Cindy and the Barbecue Republicans

According to The Washington Post, Cindy's still on watch in Crawford, Texas.

The rising profile of Sheehan's vigil has proved awkward for the president's staff, which has been reluctant to publicly refute the mother of a soldier killed in Iraq, even as they do not wish to be seen as bowing to what they view as an orchestrated publicity campaign. On Friday, as Bush's motorcade whizzed by Sheehan's camp on the way to a nearby barbecue expected to raise $2 million for the Republican National Committee, Sheehan held up a sign saying "Why do you make time for donors and not for me?"

Bush has been publicly respectful, responding to Sheehan's case with reporters on Thursday and saying he has thought "long and hard about her position," even though he disagrees with her about the war.

The administration's proxies aren't being so polite. In a piece titled "Crocodile Tears," The American Spectator blasts her with a barrage of Coulter-class schoolyard insults:

Every day more aging hippies, professional grievance-mongers, and underemployed liberal arts majors show up with their backpacks and banjos to join [Sheehan]. Squatting in ditches, sleeping in pup tents, and sitting around a campfire at night yodeling "This Land Is Your Land" is after all the anti-war protesters idea of nirvana...

... Sheehan now demands that, "if George is not ready to send the [Bush] twins [to Iraq], he should bring our troops home immediately." Didn't Clausewitz say something similar in his chapter on war and hot-looking twins? Oh, yes, here it is: "Only if the leader is willing to send his young twin daughters to the front may a nation go to war. Otherwise he must hoist the white flag and surrender his sword."

Christopher Ortlet, author of the piece, runs the right wing blog Existential Journalist. This Ortlet guy is a piece of work. His front page features a story about how he's refusing to pay a fine for a ticket he got for not wearing his seatbelt. So you get a good idea of his notion of activism. He cries about getting a ticket for violating a misdemeanor law he thinks is stupid, but thinks it's cool to ridicule a mother who cries about losing a son in a stupid war. And oh, his front page also carries a link to the (Shock! Awe!) Ann Coulter site. His profile page is blank. I've left him a note, asking if that's because he doesn't want to mention that he's another young chicken hawk who never served in the military.

Punk.

---

Cindy's Barbecue Republican in-laws are in on the act too. They've released a statement saying they support "the troops, the war, and the president." I just bet they do.

---

Go, Cindy! Don't let the bastards get you down. This military veteran is four square behind you.