Monday, May 31, 2010

ARLEN SPECTER

He was named for screen star Richard Arlen and he grew up in Kansas. Tall and solidly built, with dark curly hair, Arlen Specter had a deep voice with a pleasing Western accent that has gotten less crisp over the decades. His attractiveness is not from charm, of which he has little, but from his vitality, intelligence, and high energy.

When young, Specter was assistant counsel to the Warren Commission and gave us the single bullet theory. A Democrat, he was offered the GOP nomination for district attorney of Philadelphia. He accepted it, campaigned hard, got elected. That was in '65. In '67 he ran for mayor and nearly ousted a mediocre incumbent as a Repub in a Dem city.

In office he was aggressive and efficient. But he showed an excessive inclination to expediency that we were to see again when he cozied up to a later mayor, Frank Rizzo, a nominal Democrat who reform city councilman David Cohen aptly summed up as "a corrupt, bloody Tarzan."

Specter was popular. After a bit he got into the Repub race for governor, losing but running very well. Two years after that he won a contested nomination for the Senate and took an open seat. He would serve five terms.

He was a moderate, probably as progressive as he thought he could afford to be and stay in good with his party; his voting record was about 23% liberal according to one measure. It was always surmised that he was a Dem at heart.

Specter was not an exceptional senator and had no great achievements, but he worked hard, looked out for his constituents' interests, and could beat anyone in a race to a camera.

In 1991 President Bush 41 put up a black reactionary named Clarence Thomas for the Supreme Court. There was a story around that Thomas had sexually harassed a black lawyer named Anita Hill. Hill reluctantly confirmed that before the Senate judiciary committee and was grilled and defamed by the Republicans, including Snarlin' Arlen. There was no evident reason for her to lie. I think I am a fair judge of character and I found her entirely credible, while Thomas seemed to me a bad actor in both senses of the term.

During the hearings Specter took the lead in doing the overzealous prosecutor bit and tried his worst to discredit Hill. He was smart enough to know better, even if some of the other Repubs weren't. This was a performance some have never forgiven him for.

His savaging of the young but calm and dignified Anita Hill was hard to stomach. Worse, if he knowingly helped give the title of Justice to a perjuror, he did this country a great disservice.

Why did he do it? I think it was plainly because he felt he would be vulnerable in the '92 primary if challenged, as was expected, by a very conservative state legislator named Stephen Freind. He was protecting his right flank. Freind backed off, but then Specter faced a tough re-election race against Democrat Lynn Yeakel, who made his treatment of Hill an issue. It was "The Year of The Woman" in national politics, but not quite in Pennsylvania.

Staving off the righties became harder and harder. Last time out, Specter was almost overturned by way-way-right Congressman Patrick Toomey. He tried to cover himself again more recently, voting against confirmation of Elena Kagan for solicitor general. But his time was up, and a party switch encouraged by Governor Rendell and President Obama couldn't save him.

I had some amount of admiration for Specter because he never caved so far as to go all the way right; he was mostly reasonable and pragmatic, the kind of Republican that Pennsylvania has usually sent to the Senate. The Anita Hill villainy, however, remains on his record. It will be a blot on it for as long as anyone remembers him.

What is the lesson of this career? Maybe just that if you belong to an evil party you do evil or get forced out - or both.










Saturday, May 29, 2010

LOOKING TO '12: NEWTIE

One of the GOP's 2012 aspirants is former House speaker Newt Gingrich, originally of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and thereafter of Georgia.

He is the Lenin of the Repubs' revolution of 1994, the year they proposed their Contract With America, took over the Congress, and Newt-ered the Clinton administration.

His real first name is Newton. His Pennsylvania Dutch surname he got by adoption; his birth parents were named McPherson. He taught political science and at one time favored Nelson Rockefeller for president. But he has long since been reliably reactionary.

He is astute and able. Yet, probably because of emotional factors, he seems clueless about the present Republican moment. Privately he must be contemptuous of the inflamed amateurs who are upsetting everything and everyone; to him they are the froth and not the beer. But today there is no beer. And their upheaval can't be managed from the top down.

His instinct has been to keep moderates in the party. The "big tent" ideal is right for someone who wants to save the GOP from itself (a suicide mission), wrong for someone who wants to be the presidential choice.

