Food For Thought

By Baxter

We cats received a nice Thanksgiving Day message yesterday from Terry  McAuliffe, our Governor-elect of Virginia. Hooray! How appropriate — we can't begin to tell you how grateful we are that Ken "Fetuses Are People, My Friend" Cuccinelli won't be moving into the Executive Mansion in Richmond next year.

We're mystified, though: Even all these weeks after the election, why were the Republicans so against our friend Terry? They said he was an inexperienced novice, a businessman who traded on his connections, and — as a previous DNC chair — a mere gladhander and fundraiser who didn't have the chops to run an entire state.

Goodness gracious. That is the perfect description of Haley Barbour — a deeply networked lobbyist, former chair of the RNC, and all-around GOP hail-fellow-well-met who before 2004 had never held elective office himself. In other words, a fat, Republican version of Terry McAuliffe.

But somehow, in Republican eyes, it was okay for Haley Barbour to be Governor of Mississippi. According to them, he was eminently qualified. But for Terry to be Governor of Virginia? Not so much.

It's just another case of Republicans making rules for the rest of the world, but not applying them to themselves. We cats HISS.

The Snit Hits the Fan

By Zamboni

While people's heads continue to explode over Justin Trudeau appropriating a quote from the late NDP leader Jack Layton, we cats — who write for a living when we're not chasing mice — figured we'd better weigh in.

Justin paraphrased Layton this past Election Night, when he made a speech criticizing the New Democrats for running a negative by-election campaign. "It is the Liberal party tonight that proved hope is stronger than fear, that positive politics can and should win out over negative," he said.

It's the "hope" and "fear" part that has made people mad. Because a few days before his death back in 2011, Layton published a lovely letter to Canadians, saying, in essence, goodbye. "My friends...hope is better than fear," he wrote. "Optimism is better than despair. So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic. And we’ll change the world."

We cats think that by itself, the borrowing of "hope" and "fear" is harmless. But our first thought was this: Although those were not Layton's "dying" words, as some have claimed, Jack has been gone only a short time. If we had been Justin's speechwriters Monday night, we would have told him to leave well enough alone.

But then we realized what he was really up to. He was laying down a marker for 2015 — making a definitive statement to Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party that, two years from now, trashy, Republican-style campaigning (of which Harper is so fond; just ask Stephane Dion and Michael Ignatieff) will not be tolerated.

So, NDPers who are loading the Twitterverse with outrage and umbrage: Take the long view. You are not the real target. And in the meantime, it wouldn't hurt to remember your late leader's other famous words: "Love is better than anger."

Won By A Nose

By Miss Kubelik

Isn't it interesting how two very different — but similarly tight — elections can have completely opposite meanings?

Take the race for Virginia attorney general. The state Board of Elections has certified Democrat Mark Herring the winner by a margin of 165. (Since the last we heard, Herring led by 164, glorioski — he not only prevailed in the canvassing, he picked up another vote.)

We cats fully expect the rabid right-wing Mark Obenshain to demand a recount, but for now, those 165 votes mean a total sweep across the Commonwealth for Democrats — in an off-year in which our party holds the White House. That's a super big deal.

Meanwhile, up here in Canada, the Liberals and the Conservatives split the four by-elections held yesterday right down the middle. But goodness gracious — the Tories came this close to losing a previously safe seat in Manitoba, only winning by fewer than 400 votes. This race, then — although carried by the Conservatives — is actually a moral victory for Justin Trudeau and the Liberals.

Aren't politics great? Elections like these are more fun than a catnip-filled Bizzy Ball. We cats PURR.

Tidbits and Cat Treats: Monday In Montreal Edition

By Sniffles

We cats were traveling this weekend — but even if we hadn't been, we probably would have left that lovely photo of President Kennedy and John-John at the top of the blog.

Still, despite the 50th anniversary observations (which we're thankful are over), the political world rocks on, both here in Canada and below the 49th parallel. Here are a few of our thoughts:

John Boehner's insurance premiums have gone up under Obamacare? Oh, be still our hearts! Of course they have. The guy's a smoker — it's high time that he starts paying for his dangerous and expensive habit. And we'd say that even if he weren't the worst Speaker of the House ever.

