Back in 2003, Republican leaders praised the AARP for its support of President Bush's unfunded and deeply flawed Medicare prescription benefit. But now that the 40 million member organization has endorsed the House Democrats' health care reform bill, the GOP is declaring war on its one-time ally. Helping lead the attack is an array of industry-funded front groups and their reactionary has-been spokesmen like Pat Boone.

Last week, Republican Congressmen Dave Reichert (R-WA) and Mike Pence (R-IN) implied the nation's leading organization for seniors was in for the ACORN treatment from the GOP and its media allies. Despite the thorough debunking of right-wing claims that Democratic health care reform proposals would slash Medicare benefits for46 million American elderly:

Pence and Reichert suggested that support was the result of corruption inside the AARP and not based on the interests of its membership.

"What you've got here is a backroom deal," Pence said of reform measures expected to be introduced by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid this afternoon. "Democrats are protecting the salaries of the heads of groups like AARP while cutting Medicare"...

The GOP is using more than just rhetoric to go after the group. Rep. Dave Reichert (R-WA) claims to have launched an investigation into AARP in his home state. Reichert says his "ongoing" investigation focuses on whether AARP should be classified as an insurance company because of its revenue from royalties the group gets from licensing its brand for insurance products.

Sounding the clarion call for conservatives is aging singer turned World Net Daily regular Pat Boone. Boone, who in recent months branded Barack Obama a "president without a country" who is "waterboarding America" over "socialistic health care and a host of other ultraliberal causes," is also the celebrity mouthpiece for the 60 Plus Association.

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A gaffe, Michael Kinsley famously mused, is what results when a politician inadvertently tells the truth. And so it was Monday when Utah Republican Senator Orrin Hatch came clean about his party's scorched-earth opposition to health care reform being championed by President Obama and Congressional Democrats. Hatch acknowledged, as I've long argued, that the GOP is worried not that Obama's health care initiatives might fail, but that they might succeed.

As he did in his pivotal effort to block Bill Clinton's health care efforts starting in 1993, conservative strategist Bill Kristol warned his Republican allies then as now that that a victory for President Obama would earn his party the thanks of a grateful public and guarantee Democratic majorities for the foreseeable future. In an interview with CNS Monday, Senator Hatch revealed that was his darkest fear as well:

HATCH: That's their goal. Move people into government that way. Do it in increments. They've actually said it. They've said it out loud.

Q: This is a step-by-step approach --

HATCH: A step-by-step approach to socialized medicine. And if they get there, of course, you're going to have a very rough time having a two-party system in this country, because almost everybody's going to say, "All we ever were, all we ever are, all we ever hope to be depends on the Democratic Party."

Q: They'll have reduced the American people to dependency on the federal government.

HATCH: Yeah, you got that right. That's their goal. That's what keeps Democrats in power.

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In the wake of its shocking assessment that employer-provided health insurance now covers only 54.6% of the American people, Thomson Reuters released a disturbing assessment of wasteful spending in the U.S. health care system. Echoing the estimates of Obama OMB chief Peter Orszag and others, the analysis highlighted by Keith Olbermann Tuesday concluded that the United States wastes up to $700 billion a year - a third of the nation's total $2 trillion health care spending.

As Robert Kelley, vice president of healthcare analytics at Thomson Reuters and author of the white paper, put it:

"The bad news is that an estimated $700 billion is wasted annually. That's one-third of the nation's healthcare bill. The good news is that by attacking waste, healthcare costs can be reduced without adversely affecting the quality of care or access to care. That's the point of this report - to identify areas in the healthcare system that can generate game-changing savings."

Those game-changing savings, TR found, could be found across a broad range of health care spending. Between $600 billion and $850 billion, it estimated, is wasted on:

• Unnecessary Care (40% of healthcare waste): Unwarranted treatment, such as the over-use of antibiotics and the use of diagnostic lab tests to protect against malpractice exposure, accounts for $250 billion to $325 billion in annual healthcare spending.
• Fraud (19% of healthcare waste): Healthcare fraud costs $125 billion to $175 billion each year, manifesting itself in everything from fraudulent Medicare claims to kickbacks for referrals for unnecessary services.
• Administrative Inefficiency (17% of healthcare waste): The large volume of redundant paperwork in the U.S healthcare system accounts for $100 billion to $150 billion in spending annually.
• Healthcare Provider Errors (12% of healthcare waste): Medical mistakes account for $75 billion to $100 billion in unnecessary spending each year.
• Preventable Conditions (6% of healthcare waste): Approximately $25 billion to $50 billion is spent annually on hospitalizations to address conditions such as uncontrolled diabetes, which are much less costly to treat when individuals receive timely access to outpatient care.
• Lack of Care Coordination (6% of healthcare waste): Inefficient communication between providers, including lack of access to medical records when specialists intervene, leads to duplication of tests and inappropriate treatments that cost $25 billion to $50 billion annually.

