Republican Solution: Total Taliban Carnage

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You have to wonder at the sheer breathtaking evil of this Republican party's agenda for the future. Not solving America's problems. Witness their destructive and, frankly, ignorant attacks on the stimulus bill as a "spending bill."

And then there's this, from a Republican Congressman from Texas, Pete Sessions. And maybe you should be kind and just consider the source. After all it is a white male Republican politician from Texas.

"Insurgency, we understand perhaps a little bit more because of the Taliban," Sessions said during a meeting yesterday with Hotline editors. "And that is that they went about systematically understanding how to disrupt and change a person's entire processes. And these Taliban -- I'm not trying to say the Republican Party is the Taliban. No, that's not what we're saying. I'm saying an example of how you go about [sic] is to change a person from their messaging to their operations to their frontline message. And we need to understand that insurgency may be required when the other side, the House leadership, does not follow the same commands, which we entered the game with."

No, no, of course not, Mr. Congressman from Texas. There's nothing in your demographic group that would lead one to believe you're the Taliban. Or that you're urging that fellow Republicans should be Taliban. Not at all.

If the Democrats can't make at least as much hay from this as ol' Boner made from "condoms," then they might as well shutter their side of the aisle.

Bipartisanship was never an option for these Republicans. And any of those who profess to be moderate Republican, meet in the middle Republicans...you know who we're talking about...

It's time to ask them: are you with the American people? Or the Taliban?

Time for an up or down vote. Time to use the microphone and call these phonies what they are. Maybe Joan Walsh could give you a few tips.
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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette

Dereliction of Duty

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Day by day, the disclosures of the what-should-be-criminal misconduct of the ideologues in the Bush Administration are being brought out of the shadows into sunshine. And it's an ugly sight.

Yesterday, a House hearing on the failure of the SEC to investigate the Bernie Madoff ponzi scheming—despite voluminous filings by Harry Markopolos, a Boston accountant. Markopolos, it seems to me, was overly generous in attributing the failure to turf wars between New York and Boston. But he went further:

In his testimony yesterday, a frustrated Markopolos said the SEC is "captive to the industry it regulates and it is afraid of bringing big cases against the largest, most powerful firms." He added, "Clearly the SEC was afraid of Mr. Madoff."

Kind of the meta-theme of the entire George Bush era. The crooks have been running the country and cowardly, quaking BushCo did nothing to stop it.

A lot of fingerpointing is going on these days, and it's not a pretty sight. But more and more the nature of the mess that we've all inherited from the worst administration ever is one of ideology and bungling over pragmatism and competence.

Dick Cheney, the magic man behind the preening President, has emerged from his disclosed McLean VA location to talk to Politico. Evidently he's decided he's found the right [in all definitions of "right"] venue to replace Meet the Press as his go-to place for spewing his scaremongering. Maybe some will quiver and shake in their brush-cutter boots, but the more Dick talks, the more the rest of us see his inner Dr. Strangelove in control.

The frustration of the American people is palpable. We voted for change, and yet we see the new President ensnared by the same ol' same ol' posturings and spin, putting party before country. Party before we, the people.

Maybe McConnell needs to spend a little time back home in ol' Kentucky helping his homies get the lights back on. And a little less time trying to tear down the progress the country needs.

Some say there should be trials for all the ideologues and warmongers and profiteers and embeds throughout the government whose mission du jour was to destroy the country to save it in their own likeness.

Surely the militaristic among 'em would recognize the phrase "dereliction of duty." Even if they don't want to understand the compelling case for applying it to the former commander-in-chief on down through his ranks. In the civilian world, it's recklessness, negligence, malpractice.

The revealing SEC hearing yesterday is like a boulder in the Stonehenge [yes, I did watch Sunrise Planet Earth this morning, why do you ask?] of evidence building up in the case against the Bush Administration.

But there's also this matter of the urgency of cleaning up the mess, getting the country back on the right track, pulling back from the abyss of financial ruin.

So I've got a proposition. We'll apply their very own standard on them. Round up every member of al BushCo suspected of being linked to the egregious dereliction of duty that led to this financial and confidencial ruin of our country. Bush, Chee-knee, Norquist, Rove, Rush, Condi, Chris Cox, Alberto Gonzales, Don Rumsfeld, Goodling....feel free to fill in your own nominees...and let's send 'em all to Gitmo.

After all, they tell us, Gitmo's a grand place. Surely they won't mind languishing there a decade or two while we tidy up the cesspool they left us. We'll keep the case files handy and well-organized. Promise.

Waterboards optional.

How's that legacy thing working out, George?
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Going Washington

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The short, unhappy nonconfirmation process of Tom Daschle was a cautionary tale. The system worked...ugly. Will the lesson take? Yet to be determined.

One thing we did discover. We know a whole lot less about those who represent us, back home here in "the sticks" than we think we do.

The disclosures that came out, not just about the unpaid taxes for the driver, but the multimillion dollar fees from the healthcare industry, make me think that for all the ugliness of Daschle's determination to stick it out until he couldn't any more, we dodged a bullet.

There's an entitlement among too many Senators and Representatives and others who sign on to work in DeeCee that after a while they lose touch with what brought them there in the first place.

[Disclaimer: I don't think the Bush ideologues who trashed the place for the past eight years ever had any other agenda than trashin' the place. But then that's me....]

But even the best of them, at their Super Bowl parties or in their caucus lunches or wherever, tell each other how the little people just don't understand how hard they're working for them. Don't appreciate just how important they are.

Oh, they probably don't put it quite that crassly....

But they posture and sometimes preen and find each other the most awesomest, wonderfullest, honestest....

And the rationalization becomes easier. And that's the slippery slope that avalanched right over Obama and his vetting team this week. Chock-full o'Daschle and the deniers and the demigods.

They become "they," not "we," "the people."

They lose touch...with their constituents, their states, their country,

...and whatever brought them to Washington in their dusty ol' cars, still married to their home state wives and their principles.

...And themselves.
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Daschle Man Walking

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Good riddance.
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Next....

Pell Grants = Jobs, Senator Nelson

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ThinkProgress is reporting that Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson may oppose the stimulus package because of--get this--Pell Grant funding.

Excuse me?

More Pell Grant funding = more students who can afford to go to college = more students who need teachers to teach them at that college = more jobs for college-level teachers.

Jobs.

Sounds to me like the good Senator may need to go back to college for some remedial arithmetic and critical thinking.

This message brought to you by the parent of a doctoral teaching assistant.
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Daschle Must Man Up and Do the Richardson

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Josh notes over at Talking Points Memo the synchronicity of Obama and Daschle. That Daschle's Senate seat loss in 2004 opened a wealth of staff for the freshly elected Obama. In sum, says Josh, it'll take a lot for Obama to "pull the plug" on Daschle's nomination.

Which is exactly why Daschle should do the honorable thing himself and withdraw.

All the political capital or likability or loyalty in the world doesn't justify going forward with this nomination. Daschle is not just tainted by tax problems, he's drenched. We're supposed to be better than the Republicans. Not just as weaselly.
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crossposted at firedoglake's Oxdown Gazette

Daschle Downer

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Has Daschle withdrawn as HHS nominee yet?

Why not?
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UPDATE: Glenzilla puts the Daschles to the ethical standards test and finds major fail.
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