You know, the Catholic Church certainly gets to enforce whatever rules they make - but this wouldn't bother me so much if they were consistent. After all, when was the last time a bishop singled out someone for supporting what the Church itself labeled an "unjust war" or for voting in support of the death penalty?

PROVIDENCE, R.I. - Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin has banned Rep. Patrick Kennedy from receiving Communion, the central sacrament of the church, in Rhode Island because of the congressman's support for abortion rights, Kennedy said in a newspaper interview published Sunday.

The decision by the outspoken prelate, reported on The Providence Journal's Web site, significantly escalates a bitter dispute between Tobin, an ultra orthodox bishop, and Kennedy, a son of the nation's most famous Roman Catholic family.

"The bishop instructed me not to take Communion and said that he has instructed the diocesan priests not to give me Communion," Kennedy told the paper in an interview conducted Friday.

Kennedy said the bishop had explained the penalty by telling him "that I am not a good practicing Catholic because of the positions that I've taken as a public official," particularly on abortion.

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November 17, 2009 FOX News
NY Congressman Peter King talking to FOX and Friends about the 9/11 terrorist going on trial in New York.

Ah, feel the eliminationism.

Rep. Gregg Harper, a Mississippi Republican, had a jocular interview with Politico's Anne Schroeder Mullins and popped out this little knee-slapper:

Mullins: What in the world does the Congressional Sportsmen’s Caucus do?

Harper: We hunt liberal, tree-hugging Democrats, although it does seem like a waste of good ammunition.

Coming from a congressman from a state still renowned for its lynchings and murders not just of black people but white civil-rights workers -- in an era many of us can still remember clearly -- this kind of "humor" is anything but funny.

However, it is the kind of thing we've come to expect to today's Republicans, isn't it?

Not that makes any difference to Blue Dog Democrats like Ben Nelson. As Media Matters notes:

Ironically, Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE), a co-chair of the caucus, has praised the group for being bipartisan. "Unlike some of the other activities in Washington, Republicans and Democrats reach across the aisle and join hands to work together, not as Republican or Democrat, but as sportsmen and women," he wrote.

Someone should ask Ben Nelson if he enjoys hunting liberal Democrats too, since that's what his caucus is apparently viewed as a venue for.

(Addendum: Somehow I'm not surprised that Harper is a Mississippian who thinks John Grisham is a "literary great" who surpasses Faulkner and Welty. Gad.)

Health care activists confront Horizon BCBSNJ Executive Tom Rubino outside Horizon headquarters in Newark NJ.

I was interested in this story, not the least because, well, this is my COBRA carrier and Horizon's crazy reimbursement rates are the reason why my doctor was kicked out of their network. But really, it could be anybody's insurer. (Oh, and please: If you're having a problem like this with an insurer, call your congressman's office. They usually have a staffer who does nothing but handle insurance problems for constituents.)

BAYONNE, N.J. -- One February morning, a courier arrived at the front desk of Bayonne Medical Center, trying to get to a patient's bedside. His mission: to deliver a letter from New Jersey's dominant health insurer warning that the patient would face a huge hospital bill if he did not leave right away.

Hospital security guards stopped the courier -- and 13 others who came soon after -- before they reached patients' rooms. But then came the faxes and, after that, the letters mailed to patients' doctors and homes. Told that her health plan would not pay for her to stay in the hospital, a 35-year-old social worker named Lisa with a severe lung infection was so unnerved that, tethered to an IV pole dripping antibiotics into her arm, she began to pack her gym bag before a staff member coaxed her back into bed.

The hardball tactics being used to pry patients from their sickbeds illustrate the colliding financial interests that pervade U.S. health care. It is a tug of war over where patients are treated, who decides how much care they receive and -- fundamentally -- which parts of the health-care industry gain or lose when people become ill.

