A Trojan Horse and A Horse's Ass

We thought they were the decent guys. Maybe they weren’t our candidates, didn’t represent our party or politics, but we gave them this: they were decent.

We know better now. Let’s start with the man most detested by half of the country, Senator Joe Lieberman.

Having flipped on climate control and flopped on Iraq, he’s set his jaundiced sights on health care. “It’s time to get reasonable,” Lieberman declared last Sunday on “Face the Nation,” which CBS should have appropriately renamed “Two-Face the Nation” for him. Reasonable? A member of the Democratic Caucus, he’s threatened to filibuster against health care legislation if it includes a public option, threatened to join Republicans in opposition to legislation expanding Medicare coverage to people ages 55 to 64. What will he think of threatening to do next—outlaw band-aids?

He claims to be worried about adding to “tax-payer costs” and the nation’s deficit. How did he manage to be worry free when he supported the war in Iraq?

He claims to listen to his conscience. Since his largest campaign contributions stem from insurance industry sources and industry-affiliated political action committees, that would seem to mean listening to the voices of the people he’s heavily indebted to. He “owes” them. The Independent Senator from Connecticut is anything but independent.

Which brings us back to his membership in the Democratic Caucus. Many in his own party think he’s a Benedict Arnold. Connecticut Representative Rosa DeLauro says, "No one should hold health care hostage, including Joe Lieberman, and I'll say it flat out, I think he ought to be recalled…” Writer Tom Bisky thinks he’s a mole. I think he’s a Trojan Horse. I’m for setting Barney Frank on him.

Stop this man before he kills national health care. In his own words:

“We’ve got to stop adding to the bill, we’ve gotta start subtracting some controversial things. I think the only way to get this done before Christmas is to bring in some Republicans who are open-minded on this, like Olympia Snowe. You’ve got to take out the Medicare buy-in. You’ve got to forget about the public option. You probably have to take out the Class Act…” In other words, Joe Lieberman wants to accent the negative and eliminate the positive. Which brings us to Mr. In-Between, Joe’s bosom buddy John McCain. The Republican standard-falterer says, “Republicans see Mr. Lieberman as a voice of conscience. I'm proud of him for standing up for what he believes in.”

I’m tired of John McCain. He’s a nag.

Lieberman and McCain take their rightful places with Ralph Nader, George W—[add your own choices]—on a Mt. Rushmore of disenchantment.

No Republican Left Behind

I keep promising myself and others not to do any more “political” pieces for awhile. Then another Republican opens his mouth.

I’m learning that every time one dunderhead says something dumber than anything I believe I’ve heard before, I can bank on a new one who won’t keep the public waiting 24 hours to say something even stupider. They surface like seaweed.

I know Republicans don’t have a corner on stupidity, but they’re making a grand old effort to make it look like they do.

Enter Chuck Grassley, Republican of Iowa, U.S. Senator. Dumb as grass.

Publicly airing his outrage with the AIG mega-bonus babies, Senator Dumbassly declared:

“…They would make me feel a little bit better towards them if they’d, uh, follow the Japanese example and come before the American people and take that deep bow and say ‘I’m sorry,” and then either do one of two things--resign, or… go commit suicide.”

But mesmerized by a shiny object—a microphone—he couldn’t stop there.

“It’s irresponsible for the corporations to give bonuses at this time when they’re so suckin’ the tit of the taxpayer.”

Classy doesn’t rhyme with Grassley. (We’ll leave “Chuck” alone.) When the most intelligent thing a man says in 66 words is “uh,” you have to wonder: Why can’t Republicans teach their brethren how to speak? Whenever I encounter Rush Limbaugh gorging on trash talk, I wonder that he puts food in that same mouth.

Some cultures characteristically speak in poetic or flowery phrases—on the face of it a cultured and all in all admirable trait. But I believe they seduce themselves with it. I’ve always thought that was a major part of the problem in negotiating with the Arabs—what they say sounds so good to them as they say it, it becomes gospel. So it is with Republicans, teachers’ pets all, who lingered in the classroom long after the bell tolled, hanging on the precious rhetoric of Ronald Reagan and the absent syntax of George W. Bush with the same awe-baited breath when they should have taken a few extra-curricular speaking lessons from the likes of someone who speaks sense, not spin. Enter Barney Frank.