We're trying really really hard, but we just can't bring ourselves to care about the trials and tribulations of the Cheney family. Besides, it seems like a nefarious ruse to convince 575,000 gay haters in Wyoming that it's all right to vote for Liz. Bore, bore, bore.

If you're into microcosm, check out the civil war that's raging in the Iowa Republican Party right now. This important state — not just because of the caucuses but also due to those six swing electoral votes it bestows in November — has always had a state GOP with an establishment tradition. But now the nut cases have taken over, and the establishment is not going quietly. So... what does somebody like Chris Christie do? Does he run in the caucuses in 2016, or skip them and make everybody mad? We cats don't presume to say. All we know is that when you've got one half of a key state party mooning and sighing over you and the other half saying "Buzz off, Fat Man," you've got a problem.

Finally, the political world is popping in the True North. And no, we're not talking about that drug-addicted buffoon in Toronto. We've got by-elections today! (Think of special elections for House seats in the US, and you get the idea.) And since they're playing out against the backdrop of the Conservative party's Senate scandal, everyone's watching to see What It All Means. We cats don't believe in contributing to the babble, but we're sure of one thing: Thanks to Tory troubles and the surging numbers of Justin Trudeau's Liberals, it would be nice to party like it was 2015.

JFK 50, Part Last

"Let us not be blind to our differences — but let us also direct attention to our common interests and to the means by which those differences can be resolved. And if we cannot end now our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity.

"For in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal."

—Commencement Address, American University, June 1963

The Problems Of Three Little People DO Amount To A Hill Of Beans In This World

By Baxter

Senate Republicans on Monday blocked three eminently qualified Obama nominees for the US District Court of Appeals in the District of Columbia, inviting Democrats to end the filibuster as we knew it. And the Democrats did. So now, GOP Senators are saying they'll regret it — maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon, and for the rest of their lives.

We cats are amazed. Did Mitch McConnell and his teabagger-infested caucus truly not believe that mild-mannered Mormon Harry Reid would follow through on his threat? Guess not. We're sorry if they're in shock, but it was the only way to break the logjam.

And now Barack Obama can fill the 93 remaining vacancies on the federal bench with just 50 Senate votes plus one. Memo to the President from Us Cats: Do it, and do it now. Because one of our few arguments with you is that you didn't fill them when you had a supermajority. Now, that would have been a wow finish.

JFK 50, Part 7

"I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other people or any other generation. The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve it — and the glow from that fire can truly light the world."

—Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961

The New Coke Brother

By Zamboni

We cats heard the news about Trey Radel today and immediately thought about that CPACker we met while passing through Union Station last month.

Why? Because after she tried to strike up a conversation and figured out she wasn't going to change our minds about anything, Ms. CPAC turned to talk to the person on the other side of her. The two of them agreed that it would be just swell if people on unemployment compensation were required to take drug tests.

(Never mind that workers on unemployment have earned those payments through previous payroll deductions. Ms. CPAC and her new pal still thought those folks needed to pee in a cup.)

So, we're wondering how she feels about Trey, the Republican Congressman who just pleaded guilty to possession of cocaine. Cocaine! And he cast votes in Congress on the same day he was arrested!

Gosh, that takes moxie. But not nearly as much moxie as insisting that Americans in the food-stamp program should also be tested for drugs. Which Trey Radel has said they should do.

Incredible. Just when we think the Republicans can't possibly reach new heights of hypocrisy, they do. If you're a paycheck-to-paycheck US citizen who falls on some temporary hard times, the GOP wants your urine. But if you're a member of Congress who needs a fix? That's okay. (And you only get a year's probation? While other Americans get life for shoplifting?)

We cats realize that late-night comics will have a field day with ol' dog Trey and his CPACker fans. But right now, all we can think of is the unfairness of it all. So we not only HISS. We SNARL.

Cry-Baby Ken In 2014?

