LTE Follow-up on Ruth Ann's Latest Propaganda

You remember this column, right?

I blogged on it here.

Looks like I wasn't the only one to think Ruth Ann drank the conservative kool-aid. Three (count 'em three) letters to the editor in today's P-G suggest (at the very least) that the lovely and talented Ms Dailey rather undaintilly stepped off the reality train on this one.

The first letter, by a Frank Bienkowski of Wilkinsburg, gets the facts right:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi didn't ask, let alone "demand," a military aircraft for flights to her home district in California. The suggestion came from the House sergeant-at-arms, who did so as a matter of maintaining the security protocol afforded former House Speaker Dennis Hastert following 9/11. A larger plane is necessary to fly nonstop from Washington to San Francisco than could do so to Chicago. Ms. Pelosi had stated that she is satisfied with taking commercial nonstop flights as she has been doing while serving in Washington.

While the second letter, from a William Edmonds of Robinson, reminds us why the security for Speaker Pelosi is so important:

Given the health conditions of our second in command, I believe we should be extra careful with our speaker of the House. But what is absolutely stunning is that Ms. Dailey parrots this line of baseless nonsense on Monday, so long after it had been shown to be such.

If only her column were published as harmless gossip, since she apparently has no interest in fact-checking, that would be different. But as presented, it is harmful, divisive and partisan mudslinging, and absolutely does not belong in your newspaper.

While the third letter, from a Conor Tobin of Upper St. Clair (obviously no fan of Speaker Pelosi or of the Democrats as seen in his first paragraph) chimes in with an obvious point. All the talk about the plane is a diversion from talking about the real issues facing the country. While I'd disagree with Mr. Tobin on what those issues are, it's good to see a conservative who understands Republican nonsense (hogwash, BS, propaganda, etc) when he sees it:

To set the stage, I consider electing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to be one of the great voter mistakes of the 21st century slightly behind the continued and patently inexplicable re-elections of Ted Kennedy.

That said, conservatives are attempting to make an issue of the request to have a larger government aircraft at her disposal. The aircraft former House Speaker Dennis Hastert used has insufficient range to fly from coast to coast. Mr. Hastert did not need that kind of range. Speaker Pelosi does.

Let's get on to discussions over the things that actually should keep us up at night. Nancy Pelosi's inability to grasp the very real threats that face this nation could be one. President Bush's inability to ignore dangerous pandering to secure our borders is another.

I wonder if Ruth Ann Dailey will be offering up a mea culpa anytime soon.

Yea, me neither.