Actually. the Democratic party has their own Creationists... People who are willing to be indignant about anything that they believe in, yet not what isn't of interest to them, and willing to stand up for the rights of those poor, down-trodden sould who believe what they believe.
I do not speak of the entire Democratic party as I have friends on the left side of the isle who are not that way.. I am only speaking (as you are) of the few/many/majority (take your pick) that are on the edges of their party's beliefs. People such as the Democrats who feel that every person has the right to choose for themselves what is right, yet deny a woman's right NOT to have an abortion (PLEASE don't start that discussion   ).
I am speaking of the animal rights activists who feel that eating a steak is not a bad thing (I guess only pretty animals are protected). It is the ones that believe in the right to free speech... as long as you don't oppose them by giving them your opinions. Democrats who scream that we are killing the trees and we must protect the forests... and then prove their point by singing and playing wooden guitars, and living in wooden houses with wooden furniture. THOSE are the ones of whom I speak.
Yes, it is true that the Republican political party has its hypocrites, and their people who act is such manners... However, it is also true on the left side of the isle. Fortunately, none of them reside here at Passions...

They took pictures of our dreams
Ran to hide behind the stairs
And said maybe when it's right for you, they'll fall

"If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other"

Mother Teresa

quote:

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Many of the recent news "scoops" that have been running on the front pages of major newspapers are little more than rehashed accusations that have appeared elsewhere. Despite sensational headlines and hyper-inflated allegations, these stories fail utterly to provide evidence of any wrongdoing by Tom DeLay.

Example 1: Last week's story in The New York Times breathlessly reported that DeLay had employed family members to work on his campaigns and for his political action committee. This story was so old it had whiskers. It was first reported in the Capitol Hill newspaper Roll Call in 2003.

Other news outlets dutifully followed the Times and created the impression that DeLay had put family members on the public payroll. In fact, no taxpayer money was involved. Nor was it in any way illegal or unethical for DeLay's privately funded PAC to employ his wife and daughter. The Times reported that DeLay's PAC paid his wife and daughter $500,000. This is only $50,000 a year each for the past five years, a solidly middle-class income and certainly a lot less than the editors at The New York Times earn.

Media one-sided
In addition, it has been publicly reported for years that dozens of members of Congress - including such Democrats as Sen. Barbara Boxer, Sen. Jon Corzine, Rep. Pete Stark and Rep. Dick Gephardt - have done likewise and the Federal Election Commission has ruled it was entirely proper. Neither did the press reports note that DeLay's wife and daughter were compensated at rates below what typical congressional campaign managers and PAC directors earn.

Example 2: The Washington Post recently published a page-one "expose" about the financing of a 1997 trip to Russia. The facts are that the National Center for Public Policy Research, a nonprofit association, issued a statement last month describing its sponsorship of and payment for this trip: "The National Center for Public Policy Research was careful to pay all the expenses associated with Congressman DeLay's trip. Reports to the contrary are incorrect." Every year, dozens of members of Congress and staff participate in such trips financed by nonprofit organizations.

This is perfectly legal, normal and even routine.
In fact, despite being in the minority, over the past four years Democrats have taken 54 percent of such trips and Democrats were the top five private trip-takers (in terms of money spent). They were in order: Sen. John Breaux. Rep. Robert Wexler, Rep. Gene Green, Rep. Maurice Hinchey and Rep. Cal Dooley. And when it comes to taxpayer financed trips, Democrat Nancy Pelosi has spent six times more on foreign travel than Tom DeLay.

Example 3: The Post published a story alleging impropriety in Tom DeLay's traveling to Korea under the auspices of a group that was a registered foreign agent. The fact is that the group was registered as representing a foreign interest only after the trip was arranged and approved by the House Ethics Committee. DeLay had no prior knowledge of this development.

Pelosi aide in trouble
The Post also failed to report that the only congressional staff member traveling under the group's auspices who failed to file the required paperwork was a senior aide to House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi. When confronted with this fact, Rep. Pelosi's staff member countered that there was no way anyone involved could have known the trip might be in violation of the rules. A spokesman for Rep. James McDermott, D-Wash., who took a trip with the same group, noted: "It's a great 20-20 hindsight story." Rep. McDermott's understanding, his aide said, "was that the Ethics Committee cleared this."

