In a nutshell, how the GOP sees muslims and liberals:
Latest Updates: Republicans RSS
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aziz
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aziz
Republicans have been whining about not getting a seat at the table and being excluded from giving their ideas on health care reform. So, the President has invited the Republicans to join him at a health care summit on Feb 25th, which will be televised, so that they can offer their ideas to the American people and work with Democrats to publicly discuss the reform issues.
What’s the GOP response? “It’s a TRAP!“
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johnpi
Republican congressman Darrell Issa from South California says the democratically elected Democratic congress is ‘exactly the same’ as Kazakhstan’s dictatorship.
Issa made the comment at a hearing to Kazakh foreign minister Kanat Saudabayev:
I want to share with you something here today. Washington, D.C., is exactly the same. This is a one-party town, even though there are people who are not Democrats. And this town has decided to have representation, at least one member of the council, who is chosen simply to represent minorities.
Issa has also nominated Kazakhstan president Nursultan Nazarbayev for a Nobel Peace prize.
Kazakhstan has been described as an authoritarian state and one of the “least free countries in the world” by Freedom House, a human rights organization.
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johnpi
A new poll of more than 2,000 self-identified Republican voters finds that more than half believe or are at least suspicious that Obama “wants the terrorists to win.”
I’m not optimistic about how those Republicans view US Muslims in general.
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johnpi
US Senator James Inhofe: ‘I believe in racial and ethnic profiling’ because ‘all terrorists are Muslims or Middle Easterners.’
This from the senator of the state that suffered the second-largest terrorist attack in US history – at the hands of Timothy McVeigh.
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Shams al-Nahar
Students Day from Tehran Bureau.
On November 15, 1952, the coup government announced that Richard M. Nixon, then Vice President to U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, would pay a visit to Iran on December 9, 1953, presumably to celebrate with the Shah the demise of the Mosaddegh government and restoration of the monarchy. Nixon’s visit was also supposed to demonstrate the Shah’s full support for the United States. At that time however, anti-American feelings were running very high in Iran. Despite the extreme repression, the Shah had not been able to completely crush the opposition. The news of Nixon’s trip angered the frustrated population, especially the opposition. [...]
On the morning of December 7, 1953, the guards entered [the University of Tehran], the heart of the protests, to prevent any repeat demonstrations.
Though there had not been any demonstrations yet that day, the excuse given was that some students had mocked the police, and the police wanted to arrest them. Two soldiers and an officer went to a class to make the arrests. But the professor, Shams Malak Ara, asked them to leave. As they arrested two students, one student jumped on a desk and began shouting for help. Shams Malak Ara notified the Dean of the FOE.
The soldiers and the officer then went to the office of Dean of the FOE, Mohandes Khalili [who was later active in the National Front]. He also protested the intrusion, and his deputy, Dr. Rahim Abedi, was ordered to ring the bells to notify the students. Students gathered in the hall on the first floor of the school. The guards who had been on alert invaded the FOE building. According to Dr. Abedi, 68 bullets were fired. Three young students — Mostafa Bozorgnia, Ahmad Ghandchi, Mehdi Shariatrazavi — were killed.Ah, yes the Land of the Free imposed a puppet government to suppress citizen protest and enable tyranny. Nejad and Khamenei are just the mirror of the US-imposed Tyrant Shah.
That is why the Green Wave will triumph.
Still, an edifiying read for the “why-do-they-hate-us” crowd, and the bulk of theRepublicanWEC Party.
Sully continues to have the best coverage of the Green Wave in Known Blogspace. -
buzz
Republicans want this to go away in the worst way. They want to deal with Khalid Shaikh Mohammed in a dark military tribunal where the reporting is limited and the public won’t be able to consider charges against the Bush Administration. Love the explanation: it “gives an unnecessary advantage to the terrorists.” Such a joke.
Giuliani Criticizes Terror Trials in New York
By JOSEPH BERGERRudolph W. Giuliani, mayor of New York at the time of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, said on Sunday that the Obama administration’s decision to try Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the self-described mastermind of the attacks, in a civilian court in Manhattan would unnecessarily cost millions of dollars for security, create legal advantages for the defense and symbolically deny that the United States is at war with terrorism.
“It gives an unnecessary advantage to the terrorists and why would you want to give an advantage to the terrorists, and it poses risks for New York,” Mr. Giuliani said in an appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union.” He also interviewed on ABC’s “This Week” and “Fox News Sunday.”
Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. announced on Friday that the United States would try Mr. Mohammed in the federal courthouse in lower Manhattan, just blocks from where the World Trade Center towers were brought down by the attacks, which killed almost 3,000 people in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania. Mr. Holder said that a military commission would try five other detainees held at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, because they are accused of committing crimes overseas.
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aziz
a great series at Open Left by diarist dreaminonempty has been chronicling the future decline and fall of the Republican Party on the basis of demographic trends, ethnic and religious. The post on religious trends had a extensive section on how muslim voting trends, which have been much more volatile in response to policy than comparable groups like African Americans or Jewish Americans. I take these results at City of Brass and re-open an old debate about whether there is/should be a "muslim vote" and whether it would necessarily be aligned with the political Left.
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johnpi
Analysis of ‘West Asian’ voting patterns in most recent US elections at Open Left. An example:
Money quote: “It is simply astounding that Republicans have been able to take their relationship with several different communities who have ties to this region and alienate so many, so well, so quickly. “
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johnpi
The Untouchables: Right-wingers put themselves in an uncompromising ‘world apart.’
Reaching for a metaphor:
Commentators have observed a resurgent brand of conservatism that has taken on the characteristics of religious zealotry. It is a brand of conservatism that cannot be negotiated with because its adherents see themselves as the bearers of the one true faith and as victims of a host of apostate “others” who they feel must not be appeased through compromise.
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johnpi
Recently, US Senator Al Franken introduced an amendment that would give US citizens working for military contractors access to US courts if they have been raped by other contractor employees. Thirty senators – all Republicans – voted no.
Someone has created a website, http://www.republicansforrape.org for the “thirty legislators who were brave enough to stand up in defense of rape and vote against Senator Al Franken’s anti-rape amendment to the 2009 Defense Appropriations bill.”
The satirical blog writers couldn’t resist a Saudi Arabia analogy:
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johnpi
The Democratic party’s response to Republican outrage at Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize:
“Either sensing an opening to cast the Republican Party as actively rooting against America, or just fed up with the stream of negative responses,” writes Sam Stein, “the Democratic National Committee put out an unusually blunt statement Friday morning. The gist: that the GOP sides with the terrorists.”
“The Republican Party has thrown in its lot with the terrorists — the Taliban and Hamas this morning — in criticizing the President for receiving the Nobel Peace prize,” wrote DNC Communications Director Brad Woodhouse. “Republicans cheered when America failed to land the Olympics and now they are criticizing the President of the United States for receiving the Nobel Peace prize — an award he did not seek but that is nonetheless an honor in which every American can take great pride — unless of course you are the Republican Party.
The 2009 version of the Republican Party has no boundaries, has no shame and has proved that they will put politics above patriotism at every turn. It’s no wonder only 20 percent of Americans admit to being Republicans anymore – it’s an embarrassing label to claim.”
Chris Bowers lauds this response: “That is just about the most aggressive, hard-hitting rhetoric I have ever read from a Democratic Party committee. It is like Alan Grayson wrote this response.” Glenn Greenwald pans it: “Apparently, according to the DNC, if you criticize this Prize, then you’re an unpatriotic America-hater — just like the Terrorists, because they’re also criticizing the award. Karl Rove should be proud.”
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johnpi
Florida Republicans shoot ‘Muslim’ targets at meeting.
South Florida Republicans held a weekly meeting at a gun range, shooting at targets including cut-outs of a Muslim holding a rocket-propelled grenade launcher.
The GOP (Republican) candidate to replace U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz fired at a full-body silhouette with “DWS” written next to its head.
Wasserman Schultz declined comment, but the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee called the Tuesday event “extremist” and “sexist.”
Robert Lowry, who’s vying for Wasserman Schultz’s seat, initially described his target as a joke. Minutes later, he called it a mistake.
Others refused to apologized for the Southeast Broward Republican Club event, featuring assault rifles and handguns. A conservative activist said they should stand up for their beliefs in the heavily Democratic county.
Update:
Here’s a screengrab of the target being used:
>
Check out video of the shooting event here.
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johnpi
Bob Corker, a Republican senator from Tennessee, insulted a former Canadian Public Health Minister by telling her that her country, which has universal health care, has a “parasitic relationship” with the United States because of its supposedly inferior health care technology:
During a hearing of the Special Committee on Aging, the Tennessee Republican told Canada’s former Public Health Minister, Dr. Carolyn Bennett, that her country is “living off of us” because they set lower prices for health care and “all the innovation, all the technology breakthroughs just about take place in our country and we have to pay for it.”