The battle playing out in Bayonne has particular relevance as Congress tries to rewrite the rules that govern health care nationwide -- with hospitals, insurers, doctors and other stakeholders descending on Capitol Hill to angle for advantage. The bills before the House and the Senate would shift the system's balance of power that has evolved over decades -- a balance at the core of the dispute here.

Yet the fight over hospital patients in this working-class enclave also hints at the limits of what federal health-care changes would accomplish; none of the bills would legislate away the specific business practices that have escalated into a full-scale brawl between the city's only hospital and New Jersey's largest health insurer, Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield. Lawsuits are flying in both directions, each side accusing the other of fraud, greed and underhanded behavior that harms consumers and increases medical costs. Bayonne accuses Horizon of harassing patients and not paying its bills. Horizon accuses Bayonne of price-gouging and interfering with its health plans.

Such a sharp clash of self-interests is evidence that President Obama may have been naive in suggesting early on that health care's stakeholders are now willing to set aside rivalries that have thwarted previous attempts at reform, said Uwe E. Reinhardt, a health economist at Princeton University who led a state commission on New Jersey's shaky hospital finances. "It's no different from Iraq with all the different tribes. . . . 'How does it affect the money flow to my interest group?' " he said. "They are all sitting in the woods with their machine guns, waiting to shoot."

In such a tense climate, Bayonne has become virtually the only hospital in the country that has withdrawn in protest from the "provider networks" of every major insurer, abandoning a tradeoff that has become a staple of the health-care system: Hospitals agree to be paid lower rates in exchange for knowing that insurers will steer patients to their beds. Bayonne is not, however, the only hospital at odds with Horizon. Four others have pulled out Horizon's network or are close to leaving.

Are you sick and tired of the silly talking point Republicans use when they say all we have to do is allow people to cross state lines and buy insurance anywhere in America? They say that'll lower costs and save us all. Really? OK, here's what I have to say to that.

I want every member of Congress who is against health care refom with a public option to go out into the real world and try to purchase their own private insurance in any state they choose as a test. They can't say they are Senators or Congressmen, though. Make believe they are real citizens and then be like everybody else. Let's see how many of them actually would qualify for a plan at all and if they somehow can get insured, I want to see how much it would cost them and their families.

Hmmm, I wonder what would happen to Orrin Hatch?

That's what I want to see.

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(Oddly, still is)

Since its enactment in 1947, the famous (or infamous) Taft-Hartley Act (or Slave-Labor Bill as some call it) has been in an almost constant state of proposed revision. But never getting off the ground. Initially vetoed by Truman in 1947, it was overridden and set into law by the Republican led 80th Congress. Amendments have been proposed ever since.

In 1949, part of the America United Series, moderated by David Brinkley, approached a panel consisting of a young Eugene McCarthy newly elected Congressman, Thruston Morton, Anthony P. Alfino from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Tom Harris who represented the CIO.

Tom Harris (CIO): “The question you ask, ‘How Should The Taft-Hartley Act Be Amended’ is an easy one in our judgment to answer. It shouldn’t be amended at all but should be replaced with an entirely different statute, along the lines of the Wagner Act. That is essentially what the Thomas-Lezinsky Bill does. We think that should be done because the approach of the Wagner Act to industrial relations was sound. While that of the Taft-Hartley Act is wholly wrong. The ideas behind the Wagner Act were very simple; they were first, to permit workers to form strong unions if they wanted to. Secondly, to require employers to deal with those unions on wages, hours and so on. The authors of the Wagner Act hoped by these means to promote industrial peace and to raise the living standards of workers. With consequent benefit to the entire community. The idea behind the Taft-Hartley Act is also very simple; it’s to weaken unions. The men who wrote the Taft-Hartley Act just didn’t believe in labor unions. The Taft-Hartley Act is a composite of all the anti-union devices which reactionary congressmen were able to think up during the years of the New Deal. When they got into power, briefly as it turned out, in the 80th Congress, they wrote these numerous devices into law. That’s the Taft-Hartley law. And its bad in its entirety and should be stricken from the books.”