But in its catalog of health care spending horrors, however, Thomson Reuters may have understated potential savings in one area while overstating them in another.

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The Bitter Man strikes back.

Democratic moderates who control the balance of power on health care legislation balked Tuesday at a government-run insurance option for millions of Americans, underscoring the enormity of the challenge confronting Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid one day after he unveiled the plan as a consensus product.
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The decision to include a government insurance option in his legislation had obvious appeal for liberals who account for a strong majority inside the Senate Democratic caucus, and it is likely to please labor unions and party activists in Nevada.

But it has gained less-than-effusive support from Obama, who is eager to have at least a dollop of bipartisanship for his signature domestic issue. Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine, the only Republican who has sided with Democrats in committee this year, has announced she will not support the bill Reid drafted.

Still, if Reid is pressed in coming weeks by moderates to fall back, he can explain to liberals that he was forced to do so because his preference — a government insurance option — proved to be unobtainable in the Senate. Already, that pressure is evident...read on

Joe Lieberman is a bitter old man who was looking for some media juice yesterday when he decided to spit in the face of Americans who want real health care reform. Can you trust either his motives or what he says anymore?

Joe Lieberman has once again rolled a political hand grenade into the Democrats’ tent.

The Connecticut independent obliterated any illusion that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) can quickly ram through health care reform with a public option, telling reporters on Tuesday that he would join Republicans in a filibuster to prevent a vote on Reid’s plan if it isn’t changed first.

“We’re trying to do too much at once,” said Lieberman, who signaled he would vote with Reid on the first procedural vote that requires 60 votes, the motion to proceed.

The media will never call out Lieberman over his bullshit.

And Lieberman’s justification on this is just nonsense – the public option would SAVE money for the government, to the tune of $100 billion dollars over 10 years according to the Congressional Budget Office. It also would cost nothing to the taxpayer, being financed by individual premiums.

The public option saves money and Holy Joe knows it. And the Senate will never take action against another Senator no matter how outrageous their behavior is.

But Lieberman’s fellow Connecticut senator, Democrat Chris Dodd, who faces a tough reelection fight in 2010, dismissed the idea that Lieberman would incur any retribution.

“No, no, no. People are going to be all over the place,” he said when asked if Lieberman should be punished. “The idea that people are going to be reprimanded because somehow they have a different point of view than someone else is ridiculous. That isn’t going to happen.”

Lieberman can thank President Obama for retaining his committees and unless he gets caught in bed with a goat, he gets to do whatever he wants. The House of Lords always protect their royal status over their constituents. Well, Mr. President -- it's time to reign in this herd of Conservadems if you really want the public option. All this could be the awesome kabuki dance that pols do as they negotiate legislation through the media. Well, Mr. President, you got him -- you own him now so make him pony up. Oh, wait -- Senators are immune to any type of accountability. Sorry, I forgot what I wrote earlier in this piece.

Too bad Ned Lamont didn't win in 2006, but we forced Joe out of the Dem Party and Ned is still speaking up against Lieberman. They did debate health care and Holy Joe was for "universal health care" at the time, but now he has a Republican base to protect.

I asked Lamont if he thinks that Obama, who intervened last November to keep Senate Democrats from stripping Lieberman of his committee chairmanship, was guilty of trusting Connecticut's junior senator too much.

"I would really hope that Senator Lieberman would have returned that courtesy by talking to the president's team before walking out on this filibuster plank," he replied.

Lieberman's seat will be up in 2012. His polls numbers have improved a little this year, but they're still very shaky, a 48-45 percent approval rating among all voters in the state. But among Democrats, they're poisonous. Does Lieberman's latest move mean he's abandoning any thought of running as a Democrat again in '12?

"He got re-elected in '06 with overwhelming Republican support," Lamont said. "So I guess he's just taking care of his base."

Do me a favor and contact Joe's offices and tell him to give us an up-or-down vote on health care and not to join Republicans in a filibuster. He likely won't listen, but it's important that he hear our voices.

