Adios, Cao. No personal hard feelings. You're still a good guy in my eyes. And I may even support you on other pieces of legislation, such as they may be in the remainder of your sure-to-end term of office. But you have irretrievably lost my vote in November. There is no way you will be able to convince me that your "No" vote wasn't a vote against life. So much for Anh "Joseph" Cao, Resume of a Democrat. Sad.

I can only imagine what it must have been like for Cao to sit in his seat and listen to his fellow Republican members berate Democrats for failing to listen to the American people all the while knowing that he pointedly refused to listen to the clear majority of the people in his district who supported this bill.

UPDATE: Another thought. It must have been equally uncomfortable for Cao to sit there and listen to his Republican colleagues speak of backroom deals, hidden arm twisting, and order-taking from unelected special interests, instead of listening to the American people, yet knowing that he gave more credence to the Archbishop of New Orleans and the US Bishops on how to vote on the bill than from the express will of the very citizens, many of us Catholics ourselves, he was elected to represent. Yes, I'm bitter. I really stuck my neck out for Cao way back when, and I've been a defender of his since. And I do feel betrayed. I think Stupak showed a lot of courage. And it sickens me that Cao allies himself with folks who would call Stupak, of all people, a babykiller in the halls of Congress. Does Cao have no shame to sit next to such people? I don't know about the kind of Jesuit training he received, but the training I got from the Jesuits would lead me to find such behavior repugnant and abhorrent. Treating pro-life Democrats like Stupak in this way proves to me that the so-called pro-life Republicans don't give a damn about life, really. They would rather run into the ground every Democrat like Stupak who pushes hard within the party to advance a pro-life culture. They will never win the argument this way. Never. And Cao is one of them by association.