The disturbing rise in violent threats against congressional officials in the wake of health care reform’s passage – and the namby pamby response by Republicans – is worthy of note by all who care about the health of this country. Josh Marshall at Talking Points puts it best in a post aptly titled “The Undying Shame”:

I’m not sure John Boehner making a generic statement that violence, threats and vandalism aren’t legitimate parts of the Health Care Reform debate really cuts it. Especially when his own congressional campaign committee is actively downplaying the importance of violent incidents and even blaming them on the victims. Thankfully, no one has been injured or killed. But this didn’t come from nowhere and it can’t be pawned off on a few cranks. Everything that’s happened over the last five days has grown from a pattern of incitement going back almost a year — wildly hyperbolic statements, coded appeals to menacing behavior, flippant jokes about bringing firearms to political events and all the rest.

Now Eric Cantor (R-VA) is going on the attack, claiming that who’s really to blame here is the Democrats for making a big deal about these acts of violence against them. No one who is even remotely honest can pretend that anything about this is bipartisan in character. The Right and yes the national Republican party has been stirring this pot for months. We all see this. Cantor’s behavior is shameful beyond imagining. It’s time for a truth moment for the national Republican party. Incitement matters. They have to take responsibility for what they’ve done: which is nothing less than a campaign of incitement for which they’re now unwilling to take any responsibility.

Taking a moment in the audio booth of Audible Arts Studio in Princeton, WV. The results will be released into the wild this summer. But hear the debut of our new musical theatrical troupe, Third Eye Cabaret, on Saturday, April 3,  at the RiffRaff’s Room Upstairs in a free, collective concert starting 6 p.m. that caps off AllTogetherArts Week in Mercer County. The show features Option 22, the Captain Lazerblast Band, Kathleen Coffee, Melissa McKinney, Briddy & the Buzz and Third Eye Cabaret. Starting about 11 a.m. that Saturday, catch the colorful parade down Mercer Street, followed by a drum circle in the park across the street. I need new parade headgear for the 2010 parade. Last year, I wore the back-half of a cow pinata from  my daughter’s 12th birthday celebration. There’s photographic evidence somewhere. Plus, if you look closely on a sunny day you can probably still see the glitter glinting in the middle of the street from last year’s boisterous, many handfuls of it flung into the Mercer Street air.  See here for more details on the day.

“I have seen wicked men and fools, a great many of both; and I believe they both get paid in the end; but the fools first.”

~ Robert Louis Stevenson (“Kidnapped,” 1886)