One Constitution Plaza
7th Floor
Hartford, CT 06103
(860) 549-8463 Voice
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706 Hart Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
(202) 224-4041 Voice

And please: Donate to Blue America's Campaign For Health Care Choice so we can continue to fight for health care reform. We have several actions we're working on...

While the Obama White House, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Congressional Democrats debate among themselves whether the so-called "opt out" public health insurance option endorsed by Reid will be included in reform legislation, Minnesota Governor and GOP presidential wannabee Tim Pawlenty has already weighed in. Asked if he would "lead a charge" in his state to opt out, Pawlenty replied, "I think so because I don't like government run health care."

That's easy for him to say. As it turns out, Minnesota is the exception that proves the rule of red state socialism. An increasingly blue state with the 4th best health care system in the nation, the Land of 10,000 Lakes sends far more tax dollars to Washington than it receives in federal spending in return. But for Pawlenty's fellow Republican refuseniks, leaders of red states offering dismal health care and a beneficiaries of a one-way transfer of taxpayer funds from DC, opting out may not be an option.

In recent weeks, Texas secessionists and Georgia legislators have echoed Pawlenty's confused reading of the Tenth Amendment by endorsing a state veto over federal health reform mandates. But just in time for the debate over the merits of a state-by-state "opt out" of a national public health insurance option, the Commonwealth Fund has released its 2009 state health care scorecard. As in 2007, the data reveals the critical condition of red state health care. All of which could present Republican governors and legislatures with a dilemma: Will they refuse to offer lower cost insurance coverage for their residents by rejecting a system funded in part by blue state taxpayers?

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In recent days, Republican leaders have scored a series of political victories in their eternal quest for tort reform. Last week, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) told Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) that an onerous package of malpractice curbs he championed could save the government an estimated $54 billion over 10 years. That came on the heels of President Obama's latest offer to support limited tort reform as an olive branch to recalcitrant Republicans balking at his health care proposals, including funding for a $25 million pilot program.

But largely overlooked in the heated discussions of damage award caps, special health courts, expert panels and national compensation schedules is the inescapable truth that the medical malpractice system has only a negligible impact on overall American health care costs. Republican horror stories of a torrent of baseless malpractice suits producing "jackpot justice" that fuels rising premiums for physicians and patients alike while driving doctors from practice simply don't comport with reality. The overstated, overblown, over the top and often outright false GOP claims suggest that the Republicans' real target is not the flawed American malpractice system, but instead the nation's trial lawyers whose campaign contributions help bankroll the Democratic Party.

Here, then, is a look at Republican Malpractice Myths:

1. An Explosion of Malpractice Litigation
2. A System Plagued by Frivolous Lawsuits
3. Rising Damage Awards Key to Higher Malpractice Premiums
4. Rising Malpractice Insurance Rates Driving Doctors from Practice
5. Medical Malpractice Reform Would Save U.S. $200 Billion Annually
6. Defensive Medicine Costs $200 Billion a Year

For the details and data behind each, continue reading.

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This is going to happen more and more and more and I hope the Secret Service is making good money.

On the eve of the President's arrival in Newark, a private airport security guard is charged with making a terroristic threat against the commander-in-chief.

Police and secret service agents spent the day at Newark Liberty International Airport preparing for President Obama's arrival. It turns out one of the airport security guards is under arrest, charged with making terroristic threats against President Barack Obama.

As dozens of police gathered at the airport to protect the President, Port Authority police said they arrested 55-year-old John Breck for making what they say were disparaging and threatening remarks about President Obama.
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According to Port Authority, Breck made the threatening remarks to a co-worker. They said a third party heard the comments and that person along with the co-worker reported it to police. Investigators said Breck gave police permission to search his home and they found 43 weapons, some of which are legal.
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President Obama was in New York City on Tuesday applauding the efforts of the NYPD-FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force. He then attended a couple fundraisers to raise money for the Democratic party.

Obama will be in New Jersey on Wednesday to campaign for New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine. Air Force One is scheduled to land around 4:30 p.m.
..read on

I love going back East, but come on. I wonder how long it'll take until we find out that Breck watches FOX News every day.

So many of the saner people were driven out of the military during the Bush administration, it doesn't surprise me that the people left include a lot of the right-wing, racist fringe elements. Still, it's shocking to hear this:

DURHAM — The U.S. military is not just fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, America’s most renowned investigative journalist says.

The army is also “in a war against the White House — and they feel they have Obama boxed in,” Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Seymour Hersh told several hundred people in Duke University’s Page Auditorium on Tuesday night. “They think he’s weak and the wrong color. Yes, there’s racism in the Pentagon. We may not like to think that, but it’s true and we all know it.”

