Good thing we have these here Sheriffs and congressmen to protect us from the government isn't it ? Of course, the last thing the Federal government should do (according to the Republicans) is to transfer money to state and local governments (oops non governments) so that those non government sheriffs don't have to lay off deputies.

It is true that, sometimes, government is the enemy of the people, as when Harry Lee had his deputies use shotguns to threaten people trying to leave New Orleans on foot.

Jindahl's story is, however, a lie http://tinyurl.com/b9r69u

The added data on the supreme court is presented in an odd way. On the x axis we have justices not years.

A more logical presentation would be solid red as the Supreme court had a majority of Republican appointed justices in each of the past 8 years.

My suggestion is horizontal stripes. mostly red with 2 blue horizontal stripes (or is it 3 ? I'm so ignorant I don't remember who appointed Stevens) showing a constant Republican majority.

Lopez falsely characterized Catholic doctrine when she wrote

" Church's teaching on innocent human life." The Catholic church considers human life sacred and allows no distinction between innocent human life and guilty human life. The teaching on "innocent human life" is the teaching of the anti-abortion movement which accepts capital punishment.

To my very limited knowledge (and I'm an atheist raised by atheists and so should be much more ignorant than Lopez) for the Catholic Church the death penalty is just as unacceptable as abortion.

Thus even within the phrase you quote, Lopez demonstrates her cynical willingness to reject teachings of the Catholic church while claiming to speak for it.

Also she is totally ignorant of what happened in Indiana. There was a Republican primary in Indiana. The Nuns may well have been attempting to vote for McCain or Paul (the candidate not the saint) not Clinton or Obama.

Lopez's ignorance might be explained by laziness and the fact that the Republican nomination is arithmetically locked up (before Tuesday there was barely more doubt about who the Democratic nominee will be).

However I suspect that she assumes that everyone has as much bad faith as she does. Liberals object to the violation of the rights of the Nuns, therefore, concludes Lopez, the nuns must be Democrats, because, Lopez assumes, all arguments are motivated only by partisanship, and no one really cares about rights or principles or anything else.