By Miss Kubelik 

Ooooh! We cats are so excited. Why didn't anyone tell us that Ken "Love the Unborn, Hate the Born" Cuccinelli is thinking of running for Mark Warner's U.S. Senate seat next year?

True to form, the Cootch has just given a whiny interview to The Washington Post, in which he speculated on 2014 and blamed everyone for his gubernatorial loss except himself. (This, on top of his peevish election-night concession speech and his continued refusal to call the Governor-elect and concede. Goodness gracious, these Republicans are such babies.)

But never mind. How can we contact Cootchy and ask him to please, please run? Although we don't understand how he thinks he has the time or the wherewithal to pull it off, we'd love to see Cuccinelli in a knock-down, drag-out at another one of the Virginia GOP's far-right party conventions. It'll be him, that nutcase hater known as E.W. Jackson, and of course, the failed attorney general candidate, Mark Obenshain. And whoever else crawls out of the teabagger woodwork.

We just have two questions: How does the Cootch, who is really bad at asking for money, hope to compete against a self-funder who is probably the most popular politician in the state? And will he bring Ted Cruz in to campaign for him? We cats PURR.

Heritage Foundation Hates Immigration, Can't Speak English

"Let me be blunt: I'm sick of hearing the biased news media and the politicians in Washington trying to tell Americans like you and I [sic] what we're supposed to think."

—Fundraising letter from Jim DeMint, hilariously mailed to us cats

Right-Wing Rumble In Roanoke

By Sniffles

Hmmm, that's funny. Whole days have gone by, and we haven't noticed the Virginia attorney general's race flipping again. The winner and still champion is Democrat Mark Herring, by a whisker — 164 votes.

Although we know the results won't be certified for another week or so — and that the far-right-winger-posing-as-a-moderate Mark Obenshain could still go whining to his GOP pals in Richmond — we cats are already looking forward to the next Republican debacle in 2014.

That's when Democratic U.S. Senator Mark Warner will be running for re-election. And guess what? Virginia Republicans haven't learned their lesson: They're still planning to nominate their Senate candidate at an extremist-packed party convention.

Goodness gracious. This is exactly the same tactic that in 2013 allowed the party to foist upon the Old Dominion the most off-the-wall slate of candidates ever. And we all know what happened because of that.

So, since Virginia Republicans refuse to rescue themselves from their never-ending death spiral, we can't wait to see next June's pitched battle in Roanoke between — drum roll — Mark Obenshain and E.W. Jackson. Such fun! We cats PURR.

JFK 50: Part 6

"If anything happens to me, I have this knowledge that if I had lived to be a hundred, I could only have improved the quantity of my life, not the quality."

—Letter to Inga Arvad, September 1943

A Charter of No Value

By Baxter

Barely two and a half years ago, we cats opined on the then-new French law banning the Muslim niqab. Our take: Personally, we're not big on religious attire, but once you start calling one silly outfit out of bounds, where do you stop?

Now, we're sorry to say, the Parti Quebecois is going down the same road, seeking to forbid not only the hijab among public-sector workers in Quebec but the wearing of all "conspicuous" religious symbols. This, from a provincial government whose National Assembly (above) features a big honkin' crucifix on the wall.

Hilarious — except, not. Like the teabaggers in the US screaming about sharia law, the PQ has decided to attack a problem that does not exist. And already some prominent Quebec-based employers — such as the Jewish General Hospital in Montreal — have publicly declared that they will ignore the ban. (What will Premier Pauline Maurois do? Send in the gendarmes?)

As part-time Quebeckers, we cats find this whole thing very sad. While the PQ and its separatist allies cling to the past, Quebec and Canada are striding confidently into the future. Meaning that they're welcoming new Canadians from all around the world. A truly diverse and exciting society is being built in Montreal, but the ostriches in the rest of the province have yet to catch up.

We would only remind PQers of the words of Roch Carrier, author of The Hockey Sweater, a Canadian classic: "I was in a park recently and saw a Muslim couple," he said. "Her face was hidden by a scarf, and they were walking side by side, and in front of them was a child, I'd say, seven years old, wearing a Canadiens sweater."