In a speech on Obama’s foreign policy, Hersh, who uncovered the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam War and torture at Abu Ghraib prison during the Iraqi war, said many military leaders want Obama to fail.

“A lot of people in the Pentagon would like to see him get into trouble,” he said. By leaking information that the commanding officer in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, says the war would be lost without an additional 40,000 American troops, top brass have put Obama in a no-win situation, Hersh contended.
“If he gives them the extra troops they’re asking for, he loses politically,” Hersh said. “And if he doesn’t give them the troops, he also loses politically.”

The journalist criticized the president for “letting the military do that,” and suggested the only way out was for Obama to stand up to them.
“He’s either going to let the Pentagon run him or he has to run the Pentagon,” Hersh said. If he doesn’t, “this stuff is going to be the ruin of his presidency.”

Hersh called the “Af-Pak” situation — the spreading conflict in Afghanistan and Pakistan — Obama’s main challenge.

The only way for the U.S. to extricate itself from the conflict, Hersh said, is to negotiate with the Taliban.

“It’s the only way out,” he said. “I know that there’s a lot of discussion in the White House about this now.

Seemingly with each passing day, General Stanley McChrystal grows in the esteem of President Obama's conservative foes. After having savaged General Eric Shinseki for his pre-Iraq war testimony that the occupation would require "several hundreds of thousands" of American troops, Republicans have seized on McChrystal's public demands for more forces in Afghanistan as their latest battering ram to bludgeon Obama on national security. And as it turns out, McChrystal's inadvertent leak earlier this month regarding a classified CIA analysis puts him in the same company as Republicans John Boehner, Pete Hoekstra, Pat Roberts and, of course, Dick Cheney.

McChrystal in his leaked report and unprecedented public speech in London has put tremendous pressure on President Obama to quadruple the Bush-era commitment to the Afghan conflict. General McChrystal didn't merely announce that short of deploying as many as 60,000 more troops, the U.S. effort in Afghanistan "will likely result in failure." He also set out to demolish straw man alternatives to his escalated counterinsurgency plan, including:

"A paper has been written that recommends that we use a plan called 'Chaosistan', and that we let Afghanistan become a Somalia-like haven of chaos that we simply manage from outside."

But as Newsweek reported, that "paper" to which General McChrystal casually referred is almost surely a classified CIA assessment:

Two U.S. intelligence officials, who asked for anonymity when discussing a sensitive matter, say that the reference almost certainly comes from a recently published, and secret, CIA analysis titled "Chaosistan" (not "Chaostan"). Prepared by a "red team" of CIA analysts, the document, says one official, picks apart conventional analyses of the war and explains how forces inside Afghanistan--from hostile ethnic groups to intrusive neighbors to societal damage caused by past Taliban rule--work against the notions of a central Afghan government. The paper is not quite the policy proposal McChrystal implied it was, say the officials, since intelligence analysts don't generally recommend policy options.

Of course, the same Republican voices which lauded the leak of McChrystal's report and his UK grandstanding will doubtless remain silent now. Because while many in the GOP called for the prosecution of those behind the publication of the NSA domestic surveillance story, they themselves selectively leaked classified national security information for partisan political purposes.

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Obama officials went on the offensive on the talk show circuit last Sunday, reminding America and the corporate media that Fox News is not a legitimate news organization.

Staying true to their entertainment format, on Monday Fox News responded by putting up a poll on their website and what do you know...all of the choices are incorrect and none of them allow for the possibility that Obama is right.

What a knee-slapper! Feel free to re-write your own reality-based poll for them in the comments.

I think it's awfully nice of them to promise not to arrest sick people who are trying not to puke their guts out:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Obama administration will not seek to arrest medical marijuana users and suppliers as long as they conform to state laws, under new policy guidelines to be sent to federal prosecutors Monday.

Two Justice Department officials described the new policy to The Associated Press, saying prosecutors will be told it is not a good use of their time to arrest people who use or provide medical marijuana in strict compliance with state laws.

The new policy is a significant departure from the Bush administration, which insisted it would continue to enforce federal anti-pot laws regardless of state codes.

Attorney General Eric Holder said in March that he wanted federal law enforcement officials to pursue those who violate both federal and state law, but it has not been clear how that goal would be put into practice.

