Just a short blurb in the way it was presented, from the Media Matters for America blog:

And it’s a big jump, too, according to the AP:

An Associated Press-GfK poll says 56 percent of those surveyed in the past week approve of Obama’s job performance, up from 50 percent in September. It’s the first time since he took office in January that his rating has gone up.

We’ll see how much media play this poll gets, and then try to compare that coverage to how we think an AP poll reporting a sharp drop for Obama would play inside the Beltway right now. (Hint: that coverage would be significant.)

That’s not an insubstantial amount, frankly. Whether it’s because he’s putting feet to pavement to tackle more issues and sell health care legislation, or whether it’s because the American people are ready to place the blame for a number of the Congressional gridlocks squarely where it’s due, that’s a pretty big jump and reflects a collective exhale.

But the bigger question is why, after hearing for months how his approval ratings have slipped (but are still remarkably high for a president in the first year of his first term, historically) are we not hearing about this? Likely because the media doesn’t have a single item they can tie it to: whether it’s new negotiations with Iran, North Korea coming back to the bargaining table, the spectre of H1N1 being tempered with vaccines being made available safley at a historically rapid pace, or what. There is some good news out there, the problem is none of it is big enough to take headlines away from the war in Afghanistan or health care reform or the economy, all of which are in middling territory.

[ Uh-oh, Obama's Approval Rating Jumps; That's Not the Story the Beltway Press Wants to Tell ]
Source: Media Matters for America

The video is long gone now, taken down by the same terrorists who put it up, and likely in a sad attempt to cover their tracks against a federal investigation that I’m sure is now pending, but here’s what Joshua Holland, writing for AlterNet, had to say:

There is no universally agreed-upon definition of the word “terrorism.” As I’ve often said, the reason it’s next to impossible to define the term is that everyone wants it to mean: ‘violent acts in the pursuit of political goals with which I disagree.’

That aside, most agree that attempting to influence public officials through a threat of violence is an act of terrorism.

He goes on to post the video, which is now gone – and in an update lets the SPLC, a group that monitors and tracks hate groups and civil rights across the country, describe the contents of the video:

It advises President Obama and other prominent people (“Our Dear Leader and co.”) to “leave now and give us our country back” and to do so by next week.

“If you stay,” the silent video message continues, “ ‘We, The People’ will systematically dismantle you, destroy you and reclaim what is rightfully ours. …

“We are angry and we are ready to take back the rights of the people. We will fight and We will win. …

“Dead line [sic] for your national response: October 15, 2009

“Thank you to all patriots who support our cause. … Be prepared for when the fateful day of the declaration of war is nationally announced.”

So essentially, a threat against the President of the United States, complete with a due date. If this isn’t some 24 Jack Bauer bullsh*t, I don’t know what is. Seriously America – these folks are in our backyards, and if the justice system wasn’t designed to try and imprison them for terrorism or treason, I don’t know what is. Never would a progressive or a liberal have thought to make a substantive threat against President Bush during his Administration and expect to get away with it – not that they could have what with all of the domestic spying and surveillance going on anyway – but these are the people you would be afraid of, not the ones in Washington voting whether or not your taxes are going up or down.

As much as people like to point at Washington as some kind of cesspool, I think more attention should be turned to our own communities and rooting out weeds like these people, instead of trying to be armchair politicians.

[ Right-Wing American Terrorists Issue YouTube Threat ]
Source: AlterNet

Let’s lead off with the results from an interesting survey conducted by the New York Times:

The poll asked this question: “Would you favor or oppose the government offering everyone a government administered health insurance plan — something like the Medicare coverage that people 65 and older get — that would compete with private health insurance plans?”

The top-line result is 65% in favor, 26% opposed. Among Democrats only, it’s 81%-12%, and independents are at 61%-30%. And among Republican respondents, 47% are in favor, to 42% opposed.

So let’s be clear: even among Republicans responding to the survey, half of them acknowledge that not only is health care reform badly necessary in the United States, but a government-backed or run health insurer, also known from your local newscast as “The Public Option,” complete with capital letters and a doom-and-gloom echo behind it, is also required. That means that everyone, from the so-called liberals in their ivory towers to the salt-of-the-earth so-called “joe six-pack” demands that the government step in and make sure every American man, woman, and child have equal and open access to health care and health insurance.

They demand that things like seasonal allergies and asthma not be considered pre-existing conditions, and they’re tired of watching their neighbors go bankrupt and homeless because they can’t pay their medical bills. They’re tired of watching their elderly parents and grandparents have to choose between medications because they can’t afford them all, and take half-doses instead of doctor-recommended full-doses so they can stretch out the life of their prescriptions. They’re tired of watching their coworkers struggle to pay their company-sponsored health care plans.

We’re all tired of it – and that disappointment isn’t partisan or political, it’s national. And no matter what the fringe groups burning and hanging politicians in effigy and their backers in right-wing media and politics say, the desire for change in health care -real, substantive change- is representative of the will of the American people.

