot safer.  I guess I just thought that maybe it would a good idea to have a Senator who would whisper something in the President’s ear besides “atta boy” now and then.

But now that the Republican National Committee has put out its talking points making clear that Democrats have sold out our national security interests to terrorists and that Republican candidates will certainly benefit from the terrorism issue, I can see that I was mistaken. I know that some of my friends on the liberal fringe think the renewed effort to define Democrats as weak on national security amounts to little more than an effort to scare Americans into voting for Republicans in the upcoming Congressional elections. But I think that it’s more like Rep. Tom Reynolds, R-N.Y., the chairman of the House Republicans' campaign committee said immediately after Lamont’s victory,  “National Democrats are stone-cold guilty of engaging in a reckless and irresponsible pattern of neglect for the security of our citizens."  I mean, he wouldn’t try to use the terrorism issue to “benefit’ Republican candidates, would he?

It’s apparent that in joining with the majority of Americans concerned about the conduct of the war and the policies of the Bush administration I have become part of the Anti-American “Angry Left Fringe.” Even though my wife and I have been married 25 years, are raising two kids and working like dogs to pay our mortgage and our taxes I can see now why our support of a candidate who thinks it might be a good idea to ask a question now and then about the Bush administrations management of the war on terror might make some people think we are a couple of America hating radicals. Next thing you know we will be joining up with that “fringe group” made up of the 50 percent of Americans who, according to the recent poll by the Washington Post, disapprove of the Presidents job performance on combating terrorism. I mean, what do these people expect?  Do they think the President should have focused on catching Osama Bin Laden or implementing the recommendations of the 9-11 Commission or something?

At first I found being labeled “fringe” by the Bush/Cheney folks a little confusing, but then I remembered that the Republicans now get to “make up their own reality.  That’s why even though my opinions seem to match up with the majority of Americans I can now understand why Karl Rove is telling everyone that folks like me are just a bunch of liberal nut jobs who are planning to rerun the 1972 election. 

Well, that’s all for now. McGovern’s limo is here and I wouldn’t want the Chardonnay to get warm. He has Gary Hart, Warren Beatty and some girl named Donna with him and we are going to stay up planning our election strategy.  It’s going to be a late night, but that’s o.k.  Us “godless liberals” don’t have to get up and go to church anyway.

Lieberman Race is Referendum on Bush

Will a Lamont Victory Bode Ill for Republicans?

Amid all the blog-way blather and back and forth over the Lieberman-Lamont Senate Race to be decided today in Connecticut, Democrats appear to be at risk of missing the point.

What’s important in this race is not whether “establishment Democrats” or the “netroots” emerge victorious.  What really matters are the reasons that Connecticut voters appear to be so disgusted with Lieberman in the first place, and that those reasons have implications for the upcoming Congressional elections.

Joe Lieberman is not in trouble because liberal bloggers don’t like him.  The former vice presidential candidate is in danger of losing his Senate seat because of his support for the war in Iraq, and his support of an amazingly unpopular president Bush.  Sixty-three percent of Connecticut voters say that going to war in Iraq was the wrong thing to do and 68 percent disapprove of the job President George W. Bush is doing, according to a July survey by Quinnipiac University.

The opinions of Connecticut voters loom large over pending national races. Like their Connecticut brethren, the majority of Americans do not support the war in Iraq and strongly disapprove of the President.   Fifty nine percent of American voters say the war was not worth fighting, and 62 percent of voters disapprove of the way President Bush is handling the situation in Iraq, according to the ABC/Washington Post poll conducted August 3-6.  Survey USA finds that 61 percent of Americans disapprove of President Bush’s performance on the job. The question is whether Democrats will realize the depth of anger over the war and the disenchantment with President Bush in time to make a difference in the fall elections?

While the national numbers are stunning, The publics opposition to the war in Iraq and their dissatisfaction with the president are particularly intriguing in states with competitive House and Senate races.  Of the races identified by the Cook Political Report as toss ups, virtually all of them are in states with where public opinion is similar to Connecticut’s in terms of their disapproval of President Bush and his policies.  For example, in the closely watched Senate race in Pennsylvania, 65 percent of voters give President Bush a negative job approval rating, in Tennessee, 57 percent say they disapprove of the job the president is doing, according to Survey USA.  Candidates for the House of Representative face the same phenomena even in states previously thought of as supportive of the President, such as Ohio where 65 percent of residents give Bush a thumbs down, and Florida, where 62 percent of voters disapprove of his job performance.

Hopefully a Lamont victory will help the Democrats catch up with American voters.  According to the Washington Post/ABC news poll 38 percent of voters say they are more likely to oppose candidates who support President Bush on Iraq.  Only the election results will tell us if Joe Lieberman is going to get a very hard lesson in this reality.  But if Lamont wins, Democrats across the nation should get the message that president Bush and his war in Iraq are very unpopular and voters are looking for an alternative.