Last year, during “the healthcare debate’s final hours”, U.S. Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) insisted that “his GOP colleagues need to do more to ‘differentiate themselves’ from the hateful speech spewed” by a handful of Tea Party protesters.

Now, instead of a few fringe members of the Tea Party making untoward comments about their ideological adversaries, we have members of the leadership of Mr. Frank’s party engaging in mean-spirited name-calling. According to Politico,

Vice President Joe Biden joined House Democrats in lashing tea party Republicans Monday, accusing them of having “acted like terrorists” in the fight over raising the nation’s debt limit, according to several sources in the room.

And he wasn’t alone.  Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi “pulled out a Star Wars reference on the House floor, saying that Speaker John Boehner chose to go to the dark side’ and court the most conservative members of his conference, rather than work on a bipartisan compromise.”   The New York Times called the better part of the debt deal “a nearly complete capitulation to the hostage-taking demands of Republican extremists.”

Sources in the paragraph above via James Taranto who reports today that the vice president’s office claims the Delaware Democrat did not use the term, but that members of Mr. Frank’s caucus did.  He also provides numerous examples of some very uncivil discourse on the left.  And over at the Sundries Shack, Jimmie offers a snapshot of some of the civil Democratic discourse during the debt debate. (Via Instapundit.)

Do hope Mr. Frank and his Democratic colleagues do more to ‘differentiate themselves’ from mean-spirited discourse.

Unlike his predecessors at Log Cabin, R. Clarke Cooper, the current executive director, has distinguished himself by regularly defending Republicans who hold firm to Reaganite principles.  It does seem the success of GOProud has reminded the older group it needs do a better job establishing its Republican bona fides.

They still alas have retained a residue of the old organization, with occasional paeans to the statist ideology of the gay left and a noticeable failure to consider gay issues in light of conservative ideals, where the government neither serves as the agent of social change nor acts as a barrier to such change.

Yesterday, however, Log Cabin did join the mainstream conservatives in heralding the debt deal as a start, not a solution, a notion which tracks nicely with Datechguy’s description of the deal as turning “the ship so it is facing in the right direction” without yet steaming forward in said direction.

“Speaker John Boehner and Senator Mitch McConnell,” Cooper said

. . . set a clear goal, refusing to approve President Obama’s request for blank check unless it was accompanied by spending reforms and cuts larger than the amount of the debt limit hike. That goal has been achieved, but nobody should believe that this is more than a stopgap measure. The culture of spending in Washington must fundamentally change going forward. This is only the first step in a course that will dramatically alter how our government approaches the budget and will provide fiscal stability for Wall Street and Main Street.

Nice to see Log Cabin standing firm against the culture of spending in Washington and reminding gay people of Republican efforts to contain the growth of the federal government.

If you’d please excuse my continued self-indulgence. While the VP was calling us terrorists, the Senate and president were further committing us to paying their bills we’ll never possibly be able to afford, the markets were tanking, and apparently it’s hotter’n'hell everywhere else in the country, I extended my celebration of the Centennial State’s birthday into today.

Here was the view from 14,433′ plus 5’9″ earlier today:

That’s Mount Elbert, Colorado’s tallest (and our Nation’s #14). I was the first one to summit today, so for a brief moment was the tallest person in the state, and quite possibly in North America. Not bad.

-Nick (ColoradoPatriot, from TML)

In a post that Glenn linked yesterday, the fetching Stephen Green asks a question every American should ponder:

If the GOP nominates one of its Unwinnables, Obama could very well take the election next year — but to what purpose?

To what purpose, indeed.

Contrast the ideas underlying Ronald Reagan’s unsuccessful bid for the White House in 1976 and his successful one in 1980 with those underlying Obama’s one bid for the White House.  That good and great man had a vision of the change he wanted, a vision remarkably consistent from the moment he first articulated it to a national audience in 1964 until his political swan song twenty-eight years later.

Obama just offered the hope of change.

What purpose would his reelection serve?  What kind of changes would his reelection effect?

We haven’t even started cleaning up the messes of his first two years, but the recent debt deal, for all its flaws, at least prevents Democrats from making their mess much worse.

Jim Hoft links this chart from Gallup:

Gallup reports:

If this pattern continues, 2011 will be the third straight year that conservatives significantly outnumber moderates — the next largest ideological bloc. Liberalism has been holding steady for the past six years, averaging either 21% or 22%, although notably higher than the 17% average seen in Gallup polling during the early to middle ’90s.

What struck me was the remarkable consistency of the data.  Over the past 20 years, the number describing themselves as liberal has ranged between 16 and 21% (5-point range), as moderate between 35 and 39 43 (8-point range), conservative between 36 and 41 (5-point range).

Note how the number has surged from 37% in 2008 to 41% today.

Maybe that’s because we’re more open to reaching out to those with differing points of view.

NB: Thanks to reader Less for correcting an error in the post.

Andrew Malcolm reflects on Obama’s leadership style as manifested in recent negotiations with congressional Republicans:

Obama will, no doubt, have more to say about the deal today. See if he throws in more sour grapes as he did after the GOP won its Bush tax cut extensions in last December’s talks. Back then, Obama, who promised to bring both sides together if elected in 2008, called his fellow deal-makers “hostage-takers.”

. . . .

Obama stepped into the stalled talks in recent weeks. He never offered his own new debt reduction plan, but used several public statements and closed White House meetings to show executive leadership and criticize other plans.

