Coming from us, that headline doesn't have much of an impact. You would expect such a sentiment from us. But it's not our headline. No, that is from Canadian journalist Peter Worthington, a guy who is by no means a leftie. Worthington used to rail against former Prime Minister, the late Pierre Trudeau back in the day, almost went to jail for identifying 16 Canadians allegedly recruited by the KGB, threatened back in the still-very-homophobic eighties to out anyone who was arrested in police raids of gay bathouses, and is the father-in-law of former George W. Bush special assistant and speechwriter David Frum. It is on Frum's blog that Worthington's op-ed about Leonard Peltier appears, and it is as if we written it ourselves. He also sees a frame-up, not to mention a concentrated effort to treat him far worse than anyone else convicted of his crimes. The fact that a conservative is picking up on this is a good sign, a damn good sign, and after 35 years in prison, most definitely a welcome one.

The defense in the Hal Turner re-trial has now rested and closing arguments were to begin this afternoon, which means quite possibly today or tomorrow we will have a verdict in his case. To be honest, we are just glad that this is coming to an end. A number of us have been dealing with Turner since the early nineties and this is definitely a chapter that has been long overdue to close. We are going to wait however to see how it ends before we opine on that ending, but in looking at how we have dealt with the Hal Turner case over the years, we have to admit our mistakes as well, particularly one of them. DLJ attended Friday's court date and as has been the case, Turner's mother wife and son were there to give him their support. Now Turner has gotten the brunt of the potshots from us as he should (especially considering the number of times he suggested violence towards us), but there was one point where we crossed the line into sending one of those potshots towards members of his family, namely Turner's wife Phyllis. In an article we had written about a tussle with a Jersey City politician protesting outside his home and the July 16, 2006 trial that took place, we called Mrs. Turner, who testified in that trial, a "pig". Actually we went further than that, but you get the idea. Family members are as a general rule off limits to us, unless of course they are involved in the same activities as the people we cover. Phyllis Turner on the witness stand as for the defense should not have been seen as being involved in her husband's activites, but simply as someone who was a witness to what happened. A few of us within our little collective here took issue with the "pig" line back then, and we admit it was a low blow, but time goes by and such things fade from memory - but not if you were the one hurt by it. DLJ went to Mrs. Turner during a break in the trian and apologized to her, and we want to also make that apology to her here as well as to our readers who expect us to be above such things. Now this doesn't mean that we won't take our usual shots at folks. No, nothing's changed there! We will simply be a bit more mindful of who deserves them and who doesn't.

It's ACORN's turn now. As the house pretty much falls around conservative propagandist James O'Keefe and those that love him, the organization he sought to destroy is now demanding that the BS that was spread by O'Keefe throughout what was allegedly the liberal media start correcting the record. Bertha Lewis (pictured), the Executive Director of ACORN, writes an op-ed piece noting how after the group was cleared of any criminal wrongdoing and the videos he made with fellow propagandist Hannah Giles have now been revealed to be heavily edited things should reflect that, and they should be allowed ot go about their business. Comedy Central has been doing their part, that's for certain. Both the Daily Show and the Colbert Report, who had originally dealt with the issue as if the tapes were valid, are now turning on O'Keefe & Co., Steven Colbert noting on his program that Sean Hannity, who has had O'Keefe has been on his show on a regular basis, won't even mention him now. Meanwhile, Hannah Giles has a letter out soliciting funds for her legal defense fund because "Obama's ally ACORN is trying to destroy me." No, Hannah, you pretty much destroyed yourself, but let this be a lesson to you. We might not be fans of Ronald Reagan (we even had T-Shirts and buttons saying he rots in hell when he died a few years back), but he put his money where his mouth was, for better or for worse. The crew promoted by the likes of Andrew Breitbart are not able to do that, which is why they are going to continue their free fall until they reach their final destination - Hell.

No, we are not exaggerating a situation for politics sake. This is a pretty interesting development from the new far right regime that has taken over Virginia. The mantra from conservatives against anti-discrimination laws has always been that it stilfles the freedoms of those who should be allowed to decide who they wish to associate with. So what if an establishment decides for example that they have no problem associating with the gay community and will not discriminate? Well, according to Kenneth Cuccinelli (pictured), the Ron Paultard new Attorney General of Virginia, you don't have the right to make that decision! That's right, if you don't want to deny someone their rights as human beings, Virginia's A.G. is going to down hard on you, and by the way so is the new Governor Bob McDonnell. The whole thing stems from what really amounts to the not-so-dynamic duo taking issue with the previous Governor Tim Kaine extending anti-discrimination protections to homosexuals, but ultimately it is fast becoming the biggest reminder of just why we turned out the conservatives in recent elections. McDonnell and Cuccinelli are going to get an earful from a lot of people, and it is only going to get worse for them. UPDATE: This article includes video from the Daily Show covering this issue.