This is pretty big. Watch this video and see what you think.

Greetings all of my valueless, soulless brethren!

I have always found politics very interesting because of its use and misuse of language.   Politicians will and have always used the worst language to categorize their opponents. While I find some of the vitriol spewed offensive and/or ridiculous, I've come to learn it's part of the process.  And while I don't excuse some of the venomous attacks given by surrogates of candidates (PACs, religious leaders, etc.), on the left and the right, I know that it too is part of the beautiful process.

I DO NOT excuse the media when it takes on the language spewed by either political sphere.  They are supposed to be the filter to make sure language is fair and accurate.  Leave the flowery language to we activists and bloggers.

I should first explain that below is a statement that just went out to my whole email list regarding a faith forum that will feature Obama and McCain. I posted the exact language I sent to fellow Christians, many of whom are "low information voters", to illustrate two points. One is the fact that I think that this forum will really help Obama and hurt McCain with that demographic, as both may have to speak intimately about their beliefs (just imagine McCain's blinking and squirming). But the second point is more subtle, and I'm by no means the expert, but it involves the question of how we are to most effectively approach the low information and/or "values" voters, those whose wedge issues are abortion, sanctity of marriage to name a few. I think the following message demonstrates my method well. I'd love to hear some of your strategies for effectively communicating with these voters when out volunteering for Obama or any progressive candidate.

Just took a trip by Faux news and heard the Dick Morris comment on Scotty's book.

Does it bother anyone else that Fox gives this hooker-hiring-tax-evading scum a forum?

Their roster of commentators of values is filled with such stand up guys such as Ollie North the appeaser and convicted traitor, Bennett the gambler, Ann Poltergeist the voter cheat, not to mention Karl (I don't care about congress or the constitution) Rove.

I guess we should be glad that they give these past offenders an opportunity at a second chance in life.

My memory is short who are the other reprobates that Faux serves up as experts for the values voters of America?

In response to the tragic church shootings in Colorado, Family Research Council head Tony Perkins naturally pointed the finger of blame at the "secular media."  The senseless massacre of several deeply religious people by one of their own reflected, he claimed, "hostility that is being fomented in our culture from some in the secular media toward Christians."  Of course, Perkins has it almost exactly backwards.  Whether concerning abortion, gay Americans, immigration or judicial appointments, the line connecting the rhetoric of the Republican Party and the mainstream conservative movement to right-wing terror is a very short one.

Couldn't help it.  We have this great shot of Barack Obama and Alexsiana Lewis on stage at the Heartland Presidential Forum.  We know what he REALLY said to her.  But don't you want to have a little fun guessing?  What do you think he said?

We have a photo caption contest going at the Movement Vision Lab blog.  Come submit your caption today!

The Religious Right leadership constantly equates embryonic stem cell research with abortion- but do their members believe what their leaders are saying?

Maybe not.

More than 5,000 "Values Voters" were polled as to their most important concerns, and their answers are surprising....

How's this for idiotic, juvenile attempts at crowd pleasing humor - some gratuitous insults from the participants at this year's "Values Voters" summit.

Yesterday, during the panel on This Week, George Will commented on the Evangelical's threat to support a third party candidate if Giuliani gets the nomination, and he stated this (paraphrased):  "all voters are values voters.  They vote their values."  

I completely agree with George Will.  The progressives in this country have deep and abiding values, and we vote those values every time we vote.  

And I am fully convinced that our values are more concerned with human dignity, and with genuine human advancement, than voters on the "conservative" side.  

I recently read somewhere that Democrats just don't have any family values and that people who call themselves "values voters" have only one option but to vote for Republicans. That's almost as laughable as saying that Republican's are the only ones who can keep us safe. We all know that 9/11 happened on Bush's and Giuliani's watch, that Giuliani has no experience in fighting terrorism, only cleaning up the aftermath of terrorist attacks. Bush has created more terrorists than he has killed by invading Iraq and since Bush has taken office, terrorism, terrorist activity and terrorism deaths, are at an all time high.

