The Washington Post showed how desperate it can be to shill for the Bush Administration and the GOP in it’s Editorial, “The Right Vote.”

Despite Roberts the blatant contempt Roberts has demonstrated for the Constitution and women’s rights throughout his career, the Post acted as if he has some sort of inalienable right to a Supreme Court seat. Even worse is the Post’s lack of concern about Roberts’ blatantly unethical behavior.

As long as women, people of color, and queers will face the brunt of Roberts’ contempt for the Constitution, the Post thinks it is somehow out-of-bounds to oppose it. The Editorial ironically claimed that the actions of the three Democrats who cast cowardly and cynical votes for Roberts actions’ “took guts.” Talk about unintentional comedy.

Even worse, the Post  lied about liberals opposing Roberts, saying:

The liberal groups have made clear that they will oppose any nominee from this administration, regardless of qualifications, temperament or testimony.

This is truly bizarre. Throughout his career, Roberts has behaved as a dangerous fanatic, bent on destroying Constitutional Rights. Roberts has refused to recuse himself on a recent case where the defendants were interviewing him for the very Supreme Court appointment in question. Anyone concerned with women’s rights, constitutional rights, and ethics in government would have no choice but to oppose Roberts.

If the Post were honest, they would acknowledge the fact that the Bush regime wants to pack the courts with dangerous, anti-Constitutional extremists. Sadly, corporate interests and ideology have trumped honest discourse at that paper. It is typical of the corporate media, but it is particularly frustrating when there is so much at stake.

There is a tendancy among some people to think that New York Republicans are somehow better than Republicans elsewhere, but that certainly isn’t the case when it comes to blatant political corruption.

The Metropolitan Transit Authority runs the New York Subway, the Metro North Railway, the Staten Island Railroad, and the Long Island Railroad. The board is appointed by the Governor and the Mayor, both Republicans.

The MTA is getting famous for corrupt bidding processes. When they recently offered property in Manhattan for sale, they chose the bid of the New York Jets, even though there were two higher bidders.

Now, it has been announced that the MTA has chosen to sell its Brooklyn railyard property to Brooklyn arch-enemy Bruce Ratner at less than half of the appraised market value, and the appraisal was done by the MTA. The land will be part of a massive arena/real estate project that will destroy much of the Prospect Heights neighborhood and will get an additional taxpayer subsidy thanks to Mayor Bloomberg, who never met a corporate welfare project he didn’t like.

It gets worse. An arbitrator ruled that the MTA must stop with its extremely dangerous conductorless trains on the L line because the dangerous trains violate the MTA’s contract with the transit union. What does the MTA do? They are simply ingoring the ruling. The MTA is desperate to cut jobs so they can give away more money to GOP corporate cronies. Safety just doesn’t matter to them.

The corruption at the MTA, whose board is appointed entirely by a Republican governor and a Republican mayor is typical of the corruption that permeates the GOP. Whether it is Dick Cheney and Halliburton, Tom DeLay’s campaign dealings, Duke Cunnhingham’s ethics problems, or the Diebold ballot “discrepancies,” the GOP’s lack of ethics is utterly amazing. For a party that moralizes at queers, women, and non-Christians with glee, the Republican Party needs to learn some real moral values.

Questions about Roberts’ integrity have been downplayed by the corporate media, which is determined to promote a partisan, GOP agenda whenever possible. However, those concerns need to be addressed.

- Roberts lied about his membership in the Federalist Society, a rightist hate-group dedicated to overthrowing the constitution and representative government in the United States. It turns out Roberts was an officer in the DC chapter.

- Roberts has refused to turn over his tax records, unlike previous appointees.

- The Bush regime still refuses to turn over critical documents from when Roberts worked for Ken Starr in the Solicitor General’s office, claiming attorney-client privilege, despite the fact that the American people are the clients of the Solicitor General’s office.

- The fact that Roberts ever worked for someone as dishonest and unprofessional as Starr should raise serious questions about whether Roberts has any concept of legal ethics at all.

- Roberts refused to recuse himself on a recent case involving Alberto Gonzales’ torture memo, immediately after being interviewed by Gonzales and Bush about filling a potential Supreme Court vacancy.

Taken separately, these are disturbing enough. Together, they prove that Roberts is unfit to serve in any capacity on the Supreme Court, much less as Chief Justice.

When FEMA put up its initial list of charities, all but one were overtly religious. Originally listed was Pat Robertson’s highly controversial “charity.”

Many freethinkers would prefer to give to organizations without religious affiliation to ensure that the funds are not diverted to religious bureaucracies. Even worse is the thought that funds might be misused Halliburton-style by unscrupulous religious charities. Here are some secular alternatives.

American Humanist Association

Americares

Federation of Southern Cooperatives

Team Rescue

Food Not Bombs

New Orleans Network