And Newt wants to be president. This is his only chance because of his age and his waning relevance.

What he'd have to do is egg on the blood purge and then, once nominated, dazzle the voting public with big new, imaginative (though right-wing) ideas to make them forget how offensive and mean the party has become and how dark and twisted some of his own complicated persona is.

Newtie-toot-toot could do it. He could do it better than anyone. He is a big-concept thinker.

But something is always seething in him, and sometimes it comes to the surface in wrathful ultra-partisanship. He has that demonic, Nixonian element.

There are things that enrage him. He hates the hippies, for example, who anyone would think were just exercising the freedom he says he believes in. But to him any male who doesn't wear a necktie during the day and worship money is at best a parasite and probably a commie.

Newt has had some bad publicity. Scandal cost him his speakership, and he has a history of cheating on wives and sexual opportunism. Again, he would have to distract people from all that.

His best move would be an expedient religious conversion to appease the Religious Right. He could join some far-right mega-church with a crypto-gay pastor; then he can boast of having seen the error of his ways and being a new man, while continuing to serve Mammon.

And it's come-to-Jesus time with the teabaggers, as well. To woo them, he had better lose his insider vibe. In the fall campaign he can offer his years and his experience as evidence of gravitas.

And he had better quit glowering and take off some weight so as to lose those jowls.

My instinct says this is someone to fear in power, not because he is Macchiavellian, which he is, and not because he is a rightist true-believer, which he also is, but because he is unstable and has all that irrational anger in him.

These days, within the Republicult, that last attribute could golden, if he can use it and not be used by it.

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

THE LEINENKUGEL BLUES

A businessman named Dick Leinenkugel not long ago declared his candidacy for the Repub nomination for U.S. Senator from Wisconsin. The seat is that of Dem hero Russ Feingold. There were other candidates for the nomination, but Leinenkugel was regarded as the most viable of the lot.


He is quite conservative and you might figure he is just what the Repubs want. But he isn't. And he is no longer running.


So what happened? Did he dig his political grave with his mouth, Rand Paul style? Was he found with, as the saying goes, a dead girl or a live boy? Was he caught with his hand in the till? is he unwell? No to all of the above.


Despite his conservatism, Leinenkugel was done in by rightist radio talkers and bloggers. They labeled him - horror of horrors! - a moderate. What did he do to provoke this calumny? He briefly worked as state commerce secretary under Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle, a Democrat.


Leinenkugel explained that he thought this non-ideological job was a practical transition from business to public affairs. But no. He fraternized with the enemy. There can be no compromise.


Leinenkugel said something worth noting when he withdrew from the race. He said that the wave of intolerance we are witnessing on the right does not come from anger (as we keep being told by the teabaggers and the rightist-influenced media) but from hate.


Anger, he said, can be healthy. It can precipitate righteous resolve. It can motivate citizens to take reform measures. Hate, however, accomplishes nothing constructive.


So we begin to see that even between very conservative citizens there is a gulf.


On one side of it are those whose orientation is practical, like Dick Leinenkugel. They are reasonable. They understand that compromise is essential to our kind of society and government. They are good citizens and will do things like take on a job for a liberal governor, to promote not liberalism but a prosperity that is in the interest of everyone.


On the other side of the gulf are the teabag crowd, who are politically active only to vent and attack and demean and wreck things. Theirs is the politics of the tantrum.


The Republican party gave way to the Republicult when it decided that only ultra-conservatives could seek office under its banner. But now even many ultra-conservatives are to be cast into outer darkness because they want to serve in government rather than dismantle it.


When Barack Obama offered a new politics of hope, the Republicult countered with a new politics of hate. When and how will this folly end? We can only wait and see.

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

RAND PAUL: THE MAKEOVER

On TV you see makeovers of people and houses. One guy who could use a political makeover is Rand Paul.

Paul has said too much to the national media. He can probably win the Senate seat anyway. But how does he get from the Senate to the White House? He must start modifying his performance now.

He is so intoxicated with his libertarian vision that he hasn't realized what it would do in practice. He wants weak government for the sake of freedom, but he doesn't see that it takes a strong government to keep people free from health-destroying environmental degradation, discrimination in employment, monopoly, oligarchy, etc. He isn't for racism, but he hasn't recognized that freedom to practice racism is incompatible with freedom from racism. He and his aides must work out a new overview and rehearse it.

