I see your candidacy as potentially transformational, and I'd like to get on board.  But I am seeing:  your surrogates complaining that President Clinton's actions in fighting for his wife are unseemly, unfair, underhanded.  And I am hearing: you yourself say that perhaps your supporters won't support our nominee if it isn't you in the end.  And I am thinking: the power of the institutional disadvantages we will face in November far outstrip that of Bill Clinton.  Things will be a hell of a lot less seemly, and a HELL of a lot less fair, come the fall, and then we'll be in dire need of that unity you're always talking about.

I am tired of being told by Russert and Romney and even Reid that the reason things aren't hunky-dory in this country is because people like me just aren't civil or compromising enough.  As if I were the one pushing for quixotic wars and Himalayan budget deficits, as if I were torturing U.S. citizens and poisoning the poor.  Why should I fetishize bipartisanship?  We saw this week what overeagerness to compromise gets us: bad legislation, stripped of any benefits for real-life working Americans.  Should I now confess that it's me that's the problem?  Should I be inspired to change when I see Lieberman backing McCain?    

[warning: strong language]

I try to keep an even keel, but stuff like this gets my blood to boiling.

BEGALA: Well, there are some good things in the tax bill being voted on in the Senate today, specifically tax cuts for the middle class. But one provision of that bill shows the true heart of the Republican Party in the age of Bush, and it's not a pretty sight.

The bill takes away the child tax credit from 9.2 million of the very poorest children in America, while giving $13 billion in tax breaks to corporations. That's right. The rich get billions. The middle class gets a little something. It is, after all, an election year. But the poor, and I mean the poor, families making less than $10,750 a year, will actually lose some or all of their child tax credit. Sorry, you're out of the game, but thanks for playing.

The savagery, selfishness, really sinfulness of the Republicans hurting the most impoverished children in our country while helping huge corporations is just stunning. Friends, if this is compassionate conservatism, I guess Dick Cheney is Mr. Rogers.

CARLSON: OK, well, the sinfulness, huh? Well, thank you, Father Begala, for your -- you're a holy man and I appreciate you spreading a little of your holiness to the rest of us.

BEGALA: It is sinful.

CARLSON: And I must say, Paul, when you get done with this gig, maybe you can apply for a job in the propaganda bureau of the North Korean government...Because this is so stupid, that it's sinful. It's a tax bill, man. Lighten up. It's not sinful.

BEGALA: No, they are screwing the poorest children in America while giving money to corporations.

CARLSON: Lighten up, Paul. Lighten up, man.

It goes on and gets worse.  It's all a big joke to Tucker "jacuzzi case" Carlson.

I try to give people the benefit of the doubt, but I'm starting to become convinced:  if you marry a Republican, you'd better be into anal, because you'll definitely be fucking an asshole.

From today's edition.  It'd be funnier if it weren't so close to the truth:

Bush To Iraqi Militants: 'Please Stop Bringing It On'

WASHINGTON, DC--In an internationally televised statement Monday, President Bush modified a July 2003 challenge to Iraqi militants attacking U.S. forces. "Terrorists, Saddam loyalists, and anti-American insurgents: Please stop bringing it on now," Bush said at a Monday press conference. "Nine months and 500 U.S. casualties ago, I may have invited y'all to bring it on, but as of today, I formally rescind that statement. I would officially like for you to step back." The president added that the "it" Iraqis should stop bringing includes gunfire, bombings, grenade attacks, and suicide missions of all types.

On a lighter note, from today's The Onion:

Libertarian Reluctantly Calls Fire Department

CHEYENNE, WY--After attempting to contain a living-room blaze started by a cigarette, card-carrying Libertarian Trent Jacobs reluctantly called the Cheyenne Fire Department Monday. "Although the community would do better to rely on an efficient, free-market fire-fighting service, the fact is that expensive, unnecessary public fire departments do exist," Jacobs said. "Also, my house was burning down." Jacobs did not offer to pay firefighters for their service.

I know Condi is pissed these days, but jeebus, even Drudge is running photos that have her looking like the evil aliens from Mars Attacks!.

