Finger pointing contest pits White House against Congressional Republicans

[Jack Rabbit]

Now that the election is over, the finger pointing has begun. The Republicans ask each other, "Just whose fault was this debacle, anyway?"

It is said that success has many fathers while failure is an orphan. This bit of folk wisdom does not address the kind of disaster the Republicans experienced last week. A disaster like this has got to be somebody else's bastard.

The Republicans know it would do no good to blame this one on Bill Clinton. The fault clearly lies with Republicans. That is, the fault lies with Republicans other than the one who is pointing his finger at any giving moment.

The Congressional Republicans blame the White House and the White House blames the Congressional Republicans. The Congressional Republicans, at least those who survived, say it was the Iraq War. Rove says, "that obviously wasn't it; look, our man Lieberman won in Connecticut." So his reasoning is the Congressional Republicans blew it with their own scandals.

The Republicans, who are self-appointed experts on the subject, should know that this is no way for grown ups to act. Both factions are right.

The Congressional Republicans, at least those who survived, say it was the Iraq War. Rove says, "that obviously wasn't it; look, our man Lieberman won in Connecticut." So his reasoning is the Congressional Republicans blew it with their own scandals.

It was everything and every one. The Republicans as a group have done nothing right for the last six years. Iraq was an unnecessary war that had nothing to do with national security. Jewel thieves plan their heists better than than these imperial pirates planned to liberate the Iraqi people from their natural resources. The war on terror was botched for Iraq. Al Qaida is resurgent and the Taliban are again a force in Afghanistan. For his own inept handling of the war on terror, Mr. Bush feels it necessary to gut the Bill of Rights and international humanitarian law. Meanwhile, this neurotic coward plans war against Iran (which is not a immediate threat) and makes excuses for not dealing with North Korea (which is). Mr. Bush may have been justified in cutting taxes when he took office, but not the way he did it. The benefits mainly went to America's wealthiest; Mr. Bush's failure -- with Congressional Republicans as accomplices -- to bring spending in line with reduced revenues caused the black ink that he inherited from President Clinton to turn as red as the blood of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. Or thousands of Louisianans and Mississippians in the wake of Katrina.

The Congressional Republicans added their own bit of strychnine into the mix. In addition to cutting taxes and then spending the money they didn't have like a drunken sailor in a whorehouse during shore leave, they insulated Mr. Bush from all consequences of his reckless behavior. Intelligence manipulation before the Iraq invasion? No problem; the Roberts Committee just put on the biggest whitewash party since the one organized by Tom Sawyer. There, the committee found no evidence of intelligence manipulation. How did they do that? They didn't look. It gave Rove and Mehlman a handy talking point. Culture of life? They just help the Frat Boy out by sticking their noses in Michael Schiavo's business where it doesn't belong. Waterboarding is torture? They'll just pass some legislation letting Bush define what is and isn't torture. Now waterboarding, which was once used to make witches confess, isn't torture any more. We should feel lucky that Bush hasn't decided that the rack and the iron maiden aren't.

Some congressional scandals and idiocies had less, even nothing, to do with Bush regime policy. Jack Abramoff was corrupting anybody he could buy, whether they were in the White House or Congress. And did Speaker Hastert have in mind by sweeping Mark Foley under the rug for three years? Did he believe it better that dozens of congressional pages should be exposed to a pervert than that one Republican Congressman should suffer?

In any parliamentary democracy, it is a good thing to change the party in power periodically. In 1994, the Democrats were clearly showing signs of having been in power too long. Many of the bombs Newt Gingrich lobed at the Congressional Democrats for many years prior were just firecrackers designed to make noise. Nevertheless, Dan Rostenkowski's sins weren't anything the GOP had to make up. The Democrats weren't disciplining their wayward members, weren't passing their own initiatives and weren't taking on other problems like social security solvency. A reinvigorated Democratic Party now takes the reins of power ready to begin its own legislative agenda and to impose badly needed oversight on what may be the most crooked administration in history.

[NanceGreggs]

1. Well done, JR!!!

:kick: and a Recommend!