Random political thoughts on an anticlimactic Friday afternoon:

First of all, what little shred of respect I had left in a sock drawer for Rudy “the drag queen” Giuliani evaporated as of the second Republican debate when he chastised crazy-netroots-phenomenon Ron Paul for the heinous crime of recognizing blowback.

Yes, Rudy, we get it: you lived through 9/11. So did a few million other New Yorkers, and a lot of them read the newspaper enough to understand that American foreign policy has consequences. Acknowledging that terrorists might strike us because of specific actions the United States takes does not in any way suggest that it’s okay to kill hundreds or thousands of civilians in retaliation, it’s just a necessary first step toward figuring out how we might go about countering and reducing the terrorist threat. Ron Paul (I’m sorry, that name seriously sounds like a porn star pseudonym — is it just me?) didn’t phrase it quite right, I don’t think, by citing the ten years of bombing Iraq while enforcing the no-fly-zone as a precursor to 9/11; that just sounds like Congressman Paul has heard Dick Cheney’s Iraq-was-behind-9/11 myth one too many times for his own good. However, as part of our continuing presence in the Middle East to enforce our policies, guess what was required? A large military presence in Saudi Arabia, which al Qaeda has specifically cited so many times as one of their biggest beefs with the U.S.

Yes. Vote for Guiliani, a man who cannot comprehend blowback in any way, shape, or form. Put that tunnel-visioned hothead in charge of protecting us from terrorism, I’m sure it will be free from consequence!

Newton’s third law: for every action there is an equal and opposite raction.
Rudy Giuliani: F in physics.

I can’t wait for some more mortal peril.
After the Democratic debate, Joe Biden went on Meet the Press and dealt with the main problem of being a Catholic Democrat in a way that impressed me all over again — just when you thought I couldn’t have starrier eyes for him, right? A lot of my liberal friends were just aghast to hear that he had voted for the late-term abortion ban in the first place, but I wasn’t going to hold it against him ’cause as a Catholic that’s just an issue I can’t touch with a forty-foot pole. Tim Russert tried to pull his usual gotcha tactics on Biden, but I think he handled it just about as well as anyone in his theo-political situation could:

Look, Tim, I’m a practicing Catholic, and it is the biggest dilemma for me in terms of comporting my religious and cultural views with my political responsibility. And the decision that I have come to is Roe v. Wade is as close to we’re going to be able to get as a society that incorporates the general lines of debate within Christendom, Judaism and other faiths, where it basically says there is a sliding scale relating to viability of a fetus. We can argue about whether or not it’s precisely set, whether it’s right or wrong in terms of its three months as opposed to two months, but it does encompass, I’ve come to conclude, the only means by which, in this heterogeneous society of ours, we can read some general accommodation on what is a religiously charged and a publicly-charged debate. That’s the decision I’ve come to.

Even within our own church, there’s been debates about life, you know, from “Summa Theologica,” Aquinas, and 40 days to quickening and right to, you know, Pious IX, animated fetus doctrine and so on. So this — the decision’s the closest thing politically to what has been the philosophic divisions existent among the major confessional faiths in our country. And that’s why I’ve come to the conclusion some long time ago, over 25 years ago, that it is the template which makes the most sense.

…

MR. RUSSERT: Were you yourself — do you believe that life begins at conception?

SEN. BIDEN: I am prepared to accept my church’s view. I think it’s a tough one. I have to accept that on faith. That is a tough, tough decision to me. But there is a point relatively soon where viability — it’s clear to me when there’s viability, meaning the ability to survive outside the womb, that I don’t have any doubt. [Pat Moynihan], like me, believed that you have this notion of abortion in the last month, where there’s clearly viability. And if you make that judgment based upon the nature of the child’s health, that is not a good basis for a societal decision. Only the mother’s health should dictate the outcome then. Otherwise, you yield to the side of the fetus, which is almost full term.

Very treacherous waters to navigate, but well done. Joe Biden: B in theology.

Tancredo’s all you got?

I got home from work yesterday to see CNN all a-twitter about a ground-breaking deal worked out in the Senate that had a rogue’s gallery of generally disagreeing senators all hanging out and patting each other on the back and the White House ready to join in. Let me just say that I have absolutely no idea what this new immigration reform plan entails or what its consequences might be, but for God’s sake pass the thing! Anytime you can get Ted Kennedy and Diane Feinstein together with Lindsey Graham, Arlen Specter, and Jon freaking Kyl for a downright love-fest, you have planetary aligment that Nostradomus couldn’t see coming. There’s a reason we are governed by representatives and not referenda: they must know something we don’t about the subject, so just trust them and let them pass it! Pass it! Pass it! Let’s move on with our lives!

Congress: O in Civics, for OMG-I-can’t-believe-Tom-Tancredo’s-the-best-opponent-CNN-could-find-for-this-bill.



Read more filed under Politics