Gwen Moore under fire; Who's got her back?

Congresswoman Gwen Moore deserves a Profile in Courage award for being one of only five House members willing to vote against a one-sided resolution on Gaza that essentially blames all of the violence on Hamas and gives Israel a free pass.

Predictably, Moore was roasted on Republican talk radio, which has never met a war it didn't like.

She's no doubt feeling somewhat beleagured for doing the right thing. Contact her here to let her know others agree that both sides must stop the bloodshed and share the responsibility for the deaths of innocent civilians.

The Summerfest compromise

Summerfest, which took a courageous stand on Tuesday and shut down an Army game which allowed teens to virtually kill people from a Humvee, took a step back after getting some heat.

The new compromise re-opened the game but replaced people's images with inanimate targets.

Reaction is mixed. Charlie Sykes, while crowing that he's responsible for the change, is still unhappy that Summerfest would even speak to a peacenik.

My take is that, while the fest tried to do the right thing, it has buckled to Army, right-wing and corporate pressure, as evidence by its boot-licking statement about how the Army is Summerfest's best friend. Read it here.

Michael Mathias, who first wrote about the Peace Action campaign to stop the killing game, says that Summerfest still deserves our thanks for trying to do what's right.

And Jim Rowen writes about Charlie Sykes's tantrum this morning, claiming Summerfest has capitulated to moonbats, including yours truly. So maybe Mathias is right.

What's your take?

Festival's halt to virtual killing is killing Sykes

Peace activists won a small victory for humankind Tuesday when a phone call campaign convinced Summerfest to shut down an Army recruiting exhibit that invited 13-year-olds and up to "hop into a Humvee simulator and fire machine guns at life-size people on a computer screen," as the JS described it.

Added bonus: It sent Charlie Sykes off the deep end, causing him to write some things that made even less sense than usual -- and that's saying something. Says Sykes:

Political rallies for Barack Obama: OK.

Virtual warfare games: Out.

While men and women continue to fight (and win) in Iraq and Afghanistan, Summerfest gets all squeamish about the Army's virtual reality war game. But, just remember: they support the troops.

How's that again?

We're winning in Iraq?

Political rallies for Barack Obama are the same as Army recruiters using violent video games to recruit teenagers?

If you don't want your kids exposed to that sort of "reality" at Summerfest you don't support the troops?

Sorry, Charlie. You clearly don't have a leg to stand on, or you'd have done better than that.