Reading notes

Quote of the day, written by Todd at TPMCafe in response to Karl Rove’s naked effort to blameshift Bush’s mistakes onto half the citizenry of the United States:

This is the true face of the Bush crowd:
extremism in pursuit of vice.

The diagnosis has never been better put. Thank God even sane Republicans are waking up to its reality.

[2005-07-15 insert: I find this diagnosis pinpoint accurate, too:
“arrogance and immaturity infused with power.” ]

When thuggery attacks decency, lots of blood ensues but decency wins. Rarely quickly, but always. The Bush crowd’s days are numbered.

This is what thuggery costs:

The United States’ image is so tattered overseas two years after the Iraq invasion that China, which is ruled by a communist dictatorship, is viewed more favorably than the U.S. in many countries, an international poll found.

This thuggery has cost us lives, limbs, decency, honor, credibility, respect, solvency. Our country’s lifeblood, literally and figuratively, is leaking out into the sands of Iraq and Guantanamo.

Dissent, especially dissent in the service of decency, is the highest form of patriotism.