Rise of the New Confederacy

White Flight
By any standard, white voters' rejection of Democrats in November's Elections was daunting and even historic. Fully 60 percent of whites nationwide backed Republican Candidates for the House of Representatives; only 37 percent supported Democrats, according to the National Election Poll Exit Poll conducted by Edison Research. Not even in Republicans' 1994 congressional landslide did they win that high a percentage of the white vote. Moreover, those results may understate the extent of the whi...

Message from senators: Tone it down
(CNN) - Following the Saturday shootings in Arizona, senators on both sides of the aisle cautioned against inflamed Rhetoric in political discourse while previewing actions of Congress in the weeks ahead. On Sunday, Illinois Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin said violent words and images have become too "pervasive in our discussion of political issues." He specifically referenced the map Sarah Palin released in the lead-up to the Congressional vote on Health Care that showed crosshairs over contested ...

White Flight
By any standard, white voters' rejection of Democrats in November's Elections was daunting and even historic. Fully 60 percent of whites nationwide backed Republican Candidates for the House of Representatives; only 37 percent supported Democrats, according to the National Election Poll Exit Poll conducted by Edison Research. Not even in Republicans' 1994 congressional landslide did they win that high a percentage of the white vote. Moreover, those results may understate the extent of the whit...

REPORT: Large-scale exodus from Democratic Party of whites...
Right turn: Sen. Marco Rubio’s supporters in Florida included many whites who voted for Obama in 2008. Previously unreleased results from the 2010 Exit Polls show a stark gap between whites and Minorities and a smaller but still significant difference between blue- and white-collar whites. By any standard, white voters’ rejection of Democrats in November’s Elections was daunting and even historic. Fully 60 percent of whites nationwide backed Republican Candidates for the House ...

Legislative fireworks, not protest drama, expected for this health vote
A week into the new Congress, Democrats and Republicans have sharpened their messages on the Healthcare Reform law as House Republicans prepare to Repeal the overhaul next week. Democrats, who have been criticized by party members for not defending the law before the Midterm Elections, have assembled an offense portraying the Repeal effort as a time-waster, a promise-breaker and dangerous to Americans. Republicans argue they were swept into office with a mandate to Repeal the reform law, which...

Anti-Obama Heckler Disrupts US Congress
© Agence France-Presse Anti-Obama Heckler disrupts US Congress A woman screaming that President Barack Obama was not legitimately elected to the White House disrupted a symbolic reading of the US Constitution in the House of Representatives on Thursday. Capitol police removed the Protester, who shouted as Democratic Representative Frank Pallone read the passage that spells out the requirements for becoming president. Mr Pallone said later on the micro-blogging site Twitter that it was a...

Shooter Jared Loughner has ties with white racist group American Renaissance
"An internal Department of Homeland Security (DHS) memo quoted by Fox News Channel revealed the gunman - named by the media as Jared Loughner, 22 - is "possibly linked" to American Renaissance." The Great White Wave: The 2010 Elections saw a dramatic uprising against the policies of President Obama and the Democratic Congress led by the “Tea Party” movement. Another phenomenon has yet to be fully expounded—the decisive factor of the white vote. Assistant editor Stephen Webster ...

Question asked, question answered
Well, that was easy. The one big question after yesterday's horrific shooting was whether the mainstream media was going to blame Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, the Tea Party, Bible-thumpin' gun clingers everywhere, or simply Conservatives in general. Question asked, question answered. Critics of Sarah Palin have already drawn a link between the shooting and the fact that the former Alaska Governor put Giffords on a "target list" of lawmakers Palin wanted to see unseated in the midterm ...

Alexander: Democrats can block healthcare repeal in Senate
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) acknowledged that Democrats have the numbers in the Senate to block any attempt to Repeal Healthcare Reform. "They've got the numbers," the chairman of the Senate Republican Conference said on CNN's "State of the Union." "If they all vote not to repeal, there won't be repeal." However, he expects near-unanimous if not completely unanimous support for Repeal from the 47 Republicans in the Senate. "My sense is that Republicans will almost all, if not all, vote to r...

Cantor: GOP Will Postpone Repeal Vote
The Hill reports: House Republicans are postponing a vote to Repeal the healthcare law scheduled for next week after the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) in Arizona. Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said in a statement late Saturday that “all Legislation currently scheduled to be considered by the House of Representatives next week is being postponed so that we can take whatever actions may be necessary in light of today’s tragedy.” “Further information relating to

Colorado legislators see hope for bipartisan efforts
In what might otherwise be one of the most partisan years in memory, leaders on both sides of the aisle say the 2011 session of the Colorado General Assembly — which begins Wednesday — could turn out to be one big group hug. The ingredients for a brawl are certainly there: It's a redistricting year; Republicans, back in charge of one chamber after six years out of power, want to reverse Democratic policies; and some bitterly divisive issues like Immigration and Civil Unions are expec...

Jeff Schneider: Will the Next Act of Terrorism be Domestic -- Revisited
I published this article here on HuffPo almost a year ago -- and the resounding backlash from the Right Wing (both fringe and otherwise) was resounding. Some felt I was painting with too broad a brush -- others felt I was misleading my readers into fearing the innocuous or righteous. Today, in the wake of the horrors at a Safeway in Arizona, makes me wonder -- was I so wrong? My fear -- that vitriol in the media was sparking more unstable individuals to view violence as a viable option for pol...

