It was only a matter of time before it started. The Democrats are beginning to turn on each other as their poll numbers sink and Republicans’ numbers start to rise.

John Adler (D, NJ) says the healthcare legislation is bad for America. And he doesn’t care whether there’s a public option in it or not.

The Weekly Standard notes

“The bill that’s coming through the House, with or without the public option, isn’t good for America,” Adler said matter-of-factly. “We have Congressional Budget Office projections of a trillion-dollar increase in costs that will have to be borne by taxpayers or insurance purchasers; meaning businesses and households. Either way, that’s a cost we can’t afford.”

But it’s not just Adler. Seriously endangered Democrat Parker Griffith of Alabama believes Nancy Pelosi is too divisive to be Speaker.

Rep. Parker Griffith, a former oncologist from Alabama, told a town hall meeting this week that Pelosi is too divisive to be speaker. “I would not vote for her [again],” he added. “Someone that divisive and that polarizing cannot bring us together.”

With one Blue Dog Democrat speaking out like that, it can only be a matter of time before other Democrats also start speaking out against both Pelosi and Barack Obama.

It’s also time to get other Democrats on the record about Nancy Pelosi. In fact, if you are going to a town hall meeting (see the calendar on the right) you might want to ask, “Do you agree with Blue Dog Democratic Congressman Parker Griffith that, in his words, Nancy Pelosi is too divisive?”

I was going to wait until Ms. Roby had a campaign website up - she only announced last week, and this was Memorial Day weekend - but apparently the local Democrats are already beginning to play the “create multiple accounts and go after her for being a mom*” in local comment sections, so best to get this up now.

So.  AL-02.  R+16 in the Cook Political Report; Bobby Bright won this one by something like 1800 votes.  Against an incumbent and/or a Democratic President’s coattails, he would have lost.  Bright claims “Blue Dog” status; he has slightly more reason than some, given that he did break with his party to vote against the ‘stimulus‘ package.  The DCCC has him on their list of Representatives to protect, so he’s almost certain to get away with that, too.  They may even drop more money on him this time, assuming of course that they have it to spare.

But enough about this calculated insult to progressive Democrats by their own party; let’s look at Martha Roby.  She’s young (32 years old), currently on the City Council for Montgomery, where she apparently represents a majority-minority constituency (if this report is correct, in her last election she won majorities among both white and African-American voters in her city district).  She’s popular in her home area, plans to run as a conservative, and it can be safely assumed that her candidacy is going to be supported by the NRCC.

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The cool thing about attacking someone that’s been dead for over 100 years is that they can’t fight back. The other cool thing is that you can use them to fuel your race baiting so that you can get some cheap publicity, get noticed, or play the faux “civil rights leader” on TV.

Such is the case in Auburn, Alabama where a city councilman decided to get noticed by ripping tiny Confederate flags from the graves of long-dead Confederate veterans buried in a local cemetery. Shockingly those flags were placed there on Confederate Memorial Day. Who wouldda thunk it, eh? Confederate flags on Confederate graves on Confederate Memorial Day! Shocking, I know.

Despite that this has been going on for well over 100 years, this councilman puffed himself up to being “offended” because he claimed he was a “civil rights leader.” He said that the tiny flags made him feel that the cemetery was “like a Klan rally or a skinhead rally.” He put on his showy high dudgeon claiming that the tiny flags are “intimidating to black folks.” Yes, he, an elected official, is “intimidated.”

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Update by Jeff: Perhaps this comment will shine a bit more light on the import of this issue.

WHO SHOULD HAVE CONTROL over your medical care: your family doctor, or a bureaucrat you’ve never met whose sole job is to look out for the government’s financial bottom-line?

That question, which is the subject of today’s AOL Hot Seat poll, is being debated in court right now, as three states are currently seeking a ruling from a federal judge that the final say in an individual’s medical treatment lies with the government, not with that patient’s doctor.

In March, Georgia, Florida, and Alabama joined in an appeal of a 2008 U.S. District Court ruling that a patient’s physician was better positioned – and better qualified – to make decisions about that patient’s medical treatment than state bureaucrats.

The case centers on Callie Moore, a disabled teenage girl living in Georgia. A stroke Callie suffered in utero left her suffering from multiple conditions, including cerebral palsy and mental retardation. For the last decade, she has received around-the-clock in-home nursing care for her medical conditions.

IN 2007, THOUGH, the state of Georgia cut coverage of Callie’s in-home care by 15%, from 94 hours a week to 84 over the objections of her attending physician, who was intimately familiar with her case and her needs. State officials (who were not medical professionals) cited disagreement with the attending physician about just how much care Callie needed as the primary reason for this reduction in care.

Callie’s mother filed suit in 2007, arguing that the state had no right to contradict the orders of her personal physician and limit her treatment. However, because Callie receives her medical treatment under Medicaid, the joint federal-state administered health coverage program for low-income individuals and families, Georgia officials argued that Callie’s care was subject to rationing, as state bureaucrats’ need to ensure Medicaid resources were allocated “fairly” superseded her doctor’s care prescription or her personal medical needs.

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