Chutzpah

There was no way that Republicans would simply accept their defeat in the 2006 elections and be put out to pasture. We all knew that they were BETTER from the attack dog position that they were ever at governing. They thrive on being the persecuted minority; it's hard-wired into their worldview. And since they hate government, attacking those in power is a natural fit.

Still, I'm not sure any of us expected them to have the chutzpah* - there's really no other word for it - to attack the Democrats for the very sins they displayed throughout 12 years of rule in the Congress. Yet we should have. Because these are some of the most shameless people who've ever walked the Earth, and what's more they saw a winning formula in 2006, and they co-opted it. Plus, they rely on a low-information electorate who won't pay attention to the total hypocrisy coming out of their mouths when they blather and bluster.

This actually started very early in the Congressional session, when the GOP started whining about being locked out of the legislative process and the Rules Committee. But it's really reached a state of perfection in the past couple weeks. Once they saw Democratic weakness on Iraq they struck - and in the most logically challenged ways possible.

First they assailed the Democrats for - get this - earmarks.

Reps. John Boehner (R-OH), Roy Blunt (R-MO) and Jerry Lewis (R-CA) all actively participated in the extraordinarily irresponsible explosion of congressional earmarking that began shortly after the Republicans gained control of the Congress in 1995 and lasted until the voters tossed them out this past November. But according to their political rule book, making a huge mess doesn’t mean you can’t complain about how someone else is cleaning it up.

In an effort to sidestep those political mine fields they have instead decided that voters are dumb enough to forget who gave us “The Bridge to Nowhere,” who increased earmarking in the Labor, Health and Human Service Education bill from zero to more than a billion dollars a year, who tripled the number of earmarks in the defense bill, and who is currently the target of criminal investigations because of allegations that their earmarking practices were not only wasteful but also corrupt. Why, they ask, should anyone doubt their commitment to reform?

So indignant are they at the slow pace in reforming the abusive conduct they developed into an art form that they are now attempting to stop the movement of all appropriation bills and as a result funding for myriad critical federal programs.

And guess what, this actually worked, as the Democrats agreed to allow members to question individual earmarks dropped into bills in conference reports, and allow for what Roy Blunt - Roy frickin' Blunt! - called "the same rules of transparency passed by Republicans last Congress." That's right, Roy Blunt is taking the moral high ground on corruption. This guy.

Rep. Roy Blunt and the man he wants to succeed as House majority leader, Tom DeLay, shared similar connections to convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff and to corporate lobbyists.

Blunt, R-Mo., wrote at least three letters helpful to Abramoff clients while collecting money from them. He swapped donations between his and DeLay's political groups, ultimately enriching the Missouri political campaign of his son Matt.

And Blunt's wife and another son, Andrew, lobby for many of the same companies that donate to the lawmaker's political efforts.

The President is getting into this act as well, adamantly huffing that he'll contain runaway spending. The guy that's presided over the largest increase in government since LBJ.

President Bush warned Congress on Saturday that he will use his veto power to stop runaway government spending.

"The American people do not want to return to the days of tax-and-spend policies," Bush said in his radio address.

The House passed a $37 billion budget for the Homeland Security Department on Friday, but Republicans rallied enough votes to uphold a promised veto from Bush.

The measure — one of several annual spending bills that Congress began to consider this week — exceeds Bush's request for the department by $2.1 billion.

Democrats on Friday defended the extra money in the homeland security bill, noting it contains money to hire 3,000 additional border agents, improve explosive detection at airports and provides money to double the amount of cargo screened on passenger aircraft.

Nowhere in the article does it mention the bloated defense budget or the massive increase in spending under Bush and the Republican rubber-stamp Congress. The he said-she said media is just engaging in stenography, and the American people have to figure out on their own how audacious it is for these serial spenders who've been fattening the pockets of contributors for the past 12 years could suddenly be interested in fiscal restraint.