He thinks too abstractly. He oversimplifies. He lacks a sense of nuance. But he can adapt.

He doesn't seem mad at anyone, which is a plus. Despite his zeal, he comes across as good-natured. While he hasn't much charm, he can be engaging. And he has a slightly elfin quality.

What about that makeover, then?

Okay, Rand, babes, here's the deal:

>Your task is to complicate your worldview and your persona. You can say, "I'm a liberty boy, yeah, but I get that there has to be regulation. Businesses should be free to do right, not wrong." Make yourself harder to categorize. Stress practicality and the limits of theory.

>The fury of the teabaggers, with whom you are so identified, alarms the independents and conservative Dems you want to attract. So take pains not to be unfair. Don't call your opponent names. Play down the "liberal" and "socialist" language, as that doesn't persuade anymore. Tell your audiences that this is still one country, not two, and that what works best will be evident to everyone in the long run. That fits with your native optimism.

>You are thought even by some who know you to take yourself too seriously. Put some humor into your act. Above all, poke fun at yourself. That's disarming. Seem like a good guy who can take a joke.

>Try to be thoughtful and imaginative rather than rigid and predictable. A good proposal for you to make might be an end to the Constitutional prohibition against foreign-born persons serving as president. When there are so many legal immigrants among us, that prohibition has to seem bigoted and unrealistic to contemporary people. Your party has alienated Hispanics, the fastest-growing minority. You can appeal to them with this proposal, offering them a chance to be first-class citizens all the way. That is not inconsistent with what you believe. And what is your Dem opponent going to say? "No, I'm for keeping them inelligible"? Hardly. He will have to go along with you. Whatever common ground you have with him will make you look less extreme.

That's what I'd suggest Paul do. Now we'll see what he actually does.

Sunday, May 23, 2010

LOOKING TO '12: TINY TIM

One of those aspiring to the GOP presidential nod in 2012 is Minnesota's governor Tim Pawlenty.

Most people don't know much about Pawlenty. Did you know that his dad was a fervent Stalinist who read to the family every evening from Das Kapital and made his kids memorize the Communist Manifesto?

Did you know that Tim ran away from home at age 11, that he took with him only an American flag that he had bought with his skimpy allowance, and that he used the flag as a blanket while sleeping out in the wild till he was able to join a circus and make some money?

Did you know that he became a daring circus acrobat and used what he earned to pay his way through Harvard where he got straight "A"s?

Did you know that as governor he wiped out the state debt, greatly reduced the bureaucracy yet improved its productivity, cut taxes in half, aggressively tackled environmental pollution, doubled benefits to the disabled, and introduced a new era of cooperation and good feeling in Minnesota civic life?

You didn't know all that? Where have you been?

Of course you didn't know it. All of it is bull. I present it for contrast with the real story.

What is this fella really like? Well, he's 49. He's fairly pleasant-looking. He dresses well. (Yawn) Excuse me!

Timbo's background? Played ice hockey in high school, labor lawyer, vice prez of a software company, city councilman, state legislator, ran for gov promising not to raise taxes and won narrowly, raised fees, got re-elected by 1% of the vote. (Zzzzzzzzzz)

In '05 a disagreement with legislators, along party lines, led to a temporary shutdown of the state government. Lately another crisis has arisen, with Pawlenty insisting on closing a three billion dollar deficit without further taxation and rejecting compromise. Obviously a great leader and a unifier.

Wikipedia's article on him reports, "State and local taxes increased for 90% of state residents, but tax rates decreased for those earning more than $130,000." Why is this not surprising?

He seems intent on showing himself an unmitigated right-winger worthy of the Republicult, regardless of what that does to his state and its citizens.

Who needs this?

He's right-wing enough for what he aspires to, and he might be on the nominee's short list for veep. But for the top spot? Somebody so obscure and so bland could get a presidential nomination only if he were a compromise choice.

Ooops. Forgot. No compromises on the right!

Thursday, May 20, 2010

RAND PAUL: DESTINY'S CHILD?

