Sunday Morning Reading

We have two items for your consideration this fine fall Sunday that point out, yet again, what's at stake in the midterm elections:

-- Via Steve Benen, we get a peek at one Jesse Kelly, a Rethug wingnut running for Congress in Arizona's 8th district. Kelly has some "interesting" views on the government's role in ensuring food safety (not to spoil the read, but he's one who safely falls under the category of "E. coli conservative"). Apparently, this crackpot has a good chance of winning.

-- Gail Collins has a piece in the NY Times on Wisconsin's Sen. Russ Feingold, who's doing battle against yet another Randian Rethug millionaire, Ron "Tiny" Johnson. The strong possibility that Feingold, a man of principle and integrity, could lose to someone like Tiny reminds us of Steve Benen's line in the above blog: "I can only assume the vast majority of the country has no idea what they're about to elect."

(P.S. - Speaking of Wisconsin, Wisconsin 31, Iowa 30)

The Assministration's "E-Coli Conservatism"

The Bushies are in Federal appeals court seeking to overturn a lower court ruling that would allow a meatpacking firm in Kansas to test all of their slaughtered cows for mad cow disease. The attorney for Creekstone Farms Premium Beef says the company wants to test for mad cow disease to reassure customers, but the Bushies and the larger meatpackers are against the testing.

Of course, if there were to be a future case of Americans contracting the disease from tainted beef, Dumbya's White House would spring into action, issuing heartfelt statements of concern and a promise to look into the matter. A heckuva job would ensue.

Mine Safety and "E. coli conservatism"

Crooks and Liars has a nice piece linking the conservative agenda with mine safety issues. The piece also links to an article by Rick Perlstein in .commonsense, entitled "E. coli conservatism." Perlstein's article provides another glimpse of Bob Murray, the blowhard Utah mine co-owner, whom Perlstein rightly describes as a "poster child" of the E. coli conservatives, i.e., those right-wing bidnessmen and their Rethug enablers who put profit over public safety. (When they attain public office on their no-tax platforms, we refer to them as "bridge collapse conservatives.") Take the time to look at the picture and you'll see, as we noted earlier, the face of Republicanism.

We're still waiting for the brain-dead MSM to remove their collective lips from Murray's arse and start acting like they have some neural activity in their beautiful heads.