Sunday, February 27, 2011


'Get a Little Bloody'
A Democratic congressman urges government employees to take violent action.

The rhetoric around Wisconsin's government labor dispute is getting more violent. NHJournal.com reports that Rep. Michael Capuano, a Massachusetts Democrat, said this yesterday at a Boston "solidarity" rally: "I'm proud to be here with people who understand that it's more than just sending an email to get you going. Every once and awhile you need to get out on the streets and get a little bloody when necessary."

The Boston Globe reports that the union crowd responded to Capuano's exhortation with "cheers, whistles and applause" and that Capuano, issued a written semiapology: "I strongly believe in standing up for worker rights and my passion for preserving those rights may have gotten the best of me yesterday in an unscripted speech. I wish I had used different language to express my passion and I regret my choice of words."

It will not surprise you to learn that Capuano is another "civility" hypocrite. On Jan. 9, the day after a madman in Tucson, Ariz., got a little bloody, the Globe quoted him: "What the hell is going on? There's always some degree of tension in politics; everybody knows the last couple of years there's been an intentional increase in the degree of heat in political discourse. . . . If nothing else good comes out of this, I'm hoping it causes people to reconsider how they deal with things."...

... Unions, most of whose members are public employees, gave Democrats some $400 million in the 2008 election cycle. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the biggest public employee union, gave Democrats $90 million in the 2010 cycle.

Follow the money, Washington reporters like to say. The money in this case comes from taxpayers, present and future, who are the source of every penny of dues paid to public employee unions, who in turn spend much of that money on politics, almost all of it for Democrats....

... The Ontario parents of a dying baby boy say they will not give their consent to have him removed from life-support, despite a court's order, as they try to hold out so he can be transferred to a hospital closer to home.

Baby Joseph Maraachli had been scheduled to be taken off life-support Monday morning.

The 13-month-old child, who is in a vegetative state, has been at the London Health Sciences Centre in Ontario since last fall. His parents have said they want to bring him home to die surrounded by family, not in a hospital.

Father Moe Maraachli said Monday that, on the advice of the family's new lawyer, he and his wife, Sana Nader, are not consenting to have Joseph's breathing tube removed, despite the ruling of a Superior Court judge last week and a January decision of the Consent and Capacity Board of Ontario....