And that, mesdames et messieurs, is Quebec's true religion. We cats PURR.

Cat Fight! Sarah Palin vs. Pope Francis

By Zamboni

We cats never thought we'd rush to defend a Pope, but when the famous quitter from Alaska is involved, you never know what will happen.

Referring to Francis, she recently babbled, "He's had some statements that to me sound kind of liberal, has [sic] taken me aback, has [sic] kind of surprised me."

Unbelievable. Never mind the faulty subject-verb agreement — what right does Sarah Palin have to criticize this guy? Is she Catholic? Is she a thought leader? Is she anyone of consequence at all?

If Palin wants to judge a Pope, she can slam Benedict — the guy who quit. Otherwise, as in myriad other areas of life, she's just not qualified. We cat HISS.

JFK 50, Part 5

"I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered together at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone."

—Remarks at the dinner honoring Nobel Prize winners, 1962

Happy 65th, Your Royal Highness

By Miss Kubelik

Okay, so Prince Charles turned 65 today. Barely anybody noticed, save for those Dianafans/Charleshaters who are taking the occasion to propose that Queen Elizabeth II abdicate in favor of Prince William — which will never happen.

We cats have an odd sympathy for Charles. Sure, he's been hamfisted in the past, but we can't help but think he would have handled things better had Uncle Dickie been alive to guide him.

Plus, we predict that when Charles eventually does succeed to the throne, the media and the bloviators and the opinion makers will say, Give the chap some room, everyone.

And you know what? Better to turn 65 in the comfortable circumstances of a happy second marriage than to have died in a Paris tunnel with a fly-by-night suitor whose chauffeur was drunk. Just sayin'.

This Ford's An Edsel

By Sniffles

We cats have been trying to decide what, if anything, to say about that buffoon up in Toronto, Rob Ford.

It's been tough. His behavior has been so outrageous that any comments from us would automatically seem superfluous. But we think it's reached a point at which we simply have to weigh in.

To say, in short, the following: Why is this repulsive individual even Mayor of Toronto in the first place? Who among the 2.5 million gentle souls who inhabit Canada's most deeply boring city looked at this guy and said, "Yeah, that's who I want running things"?

Did Hogtown think they had to mix things up a bit by voting in a fat, inebriated, crack-smoking misanthrope? Did they hope that Ford's colorful antics would not extend beyond incorrect grammar? (We hate to tell you, Mr. Mayor, but "I have drank alcohol in excess" is not proper verb construction.)

And then the answer dawned: Tory Rob Ford was elected after years of Liberal governance by focusing on budget issues and saying contrary stuff like, "We just need to get rid of these lifelong politicians that [sic] just give out money to special interest groups and don't serve the community." Remind you of anybody? It's a consolation that we who live south of the 49th parallel are not the only ones suffering from right-wing characters who embarrass us.

And then we wondered: Why are guys like this always Conservatives? Is there something in the Tory/Republican playbook that demands immature, over-the-top behavior?

Again, the answer was easy — at least, as far as the Canadians are concerned. Rob Ford exists to make Peter MacKay look smart, and Stephen Harper look svelte. We're not sure, though, that we can explain Ted Cruz, Steve King, Raul Labrador, Joe Wilson, Michele Bachmann, Louis Gohmert, Rand Paul and Sarah Palin.

Pushback

By Baxter

One thing that we lefties don't do as well as the goons on the right — and that we cats wish we were better at — is beat the drums relentlessly for stuff we believe in. Why is that? It must be because as clear-thinking, rational individuals, we're certain that the truth, or reasonableness, will win out in the end.

Don't bet on it! With the teabaggers on the scene, truth and reasonableness go right out the window. The teabags scream about people not being able to enroll in a program they want to kill, and care less about the 3,000 victims of a September 11 that took place when the Bush-Cheneys were in charge than they do about the four victims of a September 11 presided over by Barack Obama.