The GOP wants the teabaggers' passion and fears their wrath. I have been on the lookout for the Big Bagger, the person who commands their loyalty and would be viable as the party's presidential choice. It may be that he is in view.

I am referring to the Repub nominee for U.S. senator from Kentucky, Dr. Rand Paul. Forty-seven years old, he is an eye surgeon and a son of several-time presidential candidate Ron Paul. Rand has promoted low taxes but had not run for office till now.

The teabaggers are wild for this lad, and he has pledged his fealty to them. I doubt he needed their help to win, and he has given them a victory after a string of primary election defeats.

Already White House talk has begun.

Rand Paul is different. He is different to the ear and even to the eye. Youthful-looking and curly-haired, he is glib and has been accused of sounding messianic. Most of these right-wing pols come across as frowningly cautious and dour, but Paul speaks with conviction and enthusiasm.

He has his own point of view and isn't just going along with a party trend. So in that sense he is refreshing. His forthrightness and openness contrast nicely with Mitt Romney's phoniness and opportunistic positioning.

It has been noted elsewhere that old Ron Paul has an air of humility that makes him likeable while he is being a know-it-all, while Rand is cocky and arrogant. You can get away with arrogance in politics if it translates as self-assurance and leadership ability. But you must let people see that you recognize your limits.

Like his father, Rand is against an interventionist foreign policy and was opposed to the Iraq invasion. There are many in the GOP, perhaps Dubya and Cheney above all, who do not want to see a Republican with that viewpoint get somewhere. They will not be his fans.

The Repubs have notoriously nominated for president the person whose "turn" it was perceived to be. In '12 that might be Newt Gingrich. But if Rand Paul wins this Senate seat, the new populist uprising in the otherwise lifeless party might bear him on its shoulders to the nomination. One senses that that would be fine with him.

A Rand Paul-Scott Brown ticket? Could happen.

First, though, there is this year's election. Polls have had Paul far ahead. But, like other political novices, he is in danger of getting in trouble by being incautious. Lately skilled interviewers have been drawing him out and revealing how Martian some of his thinking is.

Though he emphasizes that he abhors racism, he expressed displeasure that the landmark 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibits businesses from being racist in employment; what he dislikes is the loss of local discretion. Only a conservative would think that a businessman's "right" to be a bigot outweighs the right of his employees to be treated fairly.

This disclosure at once put him on the defensive, though I'm sure not for long.

Then he blew it twice more: defending the oil company BP against President Obama in the oily wake of that terrible spill, and grousing about the cost to business of the Americans With Disabilities Act.

Paul is untested, still a kid politically. He is going to have to catch on fast about what he can and cannot say. Being seen as sticking up for segregation and oil pollution and discrimination against disabled workers is uncool. Democratic candidate Jack Conway has been jumping all over him, and rightly so.

Paul has clammed up. Look for him to stay "on message" hereafter.

It's a shame that he can't continue being candid. Authenticity is good for a human being. And it is good for the voting public to know what a candidate really thinks. Unfortunately, Paul's authentic self is a little creepy, putting bigger profits for international corporations ahead of the well-being of Americans and the success of American ideals.

Kentucky is Dem in registration - by half a million votes - but is also a conservative state that often votes Republican. The president is unpopular there. My suspicion is that if Rand Paul handles things well from now on, he will be elected by a wide margin. If anything defeats him, it is likely to be his assumption that history is calling and that nothing can.

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

WHAT RECENT PRIMARIES TELL US

The Dem electorate has been showing a strong survival instinct by nominating candidates who look like winners, even repeatedly defying the party's national and state leaders in order to do so. Cases in point:

>West Virginia's Dem Congressman Alan Mollohan has been in the House forever, and his old man was there forever before him. Mollohan is a porkbarrel type and has been under fire for ethically questionable behavior involving his office and a business; this gave the GOP hopes of knocking him off in November. But Mollohan lost his primary to young, less liberal, reform-minded State Senator Mike Oliverio, whose distinguishing traits are just what it will take to keep that seat blue.

>For the Dem nod for U.S. senator from Kentucky, Lieutenant Governor Dan Mongiardo, a wealthy and somewhat conservative physician with a propensity for being unpleasant and needlessly controversial, had organizational support and led in the polls during most of the race. But by the end the young and clean-cut and more liberal state Attorney General Jack Conway edged past him. Conway is by far the more delectable and more electable of the two.

