You know how sometimes extreme hypocrisy can morph into an excellent teaching moment? A moment to examine the foundational principles upon which humans wish to build their communal structures?

Well, the RNC epically failed this round. Way to go, Michael Steele.

So the Republican party began kowtowing to right wing extremists back in the late 70s, all  in the name of "appealing to their base," something that rather backfired on center-right fiscal Republicans from the 80s and 90s who thought "hey, free votes for saying we love Jesus, too!" and ended up with President Dubya. Part of this includes publicly condemning and/or shaming anyone who believes a woman should make medical decisions with her doctor and not the state (and possibly with her priest or rabbi, should she feel so inclined).

Except, like the Ann Coulter's of this world, women who say "women have no place in politics except me because I"m special," the Republican National Committee offered a health care plan to its employees that covered a basic medical procedure. Indeed, it's one of the most commonly and frequently used procedures in the United States.

Yep. The RNC health care plan covers elective abortions. Except not any more. Because somebody had the brilliant idea to scream "Irony!" in the convention hall. And rather than use this as a moment to admit that women choose to terminate pregnancies for a myriad of reasons and that perhaps we should trust them to do so, the RNC chose the cowardly easy way out and simply cancelled the program.

God Bless America, ya'll.

This man is my new guru. Because he cuts through the bullshit and gets right down to the basic building block of human society--empathy and compassion. And he does it in that particular Southern preacher sort of way that reminds me of my religious childhood. I might have a lot of problems with Evangelical culture but I also spent years reading my Bible (what else are you going to do when you're a reading kid who attends church six to seven hours a week?) and this guy nails the message of the whole thing in a relatively short segment. He also gives the best example of how to respect Obama and take him to task for policy at the same time:

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