So we liberals and Democrats should all be out there pushing back, and pushing hard. On the ACA enrollment problems, for example, we should be boldly saying, big woo. More than 100,000 people are getting health coverage they couldn't have gotten before — and there will be more. And the folks who will need to get different coverage than what they've got now will get better, cheaper coverage. (And oh yes, in the words of Bill Clinton, the website will get fixed.)

On the Benghazi thing, why is FOX "News" completely ignoring CBS's retraction of their "60 Minutes" report? We should not only be howling about that (Media Matters can't do it all by themselves), we should be telling the managers of every restaurant, bar or health club with FOX on its TV to change the channel or else.

Happily, all is not quite lost in the pushback wars. After nearly three years of Republican assaults on abortion rights in the states, Democrats in Congress are finally stepping up with the Women's Health Protection Act of 2013. And (sigh, wring hands) it's going to be a heavy lift in the House. Who cares? Put those Republicans on the spot — make them take a stand (or basically declare their hostility to women by not even bringing it up for a vote).

Good things happen when we do stuff like that. Which makes us cats PURR.

If The Shoe Fits, Throw It At Richard Cohen

By Zamboni

We cats loathe the Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen, but until now have never wasted any blog space on him. Why? Well, because the Post has fallen so far in our estimation that it seems redundant to criticize its super-lame editorial page now. Also, other bloggers do such a good job of slamming him that we couldn't possibly have anything better to add.

But now he's taken the cake, and we really must say something.

Why, you ask? Is it because Cohen made the disgusting statement that "people with conventional views must repress a gag reflex when considering the mayor-elect of New York — a white man married to a black woman and with two biracial children"? Indeed not — although it was frightfully behind the times. And of course there's absolutely no reason to tip one's hat in the direction of "conventional views" if those views are decidedly bigoted.

No, we cats have a problem with Cohen's subsequent declaration that "Today's GOP is not racist."

Puh-leeze. Ask any person of color — or any clear-thinking white person, for that matter — and you will get a different take.

To Richard Cohen — and to all other clueless, overpaid, undeserving blowhards in the media punditworld — we cats simply quote Congressman Alan Grayson's devastating recent indictment of the Republican Party's base:

"Tea Party members have circulated countless altered pictures depicting President Obama and the First Lady as monkeys. Tea Party members also called my fellow Member of Congress, civil rights hero John Lewis, a ‘n***ger,’ and Representative Barney Frank a ‘faggot.’ One could go on and on, because there is overwhelming evidence that the Tea Party is the home of bigotry and discrimination in America today, just as the KKK was for an earlier generation. If the shoe fits, wear it."

JFK 50, Part 4

"War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today."

—Letter to a Navy friend, quoted in A Thousand Days

This Veterans Day, A Float For The WASPs

By Miss Kubelik

We cats were privileged to have once known a member of the Women's Airforce Service Pilots, those trailblazing "fly girls" who served their country loyally in World War II, but who didn't get official recognition (or military benefits) until 1977.

Now, it's time for the WASPs to get a float in the Rose Bowl Parade.

The Tuskeegee Airmen were honored with a float back in 2009 — and today, all of us who ever loved and admired a WASP are hoping that the 2014 parade will celebrate our favorite female pilots, too.

Wingtip to Wingtip has been working hard to fund the project all year, but to make their goal, they have to raise the last $30,000 right now. So we cats have not only kicked in a few cans of tuna but are making it easy for you to give, too: Click here to give whatever you can afford.

Let's roll up our sleeves and build a float! We cats PURR.

Sometimes, You CAN Get What You Want

By Sniffles

Here's the difference between Governor-elect Terry McAuliffe and a Governor-elect Ken Cuccinelli: Governor-elect McAuliffe  spent yesterday calling Republican state legislators to forge common ground. A Governor-elect Cuccinelli would probably have been in Iowa.

Heck, the Cootch hasn't even called Governor-elect McAuliffe to concede. Kinda like that teabag loser in Alabama. Guess that when the voters go against God's will, ultra-right wingers think they don't have to be gracious.

