Paul Begala's reaction to critcism of his remarks at the Campus Progress National Security Conference where he said:
""I was driving past the Pentagon when that plane hit" on Sept. 11, 2001. "I had friends on that plane; this is deadly serious to me,"
(yawnnn....oh, sorry)
"They want to kill me and my children if they can. But if they just kill me and not my children, they want my children to be comforted -- that while they didn't protect me because they cut my taxes, my children won't have to pay any money on the money they inherit," Begala said. "That is bullshit national defense, and we should say that."
So Paul explains what he meant. ie: the Durbin defense: "I'm sorry if you didn't understand what I meant when I slandered"...
"Imagine my surprise in returning from taking my boys fishing with their grandfather in a remote mountain village in upstate New York to find I’d “accused Republicans of wanting to kill” us."
Continue Paul...
"At the groundbreaking Campus Progress National Student Conference, I participated in a panel discussion in front of hundreds of brilliant young progressives. When the matter of national security came up, I repeated an argument I’d made scores of times on television and in speeches: that the terrorist threat is, in fact, very real. And while President Bush and many of his conservative supporters use the 9-11 tragedy for their political purposes, they’ve shamefully neglected homeland security. They’ve put trillions into tax cuts for the rich, while under-funding the strong measures experts say we need to protect us from another terrorist attack.
This, I argued, was an example of their “piss-poor national security” strategy. I concluded with the observation that, perhaps if the terrorists killed me, conservatives would want my children to take comfort in knowing they won’t have to pay any tax on the money they’ll inherit."
"Trouble is, rather than clearly delineating between right-wing conservatives and terrorists, I’d referred to each as “they” – in very different contexts. Still, I did use the pronoun “they” without a clear antecedent. Miss Charlotte Moore of John Foster Dulles High School in Sugar Land, Texas taught me better, and, Miss Moore, I apologize. But no one – not one of the hundreds of people in the room had a hard time distinguishing between “they” the terrorists (who want to kill us) and “they” the conservatives (who’d rather cut taxes for the rich than do all we must do to defend America).
Ok, spin if you will, you said what you said, and it is very clear what you meant. Oh, yeah, it the Clinton defense..."it depends on what you mean by 'kill'." What's with liberals and semantics? It's "our fault", I see...
Piss poor national security.....hmmmm, Paul, check your watch, your train left.
By the way, we didn't let Osama Bin Laden go when he was offered gift wrapped, you're boss did. I think that would have had an effect on whether 9/11 took place.
By the way, Paul, if you guys are so good at National Security, what's up with 156 Democrats - include Ms. Pelosi voting "nay" on the renewal of the Patriot act?.
Yeah I know, "Liberal Kryptonite": Facts, don't mean 'nutin'...
Anyway, Paul then takes on the rightwing blogsphere for having the audacity to call him on his "bullshit":
"Trouble is, rather than clearly delineating between right-wing conservatives and terrorists, I’d referred to each as “they” – in very different contexts. Still, I did use the pronoun “they” without a clear antecedent. Miss Charlotte Moore of John Foster Dulles High School in Sugar Land, Texas taught me better, and, Miss Moore, I apologize. But no one – not one of the hundreds of people in the room had a hard time distinguishing between “they” the terrorists (who want to kill us) and “they” the conservatives (who’d rather cut taxes for the rich than do all we must do to defend America).
And then the pronouns hit the fan. Or, rather, the blogosphere. Perhaps uninterested in covering the Bush White House’s cover-up of a top aide’s alleged role in leaking the identity of a CIA operative, the vast right-wing conspiracy (well, more half-assed than vast in this case) pounced. They accused me of accusing them of wanting to kill me. Methinks they protesteth too much.
Still, it got me to thinking. Maybe Republicans do want to kill me. Bill Frist’s speeches can certainly induce a coma. President Bush’s tortured responses to questions about his aides’ potential criminality are enough to give me an aneurysm. Rick Santorum’s breath has been registered with the EPA as a lethal chemical. And you do not want to be sitting behind Denny Hastert on an airplane when he leans his seat back. And if all that doesn’t put you in fear of your life, I have four words for you: Rush Limbaugh. Bean Burrito.
In the immortal words of Elvis Costello, I used to be disgusted, but now I try to be amused. And amused I am.
Amused that the right-wing bloggers could be such dunderheads – or so duplicitous. Amused that they’ve given my argument so much airtime (or ethertime, or whatever it is they have in the blogosphere.) Amused that they have such a low image of themselves that they would think that anyone would confuse them with terrorists. And amused that they’ve driven traffic to this website to an all-time high.
Yes, I’m amused. You might even say those Republicans just kill me."
Well Paul your covered the MoveOn.org talking points pretty well, but you still haven't said anything, except to show your real ignorance, or "duderheadedness", (which is really where sarcasm is founded).
All this is really just more proof that you guys really don't get 9/11 and why you don't win elections.
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