Sarah Palins Violence
These calls for violence have resulted in threatening emails, gas lines cut, windows broken and now a deadly shooting Assassination attempt of a democratic US representative Gabrielle Giffords yesterday.  The Tea Party movement has targeted women mostly democrat women like Nancy Pelosi and those who helped pass the Health Care bill. What does this say about Sarah Palin’s movement of a call of violence against those she disagrees with and her targeting of opponents. Sarah Palin has no...

White House braces for savage cuts
Republican John Boehner receives the gavel from outgoing Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Photograph: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Dick Armey's black, lizard-skin cowboy boots lay on the floor while he relaxed on the couch in stockinged feet. The former Texas congressman was in a jovial mood in his office just off the Washington Mall - and for good reason. He may no longer be a politician but as chairman of FreedomWorks, one of the main forces behind the conservative Tea Party movem...

Tea Party rules Washington as Barack Obama braces for savage cuts
Dick Armey’s black, lizard-skin cowboy boots lay on the floor while he relaxed on the couch in stockinged feet. The former Texas congressman was in a jovial mood in his office just off the Washington Mall - and for good reason. He may no longer be a politician but as chairman of FreedomWorks, one of the main forces behind the conservative Tea Party movement, he is once more a major player in the new Washington DC. “My wife likes the terminology of a ‘Paradigm Shift’...

Paul Krugman Blames Giffords Shooting on Palin, Limbaugh and Beck
While Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) fights for her life in a Tucson, Arizona, Hospital, liberal media members continue to point fingers of blame for Saturday's tragic shooting spree at prominent Conservatives such as Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, and Glenn Beck. We don’t have proof yet that this was political, but the odds are that it was. She’s been the target of violence before. And for those wondering why a Blue Dog Democrat, the kind Republicans might be able to wo...

Andrew Levine: Delusions: What Obama Apologists and Tea Party Supporters Have In Common
What a spectacle Washington has become! Democrats fall over themselves capitulating to Republicans, expressly as with Obama's "Compromise" on taxes or, more often, preemptively; while establishment Republicans, fearing the wrath of their useful idiots, capitulate to Tea Partiers, who therefore call the shots. Such Democracy as we have had has always been a tenuous achievement thanks to institutions that make it difficult for the will of the people to prevail, and thanks to the inequalities gen...

Boehner: No 'heinous' acts will keep members from doing their jobs
House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said Sunday morning that "no act, no matter how heinous" would keep members of Congress from doing their jobs. "The thoughts and prayers of the House and the nation are with Congresswoman Giffords and her family," Boehner told reporters from his home state, calling to mind U.S. District Judge John Roll and the others who were killed or injured when a gunman opened fire at a "Congress on Your Corner" meet-and-greet event by Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) o...

House Postpones Health Care Repeal Vote After Giffords Shooting
Wednesday's scheduled vote on repealing the Affordable Care Act has been postponed in light of the shooting in Arizona: House Republicans are postponing a vote...

Alexander: Back To Business Quickly On Capitol Hill
If you think yesterday's events will ease the partisan gridlock on Capitol Hill for a long time going forward, think again. On CNN Sunday morning, Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) said Congress will return to business as usual quickly. "For the next few days, obviously it's going to affect our agenda," Alexander acknowledged. "The House of Representatives has already said they're not going to vote on repealing the Health Care law now. So we need to stop pause and reflect." "But then I think we're b...

So What Happens Now?
Walter Shapiro raises some good points. The acidic anger corroding our political system is premised on the belief that elected officials in Washington are arrogantly out of touch. But what will happen when representatives and senators begin to believe that they are risking their lives by appearing in public to answer voter questions? The inevitable result will be new barriers (portable metal detectors, omnipresent Security Guards) standing between the political elites and the governed. Equally...

Former Rep. Carney, Palin target: Palin should 'say she was wrong'
Former Pennsylvania Rep. Chris Carney, who was -- like Gabrielle Giffords -- targeted by Sarah Palin in a campaign whose graphic put a gunsight on their districts "I'm not sure if 'blame' is the right word for Ms. Palin, but I think it wasn't helpful, obviously," Carney told the Scranton Times-Tribune of the map. "It would be very useful if she came out and, if not apologize, say that she was wrong in putting that sort of logo on peoples' districts." "[A] lot of folks ...

NYDN Columnist: Daily Kos to Blames for Giffords Shooting
Obviously the incendiary Rhetoric of the Far Left is the blame for the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords. Oh wait, of course not. It's Sarah Palin's fault.Palin would no doubt say that she was only speaking in metaphor, that she only meant her followers should work to unseat Giffords and 19 other Democrats who had roused her ire by voting for Health Care. But anyone with any sense at all knows that violent language can incite actual violence, that metaphor can incite Murder. At the very least, Pali...

Army 'revisiting' ban on female soldiers in combat units, General Casey announces
© Unknown The Army's top general said recently that a policy banning women from combat arms units could soon be revised. "We're looking at revising the policy," Gen. George W. Casey Jr. told a breakfast gathering of the Association of the U.S. Army in Arlington, Va. "We've had some work going on for a while, and that'll double back up to the secretary, I would think, in the next couple of months." "When I get the recommendations back from the team [studying it], I'll take a look at it, ...

Army revisiting ban on female soldiers in combat units, Gen. Casey announces
Stumble This! The Army's top general said recently that a policy banning women from combat arms units could soon be revised. "We're looking at revising the policy," Gen. George W. Casey Jr. told a breakfast gathering of the Association of the U.S. Army in Arlington, Va. "We've had some work going on for a while, and that'll double back up to the secretary, I would think, in the next couple of months." "When I get the recommendations back from the team [studying it], I'll take a look at it, but ...