President Obama was in my hometown of San Francisco Friday for a fundraising dinner and apparently was in a feisty mood. While teabaggers greeted him at the entrance of the hotel, Obama took the time to address his dinner crowd with some of the most partisan words I've ever heard from him:

But I know this is a Democratic event. And I want to talk to all of you just for a second. You know, there are going to be some fierce arguments over the next couple of weeks about health care. There should be. This is big. But understand that the bill you least like of the five bills that got passed would all provide billions of people who don’t have coverage, coverage. Would all prevent insurance companies from barring you from getting health insurance because of a pre-existing condition. Would all set up an exchange so that small businesses could compete and get the same deal that big businesses do for their employees. Would all provide subsidies to people who don’t have health insurance and give them a measure of security. All of them.

So as we’re going at it -- and we’re going to be going at it –- I just want all of you to understand: We are going to get this done. We are going to get this done.

Now, to the non-Democrats who may be watching today -– I want everybody to know we believe in a strong and loyal opposition. I believe in a two-party system where ideas are tested and assumptions are challenged -- because that’s how we can move this country forward. But what I reject is when some folks decide to sit on the sidelines and root for failure on health care or on energy or on our economy. What I reject is when some folks say we should go back to the past policies when it was those very same policies that got us into this mess in the first place.

Another way of putting it is when, you know, I'm busy and Nancy busy with our mop cleaning up somebody else’s mess –- we don’t want somebody sitting back saying, you're not holding the mop the right way. Why don’t you grab a mop, why don’t you help clean up. You're not mopping fast enough. That's a socialist mop. Grab a mop –- let’s get to work.

I think all of us in Washington have a greater purpose. We have a higher calling. And let me tell you, as long as I have the privilege of holding this office, I will do my very best to live up to my responsibilities to our country, to our children, to the future that we hold in common

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NicolasC at DailyKos says this is a phrase worth repeating to the whingeing Republicans:

Obama's come up with political gold to counter any attempt to pass a Republican mess off as his own, or criticize him for not cleaning it up fast enough. And we need to repeat it ad infinitum and scream it from rooftops. This needs to become the political catchphrase of the next year.[..]

Andrew Sullivan, over at the Daily Dish, knows gold when he sees it:

It's an inspired three-word challenge to the GOP. Devastating, actually - because it both reminds people of the damage the GOP did while not seeming to dwell on the past or to score partisan points (while actually doing both).

Now, understand here, I'm not trying to head off legitimate, substantive criticism of the president or his policies, be they from the left or the right. There's plenty of that and no three-word catch slogan could or should diminish those. But as a counter to the brain-dead, disingenuous, hypocritical, and often baseless criticism from the people whose messes he is cleaning, it doesn't get any better than this.

As one of Andrew Sullivan's readers put it:

If a Republican president had come up with this slogan, it would immediately have been put up as the main headline on Drudge (red font & siren optional), which inevitably leads to the main topic of conversation on conservative radio. Every damn Republican representative would be working every interview around those three words and the national narrative would be created ... unfortunately these are the Dems we're talking about, so the only people who will ever hear this are the ones politically interested enough to read blogs such as yours.

Sadly, (s)he's probably right. Unless we start hammering these words in now any time we see hypocritical and brain-dead talking points.

Republicans, you want to help this country? Then STFU and...GRAB A MOP!

I realize that there has to be a little more latitude given to op-eds than to straight news reporting, but it seems to me that there has to be a certain level of fact-checking for even editorials for the sake of the credibility of the paper. But then again, maybe WaPo is so deep into their Obama Derangement that they no longer are able to care about credibility.

People can, and undoubtedly will, argue for some time about whether President Obama deserves the Nobel Peace Prize. Meanwhile, though, there's a simpler and more immediate question: Does the Constitution allow him to accept the award?

Article I, Section 9, of the Constitution, the emolument clause, clearly stipulates: "And no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them, shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince or foreign State."

The award of the peace prize to a sitting president is not unprecedented. But Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson received the honor for their past actions: Roosevelt's efforts to end the Russo-Japanese War, and Wilson's work in establishing the League of Nations. Obama's award is different. It is intended to affect future action. As a member of the Nobel Committee explained, the prize should encourage Obama to meet his goal of nuclear disarmament. It raises important legal questions for the second time in less than 10 months -- questions not discussed, much less adequately addressed anywhere else.

Like how the authors gloss over that two other sitting Presidents have received the Nobel Peace Prize, pretty much obliterating their theory on the constitutionality of awarding such a prize? Boneheads, they blow their own argument out of the water. Their choice of laureate: Iranian election martyr Neda Agha-Soltan, which of course, violates the Oslo committee's rules on bestowing the award to a living person. But hey, if you're going to employ poor syllogism to explain why Obama doesn't deserve it, why worry about things like rules?

