Happily kicking this!

I may cycle back around and kick it again!

Welcome to DU, Hydepier!

Glad you're here! I'm a retired journalist myself and people like Chuck Todd embarrass and infuriate the hell outta me! I wonder if he has the same roots Jonathan Karl has. He was groomed for this in one of the many wrong-wing think-tanks and message-manipulation machines - The "Collegiate Network":

http://fair.org/extra-online-articles/a-right-wing-mole-at-abc-news/

Just one more thing we'd better keep an eye on. They've been grooming moles for a long time. Part of their overall take-over strategy targeting the public mindset.

Reminds me of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

In a fairly ritzy neighborhood I was driving through, I saw a big truck being loaded up with donations - of clothing, including lots of prom dresses. For a moment, I thought - WTF????? PROM DRESSES????? When these hurricane victims need food and shelter and funds and medicines and stuff????

I didn't get it. Soon enough, I realized this was a WONDERFUL donation!!!! How many young girls in New Orleans had their hearts broken not only by the storm and its more conventional agonies, but by the disappointment of a broken dream-evening, involving something as simple as just wanting to get dressed up for a big moment in a girl's young life. Morale!!!!

MORALE can sometimes be EVERYTHING!!!

All those pretty dresses - hopefully perked up a few unhappy young women during some awfully glum times.

Anything that sends the wrong-wingers into apoplexy is a good thing.

It's the middle man's message, not the message of Christ. Paul was kind of a hard-ass.

I'd rather stick with the Beatitudes and other messages that the Gospels attribute directly to Jesus. Jesus didn't need an interpreter or a spin-meister.

Thank you for letting us know about this, stevenleser.

Just stupefying that this could happen in America. But it's no longer the America I believed in when I was growing up. Too much greed, short-sightedness, selfishness, thoughtlessness, willful ignorance, petty grudges, and poor sportsmanship. And pure unadulterated meanness. Safe passage, Stephanie. It'll undoubtedly be a kinder place you're headed for.

Aw, much love and many hugs to you, ClusterFreak. And all our sympathy.

Thanks for the backstory and also the link!

I remember seeing "glarius" posts pop up. We'll all miss her.

Amen!

Reminds me of a quote from the movie "The Competition," from 1980, with Lee Remick, Amy Irving, and Richard Dreyfuss. It was about an international piano competition, and Irving and Dreyfuss were among the (at the time) young competitors. Lee Remick played Irving's mentor/teacher. Amy Irving's character won. But she was still bummed out because a love affair with Richard Dreyfuss's character had apparently gone wrong. So instead of being proud and happy about her hard-won and much-yearned-for victory, she hid away, moping, in another room off of the grand salon where the party was. Lee Remick confronted her and (if I remember correctly) told her: "it's going to take at least another 100 years for Nature to evolve the kind of man you have in mind. Until then, GET OUT THERE AND DANCE WITH WHAT THERE IS!!!"

There are MANY purists who sat things out in 2010 because President Obama wasn't the perfect liberal or the perfect progressive, because he tried to compromise, tried to get things done in other ways, but they didn't think he did enough. I'm seeing this observation popping up much more frequently these days, in print, in blogs, on-camera and on-radio, btw. And look what happened when they didn't turn out to vote! The fucking teabaggers were able to take over (just like in Colorado, recently, when our side didn't bother to come out and vote and two of the state legislators ON OUR SIDE got recalled) and dominate the national narrative ad nauseam. Would ANYONE - ANYONE HERE, AT ALL, really be happy to sit back and pout that the President isn't producing everything we want him to do, 100% of the time regardless, and assert, seriously, that they're sorry they voted for him? Would they be happy now, with a President mccain - AND Vice President palin for four or eight years, instead? Or, as of last November, Heaven FORBID - a President romney???

I appreciate the preferences articulated here. I can even sympathize with 'em. Heck, I pushed for the public option and had to hold my nose and accept the ACA instead. Wasn't perfect - an understatement for sure! But we finally got it, and got it IN, and it's settled and established enough by now that the almost deafeningly dominant public drumbeat is that the CONS don't have a prayer of doing away with it. And we can build from there at a more favorable political time - hopefully after the 2014 midterms. That is, IF EVERYBODY SHOWS UP AT THE POLLS and votes for the D's. NOT the R's or even the I's (can't trust 'em - they'll SAY they're "independents," but that's no guarantee they'll always vote the way we expect our Dems to vote). The perfect candidate for President has yet to step up and introduce him/herself to me (only Howard Dean got really close). But you bet I'm gonna be out dancing with what D there is WHENEVER there's an opportunity to vote for one. I know that D will always represent what I care about, more if not much more than ANY R would.

Welcome to DU, The CCC!

Glad to have you with us!

There've been lots of other DUers pointing out, quite correctly, that it'd be one thing if assholes like this actually worked for a living, themselves. But their side of the aisle is nothing but 200+ LAZY MOOCHERS. All take. And that's all.

Welcome to DU, yuihoshida!

Glad you're here! You've sure nailed that one! I was just watching Claire McCaskill calling what the republi-CONS are doing "throwing a tantrum." YESSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!! FINALLY!!!!! Call it like it is, Democrats! These are nothing but adult-size spoiled-brat three-year-olds throwing a tantrum in the middle of the cereal aisle at the grocery store because Mommy wouldn't buy them five boxes of Cocoa Puffs.

Next: I still hope to hear these assholes labeled "Sore Losermen." Because that's what they ARE. They don't get their way, so they throw temper tantrums. They're sore losers because they failed to win the White House with their precious one-percenter vulture/vampire capitalist king and his smug, haughty, arrogant queen. They're sore losers because they failed to win the Senate. They're sore losers because they couldn't keep the White House after bush/cheney left it ransacked and smeared with shit. They shoved it in our faces constantly after bush/cheney stole the White House in 2000. I want to see THEM wear that label around for awhile now. They've certainly earned it!!!