He used his poll-tested “balanced approach” demand numerous times (meaning more taxes as well as spending cuts) and sent aides like David Plouffe out to repeat how Republicans were demanding “my way or the highway.”

Via Instapundit.  Read the whole thing

Wasn’t Obama the guy who was “trying to break is a pattern in Washington where everybody is always looking for somebody else to blame.“

Looks like one of our critics was having a bad day on Friday and decided to vent on our Facebook page:

If I were a federal Representative or U.S. Senator, I’d be getting a lot of calls today from party leadership making the case for the debt compromise package.  I remain ambivalent about it.  Enough liberals are “freaking out” about the package, with one Democratic Senator calling it the “Death Of Keynesian Economics.”  All that sounds good.

But, I don’t like this idea of a superduper congressional committee to find even more cuts.  That sounds like passing the buck to me, avoiding those “tough decisions” the president tells us we need make.

Stacy McCain, who offers some thoughts on the death of Keynesianism, links a post making perhaps the best case for supporting the legislation.  Datechguy, who has actually read the bill, says it

is not an example of steaming in the right direction, it is an example of completing the turn of the ship so it is facing in the right direction but you have to turn the ship before you change directions, this is the turn.

Not quite a step in the right direction then, but turning your body so that the next step you make will be.

UPDATE: In one of her many (must-read) posts on the debt deal, Jennifer Rubin quotes Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), the ranking minority leader on the Senate Budget Committee who reluctantly backs the bill as a “first step“. She also reports that he. . .

. . . has railed against the absence of a proper budget process. For over two years, the Senate has not produced a budget. This is not simply a matter of being a stickler for rules. Sessions understood that, without a budget, Senate Democrats could evade responsibility for making tough choices and simply demagogue whatever Republicans proposed.

Emphasis added.  We do need to keep reminding people about that Democratic failure.  Read the whole thing.

Today, August First, my great Centennial State of Colorado marks its 135th birthday. On this date in 1876, the territory between the 37th and 41st parallels and 102° and 109° West was designated the 38th of the United States of America.

Ours is a beautiful and bountiful state with the vast prairies in the east, the majestic Rocky Mountains separating the continent, and awe-inspiring vistas on our Western Slope. Colorado is home to 53 of the 88 US mountains over 14,000 feet—its most famous, Pike’s Peak being the inspiration for the song “America the Beautiful”.

Colorado is home to exquisite wildlife, endless outdoor activities, and—if I may say so myself—some of the best people you’ll ever meet. If you’re looking for a getaway from the record heat and general misery of the East Coast this summer, or if you’ve had enough of earthquakes and sharks out West, you’re invited: Come out to Colorado and see what we have to offer!

-Nick (ColoradoPatriot, from HQ)

“Men,” writes David K. Li in the New York Post, “have to be dragged kicking and screaming to the altar – whether they’re straight or gay.”

While several studies have suggested that there are more gay men than lesbians, there have been more lesbian marriages than gay (male) ones by a margin of 3-to-2.  Since the Nutmeg State, for example, recognized same-sex marriages, “3,252 lesbian couples have wed . . . compared with just 2,053 gay guys.”

It does seem women seek to “nest” more than do men.  Guess some of our male fellows just prefer being the lone wolf.

(This is not the first time I’ve noted this phenomenon, but as I came across the (relatively recent) article while surfing the web, thought I would share it with y’all.)

Over at YidWithLid, Jeff Dunetz calls the bipartisan debt deal “a huge victory for the Conservative wing of the party.”  He includes a lot of bullet points about the deal as well as the Speaker’s PowerPoint presentation offering details of the “Two-Step Approach” to hold the president “accountable,” contending that it cuts government spending more than it increases the debt limit.  (H/t:  Instapundit.)

Jennifer Rubin agrees with Dunetz that all “in all Republicans have much to crow about.”

I learned of the deal via CNN, having looked up from my cardio machine to see the “Breaking News.”  I initially thought it was a bad deal, given how some commentator on the “news” network seemed to be gloating, but then they showed the president who didn’t seem too pleased, especially when he lashed out at those Republicans who prevented millionaires and billionaires from paying their fair share.

(Question for consideration:  why does Obama feel the need to attack Republicans for this failure to increase taxes on some of the most productive in our society.)

I’ll just say I have mixed feelings about the deal.  I don’t think Republicans should have given in to the president’s demand that they agree to extend to the debt limit through the 2012 campaign.  If Ronald Reagan, as Obama claimed in his speech last week, raised the debt ceiling eighteen times, that means he did it, average, more than twice a year.  Why shouldn’t a president who has lately (rhetorically at least) become so fond of the Gipper have to do it less often, only once in two years?

That said, before the deal was announced Michael Barone said Republicans had won because the fight was on our proverbial turf, “over cuts not more taxes.” (more…)

Over at the Washington Examiner, Charlie Spiering looks at the president’s loss of Twitter followers:

“Since @BarackObama’s busy spamming folks on Twitter, @TomRooney was kind enough to share a copy of BO’s debt plan: http://1.usa.gov/olI0Cc,” Congressman Patrick McHenry wrote linking to a blank document.

Presidential candidate Herman Cain wrote:  “@BarackObama calls for bipartisanship. Then tweets out names of GOP lawmakers to attack. #youredoingitwrong #compromise”

Must be that new kind kind of politics, put yourself forward as post-partisan while leveling partisan zingers at your political adversaries.