The GOP is even using the phrase do-nothing Congress, when in fact, they've obstructed this Congress from doing the people's business, and they did next to nothing beyond profit taking for the last 12 years.

Republicans also are tweaking Democrats on other fronts, such as stalled efforts to upgrade health care and reduce the cost of college and energy. (which THEY stalled! -ed.)

They are even adopting the same line Democrats once used against them, calling this "a do-nothing Congress."

"If Democrats fail to reverse course, the dynamics in the 2008 elections may shift significantly, allowing Republicans to run as the party of change ... only two years after Democrats successfully campaigned on that same theme," Senate Republican leaders told their ranks in a letter last week.

There's a certain pathology at work here, for Republicans to try and shed everything they've embodied for the past decade and to turn it around on the opposition. But it's devastatingly effective politically.

Just as it was before last year's elections, polls show most Americans believe the United States is headed in the wrong direction.

"The primary reason is war," said James Thurber of American University's Center for Congressional and Presidential Studies.

But there are other reasons. "People have problems in their lives and they don't see the White House or Congress dealing with it," Thurber said.

A Quinnipiac University poll this month found Congress with an approval rating of just 23 percent. "People voted for change. But they don't think they got it," said Peter Brown, an assistant director of the poll.

A Gallup poll last month put Congress's approval rating at 29 percent. The number had fallen to 21 percent last December, just weeks before Republicans yielded control.

We have an instant-grafitication, short-term memorty culture, combined with a very slow ship of state. That means that the calls for change are almost continuous from one election to the next, and either side can simply borrow the other's clothing and use the same messages to their benefit. The Republicans are very, very good at this. We see it in the Iraq debate. The same people that used any scrap of evidence to claim that the surge was working a couple months ago are now saying that the surge hasn't even started yet and we need to give it more time. You simply cannot expect internal logic from these people. They are absolutely shameless, and it helps them immensely in the political arena, where the media has no use for the past either, and sees politics as professional wrestling, where a sense of shame is not a favorable attribute, but a relentless forward-moving attack is.

This is not only worrisome for the next election cycle, but far into the future, as Republicans clearly will keep using these kinds of logical leaps and get away with them, burying the past and attacking with a straight face. Indeed, those honest conservatives breaking with the President ARE setting up the Democrats for the future.

I think that when the "honest conservatives" reject Bush they're just setting up their assault on the Democratic president they expect to see elected next year. Their way of digging themselves out from under the Bush disaster (and obscuring their own massive role in that disaster) will be to swear that "Never again can an American President be allowed that kind of free hand!" This will justify their fighting the new Democratic President tooth and nail for every inch of ground.

For example, Bush's politicization of the career staff in Justice and elsewhere was a very bad thing, no? And certainly this kind of thing has to stop, no? So we will forbid the new Democratic President to interfere with career personnel, with the result that all of the political hacks Bush put in civil service positions will be untouchable. (When that happens, can we expect the media to understand what's going on? No, of course not. Can we expect the Democrats to understand? Not really, but this is one area where I'd trust Rahm Emmanuel. Send a hack to catch a hack.)

Digby expanded on this, and made the absolutely true point that Republicans have no problem co-opting any message and using it to their advantage, whether it's "stolen elections" (through voter fraud) or "culture of corruption" (the current earmark debate) or whatever.

The question is, how do you deal with it, because the Democrats almost invite this attack by going ballistic and trying to explain precisely how Republicans are being hypocritical here.

One way to deal with this infuriating, sophomoric (yet highly effective) political style is to simply ignore them, as we do trolls, who operate on the same principle. Instead of David Obey coming to the floor of the Senate with steam coming out of his ears, explaining that the Democrats are trying to clean up the carnage left behind by 12 years of Republican rule while John Boehner smugly buffs his fingernails and chants "earmarks, earmarks, earmarks" Obey should just refuse to acknowledge Boehner's ridiculous accusations and move forward with his own argument.

