Blogotional

The death of Terri Schiavo remains my primary motivation for busting the filibuster and bringing in some decent judges, but blatant anti-Christian bigotry is running a close second and gaining.

In good news, Dick Cheney has gone on record saying he will vote, if necessary, to break the filibuster. Frist has also reaffirmed his decision to appear with prominent Christian leaders on the matter. Focus on The Family has started an ad campaign to bust the filibuster.

But the opposition is fired up as well. Needless to say, the MSM is on-board with the left in pieces like this and this.

But let's have some fun this morning with some leftie bloggers I have chosen from a Technorati search on the word "filibuster."

Check out this post. They do not cite a single utterance by Bill Frist that is inappropriate, rather they attack those he meets with and goes from there. Check it out in full, but here:

• Who else is Frist hanging with these days?
• Can we not fairly conclude that Frist feels this way, too?

Not that the evangelical leadership is anything like prostitutes, but isn't this a little like persecuting Jesus for ministering to prostitutes?

Then there is this post.

In public policy, religion is supposed to be irrelevant.

So, am I supposed to have some switch that I turn off when I think about public policy? What kind of faith would that be?

Along those same lines, I ran into this:

Now I don't really care if a fellow citizen prays to Jesus or a Bufo alvarius (Colorado River Toad/Sonoran Desert Toad); I just don't want to hear about it. And I certainly do not want my elected government officials, Federal, State, or local, inserting their religious dogma into the diurnal rhetoric, talking points, and legislative or governing process ever. In fact, I see very little difference between the ancient Greeks and American Evangelicals in terms of self-delusional idiocy. Of course, I am not about to soapbox atheism or agnosticism either because, I just don't have a philosophical stake in the subject. However, there are things that need to be discussed with urgency and conviction, like the wholesale hijacking of the long term interests of the American people by Mammon worshipping, right-wing extremists who use perverse religiosity as a distraction, like carnie magicians, while pushing through cruel agendas that are crushing the middle class and the poor, and leaving future generations with a used up economy, environment, and way of life.

Does this guy not see that he is as dogmatically possessed of his issues as any of us with religious conviction are of ours? And he calls us self-delusional!

This is what we are up against. It truly is religious bigotry. Let's just remember, Martin Luther King beat back racial bigotry, Malcom X only inflamed it. In this fight, let's follow the MLK example.

WHAT TO DO

Interestingly, Bob Novak reported at RealClearPolitics yesterday that Republicans have the votes to bust the filibuster. His report names three sure defectors Chaffee, McCain, Snowe, but his sources are unnamed. Forgive me, until I hear a vote count from the mouth of Mitch McConnell or Bill Frist the day the vote is to be taken; I think it is wholly appropriate to keep the pressure on -- hard.

Check out yesterday's post for who to call to lobby to end the filibuster and move these nominations forward.

THE FILIBUSTER AROUND THE ALLIANCE

Holy Coast drew from a Weekly Standard piece late yesterday.

We need to make people understand that filibustering judicial nominees is not in the Constitution, nor is it the tradition in the Senate. It's a new procedure, instituted by the Dems in the last Congress, for the express purpose of keeping conservatives, and especially religious conservatives, off the federal bench.

Amen, Rick.

Sheep's Crib is keeping great track of the Alliance and it's blog fight on the filibuster. Thanks John for the great job.

UPDATE 1:30PM

Hugh Hewitt has brought out the big guns today as he tackles first the Washington Post and then some fellow conservative blogger.

This morning's Washington Post's lead editorial really is a sight to behold. Hugh does a great job of refutation, there is little I can add, save for one thing. Consider this quote which Hugh also pulls:

Whatever one says about the aggressive Democratic use of the filibuster -- which we do not support -- it simply is not motivated by anti-religious sentiment. There are people of faith and goodwill on both sides of the issue.

Here's what I want to know -- where are the words like that when the shoe is on the other foot? How many times has the right been accused of racism, or elitism, or anyotherism and had it's motivations attacked by both the opposition and the MSM? How many times have we read stories in the Washington Post disagreeing with the conservative stand on a subject using adjectives and description that imply motive, if not downright assign it? How many times has the right been challenged to prove its "proper" motivation by caving in to the left?

That has got to be the most disingenuous crock of *&^%%#@ I have read in quite a while.

Hugh then goes on to tackle GOP Bloggers and My Vast Right Wing Conspiracy on their challenges to his call to stop giving until our party falls into line. Again, Hugh beats them back with little effort. I find GOP Bloggers invocation of the 1992 election most fascinating, because that is exactly the same place my mind went when I read Hugh's post. In 1992 we did back away, but that is not what Hugh proposes here. Rather Hugh proposes activism with money as the tool. Bush 41 lost his second term because we felt disenfranchised and lost interest. That will happen again if the Senate Republicans do not respond to our wishes, but to advocate against using money as a lever now is to concede the fight to the minority.

I'm with Hugh -- after the Iraq aqnd Afghanistan war votes, this is the most important vote in the Bush 43 presidency. We have to fight with every tool in our arsenal. The political war hinges in large part on this battle. If we lose, then we rethink, but we have not lost. For now we fight to win.