“It is not really our country so much is the problem, it’s sort of the parasitic relationship that Canada, and France, and other countries have towards us,” Corker said. “…You benefit from us, and we pay for that. And I resent that, and I want to figure out a way to solve that.”
Think Progress blogger Zaid Jilani notes:
Although attacking the Canadian and European health care systems is a common tactic for conservatives, the fact remains that these countries have been leading health care innovators time and time again.
Canada brought the world insulin, developed bone marrow transplantation, and conducts more lung transplant surgeries than the United States. Meanwhile, of the twenty most profitable pharmaceutical manufacturers, only nine are from the United States — the rest are from western Europe, Japan, and Israel, all of which have universal health care systems that Corker so is opposed to.
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razib, murtad fitri
Attitudes of Republicans & Conservatives by demographic to evolution
Conservative elites are conflicted on evolution, liberals are not
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johnpi
Texas: 11th Congressional District candidate calls for end to Muslim immigration.
Big Country congressional hopeful Canyon Clowdus wants no more Muslim immigration to America. But he doesn’t want to stop at the stance he outlined to radical blog “Dr. Bulldog and Ronin,” which endorses him for 11th Congressional District representative.
“It’s not just them,” the conservative Republican told a reporter Sunday night. “They need to check all immigrants. They used to assimilate.”
Instead, immigrants retain their beliefs, hurting America, Clowdus, a Marble Falls businessman, said.
Clowdus wants to halt Muslim immigration to stop what the blog termed a “stealth Jihad” and “creeping sharia” to replace the Constitution with Islamic religious law.
Clowdus’ motto: “Let’s put God back in government!”
Clowdus’ campaign website seems to say that George Washington wasn’t very bright, but he was a good man, and it’s the same diff’ for Clowdus.
George Washington was not elected our first president because he was a “mental giant” as Thomas Jefferson or Ben Franklin were considered to be, but because he was a “moral giant“. Many of our elected officials simply do not want to act on the taxpayers best interest in fear of making enemies, in turn, not getting re-elected. We need leaders in Washington that will fight without concern of re-election or any loss to themselves. Fight for what is right…fight as “moral giants“ for OUR great nation.
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johnpi
Remember this? “…many American Muslims share the Republican party’s social views.” Meet the ‘young lion’ of US conservatism: “No guy will die for an ugly girl.”
Jason Mattera describes himself as “the surprisingly fresh face of conservatism.” He is the spokesman for the Young America’s Foundation, a student organization. Its motto is “The conservative movement starts here,” and is described as “the principal outreach organization of the Conservative Movement.”
Sarah Posner writes in Campus Progress:
During the panel, Mattera took the David and Goliath metaphor another perverse step: If conservatives (David) smite liberals (Goliath), they will be rewarded with the hot conservative women, just like King Saul promised his daughter to the warrior who slew the evil giant. “You know his daughter must have been beautiful because there’s no guy who is gonna die for an ugly girl.” “Our women are hot. We have Michelle Malkin. Who does the left have, Rachel Maddow? Sorry, I prefer that my women not look like dudes.”
So what sort of fella is Jason Mattera? The young conservative leader maintains a blog with posts titled: Ted Kennedy Silenced, Can Lesbians Have Phalluses, Defending Rush Limbaugh, Abortion Deadly, and What’s the Difference Between a Jewish and a Latino Phallus. (He’s rather focused on phalluses, ya’ think?) On the blog’s “about page” Mattera writes like a 90’s Valley Girl: I heart free markets, traditional values, and limited government. Currently I represent Young America’s Foundation. I have two awesomely awesome parents. I swing and salsa dance… I avoided a public school education, thanks to the financial sacrifice of my awesomely awesome parents.
Because Republicans “heart” your “awesomely awesome” conservative values.
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johnpi
In an interview:
THE HILL: What vote would you like to redo?
KING: I don’t really go back and re-live that sort of thing. Some of the big votes that I’ve thought about, some of the jury’s still out. And at this point, maybe I’d answer that question another way, probably the singular vote that stands out that went against the grain, and it turns out to be the best vote that I cast, was my “no” vote to the $51.5 billion to [Hurricane] Katrina. That probably was my best vote. But as far as doing something different again, I don’t know.
Amanda Terkel reports:
Media Matters Action Network’s Matt Finkelstein writes, “Katrina killed 1,464 in Louisiana alone and uprooted the lives of countless others all over the gulf region. Yet, King says this was his ‘best’ moment in Congress. Not fighting for ‘conservative principles’ like smaller government, lower taxes, or a strong national defense — no, he’s most proud of opposing relief for victims of a catastrophe.”