It's very unsatisfying, because you want more than anything to scream in frustration that these hypocritical asses have the unmitigated gall to accuse the Dems of exactly what they've been doing for 12 years! But it's what they want and the Dems shouldn't give it to them.

I think mockery is really the best way. The Republicans look ridiculous making these attacks - but only to those who pay enough attention to know the hypocrisy. To the low-information voter, it simply doesn't come across that way. Unless you present it as a given in the context of a joke. People soak in through osmosis what they are expected to know. It's exactly how Republicans operate.

Picture a video of a Republican standing on the House floor. He's going on and on with a long speech about how the Democrats should be ashamed of themselves for selling out to the lingerie industry. The whole time he's wearing a teddy and being outfitted with garters and boustiers and the like. You can see where this is going. It's hard to explain hypocrisy but easy to visualize it, and the public will very easily pick up on the message. Another example was my idea to literally debate a Republican Memory Loss Act calling for federal funding to help Republicans like Scooter Libby and Alberto Gonzales get their memories back.

In the meantime, it's something that these high-paid consultants might want to consider. When the Republicans are this full of chutzpah, you have to throw a little chutzpah right back at them. And understand that when they are whining, that means you're winning.

* - For the Yiddish-ly challenged, chutzpah simply means audacity, denoting behavior that is so fantastically dastardly that it's almost breathtaking to watch someone do it. It was also a book by Alan Dershoqitz I read back when Dershowitz wasn't calling for torture warrants.

Pass the Republican Memory Loss Act of 2007

People laugh, but I think we have a real epidemic here. Whether from vitamin deficiency, a chromosomal imbalance, or too much time spent arguing that the estate tax affects small farms, Republicans are losing their memories left and right, and we simlpy have to do something about it.

I propose a landmark mental health initiative, offered in the Congress, called the "Republican Memory Loss Act of 2007," which would provide $50 million dollars of federal funding into research and development for the National Institute for Health, to determine just what happens when Republicans are forced to testify before Congress or a grand jury and suddenly lose all recollection of their work.

Poor Hans von Spakovsky, for example, simply can't remember his entire tenure in the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department.

Another former Justice Department lawyer went before Congress on Wednesday with few answers for his Democratic interrogators and a spotty memory.

Hans von Spakovsky, who's seeking a full six-year term on the Federal Election Commission, deflected questions about whether he undermined voting rights laws, saying, "I was not the decision maker in the front office of the Civil Rights Division."

Time and again during his confirmation hearing, he cited either the attorney-client privilege or a cloudy memory for his purported role in restricting minorities' voting rights.

Von Spakovsky couldn't remember blocking an investigation into complaints that a Minnesota Republican official was discriminating against Native American voters before the 2004 election.

Under oath, he also said he didn't recall seeing data from the state of Georgia that would have undercut a push by senior officials within the Civil Rights Division to approve the state's tough new law requiring photo IDs of all voters. The data showed that 300,000 Georgia voters lacked driver's licenses. A federal judge later threw out the law as unconstitutional.

He just doesn't remember, guys. You wouldn't throw your dear old grandmother in jail just because she doesn't remember anything from her days as a flapper girl in the 1920s. And we shouldn't be doing the same with Republicans. They aren't cynically pretending to forget to wiggle out of their legal troubles. They have a disease.

Like poor Lurita Doan who has searched and searched her memory about a meeting with the GSA exhorting them to use the office to help Republican candidates in 2006, and could only remember that there were cookies at the meeting. Now, if she were Proust, that rememberance of madeleines would have set off a rich tapestry of rememberances of things past. But she's not, she's a Republican afflicted with this scourge of memory loss.