Which is another little-noticed reason that Cootchy would have made a terrible governor, even with that solid-red crowd down in Richmond. He is righteous, judgmental, pinched and peevish — unwilling and unable to extend a hand instead of a fist to the less-than-true-believers he'd need to govern. And he'd drive the nonideological business community away from the tech corridor and other booming areas of the Virginia economy.

Terry, on the other hand, has that oft-repeated-by-lazy-pundits reputation as a gladhander. You know what? Considering how divided the Old Dominion is, perhaps that's just the kind of ebullient, enthusiastic guy we need. Maybe they'll even call it "The McAuliffe Treatment." We cats wish him well, and we PURR.

JFK 50, Part 3

"I can assure you that we love our country, not for what it was, though it has always been great — not for what it is, though of this we are deeply proud — but for what it someday can, and, through the efforts of us all, someday will be."

Freepers Have A Sad (And An Anti-Christie Mad)

By Baxter

Having mentioned the report that Chris Christie refused to campaign in Virginia for Ken "I Still Haven't Called Terry McAuliffe to Concede" Cuccinelli, we cats simply had to check on our paranoid right-wing friends over at Free Republic to see how they were handling the news.

'Cuz see, despite all the oohing and aahing in the press about Christie 2016, we don't see how Big Boy gets the Republican nomination when the crazy base of his party simply hatehatehates him.

And things haven't changed. Here are some of the choicer Freep comments — and we're not sure how the Newly Anointed Savior of the GOP works around them. We cats PURR.

"Outside of New Jersey, he's nothing!"

"ChristieKream is just a fat narcissist sucking on the RNC teat."

"Who the hell wants that fat slob slobbering all over Virginia anyhow?"

"Fatass will never get my vote."

"I will not vote for Christie. He is dead to me."

"I HATE HIM!"

"Now that he has helped thow a true conservative under the bus he can count on me actively working against him if he runs for national office."

"This pig will never get a vote for me. I don’t care if he ends up running against Hillary or the reincarnation of Hitler himself....I’ll never do it."

"I can think of no situation where I would vote for this a-hole Christie. He is the GOP's Obama, a narcissistic know-it-all who hates conservatives. It would simply be 4-to-8 more years of a president flipping the bird to conservatives/the Tea Party. No, thank you."

"If that worthless tub of guts get the nomination I won’t even go to the polls to vote!"

A Squeaker? We Cats Like Squeakers (If We're Talking About Mice)

By Zamboni

Whew. We cats weren't expecting things in Virginia to be quite so nail-bitey, but what the hell — a win is a win.

The Cuccinelli watch party down in Richmond must have been really jumpin' earlier tonight — even though they knew that only a third of the precincts in Loudon, Fairfax and Prince William Counties had reported in. Now, we imagine, the atmosphere has become more funereal.

Our initial take? That the election gods must have listened to us a lot more closely than we thought. Last year, we cats were dreaming that the Romneybots would be sure they would win, only to have their hopes cruelly dashed — and lo and behold, that's exactly what happened. This year, fate apparently toyed with the Forces of Cootchy as well. They could fantasize about victory, only to have it snatched away.

And the tight race in Virginia will only embolden the teabags to continue their war on establishment Republicans. (We're hearing that Chris Christie refused to come to Virginia to campaign for the Cootch.) Between that and the fabulous news from Illinois today, we cats are finding a lot more reasons to PURR than to HISS.

P.S. Our best experience this afternoon was unexpectedly ferrying a 91-year-old devoted Democrat to the polls. Had we not knocked on her door, she may not have voted. Ain't democracy great?

Driving Us To The Polls

By Miss Kubelik

We cats have a habit of living in bellweather counties in swing states. In fact, at the moment we're right in the vortex of the Virginia gubernatorial election, which is tomorrow.

We were out talking to voters this weekend, and we were lucky enough not to meet a couple of the guys who appear in an otherwise encouraging story about the race in today's Washington Post. Mostly, the voters whom the Post interviewed were clear-thinking folks repulsed by the social views of Ken "Every Fetus Is Sacred" Cuccinelli and by the Republicans' unrelenting xenophobia.

