When W Talks Down

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Try this one on for size: W wouldn’t dare talk down to his citizens by suggesting they drive less and conserve near $5/gallon gas. From Politico:

“I mean, you know, it’s interesting what the price of gasoline has done,” Bush said at a news conference in the White House press room, “is it caused people to drive less. That’s why they want smaller cars: They want to conserve. But the consumer’s plenty bright. The marketplace works.”

“It’s a little presumptuous on my part to dictate how consumers live their own lives,” the president added. “I’ve got faith in the American people.”

Unless, of course, the American people are women who want to control their own bodies.

Now that I think about it, it seems to me that his psycho statement is a serious signal that Bush is in so deep with the corporate-crook mafia, especially the ones profiting from the Iraq War, that he doesn’t even dare pay lip service to anything that might leave him with nobody but his own mama in his corner. C’mon, he could beg us to drive less, to (hee hee) take the bus, to urge that our city and state governments develop mass transit systems. Then he and the other bwanas could chuckle and elbow each other as they watched the broadcast in their country clubs and mansions. “Good one, George. Good one.” Is he so afraid of ticking off the oligarchs that he can’t even pretend to care how the little people live?

What else explains this kind of double speak? God forbid the president tell Americans to listen to good advice on gas consumption.

Now check this out, from Women’s eNews:

The White House is trying to define emergency contraception as abortion. And require family planning facilities to hire practitioners regardless of their views on abortion and contraception, including emergency contraception.

Under the draft proposal, federally funded hospitals and clinics that provide family planning services would be required to promise in writing that they will turn a blind eye to health care providers’ views on abortion and certain kinds of birth control, such as emergency contraception…

In other words, health care providers would have the right to refuse to provide patients with comprehensive information about abortion or birth control even if they ask for it.

Now, these are the same folks who fought for the right of faith-based organizations’ receiving public funds to employment-discriminate against non-believers.

Unbelievable the hypocrisy of the loony right these days. The two stories separately are mind boggling, but together?

You have to wonder exactly flavor Kool-Aid these kooks are drinking these days. Just how much hypocrisy is enough before the electorate wakes up?

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We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

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