[Disclaimer:  personally I find it annoying when people speak about groups as if they are monoliths (i.e. the "jewish vote" or the "black vote.")  But obviously socioeconomic realities influece voting patterns, and we use shorthand language to address those patterns.  Please take this post in that spirit.]  

In my work (public health) I deal frequently with the problem of assessing various ethnic groups' overall response to public policy and health interventions.  

I feel that as a whole the Democratic party is doing a fairly ineffective job of addressing the concerns of minority voters, even though on the whole minority voters remain among the strongest supporters of the party.  I think part of the difficulty is a lack of understanding of cultural trends among different groups, and another part is the obvious reality that the economically disadvantaged are underserved as a whole, and the poor skew more strongly minority than do the middle and upper classes.

But today I noticed something interesting.  Ed Gordon of Black Press USA and BET was on the Chris Matthews show today and made an  observation - that in heartland states (he specifically referenced his conversations with voters in Michigan) gay marriage is just not going to be a big issue in November, and wouldn't really constitute a strong "wedge" issue for Bush to exploit to his advantage.  

From where I sit (as a member of a relatively conservative (white Irish) Catholic family centered in rural NY - many of whom always vote Republican, but aren't going to this time) it seemed like a pretty astute comment.  In the heartland, it seems to me, the salient voter issues are the economy, the war and civil liberties.  "Family values" - Janet Jackson's figure notwithstanding - are running a distant fourth.    

Gordon did not specifically address the question of whether the gay marriage issue would be a more salient wedge for black American voters, but I think it's reasonable to assume for that if his reportage suggested that it would be, he would have mentioned it.  

My understanding is limited, but research has suggested that blacks and hispanics who do vote Democrat tend to lean more to the right than do their white counterparts on issues involving homosexuality, and generally approach social issues from a point of view somewhat more motivated by religious faith (for instance, black Democratic voters' relatively strong support for alternative education programs (e.g. "vouchers") that would allow public funds to be redirected toward religious schools is probably due in large part to economic patterns but also somewhat to strong support for religious programs in general.)  

That Gordon didn't mention a possible anti-Democrat backlash on the gay marriage issue among socially conservative minority voters therefore surprised me.  

Am I misunderstanding the state of the art in terms of voting patterns?

Is it just that the other issues swamp whatever disproportionate influence this issue would have on the minority vote?  

Or is Gordon's (presumed) assessment correct:  that it's just not that big a deal to most people?

Or will it be a salient wedge after all?            

If Cheney's office is besieged by the grand jury,  will Bush dump him?  Perhaps so, and I'm starting to think that the logical candidate to replace him would be Joe.  

Whaddya think?  Is this crazy talk, or could Bush use some of that old tyme Joementum?

There may be a poll like this up already, but if so I can't find it.  

Try to be honest ;)

In real life I am a teacher, researcher, and public health scholar.  Over the past two years  I have become increasingly angry and alarmed at the many instances in which the Bush Administration has sought to subvert science for political ends.  Their willingness to do so has manifest itself in many areas, including but not limited to well-documented instances of the truncation and/or alteration of EPA reports, the shielding from liability of pharmaceutical corporations, the mischaracterization of the nature and purpose of therapeutic cloning and stem cell research, the conscious de-emphasis of the use of condoms as a method of controlling the spread of HIV in favor of fear and "abstinence only" programs, and the ongoing disinformation campaign concerning gays and lesbians and their ability to be "cured."

Fellow diary writer "Michael" has noted NIH employees' anxiety over the GOP's increasingly bold retrospective challenges to scientific investigations which have already attained NIH funding though competitive peer-review (a process which I can tell you from personal experience is quite intense).  On July 11th of this year, the U.S. House of Representatives came within two votes of approving the 'de-funding' of five grants dealing primarily with the study of HIV and AIDS, "high risk" behavior, issues of sexual preference and people of minority backgrounds.

More recently, a chill has been cast over the public health research world as prominent researchers in these areas have been personally targeted for scrutiny by so-called conservative lobbying groups.