The lengths to which Republicans will go to try to defeat Obama

Here's a guy you can trust with your reproduction

h/t The Rude Pundit.

That is Bishop William Lori of Bridgeport, Connecticut. Despite the unfortunate photo, which looks like the last thing an altar boy sees before being taken into a booth for some private confessin’, Lori actually co-wrote the zero tolerance policy for child-f****** priests or, as it’s known everywhere else, “Wait, You Mean There Wasn’t a Zero Tolerance Policy for Child-******* in the Catholic Church Already?”. He’s also a warrior for all things churchy in this vile, depraved secular nation.

… yesterday Bishop Lori testified, as part of an all-male panel, before the House Oversight Committee during its hearing on the Obama administration’s continuation of a Bush-era policy, already passed in 28 states, including being signed into law by Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee when they were governors, that employers who provide health insurance for their employees, including businesses and institutions run by religious groups, with the exception of houses of worship, must include female contraceptive coverage.

Washington GOP decides not to count all the votes. WTF?

link

As you know, here at TPM we’ve been really curious what happened up in the Republican caucus in Washington state. For probably the first time in all the primaries and elections I’ve ever watched, the folks running the election decided to stop counting the votes with 13% of the votes uncounted. And this wasn’t a 70-30 blow out, but a tight race where the two top vote getters were separated by less than 2% of the vote. Then this morning, state party chair Luke Esser decided to declare McCain the winner.

Dufus wins GOP primary in Iowa

I couldn’t be more pleased.  Evangelicals were 60% of the few GOP voters who gave a shit.

John McCain is being annointed by Big Business as the GOP nominee

The current crop of crazies leading the GOP field of presidential candidates scares the business community, in part because they are unelectable, and in part because some, notably Mike Huckabee are not tax cutters. What to do, what to do?

Well, I think the decision has been made: Bring in John McCain, who has no real principles any more other than he wants to be president REAL BAD. McCain has a lot of name recognition, but somehow just hasn’t caught on this time around; he needs cash in a big way. The plan: try to “flip him” on this tax cutting stuff, by promising a truckful of cash.

The Wall Street Journal reports on the results: a great success!!!

Mr. McCain paid a visit to our offices last Friday, and he now says the supports extending the Bush tax rates, even admitting they helped the economy emerge from recession “Without a doubt. Without the slightest doubt,” he told us. “Absolutely.”

We now have two pieces in the Journal on McCain in two days, an endorsement by the Journal and by Lieberman, and The Journal suggests that McCain is “surging”, probably because of his support for Bush’s “surge.” Hmm….I think McCain is merely benefitting from the collapse of Giuliani and Romney, but the Journal is not exactly the Straight Talk Express.

I will be very surprised if McCain doesn’t report a huge influx of cash in the immediate future. It’s probably too late to have much effect on the Iowa caucuses, but NH is next and favored McCain in 2000 by 18 points over Bush.

McCain’s pilgrimage immediately brings to mind his 2006 pandering to the religious right, with whom he had been warring:

When he ran for the Republican presidential nomination in 2000, …McCain blamed religious right leaders for the [South Carolina] smear campaign. He went to Virginia Beach, Va., home of Pat Robertson’s Christian Coalition, and gave a speech attacking Robertson and Falwell by name, calling them ”agents of intolerance” who were corrupting both religion and politics.

And, in 2002, McCain collaborated with Russ Feingold to pass the McCain Feingold Bill, billed by the religious right as an attempt to suppress “freedom of speech.”

But in May, 2006, sensing that his campaign was losing steam, McCain humbled himself before the High Priests:

McCain, who is all but officially on the presidential campaign trail, will deliver the commencement address at Falwell’s evangelical Christian college. Though he’s simply speaking to Liberty University graduates and their parents, the Arizona Republican’s visit to the Lynchburg, Va., college is nonetheless freighted with broader political symbolism.

By accepting the invitation and showing newfound respect for Falwell, political analysts say, McCain is courting religious right voters with the goal of accomplishing in 2008 what he couldn’t in 2000: win the Republican nomination for president. McCain, they say, apparently has calculated that improving his relations with one of the Republicans’ core constituencies is worth the risk of damaging his contrarian image, which made him popular among independents.

”He’s obviously going down to kiss [Falwell’s] ring,” said Larry Sabato, a political science professor at the University of Virginia.

Falwell, of course, is no longer alive, however, and Pat Robertson would have none of it, endorsing Rudy Giuliani (!). It will be interesting to see if the current pander is more successful.

Now that John McCain has officially denounced those stances that made him a maverick, let’s see is he still tries to portray himself as one….at least he’ll have lots of money….