In 1949 they wanted to amend it. It's 2009 - still waiting.

I have this idea. It's pretty simple and I think it will appeal to a lot of people.

Here it is.

I want every uninsured man and woman who comes down with swine flu to go sit in the waiting rooms of their elected representatives.

That's it. Just sit there - coughing. Throwing your used Kleenex in their trash receptacles. If they want us to suffer, they should have to look at at the logical consequences of their inaction. Tell them you're going to keep coming back until they manage to pass something that's actually going to help people instead of lining the pockets of the insurance companies.

If the weather gets cold, set up a tent in the parking lot, put a sign on it that says "Waiting Room: Waiting for Affordable Health Care." Set up your lawn chairs and invite everyone who passes to sit there with you. Be sure to call your local media.

With apologies to Arlo Guthrie:

if you're in a situation like that, there's only one thing you can do and that's walk into the congressman's office wherever you are ,just walk in say "Congressman, we just want affordable health care". And walk out. You know, if one person, just one person does it they may think he's nuts and they won't pay attention. And if two people, two people do it, in harmony, they may think they're just odd and they won't take either of them. And three people do it, three, can you imagine, three people walking in saying "We just want affordable health care" and walking out. They may think it's an organization. And can you, can you imagine fifty people a day, I said fifty people a day walking in, coughing their heads off and saying, "We just want affordable health care" and then walking out. And friends, they may think it's a movement.

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From Fox News Sunday, Chris Wallace suggests to ACORN's Bertha Lewis that the hit job done on them which I think amounts to entrapment by the conservative film maker James O'Keefe means that the improvements made under Lewis' watch are meaningless. I'm not sure what more he thought she should do besides fire these workers.

Emit at Daily KOS has more on Karl Rove wanna' be James O'Keefe--O'Keefe said he went after ACORN because it registers minorities likely to vote against Republicans:

James O’Keefe, one of the two filmmakers, said he went after ACORN because it registers minorities likely to vote against Republicans: "Politicians are getting elected single-handedly due to this organization," O’Keefe told The Washington Post. "No one was holding this organization accountable."

New York Times: Did ACORN Get Too Big for Its Own Good?

That statement alone should be enough to prompt curious progressive minds to dig a bit deeper into this young Rove-in-the-Making, James E. O'Keefe III.

In the court of public opinion, thrust at us via Fox News and Breitbart, these videos that O'Keefe and Hannah Giles created seem to have offered up immediate 'proof' of ACORN's corruption, on the whole.

Verdict? Guilty until proven innocent!

After all, who wants to defend someone who condones and even appears to assist in the trafficking of teenage prostitutes? O'Keefe knows this. It's been his game for some time.

Jump in.

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Transcript below the fold.

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Law Enforcement Against Prohibition: FBI numbers prove that the 'War on Drugs' is a failure

Wall St. Cheat Sheet: Congressman Alan Grayson talks Fed transparency and missing money

Culture Monster: Glenn Beck and Freedom Works' 9/12 logo based on communist and socialist designs

The New Republic: Wealthcare

Echidne of the Snakes: Guarding our hearts and wallets

Sadly, No!: Quick Question

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Compassionate conservative Rep. Paul Broun makes Ed Schultz's Psycho Talk segment for this number- Rep. Broun walks away from man asking for plan to lower health care costs: ‘If you have a suggestion, send it.’:

Yesterday, Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) held a town hall in Watkinsville, GA, where he fielded questions about health care legislation before Congress. At the conclusion of the town hall, Ryan Lewis, an Athens, GA, resident, approached the congressman and politely explained to him about how his health insurance company refuses to pay for his treatment. In response, Broun told Lewis, “We need to make insurance affordable.” Lewis then asked, “How do we do that?” Rather than offering a GOP solution to skyrocketing health care costs, Broun simply told him, “If you have a suggestion, send it to me” and quickly walked away.

