A victim of collision on the open sea

Nobody ever said that life was free

Sank, swam, go down with the ship

But use your freedom of choice

I'll say it again in the land of the free

Use your freedom of choice

Your freedom of choice

In ancient Rome there was a poem

About a dog who found two bones

He picked at one

He licked the other

He went in circles

He dropped dead

Freedom of choice

Is what you got

Freedom of choice!

Then if you got it you don't want it

Seems to be the rule of thumb

Don't be tricked by what you see

You got two ways to go

I'll say it again in the land of the free

Use your freedom of choice

Freedom of choice

Freedom of choice

Is what you got

Freedom of choice!

In ancient Rome

There was a poem

About a dog

Who found two bones

He picked at one

He licked the other

He went in circles

He dropped dead

Freedom of choice

Is what you got

Freedom from choice

Is what you want

Oh, was that "not only extremely tacky...disrespectful...insensitive and mak[ing] a mockery of a national tragedy?" Too f'in bad.

Well, I'm off to get some delicious Krispy Kremes!

"Don't think it hasn't been a little bit of heaven!

'Cause it hasn't."

...shouldn't he also chomp down on his creationist hat, for being proved wrong?

Of course, that would require him traveling in time back to when he was proved wrong: about 150 years ago, when Darwin published Origin of Species.

...as long as he actually tries to uphold the oath.

You know, to actually try to "preserve, protect and defend" the Constitution, as opposed doing as the Bushies did: rape, ignore, and trample it.

Joan (if you're reading these), for the life of me, I could not figure out the location of the magical line where Armey believes "politics" starts. From the looks of it, you couldn't figure it out either. You were talking policy--by definition, a part of politics, as you mentioned--and all he could muster by way of argument was "give it a rest." In other words, he had no argument; only insult and derision.

All in all, an intellectual gunfight against an unarmed man!

I know everybody here is outraged, but at this point I'm all for MORE Dick Armey, MORE kissing Limbaugh's ass, MORE Republicans making juvenile suggestions about putting terror suspects in Alcatraz, etc, etc. In these scary times, who's going to start trusting these guys again? The Republicans are digging themselves deeper, everybody give 'em a shovel!

"I think we may go back to more guerrilla warfare, or go back to working harder on your own abortion clinic in your town," says pro-life blogger Jill Stanek.

Gee, given that terrorist Eric Rudolph--as well as all the felons that helped hide him in western NC--was literally waging guerrilla warfare against abortion rights, I really hope they don't go back to that approach.

Because, given his policies for Central America, that's the most fitting thing I can think of.

I agree with other commenters: this guy's a dangerous psychotic. Or are we going to start strafing anyone found in opium-growing areas? Are we going to start a scorched-earth campaign on Afghan agriculture? That's within the bounds of his directive.

We need to ensure that Afghans can have actual economy without putting half their work into opium production. If we can't...well, that's kind of our whole problem with Afghanistan, innit?

If we can't solve that problem, then we're not about to "win" any war.

I see the Republican's "Project: Demographic Suicide" program continues apace!

"...unlike in the House, Democrats can't come away without a single Republican vote in favor and still claim victory."

And why not, Alex? A win's a win, ain't it? And if they get 51 votes, and an attempted filibuster collapses, that's a win. Obama signs it. Boom! It's a law! Or did the Constitution get amended otherwise?

Call their f'in bluff. They threaten to filibuster? Fine. Make. Them. Filibuster.

It only makes sense, following their arguments. So dynamite those TVA dams, the Lincoln Tunnel, or the lovely examples of the Capitol building in Helena, MT, or the high school your daughter attends. Get rid of it all! Monuments to Socialism! They're warping the One True Free Market!

But that would put a further crimp in the economy, wouldn't it?

I am not going to argue with these people over things that didn't happen. Counterfactual "analyses" belong in the fiction section. Unfortunately, the WSJ writers don't have the imagination of a Harry Turtledove, or of a Philip K. Dick, writing "Man in the High Castle;" they only end up wasting our time with their propagandistic fantasies (see Rand, Ayn).

But I will say this: the New Deal "hired 3,000 writers, musicians, sculptors and painters, including Willem de Kooning and Jackson Pollock..." and my paternal grandfather. Who lost his job during the belt-tightening that FDR submitted to in the mid-late 30's (thank you, Republicans!), turned to the bottle, and died young, decades before I was born. So, Amityville Shlaes and your fellow cadres: I take it personally, you neofascist sons of bitches.

At this point, "leadership" in the Republican Party has devolved into nothing more than celebrity status. True, this is a general problem in American society: Obama succeeded partially on his charisma and "likeability." HOWEVER, he has the intellectual chops to back it up.

Republicans neither know nor care about ability any more. So, first we had Dubya, who everyone supposedly wanted to have a beer with, and now with Sarah, Rush and Joe, they've dropped any pretense of anyone having any sort of competence whatsoever.

(It's even worse than it sounds: out of those three, PALIN is the most competent!--she at least knows the operation of Alaskan government pretty well.)