Unemployment vote shows Arizona Republicans in Congress are more conservative than other Republicans

Just in case you hadn't gotten the idea yet that Arizona Republicans are way off on the right end of the political spectrum, even to the extent that they are way beyond the mainstream of conservatives,

Today the house voted 403-12 to extend unemployment benefits for fourteen more weeks (plus six more in states with the highest unemployment.) This is a no-brainer with unemployment poised to break 10%, and the house action follows a 98-0 Senate vote.

Among the conservative members of the house who followed the unanimous vote of the Senate were John Boehner, Michele Bachmann, Marsha Blackburn, Dan Burton, Eric Cantor, Duncan Hunter, Peter King, Mike Pence, Jeanne Schmidt and Joe Wilson.

Not exactly a list of bleeding-heart liberals there.

In fact, the three Republicans in the Arizona delegation-- all three of them-- Jeff Flake, Trent Franks and John Shadegg-- showed that they are way more conservative than even the rest of the house GOP by providing fully one fourth of the 'no' votes.

In Arizona, the most extreme views that are held anywhere else are unfortunately the 'party line' view held by many if not most of our GOP elected officials. Today's vote once again puts the extreme conservatism of Arizona Republicans on display for everyone to see.

President to say 'God' in public school classroom. Fortuitously censored by the right so lots of kids won't hear it.

Well, tomorrow is the day when President Obama will speak to the kiddies, and thousands of followers of right wing talk radio have either promised to pull their kids out of school or even forced their local schools to not even carry the webcast (I know, I know. I'm too sensitive about this, the truth is that these parents were just as angry a generation ago when President Ronald Reagan spoke to students via television.)

Craig at Random Musings has posted the text of the President's remarks tomorrow.

Mostly it's pretty innocuous stuff, telling kids about how important his mother felt it was to make him study and why they should do it and about how they should listen to their parents. He goes on to point out that no matter what their circumstances are, they have no excuses if they don't study and get the education they need. Study hard, stay in school, listen to your parents and your teachers. You know, the standard Marxist/socialist propaganda that the right was up in arms about.

But then he finishes with this shocking last line:

Thank you, God bless you, and God bless America.

Wow! Those right wingers were right after all keeping their children at home or pressuring the school districts not to show the speech. There really is something in it they will never hear their teachers say in a classroom. The word, GOD is in the speech. In fact he says it twice in that last line.

Now you know and I know that if you or I or your kids' third grade teacher said, 'God' in a public school then the big, bad ACLU would come and haul us into court and put us on trial for intolerance and have us sent to an atheist re-education camp where we would be forced to learn secular humanism. Isn't that true, right-wingers?

But here we have the President of the United States saying the word, 'God' and it will be webcast right into hundreds of thousands of classrooms all over America.

Wow! Good work, right wing wackjobs. Thank you for saving so many children from hearing the word, 'God' spoken in a public school. Atheists all over America will owe you a debt of gratitude.