Adam Blickstein points out a problem with their thinking:

One problem: the hero of the first Gulf War, Gen. Normon Schwarzkopf, received an honorary Knighthood from Queen Elizabeth (which technically makes him a "Knight of the British Empire") in May of 1991 while still on active duty. According to Rotunda and Pham's argument, this violated all kinds of constitutional constraints, Emolument Clause notwithstanding. He retired at the end of August 1991, meaning the General was clearly a foreign agent for the British Empire for approximately 3 months, because how can you be a Knight and an American General at the same time? Where would his loyalty really be? Under this Op-Ed's logic, Schwarzkopf's retirement South should have sent him to the Naval Brig at Charleston, not the golf courses of Florida.

Another government luminary who should have fallen victim to the Emolument Clause as the authors of the Op-Ed envision it? Alan Greenspan, who received his Honorary British Knighthood in 2002 while still serving as the Chairman of the Federal Reserve. How could President George Bush sit there idly as the Chairman overseeing America's treasury was more a servant of Britain's Queen Elizabeth than the Commander-in-Chief of the United States? I'm shocked that the entirety of America's money supply didn't end up alongside the Crown Jewels at the Tower of London. But apparently, there was concern in Conservative circles over the legality of Greenspan's ascension in the British Empire. According to Newsmax, the Federal Reserve's General Counsel cleared Greenspan under the Emolument Clause[..].

Even Conservatives acquiesced that a Knighthood was not in violation of the Emolument Clause. I assume the same logic applies to a Nobel Prize.

Is it possible for Conservatives to offer even one well-reasoned argument? Or is it too difficult because, as Colbert says, facts have a liberal bias? Shame on WaPo's editorial board for being so eager to feed their Obama haters. (h/t Ambinder)

When I woke up and opened my email box, I have to admit I first thought it was some sort of Onion spoof – Obama Wins Nobel Peace Prize? Oh c’mon, where’s the punchline? But less than a half a cup of coffee later, I realized, bloody hell, this actually has happened!

Barack Obama, with less than a year in office, has won the Nobel Peace Prize, only the fourth US president to win it, after Teddy Roosevelt (1906), Woodrow Wilson (1919), and Jimmy Carter (2002), and the first sitting president since Wilson. Ostensibly, Obama has won it for "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples,” and specifically in recognition of his efforts to work toward a nuclear weapons-free world…

Well, obviously, they had to give it to him for a specific reason, and there’s certainly a lot of validity in the ones the Norwegian Nobel Committee decided on. But the Nobel Prize has always been political, which leaves it open to many who have complained about certain recipients in the past – Yasser Arafat and Henry Kissinger probably the most notable of controversial winners. However, Arafat’s and Kissinger’s detractors were their already sworn enemies, primarily Israel, so no real surprise there. But the instant denunciation of Obama’s worthiness has been, astonishingly enough, our own people. Our fellow Americans. Citizens of the United States who should be thrilled to bits Obama has won this incredible distinction and at a time when it is so crucial for America’s battered standing in the world community.

Larisa Alexandrovna, in her blog article, “Republicanistan - A country of its own” gives a great run-down on the scale of venomous spewing from the right, from Malkin’s spittle flecked incoherence to Limbaugh’s OxyContin and Viagra fuelled rage, along with all those who cheered when Chicago lost the Olympics, who have openly expressed the hope Obama’s policies will fail, regardless of how much that would hurt the country, those flag-waving, gun-toting patriots who have called for a military coup – a military coup! – to oust a legitimate and democratically elected leader of our own country. They must destroy the village to save the village. Their war on Obama takes no prisoners, even if the entire country itself should end up as a fatality.

Yet I would suggest that is it exactly these people – yes, these hate-mongering, stark raving loony-toon seething cabal of gibbering wingnuts at the head of the marching moronic army of stoopid peepul – who are directly responsible for Obama’s surprising win.

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Well, well, well....:

President Barack Obama made history again Friday, winning the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples

The Norwegian Nobel Committee recognized Obama's efforts to solve complex global problems, including working toward a world free of nuclear weapons.

President Obama is the first sitting President since Woodrow Wilson to be awarded this honor. (Videos from CSpanJunkie)

Of course, the right wing is saying it's because he's not George Bush, without acknowledging the shame our country still wears from Bush being the "Anti-Peace and No Prize" President: