Since Oct. 20, the Republican National Committee’s Facebook page has had a picture of President Obama with a caption reading “Miscegenation is a crime against American values. Repeal Loving v. Virginia.”

[mjh: That’s right: repeal the ruling that allowed an interracial couple to marry. Rather reminiscent of the judge down south who recently said he wouldn’t marry an interracial couple because it’s bad for the kids. Tell it to Obama, jackass.]

As Raw Story notes, the RNC finally took the photo down today, after readers at Democratic Underground first began discussing it on Sunday. While it’s likely that the RNC “wasn’t aware the racist photo was on their page and it wasn’t produced or posted by anyone at the RNC,” the group had attacked MoveOn.org for a similar incident in 2004. As Chris Harris at Media Matters Action Network notes, when “a web user posted a self-produced web video that compared President Bush to Hitler as part of a MoveOn.org video contest, the RNC acted as if the video had been produced by MoveOn itself.” According to the National Journal:

“This [Bush as Hitler] is the worst and most vile form of political hate speech,” Republican National Committee spokesman Ed Gillespie proclaimed. “MoveOn.org should apologize.”

Boyd did just that, expressing “deep regret” that the ads made it through MoveOn’s filtering process, and promising to scrutinize such material in the future. Pariser emphasized that MoveOn had not produced the ads, not aired them, not endorsed them in the voting, and had removed them from the Web site –adding that the RNC had put them on its Web site to score points. Still, the damage had been done.

Will the RNC now issue a public apology?

Think Progress » Will the RNC apologize for racist Facebook photo?

Poll: GOP Favorability Falters – The Page by Mark Halperin – TIME.com 

Latest CNN/ORC survey puts Republican approval at two-year low.

Dips to 36% for only the second time in a decade according to CNN/USA Today/Gallup Trends.

Poll: GOP Favorability Falters – The Page by Mark Halperin – TIME.com

Details: CNN/ORC Poll on Party Favorability – The Page by Mark Halperin – TIME.com 

From CNN:

Republicans: 36% favorable, 54% unfavorable

Democrats: 53% favorable, 41% unfavorable

Congress: 29% approve, 69% disapprove

Congressional Democrats: 38% approve, 59% disapprove

Congressional Republicans: 33% approve, 66% disapprove

Conducted Oct. 16-18, error margin +/- 3 points.

Details: CNN/ORC Poll on Party Favorability – The Page by Mark Halperin – TIME.com

Congress performs the worst in this poll.

 Think Progress » Buchanan on GOP and Fox linking Obama to Nixon: ‘It is the most idiotic comparison I’ve ever seen.’

Taking cues from their communications shop over at Fox News, GOP Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and Judd Gregg (R-NH) yesterday attacked the White House’s campaign against Fox’s unethical journalistic practices by comparing President Obama to President Nixon. “Let’s not start calling people out and compiling an enemies list,” Alexander said, touting his days as a junior staffer in the Nixon White House as credentials for his charge. Gregg said he was “fascinated” by Alexander’s criticism and wondered if Obama is “Nixon-fying” the White House. But yesterday on MSNBC, top Nixon aide Pat Buchanan dismissed out-of-hand any comparison of Obama to Nixon:

BUCHANAN: It is the most idiotic comparison I’ve ever seen. Barack Obama won 95 percent of Washington DC, he comes in with both houses Congress behind him, the media love him, the country loves him. Nixon came in with both houses of Congress against him, he probably got 8 percent of the vote in Washington DC, the media loathed him. … I don’t see any comparison between Obama and Nixon whatsoever. … [T]here’s no comparison. Barack Obama’s got enormous press support, he’s got problems with Fox News but for heaven’s sakes there is no comparison here.

Think Progress » Buchanan on GOP and Fox linking Obama to Nixon: ‘It is the most idiotic comparison I’ve ever seen.’

You probably thought the “joke” about gunning-down liberal democrats was this week’s WTF?! But, no, we have a last-minute winner, from the drooling maw of the Big Mouth of the Republican Party (sorry, Lush, take another Oxy), Glenn Blech:

 Think Progress » Beck says ‘progressives’ are descended from ‘tyrants’ and ‘slave owners.’

On his Fox News show today, Glenn Beck said that “in the last couple of years” he’s been “trying to read a different Founding Father all the time,” offering that his latest interest is in Samuel Adams. According to Beck, Samuel Adams would have hated modern day progressives. “We call them progressives now, but back in Samuel Adams’ day, they used to call them tyrants,” said Beck. “A little later, I think they were also called slave owners.” Watch it:

It’s kind of odd that Beck deifies the Founding Fathers while attacking progressives as “slave owners,” considering that some of the most famous Founding Fathers owned slaves.

Think Progress » Beck says ‘progressives’ are descended from ‘tyrants’ and ‘slave owners.’

Think Progress declines to note that the tattered remnants of Conservatism resemble nothing so much as the end of the Confederacy (slave holders, if you’ve forgotten). I can’t wait until Blech finishes with the Founders and moves on to the Civil War. Was that war about progressive slave holders in the South? Wouldn’t that make the North the good guys? But wasn’t the War of Northern Aggression between an overbearing Federal government (Sam Adams says, “boo, hiss”) versus freedom-loving (for some) States’ Righters (or Tenthers, as they call themselves today)? Of course, as in the Republican party, the Confederacy consisted of rich people rallying poor people to their defense. The people who have everything use people who have nothing to fight people who want something for everyone. Who needs slaves anymore? Turns out, you have to feed slaves, but you don’t have to feed poor people – let them join the military.

I had thought the “penny-pinching” remark would be the best example of Conservatives digging a deeper hole just by being themselves. Then along comes this gem from a Deep Thinker in the Party of Ideas. (Those self-assigned labels for Conservatives and Republicans seems so far from the truth they aren’t even ironic anymore, just completely irrelevant.)

Think Progress » GOP Rep. from district where civil rights workers were lynched talks about shooting ‘tree-hugging Democrats.’ 

In a new interview with Rep. Gregg Harper (R-MS), Politico asks the congressman what the Congressional Sportsmen’s Caucus does. Harper’s response:

We hunt liberal, tree-hugging Democrats, although it does seem like a waste of good ammunition.

Harper represents Mississippi’s 3rd congressional district, which contains Neshoba County — the place of one of the most infamous race-related crimes in American history. In 1964, white supremacists lynched three civil rights workers.

Think Progress » GOP Rep. from district where civil rights workers were lynched talks about shooting ‘tree-hugging Democrats.’

Of course a joke about killing people can be funny, unless it comes from people who have the means and inclination and feel they are so cornered they must “resist.” But the petty “waste of good ammo” truly reveals an ugly mindset. My advice: Shoot yourself between the eyes, not in the foot. That solves our mutual problems with the least amount of good ammo.

Update: Politico’s Glenn Thrush reports that Harper is unrepentant about his remarks. Harper’s spokesman said the remarks were "supposed to be fun. … It’s having a good time."

Har. Har.

Get ready for conservative Bible – Leonard Pitts Jr. – MiamiHerald.com 

So we may soon have ourselves a conservative Bible. Besides Fox News, I mean.

This new Bible is from Conservapedia, a website that bills itself as a conservative alternative to the perceived liberal bias of Wikipedia, the user-edited online reference.

You may judge Conservapedia’s own bias by reading its definition of liberal: “someone who rejects logical and biblical standards, often for self-centered reasons. There are no coherent liberal standards; often a liberal is merely someone who craves attention, and who uses many words to say nothing.”

For the record, Wikipedia defines conservative as a word referring “to various political and social philosophies that support tradition and the status quo, or that call for a return to the values and society of an earlier age. . . .”

