UPDATE: Campus police were feeding demonstrators!

Our zany friends at Fox offered a new take on the campus police spraying demonstrators with pepper spray at UC Davis (This from Talking Points Memo):

On Monday night, O’Reilly Factor host Bill O’Reilly and Fox News host Megyn Kelly sat down to discuss what really happened at UC Davis on Friday and whether campus police acted appropriately in showering a group of sitting students with pepper spray. Their conclusion? No big deal.

“Pepper spray, that just burns your eyes, right?” O’Reilly asked Kelly.

“Right,” Kelly said. “I mean, its like a derivative of actual pepper. It’s a food product, essentially.”

Exactly! Like jalapeno poppers, or queso dip. Delicious. In fact, pepper spray is about 1,000 times hotter than a jalapeno, Mother Jones reports. But Kelly, to her credit, said the pepper spraying looked like an “abrasive” and “intrusive” act.

Ok, maybe "force-feeding" the demonstrators... After all, it is a food product. Basically....

The threat of OWS

I've been wanting to write about the Occupy movement for a while, but have been watching it instead. I did not anticipate the tenacity of the movement or individuals, but I did anticipate the reaction of the conservatives.
Dirty Hippies, defecating on police cars. Sex in public! Public urination!
I'm shocked at the latest-pepper spraying in University of California at Davis, same for New York and Seattle.
Republicans are becoming scared because the movement is forcing people to think about things like income inequality and excessive corporate and wealth's influence on the government. Conservatives have been very successful at keeping attention on other matters, guns, gays, God, etc. in order to keep focus on anything other than how money has thoroughly corrupted government.
I'm having trouble, though, with how Republicans are trying to belittle those who are exercising their rights in a perfectly appropriate, non-violent manner.
The Newtster said last night, referring to the movement, that they should take a bath and get a job. Of course, Newt is at the very heart of the problem of corruption, and that bastion of integrity is a great focus on its effects. Apparently, he doesn't even realize that people may be upset that he collected $1.6 million from Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae while publicly criticizing other politicians who supported them. Oh, and when asked in the debate about taking $300,000 from them, he failed to mention that it was actually 5 or 6 times that.
Does he remind anyone else of the Pillsbury dough boy with a second rate intellect and a third rate moral compass? May I remind the reader that he was denouncing Bill Clinton from the House floor while having running around on his second wife with his future third? Maybe its just me.
Anyway, the following is an example of a portion of a dangerous communist manifesto. Anybody recognize it? Anybody up for exercising it?

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. (emphasis added).

Here's a link to a Washington Post article:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/uc-davis-pepper-spraying-raises-questions-about-role-of-police/2011/11/20/gIQAOr8dfN_story.html?hpid=z3

letter to C/J, re: Cal Thomas, Repub hack

To the Editor,

Why do you bother printing the opinions of Cal Thomas, Republican apologist? Friday’s entry is typical of his not-so-clever spin doctoring.

In describing the Herman Cain sexual harassment fiasco, Thomas states, “Many in the media wolf pack have already judged him guilty because he updated his initial statement denying the allegations.” Say what? Cain didn’t just “update” his statement, he changed his story repeatedly throughout the days following Politico’s story early this week. At first, a blanket denial. Later, something may have happened, but he just couldn’t remember details. Still later, he remembered something about it, but the settlement (he thought it was just an agreement) was small. But Cain isn’t a flip flopper, he’s an “updater.” (Attention Mitt, new defense headed your way!)

And who can’t love the intentional deceit contained several sentences later, spun into question form: “Is Cain, a relative media novice, expected to have instant and total recall of events that may or may not have happened more than 10 years ago?” How disingenuous is that? As Cal surely knows, Politico contacted Cain 10 days before they ran the story to get his side of it. When does a 10 days heads-up to formulate a response “instant recall?”

All this leads to Mr. Thomas’ conclusion, that its hard to get good candidates to run for office because they don’t want “every mistake or bad decision” aired by the media. I’ll bet the media doesn’t have every mistake or bad decision by Herman Cain reported yet, but the first three harassment claims seem to be a darn good start. And, if true, Mr. Thomas is probably correct that Herman Cain doesn’t want those bad decisions brought to the public view.

Cal’s kind of drivel would be laughable, if it weren’t for his overlooking the pain that his candidate probably caused these women. Mr. Thomas opens by citing the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, but ignores the most obvious difference: that it was between two consenting adults, not a corporate executive trying to prey on women subordinates.

Does Cal Thomas really deserve the editorial space you routinely give him?