But every now and then a crazy person slipped through. One was a guy who said he was worried about transportation gridlock in the Washington suburbs, so..... he's voting for the Cootch.

Wait — what? Doesn't this voter know that Cootchy opposed the Bob McDonnell bipartisan transportation funding plan?? Oh — never mind. He heard that Cuccinelli was a nice guy from people at church. That's all that matters.

The other is a voter who doesn't have health insurance. But he doesn't want to be told he has to buy it. So he's voting for the Cootch.

You know what? When that uninsured idiot is maimed in a car crash on the Northern Virginia roads that Ken Cuccinelli refuses to fix, and ends up at the Inova Fairfax Trauma Center, we're all going to pay — thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars. And they say "Don't tread on me"? We cats HISS.

The Real Punishment Would Be Having E.W. Jackson As Lieutenant Governor

We cats are wondering what sin Sarah and Todd Palin committed, and why nobody in the press asks E.W. Jackson to explain that.

Happy Bad Birthday, Scott Walker

By Sniffles

We cats were out canvassing in Woodbridge, Virginia, for Terry McAuliffe today. So, busy as we were, it wasn't until we got home that we realized that Ken "Unions Should Only Be Legal If Fetuses Can Belong To Them" Cuccinelli was also in Woodbridge, campaigning with Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker.

Gosh! How did we miss them? They had all of 100 people there!

And that's not all: Prior to greeting that teeming mob, Cootchy and Mr. Cross-Eyes held an event in Spotsylvania, which attracted — GASP! — 150 attendees!! And they sang "Happy Birthday" to Scotty — who, after traveling 1,000 miles to speak to only 250 voters, was probably longing to be beamed up.

We cats think it's only fitting. After all, how do you decide to hold a rally in union territory (Woodbridge) with organized labor's bete noire? And how do you decide to take Walker to a Republican area (Spotsylvania) and not be able to turn out a respectable crowd?

We rarely desire to be anything but cats — but we would have loved to have been a fly on the wall, just to hear Walker rip into the Cootch for being so pathetic.

You heard it here first: Come 2016, somebody will turn to Walker in a GOP primary debate and say, "But you could only draw a few hundred people in Virginia three years ago!" We cats PURR.

(IMAGE: Remember this Romney rally? How Republican history does repeat itself.)

UPDATE: The Washington Post reports that fewer than 100 people turned out to see Cootchy and Bobby Jindal in Bristow last week! Goodness gracious. We hope that as chair of the Republican Governors Association, Bobby is ready to explain all of this.

JFK 50, Part 2

"Let us not despair but act. Let us not seek the Republican answer or the Democratic answer but the right answer. Let us not seek to fix the blame for the past — let us accept our own responsibility for the future." 

—Loyola College Alumni Banquet, 1958

Bad Timing

By Baxter

What a wonderful week for Ken "Fetuses Are More Worthy Than Women" Cuccinelli to welcome Rand Paul to Virginia. Because our bad-ass Commander in Chief, Barack Hussein Obama, has just knocked off another terrorist.

Mind you, we cats are not qualm-free about the Administration's use of drones. We just think it's hilarious how our Democratic President is still taking out the baddies left and right and putting the Bush-Cheney-slash-Republican record on same to shame.

And it's kinda unfortunate that the Kentucky teabag Senator, who never wants the United States to do anything outside its own borders, should have been stumping the Old Dominion for Cootchy around now. Anybody who has ambitions for the Oval Office should be prepared to face the kind of decisions that Obama has made about the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Frankly, we cats are sure that even without his isolationist leanings, Rand Paul is not quite up to the job.

As we've noted before, our surrogates are better than their surrogates. So while Cootchy brings in lamebrains like Paul, Marco Rubio and Scott Walker to pretend that they want him to win on Tuesday, Terry McAuliffe will campaign on Sunday with the President of the United States. Gosh, we're so glad we're Us and not Them. We cats PURR.

(IMAGE: R.P. and the Cootch campaigning in Lynchburg. Wait — what? Lynchburg? What are they doing in Lynchburg?)