I've been in California this week, but my friend Goldy back in Seattle managed to make it out to last week's massive rally in support of health-care reform.

There were several thousand people there, with only a tiny smattering of teabaggers opposed to reform. Goldy has photos and reportage on just how large the support for a public option was.

And yet, guess what? The media completely ignored the rally. Even the local paper -- the ostensibly neutral but in fact Republican-run Seattle Times -- ran not one single word about it.

Of course, forget about the national media bothering to report this, too.

They've been too busy telling us that the public option is dead because of the supposedly massive opposition to it created by teabaggers.

As Goldy says:

None of this happened yesterday in downtown Seattle because no ex-marine angrily yelled down a congressman and nobody got the tip of their finger bitten off and nothing apparently is going to get the media to move from the well-entrenched meme that support for reform is steadily slipping as the public turns against Obama and the Democratic Congress… not even a show of force by the public itself.

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And the dumb keeps coming. CNBC's Maria, I just met a girl named Maria Bartiromo is so intent on sticking up for her Wall Street fat cat pals that she makes an idiot out of herself when she asks Rep. Weiner how come he doesn't use Medicare if it's all that!

Well, Weiner is half way to fifty so he's not eligible, but as we know facts are useless things when conservatives want to destroy something. Actually I wonder of she got confused with the other conservative talking point that says if the public option is so great, why doesn't the Democratic Congress sign up for it. Can you tell? I know it's hard to pin down the crazy.

Nico Pitney:

Earlier today, MSNBC's Carlos Watson hosted Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) and CNBC anchor Maria Bartiromo for a discussion on health care.

At one point, Bartiromo was critical of the government-managed health care system in the United Kingdom. "How do I know the quality [of health care in the United States] is not going to suffer" with a public option? she asked.

Rep. Weiner reminded her that there already is government-managed health care in the United States -- namely, Medicare, the system created for Americans 65 years and older -- and that patients with Medicare report very high satisfaction rates.

Bartiromo's response to this argument was a true head-scratcher. In a mocking tone, she pressed the congressman: "How come you don't use it [Medicare]? You don't have it. How come you don't have it?"

Rep. Weiner, who turns 45 this week, tried to walk Bartiromo through it. "Because I'm not 65." But she was insistent. "Yeah... c'mon!" she exclaimed, laughing incredulously.

Texas Republican Pete Olson probably figured he could get away with using a young child as a propaganda tool at a recent town hall meeting -- but he was in for a big surprise.

Republican Congressman Olson (R-TX) tells the townhall about a mother who was turned away by the free market doctors for her unborn child's heart defect. She was denied by the free market doctors but persisted and was able to find a specialized doctor and got a very delicate operation and a heart transplant 17 days after he was born. Olson then claims that the public option would have denied him the needed health care and he would have died! After being challenged he abruptly ended the discussion. Watch as he is challenged, and clueless as to what to say.

As Olson spews out his talking points, people in the crowd repeatedly point out to him that it wasn't the government who turned this poor child away, it was the insurance companies. Olson was absolutely gobsmacked when people started calling him out on his obvious gaffe as he stood there looking like a deer caught in the headlights. It’s so encouraging to see some town hall video from health care reform supporters giving these GOP shills a taste of their own medicine!

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Jeez. On the same day that one of their leaders and key organizers is arrested for pulling a gun on an elderly man, the folks who run the Tea Parties in Boise got to announce that Blue Dog Democrat Walt Minnick would be meeting with them.

Now that's what I call timing.

The Political Game has the details:

What is even more unconscionable than Republicans lying about reform efforts to keep average Idahoans from supporting any of those efforts is the fact that Congressman Walt Minnick (D-Idaho) is going to speak to those who have halted civil discourse across this nation--teabaggers. Our one and only "Democratic" congressman, Walt Minnick, conducted a telephone town hall last night and will again on the last day of this month, but has otherwise avoided meeting with average constituents throughout his district (he's happy to meet with business leaders and corporate interests) who have real concerns about health care reform. The sting of Minnick's conservative positions and opposition to health care was made exponentially worse today when the Statesman reported that on Saturday Minnick will speak to TEA Party Boise at the Owyhee Plaza.