These examples underscore the fact that the charges being hurled at Tom DeLay have little to do with ethics and everything to do with politics. If these allegations had any substance, then there would have been an uproar in the press over Rep. Pelosi's apparently direct intervention on behalf of a contributor after taking money for her re-election campaign. The Washington Times reported this story, but the anti-DeLay press ignored it. Clearly, the dominant liberal press has an agenda to bring down Tom DeLay and the facts can be ignored.

With such a lack of substance, then, where are these attacks on Tom DeLay coming from and who is behind them?

The campaign to "demonize DeLay" is engineered by a cabal of leftist interest groups allied with the Democratic Nation Committee and House Democrats. The campaign is funded by the Democrats' Daddy Warbucks, billionaire George Soros.

A left-wing cabal
Soros, it will be recalled, spent $27 million to defeat George W. Bush (this from a man who was the chief source of funding for the campaign finance reform movement to take the influence of big money out of politics!) Frustrated in his inability to defeat President Bush, Soros has conspired with the DNC and the House Dems to defeat the Bush agenda by destroying Tom DeLay. These conspirators believe that they can "Newter" Tom DeLay the way they did Newt Gingrich in the late 1990s, thereby stopping the progress of a conservative Bush agenda and setting up the Democrats to retake control of Congress in 2006 and the White House in 2008.

Soros, who never tires of losing and throwing good money after bad, has spent $3 million on the so-called "Ethics Coalition," a collection of leftist interest groups that exist solely to smear Republicans and create the atmospherics of scandal surrounding the GOP Congress in general and Tom DeLay in particular. The "Ethics Coalition" consists of Democracy 21, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, Common Cause, Public Citizen, Public Campaign, Center for Responsive Politics, and the Campaign Legal center. Most of these are subsidized by Soros for the purpose of attacking Republicans. While these organizations purport to be non-partisan watchdogs, in fact they almost never target ethical abuses by Democrats.

Democrats apparently spare little concern for the character of their allies. George Soros has compared President Bush to Hitler, said the Republican control of Congress reminds him of the Nazi takeover of Germany in the 1930s, believes the United States is the greatest threat to world peace, favors legalization of all narcotics, and supports efforts to create a single global government under U.N. auspices complete with a U.N.-controlled military. Such is the man who is funding the campaign to demonize Tom DeLay.

Attack coordinated
These groups, largely staffed by former Democratic Hill staffers, coordinate with the Democratic members of Congress and the DNC to make ethics the blunt object with which to bludgeon DeLay. The strategy is to use the House Ethics Committee for partisan advantage by filing frivolous complaints against DeLay. It matters little that these accusations are baseless and in most case are summarily dismissed. Democrats know the charges are false. The purpose is simply to create a smokescreen of scandal around DeLay, undercut his political support among fellow Republicans and drive him from office. The strategy is cynical, nasty and utterly unprincipled.

Democrats make much of the fact that DeLay has been "admonished" by the House Ethics Committee. They routinely and deceptively use such terms as "rebuked," "reprimanded" or "punished" to describe the committee's actions. In fact, a letter of admonition is the mildest form of discipline and is used for instances in which no wrongdoing is found. A letter of admonition does not even rise to the level of a slap on the wrist.

Dems lack issues
The attack on Tom DeLay is evidence of the Democrats' desperation. They've lost election after election since 1994. The party is in retreat all across the country. It has no agenda, no positive policy initiatives to offer Americans. Democrats cannot win at the ballot box or in Congress. Their remaining tactics are opposition, obstruction and obfuscation.

The Democrats never will forgive Tom DeLay for his efforts in redrawing congressional districts in Texas that cost them six seats in the House (which incidentally undid past Democratic gerrymandering and brought Texas' delegation into line with the overwhelming majority of voters in the Lone Star State). Democrats despise DeLay because he is a tough, principled conservative and an effective majority leader who is successful in driving the Republican agenda though the House. Unable to win elections, and bereft of anything positive to offer the country, the Democrats and their Soros-funded allies have become little more than a pack of seething scandalmongers.

Richard Lessner is executive director of the American Conservative Union.

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Hey Ringo, glad to see you joining in here, yay!

I don't really agree with you in that the GOP is more of the inclusion party, for I still believe the Democrats are a little better at inclusion efforts than Republicans, and I'll state some examples why I believe that in a moment, but the bottom line here is I believe both these parties are too corporately-influenced and both are making a limited effort in standing up for the "little guy".