>Pennsylvania Senator Arlen Specter had the president and the governor and all of the party machinery behind him for the Dems' Senate nomination. Congressman Joe Sestak gave up a safe seat to challenge him, despite polls that showed Specter with what appeared an insurmountable lead. But Sestak, who is a retired 3-star admiral, a Harvard Ph.D, and an all-around attractive guy who has been in public office for only 4 years, won by 8 points. Specter is 80 and has been a senator for 30 years. He had too much baggage and too much a patina of opportunism to come out on top in the fall, in my estimation. Sestak, who is 58 and a new face to most Pennsylvanians, should do fine.

Mollohan, Mongiardo, and Specter had the connections and the endorsements and the ward leaders on their side. The voters didn't listen to the party honchos and made the right choices.

Along with the primaries, there was one Congressional race. The Republicult thought it was going to pick up the late Jack Murtha's seat in Pennsylvania's Johnstown district. Instead, Murtha's aide Mark Critz bested rich Repub businessman Tim Burns 54%-44%, a landslide. This is a blue collar district, full of what used to be called Reagan Democrats. If the Repubs can't carry such places, they will not make gains.

Since Obama took office there have been special Congressional elections in NY-20, IL-5, CA-32, CA-10, NY-23, FL-19, and now PA-12. How many of them did the GOP win? NONE!

The rightist-influenced media are telling you that this is inevitably a Repub year, that the Dems are sure to get wiped out. If you look at the evidence you won't buy the lie.

Sunday, May 16, 2010

WHERE IMBECILITY ABOUNDS

Some dude named Bradley Byrne has been the frontrunner for the Republicult's nomination for governor of Alabama. Now? Hard to say. Poor Brad just got hit with a vicious attack ad that accuses him of holding that parts of the Bible are not factual and that evolution exists. (This is from foxnews.com, 5/13/'10.)

Ol' Brad knows better than to let those charges stand! He at once replied that he does too believe that every word of the Bible is literally true and that evolution is wrong. He wants to make sure everyone in Alabama knows he's as big on fact-denying and reality-defying as any of 'em.

He says the ad was a joint plot by his primary opponents and the Dems. Seems they're ganging up on him to try to make him seem intelligent, which would render him unelectable.

This is what politics is like in Alabama. Sometimes I find myself wishing that the Souf had gotten safely out of the Union and stayed out. But I don't really feel that way, because I think in the longest term things will change. Still, the aggravation is there, along with that mind-bending legacy of slavery, segregation, and opposition to every notion that's honest or humane.

And don't think I'm criticizing religion, by the way. I am satisfied from much evidence that a spiritual realm exists, that we survive our deaths, and that miracles occur in this world. But literal-mindedness, exclusivism, and triumphalism are not legitimate features of any religion; they are hateful attempts to marginalize and one-up other people.

And when religious beliefs are taken to be factual claims and are used to contradict the sciences, we got trouble. Where they are used as a test of eligibility for public office, we are no longer in America, even if we are very much in red Alabama.

Sometimes only mockery is broad enough and sharp enough to answer folly:

"Ah believe the yoo-nee-verse is six thousand years old and dinosaur remains are a test of our faith, and nothin' will ever convince me otherwise.

"And ah say we should make the laws of Moses replace these-here sek-yoo-lar laws we got now.

"Besides, mah opponent married outside his family."

We are just going to have to wait out Alabama and the other deep red states, the same way we waited out the Soviet Union. Immigration from Northern states and other countries will eventually dilute the propensity for stupidity-worship and make it possible to unify the country.

Thursday, May 13, 2010

BUNCHA DUMMIES

Not to be overly tactful, why is that the Republicans run uninformed, incurious, and downright unintelligent people for national office? I mean, why would they want to?

I am thinking of Dan Quayle, Dubya, and Sarah Palin, who have embarrassed themselves and us. And if they are the classroom dunces, other Repub nominees have been "C-" students: Barry Goldwater, Jerry Ford, Ronnie Reagan. But the Dems have consistently run "A" and "B+" students.