Now, having protected unwary Americans from — ahem — Wikipedia’s bias, Conservapedia founder Andrew Schlafly (son of Phyllis) tackles perceived bias in the Good Book. He proposes to correct the Bible by creating a new translation based upon 10 principles, including: concision (as opposed to “liberal wordiness”); an emphasis on “free market parables” and the exclusion of “liberal passages” he says were inserted into the original text.

Get ready for conservative Bible – Leonard Pitts Jr. – MiamiHerald.com

It would appear the nut hasn’t fallen far from the tree in the case of Andy Schlafly and his mommy.

ABQJOURNAL UPFRONT: Rotten Tomatoes for Political Theater, by Winthrop Quigley

Tea Baggers don’t mention that as a percentage of national wealth, tax collections in the United States are lower than any developed country except Korea, Mexico and Turkey, which suggests that instead of being taxed enough already, Americans could afford higher taxes and still remain competitive in the global economy.
    Such nuance can’t be put on a protest sign, but it might form the basis of discussion of and even solutions to public problems.

ABQJOURNAL UPFRONT: Rotten Tomatoes for Political Theater

Eugene Robinson – Obama’s Peace Prize Won’t Reset His Agenda – washingtonpost.com 

Let the rejectionists fulminate and sputter until they wear their vocal cords out. Politically, they’re only bashing themselves. As Republican leaders — except RNC Chairman Michael Steele — are beginning to realize, "I’m With the Taliban Against America" is not likely to be a winning slogan.

Eugene Robinson – Obama’s Peace Prize Won’t Reset His Agenda – washingtonpost.com

Think Progress » Teabaggers Try To ‘Flush’ Graham Out Of GOP; Graham Responds: ‘If You Don’t Like’ Moderates, ‘You Can Leave’ 

One attendee of the event asked the senator, “when are you going to announce that you are switching parties?” The question drew loud applause from the crowd. Graham defended himself, and denounced the influence of Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) on the Republican party:

GRAHAM: I’m going to grow this party, I’m not going to let it get [inaudible], I’m not going to let it be hijacked by Ron Paul. […] I’m going to find people in Maine, Delaware, Illinois, other places–

AUDIENCE: Move there!

GRAHAM: That can win as Republicans, and I’m going to go up, and we’re going to move this party, and this country forward, and if you don’t like it, you can leave.

Think Progress » Teabaggers Try To ‘Flush’ Graham Out Of GOP; Graham Responds: ‘If You Don’t Like’ Moderates, ‘You Can Leave’

 Think Progress » Bar Owner With Racist Anti-Obama Sign: Obama’s A ‘Half-Breed’

The Georgia Peach Museum and Restaurant — which boasts that it is “the original Klan bar” on its website — caused a media firestorm last week when it put up a sign that read, “Obama’s plan for health care – [n-word] rig it.” The restaurant’s owner, Patrick Lanzo, told a local paper that his sign is “strictly about free speech,” and noted that he has in the past been a member of the NAACP and has marched on behalf of gay rights. …

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution interviewed Lanzo inside his restaurant last week. They took this picture of him, where a “Whites Only” swimming pool sign sits underneath a portrait of Barack Obama.

Think Progress » Bar Owner With Racist Anti-Obama Sign: Obama’s A ‘Half-Breed’

Think Progress » Federal authorities investigating anti-Obama Nazi message on Massachusetts golf course. 

The U.S. Secret Service and the FBI are investigating an incident at a Lakeville, Massachusetts golf course, in which vandals etched “I” above a swastika and “Obama” on the green. The Boston Herald reports that vandals used the heels of their shoes or cleats to scrape the message into the grass:

“We investigate these cases thoroughly,” said Steven Ricciardi, special agent in charge of the Secret Service’s Boston office. Authorities say the incident “likely constitutes a hate crime, whether the culprits meant it as a prank or not.”

Think Progress » Federal authorities investigating anti-Obama Nazi message on Massachusetts golf course.