So, back to my point; for all you values voters out there, here is a Republican/Democrat family values break down:

John McCain's schizophrenia this week over his alternating Episcopalian and Baptist status is just the latest chapter in the faith-based follies of the GOP presidential hopefuls.  In a delicious double Catch 22, those running as "men of faith" to win the nomination of what many of it own members call "God's Own Party" are now being called on it.  Then, after performing unnatural contortions to assuage radical right primary voters, the Republican candidates must veer back to the middle to have a prayer of winning the general election.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We will hear it a gazillion times before the cycle is over. The religious right is down and out; divided; even dead. And each variant will be stated with the dead-eyed confidence of the pseudo pundit whose views continue to be valued no matter how often they are dead wrong.  We will be expected to believe. But we would be crazy to listen them, again.

For a generaton, the religious right has been perennially misunderstood and underestimated -- often by people who really ought to know better. And we have been the losers as a result. The religious right is one of the most successful political and social movements of modern times, arguably in American history. And it has advanced to signficant national power far faster than anyone (including me) thought possible.

While it is certainly true that the religious right is going through a generational transition, with the deaths of Jerry Falwell and D. James Kennedy, and the advanced age and declining health of others, a far larger class of well-educated, experienced professionals and charismatic leaders are following in their footsteps. What's more, there are large, effective institutions and political organizations that did not exist a  couple of decades ago.  

No doubt, the proliferation of presidential debates held by every interest group under the sun has become one of the more fatiguing aspects of the 2008 campaign.  But by adding this week's Univision Hispanic presidential forum to a growing list of events they've skipped, the GOP White House hopefuls are sending a clear message as to which American voters the Republican Party does - and does not - value.

  We hear all the time from the Democratic Party establishment about the necessity of attracting "faith" voters and doing our best to modify the party's perceived image of being "hostile to religion". Now we all know that Dems who say this are simply plunging into (false) Republican frames -- millions of religious Americans are proud Democrats -- but the fact remains that there ARE Democrats who DO believe that this is a shortcoming in the party, and advocate outreach to even the most reactionary elements of "faith" or "values" voters.

  The unfortunate consequence of this is that some of these Democratic leaders have apparently reached the conclusion that to attract these religious voters, the Dems need to compromise some of the most essential of their core values, such as the separation of church and state. And while they're at it they need to also do things like throw gays under the bus.

from Talk to Action

As Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards got right with Jesus and the only "single-issue voters" that rate the Democratic Party's approval, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tried talking the talk to enlist "pro-life" support for funding stem cell research.

 House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has drawn guffaws from the pro-life community for comments saying that embryonic stem cell research, which involves the destruction of days-old human embryos, is a "gift from God." Her remarks came after the House approved a bill to force Americans to fund it.

"Science is a gift of God to all of us, and science has taken us to a place that is biblical in its power to cure... And that is embryonic stem cell research," Pelosi said.

I found myself becoming more and more outraged watching MTP's panel of talking heads this morning. I was particularly irritated by Newsweek's Editor and Chief, Jon Meacham. Meecham, is a self professed expert on "values" and the faith based community. Meacham is one of the prime movers behind the myth that the Dems lost in 04 because they didn't know how to speak to people of faith. It's seems he'll say almost anything to perpetuate this myth regardless of events on the ground. Let's survey his little smears and untruths during MTP today.

There have been recent discussions about whether the Dems can win without the South or what a successful southern strategy should look like. One of the interesting demographic facts to emerge from all the analysis has been the sharp differences between white and black voters in the region.

Thomas Frank made an economic argument which was that "values" trumped economic self-interest in places like Kansas. Part of his theme was that the working classes realize at some level that neither party is going to do much for them economically so they chose the one which promises to restore the lost "values" that they think are missing from contemporary life. If they can't live better economically at least they will live better morally, seems to be the thinking. I'll leave aside the issue of whether the promises were sincere, achievable or actually supported by those making them. I'm interested in social attitudes, not practical politics in this discussion.

In Seattle, the already fierce debate about public financing for a new basketball arena for the NBA's Sonics is about to get a lot hotter.  As Dan Savage first reported yesterday, Sonics co-owners Aubrey McClendon and Tom Ward contributed over 1 million dollars to fund the anti-same-sex marriage campaign of radical crusader Gary Bauer.