I explained what I believe is wrong with the Democrats and why I'm not one, so now I'll say what I believe is wrong especially with the GOP.

Frankly, I believe the GOP has just abandoned its roots in recent memory. I myself agree with many traditional conservative values, such as small government and state rights. That's what the GOP stood for in previous generations.

I was watching "NOW" last night, for instance, where David Brancaccio interviewed former Republican Governor of New Jersey and former EPA head Christine Todd Whitman, and she was arguing how she believed the GOP has done just that, side-stepping from their core roots recently. One interesting point she made was how a significant part of the environmental revolution was actually a Republican revolution, such as Theodore Roosevelt calling for a national park system and Richard Nixon calling for the EPA, and now she feels the current administration is retrograding those sorts of achievements now.

There's a number of recent events I've seen which I believe the Democrats have had more of the right idea and the GOP the wrong idea for the "little guy". The minimum wage increase, for example, which all 49 NO votes came from the GOP, something which 4 in 5 Americans want. Or the bill on cloture, which the GOP and some Democrats backed up, which I believe is siding with the corporate credit-card companies and running against low-income workers and single mothers and such. Or Nelson's "Sense of the Senate" amendment where he believed Congress should reject any Social Security reform plan that involves cutting benefits, which the GOP Senate rejected.

It's things like that that convince me that the GOP is more distant from the Middle American little guy or gal than many often believe. That they just seem to side with the corporate world more than they do the general American interest.

THAT'S exactly why I'm an independent, who realizes I must be self-reliant and do the best I can until there's some changes made either with our rigid two-party system or within the parties themselves.

I've come to many crossroads with others like myself at KBOO community radio, which is a model for the programming and the filling of needs that other media does not, giving all kinds of diverse groups a voice, providing a safe haven for unpopular, controversial or neglected perspectives, and that anyone, whether you're white, black, Asian, Native American, Hispanic, or Pacific Islander, whether you're a religious believer, agnostic or atheist, no matter what your political affliation is, no matter what kind of music you love, the community runs its whole programming line-up. And when we've just completed our latest pledge drive here and seen unprecedented numbers and contributions coming in to keep the station running, that really tells me we NEED this outlet.

Sometimes KBOO is perceived as a hippy station. And while its true that this stations name came from call letters referencing a popular strain of marijuana called "Berkeley Boo" when the station was put on the air in 1968, I believe it has a little something for everyone in the community. Obviously most of our pledges come from those who either like the music or share those progressive political interests, but I've taken about seven pledges from those who say they're Republicans and they may not agree with the evening news we broadcast (The Evening News features daily commentaries from Jim Hightower, Amy Goodman and Mumia) they say they believe it is extremely important to have this alternative megaphone alive and believe the other side of the story must be heard and that's why they contribute, and among the seven I got a few compliments on our station being tolerant and disciplined when dissenting.

And politics is just a small part of the line-up. Most of the programming is music. There's so much music you don't hear anywhere else, including The Yiddish Hour, Dr. Zonk's Stereophone Obscura, Persian Prime, and African music. There's also spoken arts programs, youth programs, gay, lesbian, woman and ethnic study programs, and all kinds of specials.

I don't get paid a penny working for KBOO, but I love working there because I believe it's a great way in setting an example for the little guys and gals in my community. It may not make everything better, but it does provide solace to those like myself!

The bottom line here is, I don't even think just saying you're a liberal or conservative does justice of who you really are or what you believe. I believe this administration in particular has really made me more liberal than I really am. I believe there's a lot of conservative spirit and values in me as well, for I'd really like to see a return to small government and a firm focus on state rights and decisions rather than federal decisions.

Some say I just have a biased grudge against the GOP entirely and that I'll never vote for a Republican president. My response is, "How would you know that?". If the GOP continues to wander from its roots, then that'll be true in the end, but if they do return to their roots and they nominate a traditional conservative candidate and the Democrats decide to nominate someone like Lieberman, I'd vote Republican in that instance, unless of course a third party candidate who I agreed with more actually had a chance.

Labels just don't make justice of all we really are. I believe I'm both liberal and conservative in heart.

Sincerely,
Noah Eaton

"If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other"

Mother Teresa