Chairman Waxman: “At our March hearing, you repeatedly claimed you could not recall any information about the January 26, 2007 meeting or the White House political presentation, and you had absolutely no memory of asking GSA employees how they could help Republican candidates in upcoming elections. That’s what you told us. We questioned you over and over again. You remember there were cookies, you remembered you came in late, you remembered that some employees didn’t attend, but beyond that you said you had no further information. Five weeks later you testified before the Office of Special Counsel and suddenly you had a new enriched details about the meeting and your statements. According to your OSC testimony, you said you asked the White House presenter, how can GSA help its cabinet liaison understand that the opening of the San Francisco federal building would be a perfect event for President Bush to attend. Did you say that to the Office of Special Counsel?”

Doan: “Yes, I believe I did.”

Do you see how this kind of memory loss can spread? Sure, Republicans remember things at just the right time, but in the interim they swim in a sea of unconsciousness, just looking for the one trigger that can bring them back to balance. It's not a life, it's a hellscape.

Just ask the FBI.

An internal FBI audit has found that the bureau potentially violated the law or agency rules more than 1,000 times while collecting data about domestic phone calls, e-mails and financial transactions in recent years, far more than was documented in a Justice Department report in March that ignited bipartisan congressional criticism.

You think they KNEW they were violating the law 1,000 times when they did it? Of course not! They were just following the dictates of their Republican executive branch masters, who don't have the brain capacity to know the law. And we simply must do something about that.

Steve Benen gives his medical diagnosis.

What is it with Republicans and their memories? Giuliani can’t remember being briefed on Bernie Kerik, Alberto Gonzales can’t remember anything, neither can Kyle Sampson, Lurita Doan doesn’t remember important meetings, and John McCain doesn’t remember his policy positions, Karl Rove doesn’t remember talking to Matt Cooper about Valerie Plame. Scooter Libby doesn’t remember how he learned about Plame’s status at the CIA. Condoleezza Rice doesn’t remember Iran reaching out for diplomatic negotiations with the U.S. in 2003.

These poor folks can’t seem to remember much, can they? Aren’t there memory tricks and/or mnemonic techniques that could give them a hand?

No Steve, it's a disease. And it requires a massive public effort to properly understand and treat it. We have done great things in the medical field over the decades. We stopped polio. We fought smallpox and malaria (not in Africa, of course, but here it's pretty much under control). We have constantly moved forward in innovative ways to halt afflictions once thought incurable. Surely we can lick this terrible scourge that affects 1 in 2 Republicans in Washington.

Lurita Doan is forgetting tenses. Forgetting tenses! She's not going to know how to use a fork by next week! We have to do something! We must pass the Republican Memory Loss Act of 2007 and ensure that the GOP has control of their mental faculties from this point forward. Otherwise, how can we trust them in any position of government?

(Run with this one, Rahm Emanuel, you're just the asshole to actually put this to a vote on the House floor)

Please Help

Hi, I'm Alberto Gonzales. You might remember me from such scandals as "the torture memo," "wiretapping American citizens without a warrant," and the US Attorney Scandal. I'm writing today to ask for your support. You see, I want to be the best Attorney General for this country. But my inability to remember anything that's ever been done during my tenure at the Justice Department severely hampers my ability to do my job. Fortunately, I can take weeks off at a time to practice for Congressional hearings, and I have a crackerjack staff who can handle all of the loyalty oaths for interns and direct meddling into ongoing investigations on their own.

But my failing mind is really hampering my ability to look like I'm doing my job. How can anyone believe it when I say that nothing improper was done in the firing of US Attorneys, when I can't even remember what was done in the first place? And I'm not alone. There are so many of us Bush Administration officials that have chronic memory loss. Scooter Libby, Karl Rove, Condoleezza Rice, just to name a few. Do you want to see these noble figures slurping up soup and playing imaginary poker games in their head while they struggle to understand how to tie their own shoes? (Democrats don't answer)

That's why I've started the "Alberto Gonzales Center for Wiping Out Republican Memory Loss." For just the price of a cup of coffee, you can help fund research into studying the Republican brain, and treatments to make sure these lapses never happen again. Call now at 1-800-... Damn, what are those numbers again? Help me, dammit!

Thank you.

