Ah, civility. Quite a change from the way it used to be, don't you think.?

Why just yesterday, Vice President Biden, trying to be helpful as always, offered the thought that the Republican strategy on cutting the budget was like blaming a victim of rape for her misfortune.

CNN:

Vice President Joe Biden blasted Republicans during a fundraiser in Philadelphia on Friday, comparing their approach to the budget battle to the mentality of "blaming the victim" of a rape.

The remarks came as he appeared at a Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) event with former Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter, then a Republican, who co-authored the Violence Against Women Act with him. Biden referenced the act in his comparison to Republicans, saying that before it was passed, "there was this attitude in our society of blaming the victim."

"When a woman got raped, blame her because she was wearing a skirt too short, she looked the wrong way or she wasn't home in time to make the dinner," Biden said at the DCCC event, according to a pool report. "We've gotten by that. But it's amazing how these Republicans, the right wing of this party - whose philosophy threw us into this god awful hole we're in, gave us the tremendous deficit we've inherited - that they're now using, now attempting to use, the very economic condition they have created to blame the victim - whether it's organized labor or ordinary middle-class working men and women. It's bizarre."

National Republican Campaign Committee (NRCC) spokeswoman Joanna Burgos responded to Biden's comments saying, "It's incredibly tasteless and offensive for the vice president to stoop to this level just to score political points. As much as Vice President Biden should retract this specific statement, he should apologize for comparing our country's dismal economic situation to such horrid acts as violence against women."

Don't hold your breath waiting for a retraction. The Democrats are just getting started. Before they're through, they'll paint the GOP as the party of starving your grandma, killing your kid, genocide against people of color, and meanies who want to take Big Bird off the TV (oh wait...they've already tried that one).

Maybe the Republicans should try this "civility" thing.