Congressman Minnick is willingly going before a potential group of extremists who are gun toting, anti-Obama, health care reform obstructionists. He has chosen principles, if he has any, over party. He is catering to the lunatic fringe in ways we haven't seen an Idaho politician of either party do since Congressman Helen Chenoweth.

Well, it's one thing to waffle, but to embrace the people who have been turning our national discourse into a three-wingnut circus is indeed unconscionable.

The ironic thing, as we've explored previously, is that none of these people will ever, ever vote for Walt Minnick. He has a better chance of convincing a rock to vote for him.

Especially the folks who run Tea Party Boise. As we noted, one of their leaders -- a fellow named Challis McAffee -- was just arrested for pointing a handgun at an elderly man whose home McAffee was photographing.

McAfee, as the AP story explains, was a key figure in the recent takeover of much the Idaho GOP apparatus by supporters of Ron Paul. McAffee also runs a Paul-supporting organization called Idahoans for Liberty.

His friends also have a fondness for getting bellicose to the point of being arrested; one of them, a fellow named Christopher Pentico, was convicted of trespass earlier this year when he refused to leave the grounds of the state Capitol building. McAffee, in cohort with Tea Party Boise, organized the Tea Partiers to appear in the courtroom at Pentico's sentencing.

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(Bourke Hickenlooper - Melvin Laird)

An eerie similarity in recent times, the astonishing lack of specifics in a Republican platform - well, this one was from Meet The Press on June 10, 1962. But you can imagine it from 2009 just as easily. The substance, or lack of it seems just about the same. The only thing different are the characters, the screaming and a bit less noise.Back in the day when "The Loyal Opposition" actually meant something.

Talking about the "Platform" this time is Bourke Hickenlooper and Melvin Laird. Laird, you'll recall, will go on to become Secretary of Defense under Nixon and coined the phrase "Vietnamization", but here he is a congressman.

Bear in mind that in 1962, the Republican Party were still licking their wounds over the 1960 election and the party hadn't been hijacked by the Barry Goldwater contingent until 1964.

Ray Scherer (NBC News): “Congressman Laird, on page four you say that Republicans urged vigorous investigations of fraud at the poles and you recommend corrective action. Is this pointed at a specific instance?

Rep. Melvin Laird: “ Well, it’s pointed at the 1960 elections Mister Scherer. We had certain evidence that Chicago and Texas and Philadelphia and other areas where there was fraud at the poles. And that the Republican minority of the House Judiciary Committee in the so-called Kramer Amendment made certain recommendations. That amendment has not been enacted into law, we believe that it should be vigorously pursued so that the right to vote of each individual citizen is protected."

Scherer: “On the same page you call for effective tax relief for medical and hospital insurance. And you also call for tax relief for financing education. How would this work?"

Laird: “First, as far as Medical and Hospital insurance is concerned, I think you’ll recall that in the Republican 80th Congress and amendment was adopted to the Internal Revenue Code which provided for double exemption over the age of 65. At the present time the Internal Revenue Code there is a three percent provision that you can’t deduct any amount unless it exceeds three percent of gross income. We believe that this provision should be done away with because many people that are buying medical and health insurance at the present time are unable to deduct it from their income taxes. Now in education: We feel that we are opposed to the so-called massive approach of general federal which passed the Senate last year. We are for the selective approach . We believe we can do much more good by giving tax incentives, tax relief. We had some members of our committee that were for a tax credit proposal in this education area. Others for a tax deduction. Our statement gives general support to this idea, but we spell it out as tax relief for the individual paying for the cost of education for himself or for others."

Vague, ambiguous and hoping no one will notice.

Same as it ever was - same as it ever was.