Tom states:

"I have listed my extensive disagreements with Bush and the Republicans on several occasions. I have also laid out my differences with various supposed fountainheads of the Right like the evangelicals, Ayn Rand, the libertarians, and others."

Let's set this into the proper context here. Tom has from time to time truly said a few disparaging words about his illustrious leader and various elements of the party but here's when that occurs and how:

1. When someone calls him on his inability to be critical of anyone in his party, he'll throw out a couple of little morsels at the very end to a long thread to pretend that he has some analytical process going on. Generally his target will be something or someone so far out of the current discussion that politically it really has no effect. He'll often go after Republicans that aren't toeing the party line.

2. At least as far as I remember, he's never begun a thread with an attack or criticism of his own party or any of its members. He's unilaterally supported every one of Bush's political appointments and never raised a single question about any of their traits, even if they've spent their entire career embroiled in controversy or haven't a lick of experience in the field they're being put into.

3. He almost always is the first critical responder to any post from any other forum member that might be considered a centrist or left of center. At times it feels like he has triggers set up that alert him if someone from a set list of names posts something. It seems to not matter if the beginning of the thread is balanced or partisan.

4. Let's use a topic that Tom claims to be at odds with within his own party - fiscal responsibility. Logic would dictate that a cure would be some balance of income generation and reduced spending but what's Tom's answer to this? Hmm, this is surprising. Of course the old corporate line of trickle down economics with tax breaks for the wealthy. And the spending reductions? Oh, of course. Let's go after the programs like education, the arts, environmental programs, health benefits, all things that have already been drastically reduced during Republican congressional domination. We'd never consider reducing our military role around the world or putting wartime profit limits on the military industrial complex or oil companies that are draining our budget dry.

5. Or let's take another of his supposed gripes with the Republicans - immigration reform. It doesn't take much of a rocket scientist to understand that the reason we have so many illegal immigrants is that we're spoiled rotten by the cheap labor and that many of his party are the ones most responsible for the utilization of that labor force. Where's his post calling for the heads of the major corporations that are profiting from this unethical and clearly illegal behavior?

6. Oh, Tom's balanced because he gets the heebie-jeebies from Ayn Rand? The one book I read by her seemed to indicate her political leanings as this cornucopia of ideals, hardly conservative. She seemed a bit flaky to me and more of an author capable of creating interesting characters than anybody someone should base their politics on.

7. Let's take his distaste for the abuses of evangelicals. I must have missed the impassioned threads he started when the Terry Shiavo case was in the news critical of Bill Frist's idiocy. Somehow I didn't notice him citing blogs critical of the Kansas school board when they decided intelligent design ought to be on the state curriculum.

I'm sure Tom, on reading this, will be pouring through the archives finding his posts supporting his claims of being critical of his party but just make sure you take anything he finds in the full context. The emperor clearly has no clothes.

Art