Stop Playing Defense!

I'm angry that it takes David Shuster to say what Democrats could have been saying all along about this ridiculous MoveOn ad controversy. Marsha Blackburn had all the stats at the ready about MoveOn (except the one where the organization has raised $1.6 million dollars in a week because of the mau-mauing from the establishment), but she couldn't name the last soldier from her district to die in Iraq, couldn't understand why that would be kind of an important thing to know, and indeed said "I don't know why I don't know that" in defense of herself. It was a shameful performance.

It goes without saying that Blackburn is supporting the Freddie Thompson campaign, who has turned not knowing things into an art form.

But the point I want to make is that this was a lay-up. We know that Republicans manufacture outrage but are impervious to compassion or empathy. We also know that they have an ideological blind spot when it comes to the attacks perpretrated by their side. Why, indeed, then, can Democratic leaders not take a look at what was sung out loud during the "Values Voters" debate, attended by 7 Presidential candidates, and make a little noise about it?

Why should God bless America?
She’s forgotten he exists
And has turned her back
On everything that made her what she is

Why should God stand beside her
Through the night with the light from his hand?
God have mercy on America
Forgive her sin and heal our land

The courts ruled prayer out of our schools
In June of ‘62
Told the children “you are your own God now
So you can make the rules”
O say can you see what that choice
Has cost us to this day
America, one nation under God, has gone astray

Why should God bless America?
Shes’s forgotten he exists
And has turned her back on everything
That made her what she is

Why should God stand beside her
Through the night with the light from his hand?
God have mercy on America
Forgive her sins and heal our land

In ‘73 the Courts said we
Could take the unborn lives
The choice is yours don’t worry now
It’s not a wrong, it’s your right

But just because they made it law
Does not change God’s command
The most that we can hope for is
God’s mercy on our land

That's really the most direct statement of hatred against America that you can ever possibly hear. And yet the DC establishment fears a backlash, somehow, if they deigned to bring up these radical, disgusting views, for fear of offending some mythical voter in the "heartland." Do they REALLY believe that most every American wouldn't reflexively recoil at this bile? Every Republican officeholder in the country should be asked if they support a view that God has abandoned as sinful America, and if they would be willing to condemn those who sang it. I mean, every Democratic officeholder was asked about a pun.

Some say that we shouldn't "play dirty" and fake outrage like this. Actually, I am a little outraged by the song. Furthermore, if you're going to unilaterally disarm in the face of relentless Republican attacks, why not just hand over the country?