I can't say it did much for Bush's credibility to state that he declassified the info...so that it could be leaked.

Read another article someplace that talked about presidents (or their party successors) pardoning members of their political staff as part of their actions prior to leaving office. So while Libby may end up taking all the heat for leaking info, once he gets pardoned (for being a loyal party member) it's all water under the bridge.

I can't say it did much for Bush's credibility to state that he declassified the info...so that it could be leaked.

And, apparently, after it was leaked.

I honestly don't know what they're thinking.

Read another article someplace that talked about presidents (or their party successors) pardoning members of their political staff as part of their actions prior to leaving office. So while Libby may end up taking all the heat for leaking info, once he gets pardoned (for being a loyal party member) it's all water under the bridge.

Right, or pardoned even before then. Again, it looks bad, but not like Bush has anything to lose. And he is big on loyalty.

My guess is they think the American public is comprised entirely of idiots.

It's amazingly reminiscent of 1984's revisionist governmental propaganda.

Man I hope Sarsgaard and Gyllenhaal hyphenate their names. We'll have a worldwide shortage of "a"s!

Statistical analysis to the rescue.

"This pattern persists at the community level. Young liberals in 2004 belonged to one-third fewer organizations in their communities than young conservatives. In 2002, they were 12 percent less likely to give money to charities, and one-third less likely to give blood. These differences were not due to demographics such as age or education."

Organizations (theory): Church organizations are the most common organizations Americans belong to *in their communities*. People who belong to a church are more likely to be conservative. Few Americans are members of organizations *in their community* beyond church, not because they don't care, but because of globalization and the dissolution of local ties. I personally count as a member of a bunch of national-level organizations such as NARAL and IBPAT. But I am not a member of ANY local organizations (even the Graduate Student Government doesn't count as local for me; I'm 17 miles away from UMCP and it might count as a professional or political organization). How many local organizations are in YOUR community? My community includes a HOA, a few churches, a stitch-and-bitch, a tennis club, and, um, that's about it.

Using the 1998 General Social Survey ('cause I can access and analyze that data just for the hell of it at this point) I did a little investigation of my own.

Gave $0 to their church
58% of liberals
44% of moderates
31% of conservatives

Gave $1-100 to their church
17% of liberals
18% of moderates
14% of conservatives

Gave $101-$60,000 to their church (the max someone reported was $60,000)
25% of liberals
38% of moderates
55% of conservatives

A tithe of 10% of your income, in 1998, would have been ~$4000 on average. A tithe of $100 or less would just be a petty alms box donation.

This means that conservatives are more than TWICE as likely to tithe to their church as liberals, which more than explains away the charity donation statistic: To wit, if liberals are donating 30% less to church (assuming the relationship hasn't changed) and only 12% less overall, it means they're giving a LOT more money to direct charities. I think liberals are more cynical about what the church uses its money for. We all know that a good deal of the money the church takes in goes to charitable works, but it also supports the infrastructure and personnel of the largest bureaucracy in the world (or a protestant version thereof). AND it supports the church's CONSERVATIVE political agenda. No birth control. No abortion. No homosexuality.

I think it just means liberals donate more precisely.