Because Republicans represent your conservative values.
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aziz
conservatism in the wilderness: the harsh bigotry of no expectations.
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aziz
It’s precisely because I think Sarah Palin is no fool that I think she is so craven, in dragging her son to the political fight over health insurance reform. “Obama, don’t kill my baby,” she cries, calculating cynicism personified. The Lady MacBeth of politics?
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johnpi
Republicans practicing taqiyya in the US healthcare debate.
One vocal attendee was a woman named Heather Blish, who identified herself as “just a mom from a few blocks away” and “not affiliated with any political party.” When interviewed by the local NBC affiliate, Blish insisted she was not a member of the Republican Party. “I left the party,” she said. Blish’s statements, however, are distortions. From NBC’s report:
Her LinkedIn page shows something different. She was the vice chair of the Republican Party of Kewaunee County until last year. She worked on the John Gard campaign, who ran unsuccessfully against Kagen last year. And it says she’s a part of the Republican Party for Kagen’s district, as well as the Republican Party of Wisconsin, and the Republican National Committee.
Her LinkedIn page shows she’s a graduate of Faith Academy (there are several in Wisconsin, but they all aim to provide a “quality Christian education.”) Count taquiyya among the good Christian values…
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johnpi
For the modern GOP, it’s a return to the “white voter strategy.”
With Republican party leaders so constrained by ideological blinders that none of their positions is likely to produce gains among non-white minorities, especially Hispanics, the GOP is finding it has no real alternative but to revert to a “white voter” strategy.
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aziz
“Dead baby juice” – this is why moderates in the GOP are a dying breed.
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aziz
I have a lot of sympathy for Attorney General Eric Holder, who is caught between his two masters, the President and the Law.
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johnpi
More racist Facebook page comments discovered by Audra Shay, the top candidate in the race to head national Young Republicans political group (post on the first set of comments here).
* In October 2008, in the wake of news that an effigy of Sarah Palin was being hung outside an affluent Hollywood home as an offensive Halloween decoration, Shay replied, returning to the “LOL” style that she employed after the “coons” comment: “What no ‘Obama in a noose? Come on now, its just freedome [sic] of speech, no one in Atlanta would take that wrong! Lol.”
She picked up the thread again the next morning with a clarification and a new insight. “Apparently I could not spell last night. I am wondering if the guys with the Palin noose would care if we had a bunch of homosexuals in a noose.”
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johnpi
Because the Republican party represents your conservative values:
David Brooks: A Republican senator put ‘his hand on my inner thigh’ for a ‘whole’ dinner party.
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johnpi
Yet another rising Republican star busted for racism.
Last Wednesday, Audra Shay, the Bobby Jindal-supported shoe-in to be the new leader of the Young Republicans was engaged in an exchange with some other members of that group on her Facebook page. A Facebook page friend posted the following:
Obama Bin Lauden [sic] is the new terrorist… Muslim is on there side [sic]… need to take this country back from all of these mad coons… and illegals.
Shay weighs in on the comments a few minutes later: “You tell em Eric! lol.”
Several other Young Republican Facebook friends challenged the use of the word ‘coon’ (but not the comment about Muslims). Shay subsequently ‘de-friended’ the commenters who challenged the racist slur, but kept her friendship link with the racist commenter.
The two comments directly below the boxed comments are worthy of attention too. “Obama faces” (with a wink) is more racist reference, and the comment about ‘Liberal’s (sic) shooting themselves in the foot’ is ridiculous in this context…
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johnpi
Americanists believe that any statement from the President that fails to build up and anoint Mousavi as the preferred candidate is discouraging to Mousavi and his supporters, because they apparently cannot grasp that being our preferred candidate is to be tainted with suspicion of disloyalty to the nation.
It is strange how nationalists often have the least awareness of the importance of the nationalism of another people. Many of the same silly people who couldn’t say enough about Hamas’ so-called “endorsement” of Obama as somehow indicative of his Israel policy views, as well as those who could not shut up about his warm reception in Europe, do not see how an American endorsement of a candidate in another country’s election might be viewed with similiar and perhaps even greater distaste by the people in that country.
(via)
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aziz
interview with Judge Robert Bork shows we really dodged a bullet. The man is a fount of rightwing conservative wingnut talking points.
via Cole, who snarks about this man supposedly being our “greatest living legal scholar”.
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johnpi
