It is fascinating to me how often SOME progressives, like some of their counterparts on the right, will outright lie and then act like petulant children when busted in said lies. Case in point is "The Mahablog", most recently taking part in the childish game of labeling Republicans with minor libertarian leanings as being representive of the entire libertarian movment. In short, The Mahablog created a gigantic libertaian strawman and then whined when called out on the lie. Further, The Mahablog is co-opting a horrible tragedy for partisan political purposes.
I posted this in response to her ridiculous lies:
There are no libertarians in Congress. Calling a few Republicans with minor libertarian leanings on a FEW issues libertarians is extremely dishonest. Doing so for the purpose of scoring political points on the backs of a community suffering a tragedy is beyond disgusting.
The blogger Barbara O'Brien, defending her lies and misuse of a tragedy, responds like a spoiled child with no integrity:
“There are no libertarians in Congress.” Yes, we know. Nobody in politics is ever pure enough to be a “real” libertarian. Sightings of real libertarians are rare and always prove to be false as soon as the sighted creature actually goes on record about anything.
In short, son, bite me.
It takes an absolute lack of intregrity, compassion failure and a miserable excuse for a human being to co-opt another's tragedy to play p9litical games for anyone else's benefit. It shows a lack of maturity to say "bite me" when called out such.
I have spent the better part of two decades involved in advocacy that worked alongside progressives, moderates, conservatives and non-partisan activists alike such as the ACLU, Center for National Secuity Studies, People for the American Way, Liberty Coalition, Electronic Privacy Information Center, American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, Amenesty International, and dozens of other organizations on a wide variety of issues such as domestic surveillance, police misconduct, prison rape, male rape survivor issues, torture, the mistreatment and illegal detention of Muslim and Arab Americans by the Bush Administration and the buildup/lies used to justify the Iraq War. One thing I've learned over the years is that there a lot of people who truly care about poeple and want to make the lives of others better, regardless of ideological compass or label.
The asshole behind the Mahablog is about none of these things. She appears to simply be an opportunistic liar, taking advantage of a tragedy for political purposes. That is disgusting and abhorrent to those of us who actually give a shit about the people involved and the lives that have been forever impacted. I grew up in a household affected by murder. I've seen family members afraid to watch the news for fear that the trial and our family member would be talked about yet again. I've seen how it affects the surviving family members and forever alters our view of the world. I abhor the fact that anyone would co-opt such an experience for political purposes. O'Brien and her blog have done that and show an utter lack of maturity and compassion in the doing, even when called out on such earnestly.