(UPDATE: Sadly, Republican politicians aren't giving to the Gonzales Memory Loss Fund. They just want him to go away.)

Bernie: The Gift That Keeps On Giving

Bernard Kerik is going to go to jail for a long time. The charges range from tax evasion to conspiracy to commit criminal wiretapping. His rap sheet includes ties to the mob, banging Judith Regan in an office rented to the city to handle post 9-11 organizational duties, filing false information to the government when he was briefly President Bush's nominee to run the Department of Homeland Security (remember that)?, hatching a plan with former New York lawmaker Jeanine Pirro to wiretap her husband to see if he was having an affair, and about 300 other examples of dirty dealing.

And his old boss, Da Mayor, knew all about this.

Rudolph W. Giuliani told a grand jury that his former chief investigator remembered having briefed him on some aspects of Bernard B. Kerik’s relationship with a company suspected of ties to organized crime before Mr. Kerik’s appointment as New York City police commissioner, according to court records.

Mr. Giuliani, testifying last year under oath before a Bronx grand jury investigating Mr. Kerik, said he had no memory of the briefing, but he did not dispute that it had taken place, according to a transcript of his testimony.

Mr. Giuliani’s testimony amounts to a significantly new version of what information was probably before him in the summer of 2000 as he was debating Mr. Kerik’s appointment as the city’s top law enforcement officer. Mr. Giuliani had previously said that he had never been told of Mr. Kerik’s entanglement with the company before promoting him to the police job or later supporting his failed bid to be the nation’s homeland security secretary.

He specifically said that he doesn't remember, adding to the Republican culture of memory loss we've seen lately. It's a get out of jail free card; just blame everything on your darn junker of a mind. This didn't work with Scooter Libby, isn't working with Alberto Gonzales and won't wotk with Giuliani. His close association with what amounts to a common street thug speaks directly to judgment, and as the campaign continues that judgment will be called into serious question.

I don't know which lame Republican candidate I'm rooting for MORE at this point.

UPDATE: In the interest of fairness, I appreciated this from Rudy, though not for the same reasons:

Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani said Thursday it was a mistake to coin the term "war on terror" because it allows enemies to redefine the United States incorrectly as a nation that prefers war [...]

But Giuliani told a gathering of newspaper reporters that "America is seen as a country by too many that wants to have war, or exercises its power too much, pushes its weight around too much." [...]

Later, in questions with television journalists, Giuliani explained.

"This is a terrorist war against us. We've got to keep reminding ourselves of the fact that they are in various parts of the world planning to come here and attack us or attack us overseas."

Uh, actually Rudy, it's a terrorist war where a small band of fundamentalists attacked us, and we hauled off and went after a country that had nothing to do with it. This is really "We didn't start this war, but we'll finish it" under different cover. The real reason to disavow the war on terror label is explained here.

The "war on terror" has created a culture of fear in America. The Bush administration's elevation of these three words into a national mantra since the horrific events of 9/11 has had a pernicious impact on American democracy, on America's psyche and on U.S. standing in the world. Using this phrase has actually undermined our ability to effectively confront the real challenges we face from fanatics who may use terrorism against us [...]

But the little secret here may be that the vagueness of the phrase was deliberately (or instinctively) calculated by its sponsors. Constant reference to a "war on terror" did accomplish one major objective: It stimulated the emergence of a culture of fear. Fear obscures reason, intensifies emotions and makes it easier for demagogic politicians to mobilize the public on behalf of the policies they want to pursue. The war of choice in Iraq could never have gained the congressional support it got without the psychological linkage between the shock of 9/11 and the postulated existence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. Support for President Bush in the 2004 elections was also mobilized in part by the notion that "a nation at war" does not change its commander in chief in midstream. The sense of a pervasive but otherwise imprecise danger was thus channeled in a politically expedient direction by the mobilizing appeal of being "at war."

It's not about how foreigners can smear us. It's about how we can smear the truth and use fear to justify literally anything.