Tweet of the week. And don't forget kids, you can follow the entire Crooks and Liars staff on Twitter here.

Open Thread below....

After 20 years working for CNN, Senior Mideast Affairs editor Octavia Nasr is leaving. Why? Because she dared to express sadness at the passing of Hezbollah leader Sayyed Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah, stirring all sorts of anger from the right.

Evidently, if you're CNN, it's perfectly fine to hire commentators who refer to a US Supreme Court justice as a "goat f@$king child molester", but God forbid an emotional, somewhat easily misinterpreted tweet should be granted similar mercy.

CNN's internal memo (according to Mediaite) dismisses her with this terse explanation:

I had a conversation with Octavia this morning and I want to share with you that we have decided that she will be leaving the company. As you know, her tweet over the weekend created a wide reaction. As she has stated in her blog on CNN.com, she fully accepts that she should not have made such a simplistic comment without any context whatsoever. However, at this point, we believe that her credibility in her position as senior editor for Middle Eastern affairs has been compromised going forward.

In other words, she didn't carry the requisite press bias toward Israel?

Her original tweet (now apparently deleted) was this:

“Sad to hear of the passing of Sayyed Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah… One of Hezbollah’s giants I respect a lot.”

Yesterday she posted a clarification on her blog.

Here's what I should have conveyed more fully:

I used the words "respect" and "sad" because to me as a Middle Eastern woman, Fadlallah took a contrarian and pioneering stand among Shia clerics on woman's rights. He called for the abolition of the tribal system of "honor killing." He called the practice primitive and non-productive. He warned Muslim men that abuse of women was against Islam.

She also clarified her position with regard to his other activities with regard to Hezbollah; in fact, she made it clear that acts of Hezbollah had killed members of her own family:

It is no secret that Sayyed Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah hated with a vengeance the United States government and Israel. He regularly praised the terror attacks that killed Israeli citizens. And as recently as 2008, he said the numbers of Jews killed in the Holocaust were wildly inflated.

But it was his commitment to Hezbollah's original mission - resisting Israel's occupation of Lebanon - that made him popular and respected among many Lebanese, not just people of his own sect.

In 1983, as Fadlallah found his voice as a spiritual leader, Islamic Jihad - soon to morph into Hezbollah - bombed the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut, killing 299 American and French peacekeepers. I lost family members in that terror attack.

At the same time, she notes that he ultimately emerged as a more moderate voice against the harsher, more powerful Iranian clerics.

In later years, Hezbollah's leadership apparently did not like Fadlallah's vocal criticism of Hezbollah's allegiance to Iran. Nor did they like his assertions that Hezbollah's leaders had been distracted from resistance to Israeli occupation of portions of Lebanon and had turned weapons against their own people.

At first, he was simply pushed to the side, but later wasn't even referred to as a Hezbollah member. Rather, he was referred to as the scholar - the expert on Islam - but nothing more. During the 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel, his honorary title "Sayyed" - indicating that he's a descendant of the prophet - was dropped any time he was mentioned on Hezbollah's Al-Manar TV and other Hezbollah media outlets.

The only thing this proves is that when it comes to Israel and the Middle East, emotions run so high and so hot that I doubt anything resembling peace can ever come to pass. There is a centuries-old rift that gets scratched open by the softest fabrics brushing thin skin. It doesn't matter what side the US takes, or what side Nasr takes on these issues. I'm certain Nasr's position at CNN -- even though she is a Lebanese Christian -- has long been a bone of contention among the pro-Israel press.

I will miss her. She was one of the few journalists on Twitter who quoted Pablo Neruda and shared the sheer joy of her travel and her job. She loved that job. I'm sure she's heartbroken.

I agree with the sentiments of her Twitter fan, Bashar Hamad:

I wonder if all these people so quick to jump on @octavianasrCNN comment Re: Fadlallah's passing be so quick to jump on real hate speech

Not only wouldn't they, they're the ones who routinely step up and use it. Whether it's racist comments about our President or libeling Supreme Court justices, they not only don't jump on it, they embrace it in the name of the First Amendment.

Open thread below....

Roger Ebert is getting a little taste of some very nasty tea...from tea partiers IRATE at the nerve of Roger Ebert for an offhand tweet he made in response to the California teens disciplined for wearing American flag t-shirts at a Cinco de Mayo school event.

Ebert tweeted:

Kids who wear American Flag t-shirts on 5 May should have to share a lunchroom table with those who wear a hammer and sickle on 4 July.

Well, you know that co-opting the favorite symbol of the tea party crowd wasn't going to set well, especially when you imply the perhaps there is a lack of empathy going on.

There are a few points of etiquette most of us learn early:

1. Always send thank-you cards.
2. Don't talk with your mouth full.
3. Don't mock those who have battled cancer and won.

Those crazy tea partiers? They forgot lesson number three.

It seems they've worked themselves into a tizzy over Roger Ebert's comments on Twitter in response to the case in California where five kids were sent home early from school for wearing American flag garb on Cinco de Mayo.[..]

CNN.com reported response tweets from the Tea Party Tweeters like: “I mean honestly. How many pieces need to fall off @ebertchicago before he gets the hint to shut the (expletive) up” and “You know, @ebertchicago, I’m not as expert on flag etiquette as you. Tell me, which do I fly when you die of cancer?”