[ No Matter What Snowe Does, Health Care Reform Will Have Bipartisan Support ]
Source: Campaign for America’s Future

The United Nations recently released its annual Human Development Index, and as much as we like to pat ourselves on the back without actually doing anything to make that back-patting worthwhile (like investing in education, infrastructure, and science) but simultaneously whining about how much (read: how little compared to the rest of the world) we pay in taxes, the United States came in at number 13. We didn’t even make the top 10. Now this doesn’t come as a real surprise to progressives who have been fighting for positive social change in the United States for years now, but this is the kind of judgment that makes conservatives and right-wingers furious. They can’t believe that these other countries who aren’t nearly as god-fearing and village-bombing as we are could possibly be rated as “better” by any possible standard – and it’s exactly the kind of thing they want off of the record and out of the eyes of anyone who might objectively look at our national community with open eyes and independent judgment.

A tongue-in-cheek analysis from Adele Stan, writing for Alternet:

Now we know why right-wingers from Phyllis Schlafly to Mike Huckabee hate the United Nations: the international body founded by our great nation consistently fails to recognize our Number-One, ass-kicking, towel-head-drubbing greatness.

Take, for instance, the U.N.’s newly-released Human Development Index, which measures quality of life in 182 nations. The United States, often referred to as the world’s richest nation, didn’t even make the top 10. We came in at 13, which is surely a numerological conspiracy designed to bring us even worse luck than we’ve had lately, what with job numbers shrinking and a communist in the White House.

In fact, we were beat by France (ranked 8th), for cryin’ out loud — a nation of Arab-coddling croissant-eaters. You know it had to be rigged. And Red Canada fourth place, with its government-taken-over Soviet health-care system!

Sure, it’s easy to claim a higher quality of life when you live in a place like France, where you get 30 days of paid vacation every year. Never mind that their productivity numbers nearly equal ours. Where’s the index for rugged individualism and personal responsibility? How good do ya think them Frenchies would do on that, huh?

They just don’t have the stuff to accept a shorter life expectancy and crappy health care. (The lifespan for African-Americans in the former French city of New Orleans is about the same as that of people living in North Korea.)

But, hey, they’re not who we mean when we talk about Americans, anyway. I don’t want your damn pinko health care. And keep your hands off my gun. Oh, and, U.S. outta the U.N., dammit!

While Adele has the humor and vitrol that I’ve come to love and adore, it is a little short on analysis (although there are tons of source links, so make sure to see the original post at the link below) on why conservatives hate the UN aside from the simple notion that they can’t stand not being number one at everything. You would think that if conservatives wanted to be number one at everything they would take everything that the UN took issue with and drive it into the ground and make sure we were on top the next time they came around to examine it, right?

Not so much – it’s not that conservatives want America to be number one at everything, it’s that they want America to be percieved as number one at everything, thanks entirely to their policies and ideologies. They won’t settle for anything else. It’s an entire philosophy based on lies and a blatant disregard for reality.

They don’t want to invest in education – they just want to change the standards by which it’s measured so we look better. They don’t want to invest in poor communities, they don’t want to fund job training programs, and they don’t want to build homeless shelters. Why? Because each of those acknowledges there’s a problem, and each one is a direct result of the policies they favor. Investing in poor communities admits that poverty exists because of a massive gap in wealth. Job training programs are only in vogue when the political opposition is saddled with resolving high unemployment, and paying for them of course only drains money from “Joe Six-pack” to pay for those non-existent “welfare queens.” Building homeless shelters acknowledges there’s a problem reaching the American dream, no matter how many mythical bootstraps conservatives tell people to pull themselves up by.

If they were forced to acknowledge any of these problems and start thinking about constructive ways to fix them, they’d -gasp- be progressives.

[ U.S. Fails to Make Top 10 in Quality of Life Index, or Why Right-Wingers Really Hate the U.N. ]
Source: AlterNet

Seriously folks, you can’t make this stuff up – and frankly, why would you even want to?

This is another article that goes in the “proof positive conservatives are crazy” file – ready to pull out the next time someone want to claim that it’s the political left that’s lost their minds:

Number 5: John Derbyshire takes a bold stand against women’s suffrage
…

Number 4: Erick Erickson threatens to dissolve his own town’s police department
…

Number 3: John L. Perry urges a military coup against Obama
…

Number 2: Dan Riehl suggests that dead census worker could have been a “child predator”
…

Number 1: Conservatives everywhere declare that it’s their patriotic duty to stop America from hosting the Olympics

Oh yeah – it’s been a great week. Some of these stories are predictable, and the whole Derbyshire bit I mentioned in another article, but they’re all fantastic. I remmeber hearing the story of the people who wanted to stop Chicago from hosting the Olympics because they “thought Chicago should have other priorities,” which I think is logical, but it’s not like any government can only focus on one thing at a time, and I really did think that there was something more insidious about it – and now we know it’s true.

And suggesting that the census worker that was hanged with “Fed” scrawled across his chest may have been a child predator is not only disgusting and actively desecrating the memory of a murdered man, it still wouldn’t be an excuse for the criminals in Kansas who killed him.

You can be sure that anything – from the smallest, most tangentially related issue to the most absolutely absurd, the conservative right will be there to betray their nutjob roots and make fools of themselves: they don’t need anyone else to do it for them.

Get a rundown of the full stories behind each at the link below:

[ 5 Crazy Right-Wing Freak-Outs in Just One Glorious Week ]
Source: AlterNet

If there were any doubt that there’s a connection between the teabaggers and folks who showed up to desecrate the National Mall on September 12th under the direction of Fox News and Glenn Beck and America’s deep seated racist past and history that we’re still struggling to overcome, let’s connect the dots.

The events since President Obama took office and the angry cries of people like these have proven that many people in America are absolutely not ready by any stretch for a Black President, and have proven that even in this day and age when many of us want to believe we live in a post-racial society, we’re far from there and live in anything but.

The Christian Right has always been on the wrong side of history, and they’ve always been on the wrong side of justice and equality, and by and large that’s suited them just fine:

Today’s grassroots right is by all appearances as socially conservative as ever, but its tone and its rhetoric are profoundly different than they were even a year ago. For the last 15 years, the right-wing populism has been substantially electrified by sexual anxiety. Now it’s charged with racial anxiety. By all accounts, there were more confederate flags than crosses at last weekend’s anti-Obama rally in Washington, DC. Glenn Beck has become a far more influential figure on the right than, say, James Dobson, and he’s much more interested in race than in sexual deviancy. For the first time in at least a decade, middle class whites have been galvanized by the fear that their taxes are benefiting lazy, shiftless others. The messianic, imperialistic, hubristic side of the right has gone into retreat, and a cramped, mean and paranoid style has come to the fore.

….

The Christian right was always rooted in an older style of reactionary politics. Before he became a political organizer himself, Falwell — who ran one of those Christian segregation academies — attacked Martin Luther King Jr. for his political activism. (“Preachers are not called to be politicians, but to be soul winners,” he said.) Before Tony Perkins was basking in homophobic interracial amity, he paid Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke $82,500 for his mailing list. In 2004, David Barton, then the vice president of the Texas GOP, spoke at an event featuring white preachers and ministry workers dropping to their knees before their black brethren to plead for forgiveness. Thirteen years earlier, Barton had twice been a featured speaker at meetings of the Christian Identity movement, which preaches that blacks are sub-human “mud people.” One could go on and on.

As racism grew politically unacceptable, the Christian right was able to channel resentment over the decline of white male privilege into a Kulterkampf directed at more acceptable enemies, like gays and lesbians. The movement borrowed heavily from Catholic theology and convinced itself that it was in a righteous struggle against a culture of death, not a culture of diversity. Now the mask is off. One wonders if fifteen years from now, they’ll bother apologizing all over again.

[ Tea Party Movement Returns Christian Right to Its Racist Past ]
Source: AlterNet (courtesy of The American Prospect)

This really shouldn’t surprise anyone, but that makes it all that much more important to make note when conservatives do things like this – especially when there are women who stand with them thinking that conservative politicians have their best interests at heart. Seriously folks – do we need a history lesson to remind us that it’s been the American conservative that’s stood against giving the vote to every minority and disenfranchised group in American history – including women? Conservatives stood against Susan B Anthony and the suffrage movement, conservatives stood against giving Black Americans the vote, and even today conservatives still try to undermine efforts to get out the vote. They stand against things like offering ex-cons who have served their time the vote and they willingly smear any organization that works to register people to vote – organizations like ACORN.

But this, this is a whole new level of disgusting. One writer for the conservative rag The National Review, takes a stand publicly against the right of women to vote in America.

The National Review writer initially said “women lean hard to the left,” which isn’t necessarily true, and certainly isn’t a rationale for denying women the right to participate in democracy. So, Colmes pressed further. Faiz Shakir posted a transcript:

DERBYSHIRE: Among the hopes that I do not realistically nurse is the hope that female suffrage will be repealed. But I’ll say this — if it were to be, I wouldn’t lose a minute’s sleep.

COLMES: We’d be a better country if women didn’t vote?

DERBYSHIRE: Probably. Don’t you think so?

COLMES: No, I do not think so whatsoever.

DERBYSHIRE: Come on Alan. Come clean here [laughing].

COLMES: We would be a better country? John Derbyshire making the statement, we would be a better country if women did not vote.

DERBYSHIRE: Yeah, probably.

He added that the United States “got along like that for 130 years,” and added that the Civil Rights Act may also lack value because you “shouldn’t try to force people to be good.”

Just so we’re clear, a leading conservative writer at one of the premier conservative political outlets, argued publicly against a woman’s right to vote and against the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Make no mistake where your side of the political spectrum stands, Republicans and conservatives – these people aren’t the center. They’re far far off the deep end, and far to the right.

[ National Review Writer Takes Stand Against Female Suffrage ]
Source: Alternet (courtesy of the Washington Monthly)