Hoo boy. You stay classy now. Ebert, bless his heart, has battled far more formidable foes than your nasty little tea bagger, so he's been giving as good as he's gotten on Twitter (follow him here: @ebertchicago). He also blogged about it in more than 140 characters on his blog:

The impression is spreading that I have drawn an equation between the American flag and the hammer and the sickle. I'm currently serving for target practice on some right-wing websites, and a group of Tweeters are having jolly fun portraying me as an America hater and worse.[..]

[My post] was tweeted at the height of the discussion over five white California kids who wore matching t-shirts to school on Cinco de Mayo, and were sent home by their school. This inspired predictable outrage in the usual circles.

Tweeted from lonestarag05: Its the USA not Mexico. They are allowed to be proud of their country. I wonder sometimes why you even stay here.

Many others informed me that Americans have the right to be proud of our flag, and wear it on T-shirts. Of course they do. That isn't the question. It's not what my Tweet said. What I suggested, in its 108 letters, is that we could all use a little empathy. I wish I had worded it better.

Let's begin with a fact few Americans know: Celebrating Cinco de Mayo is an American custom. The first such celebration was held in California in 1863, and they have continued without interruption. In Mexico itself it is not observed, except in the state of Puebla--the site of Mexico's underdog victory over the French on May 5, 1862.

Cinco de Mayo's purpose is to celebrate Mexican-American culture in the United States. We are a nation of immigrants, and have many such observances, for example St. Patrick's Day parades, which began in Boston in 1737 and not in Ireland until 1931. Or Pulaski Day, officially established in Illinois in 1977, and not observed in Poland. The first Chinese New Year's parade was held in San Francisco in the 1860s, and such parades began only later in China. In Chicago this August we will have the 81st annual Bud Billiken Parade, one of the largest parades in America, celebrating the African-American heritage.[..]

The question is obviously not whether Americans, or anyone else, has the right to wear our flag on their t-shirts. But empathetic people realize much depends on context. If, on Cinco de Mayo, you turn up at your school with a large Mexican-American student population wearing such shirts, are you (1) joining in the spirit of the holiday, or (2) looking for trouble?

I suggest you intend to insult your fellow students. Not because they do not respect THEIR flag, but because you do not respect their heritage. That there are five of you in matching shirts demonstrates you want to be deliberately provocative.

Give 'em hell, Roger.

I found this article from a tweet by GGreenwald.

President Obama thinks Republicans will engage in a full battle over his Supreme Court nominee regardless of the person's ideological leanings, and in some ways "that realization is liberating for the president" to choose whomever he pleases, an administration official told TPMDC.

In comments that are at odds with the conventional wisdom about what Obama needs to do to make sure the Senate confirms his nominee to replace John Paul Stevens, a White House official involved in the confirmation process tells TPMDC that the President isn't taking a cautious approach to selecting a nominee. Despite having one less Democrat in the Senate than when Sonia Sotomayor was confirmed last year, the administration isn't limiting itself to reviewing only centrist candidates for the court vacancy, the official said.

"It doesn't matter who he chooses, there is going to be a big 'ol fight over it. So he doesn't have to get sidetracked by those sorts of concerns," the official told me. The GOP has attempted to obstruct "anything of consequence" put forth by the Obama administration since he took office, the official said. "The president is making this decision with a pretty clear view that whoever he chooses is going to provoke a strong reaction on the right," the official added.

I hope TPMDC is right. At least the White House knows what is in store for them when they make the nomination so they should just go for it. Will they have the courage?

Not a photoshop. Life holds few honors around my house, but woot! I was only the second person to re-tweet Keith Olbermann's first tweet.

And don't forget you can follow the Crooks and Liars staff on Twitter quickly and easily at this link. We're delighted to welcome Keith to the Twitterverse.

Damn straight. While Jim DeMint is lauding the disgusting, bigoted teabaggers getting their hate on:

Republican Senator Jim DeMint tweeted that he was "grateful for the thousands of patriots who are storming the Capitol today protesting government healthcare and defending freedom." The tweet came at around the same time the racist and homophobic comments above were reported.

Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH17) went on the House floor and soundly denounced the teabaggers and their full bigoted, homophobic, hate-filled display on Saturday.

Now I think it's time for all those congresspeople feeding into this frenzy to step in and denounce hate. Bachmann? Tancredo? Demint? Boehner? Pence? Foxx? King? Come forward now, and denounce the scary result of your fear-mongering.

CPAC tweet of the day via Mock, Paper, Scissors. Open thread below...

Kudos to Newark Mayor Cory Booker, who responded to a tweet regarding a senior citizen needing help with snow removal--by going over and shoveling the snow himself. Via Intoxination.

Open thread below.

Sadly, No!: According to the Virgin Queen of the Right Wing Baloney-sphere, the title of "Teabagger" was worn with pride by our colonial forebearers. No, really.

Dependable Renegade: Seriously Meghan, put the iPhone DOWN. But first, tweet Carrie Prejean a message from the General.

Earth Bound Misfit: "Republicans for Rape" isn't just a vote, it's thirty votes. And now it's a blog. Susie Bright (NSFW) points to a simple statement on "how to prevent rape." Highly recommended.

Distributorcap NY: Discovered at Schwabs.

Mike Finnigan returns tomorrow; send tips to finnsagain AT aol DOT com.