Just for the heck of it, I'm going to look back to the start of the last century and compare the intelligence of the Repub and Dem presidential nominees. One can differ with my calls, of course. But it's a free country; as one who has always been interested in politics and biography, and who was a political science major in college before switching to philosophy in grad school, I feel qualified to offer assessments with no implication that anyone must agree with them.

By the way, 1904 was the only election in which the Dem nominee was more conservative than the Repub.

So, then:

1900: William McKinley, R vs. William Jennings Bryan, D. I'd call this a wash.

1904: Theodore Roosevelt, R vs. Alton B. Parker, D. Another wash.

1908: William Howard Taft, R vs. William Jennings Bryan, D. Still another wash.

1912: Woodrow Wilson, D vs. William Howard Taft, R. Wilson was smarter.

1916: Woodrow Wilson, D vs. Charles Evans Hughes, R. Wilson had the edge, but not by much.

1920: Warren G. Harding, R vs. James M. Cox, D. Cox was much smarter.

1924: Calvin Coolidge, R vs. John W. Davis, D. Davis was smarter.

1928: Herbert Hoover, R vs. Al Smith, D. I'd call it a wash.

1932-1944: Franklin Delano Roosevelt bested four Repubs: Herbert Hoover, Alf Landon, Wendell L. Willkie, and Thomas E. Dewey. He was smarter than all four. Who came closest to him for brains? Willkie.

1948: Harry S. Truman, D vs. Tom Dewey, R. If either had the edge, it was Truman.

1952 and 1956: Dwight D. Eisenhower, R vs. Adlai E. Stevenson, D. I'd say a wash. Stevenson was impressive intellectually, while Ike had been a great general.

1960: John F. Kennedy, D vs. Richard M. Nixon, R. Nixon was the smartest Repub nominee from then till now, but JFK was a little smarter.

1964: Lyndon B. Johnson, D vs. Barry M. Goldwater, R. LBJ was decidedly smarter.

1968: Richard M. Nixon, R vs. Hubert H. Humphrey, D. If either had the edge, Humphrey did.

1972: Richard M. Nixon, R vs. George S. McGovern, D. Nixon was smarter.

1976: Jimmy Carter, D vs. Gerald R. Ford Jr., R. Carter, a nuclear scientist, was smarter.

1980: Ronald W. Reagan, R vs. Jimmy Carter, D. Carter was smarter.

1984: Ronald W. Reagan, R vs. Walter F. Mondale, D. Mondale was somewhat smarter.

1988: George H. W. Bush, R vs. Michael S. Dukakis, D. Dukakis was smarter. (Some day I may share with you my theory as to why the very intelligent and ruthlessly competitive Dukakis blew the election.)

1992: Bill Clinton, D vs. George H. W. Bush, R. Clinton was smarter.

1996: Bill Clinton, D vs. Bob Dole, R. Clinton was smarter.

2000: George W. Bush, R vs. Al Gore, D. Gore was smarter.

2004: George W. Bush, R vs. John F. Kerry, D. Kerry was smarter.

2008: Barack H. Obama, D vs. John S. McCain, R. Obama was smarter.

So there is a marked imbalance here. You'd have to wonder why. In only one contest do I see the Repub as the brighter guy, that being Nixon over McGovern in '72.

Long ago in old England, the Conservatives became known as "the stupid party." You know, there could be something to that!

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

TEXAS: GETTING RIPE FOR CHANGE?

Texas was conservative before conservatism started pretending to be cool. At first it elected oil-industry-owned rightist Dems, but for years it has gone reliably Repub.

Now the voters may be getting restless. And it doesn't help the GOP's chances that its state leadership was taken over some years ago by professional Jesus freaks whose mindset is more punitive than anything.

Long-time governor Rick Perry is a square-jawed pretty-boy type, thick of hair and eyebrows and head. He once supported Al Gore but then flipped and got to be Dubya's lieutenant governor. Perry looked vulnerable at first in this year's primary. U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison challenged him and polls had her ahead. But then Perry began sounding teabag and neo-Confederate themes, hinting at secession and appealing to people's worst instincts. Repubs began salivating at this red meat and repudiated Hutchison for her (falsely) perceived moderation.

In the general election, Perry has to juggle his unresponsive record and his extremist positioning from the primary while trying to discredit Dem nominee Bill White, an ex-Houston mayor who was also deputy U.S. energy secretary. Moderate conservatives, for whom soundness and experience mean something, may find the competent and not-very-liberal White preferable to the all-show-and-no-go Perry. (But if Perry can win again, look for him to run for president in '12 or '16.)

I blogged a couple of days ago about Repub Senator John Cornyn. He won't go before the voters for a while, but they have no special reason to retain him when he does. He is a typical slash-spending-but-bring-home-the-pork-anyway conservative with no redeeming qualities.

Hutchison is retiring from the Senate and many Repubs are competing for the nomination to succeed her. It is too soon to say whether that situation will vitiate the usual GOP advantage, given a good run by the lone Dem in the race. He is an old hand at politics: John Sharp, at one time the state comptroller. A moderate, he has the kind of populist edge and *sharp* wits that the Lone Star electorate has shown it sometimes appreciates.

While Texans may not cotton to liberalism, they may no longer be willing to put up with shoddy goods, either. Because sooner or later practicality becomes what matters. So keep Texas in view.

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

HYPOCRISY, THAT GREAT VALUE

We have just had more evidence, as if it were needed, that hypocrisy is one of the prime conservative values. It keeps taking its place along with a handful of others such as love of privilege, heartlessness, and hatred of what America stands for (such as personal freedom, democracy, and equal opportunity) by those who are violently "for" America.

Hypocrisy has winked at us from politicians who would subjugate women and gays in the name of Traditional Family Values while taking a "wide stance" in men's rooms or paying off a mistress's hubby or "hiking the Appalachian Trail" to a gal pal in Buenos Aires. But it is good to see that it isn't confined to he-he and he-she hanky panky.

Texas' GOP Senator John Cornyn, a silver-haired cipher who looks and thinks like a corporate exec, has weighed in on President Obama's nomination of Elena Kagan for a seat on the Supreme Court, saying, among other things: "Ms. Kagan is...a surprising choice because she lacks judicial experience. Most Americans believe that prior judicial experience is a necessary credential for a Supreme Court Justice." Presumably Cornyn agrees with "most Americans" or he would not cite this.

But this is John Cornyn as of five years ago: "I mean, one reason I felt so strongly about Harriet Miers's qualifications is I thought she would fill some very important gaps in the Supreme Court. Because right now you have people who've been federal judges, circuit judges most of their lives, or academicians. And what you see is a lack of grounding in reality and common sense that I think would be very beneficial." (The quotes are compliments of Salon.com)

Miers, who had to withdraw as a nominee because too controversial and too obviously lacking in qualifications, seems an odd person to praise for common sense. But you get the picture.

Cornyn's partisan double standard is plain. If Dubya wants someone from outside the judiciary for the Court, he's a statesman. If Obama does, he's trying to stick us with some underachiever.

If you think that Cornyn left himself a figleaf in '05 when he cited "academicians" (of which Kagan has been one) along with judges as those overly represented on the Court, consider that his present statement about prior judicial experience being "necessary" still nails him.

Probably Cornyn will end up voting to confirm Kagan. A liberal president who won a clear mandate is not going to nominate a conservative, and the seat should not remain vacant. And, while fairness and consistency clearly mean nothing to him, he and other Republicultists have to worry a little that too much negativity, along with offering nothing constructive ever, may begin to wear on an electorate that is down on politicians these days anyway.

For one day both of John Cornyn's faces will face the voters again. And in the meanwhile, the eyes of Texas are upon him.

Sunday, May 9, 2010

WHAT'S WITH COBURN, ANYHOW?

Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn is a Repub in good standing. You are unlikely to find an issue on which he is not 100% reactionary. So far, so good for his party reputation.

But he has this attitude. It can only be aggravating to the faithful.

Hair mop-thick, bespectacled, with a blunt rural face, he looks a bit as Tom Sawyer might be expected to look at age 62. He is a physician and has served three terms in the House and one in the Senate. If popular Dem governor Brad Henry runs against him - whether he will is still not disclosed - Coburn could be in for a rough race this year.

And Coburn should go. Yet he is a bit of a rebel, on his own terms. He retains some contrarian instincts.

President Obama has cited him as a personal friend and someone who will listen fairly. That may not mean a lot, considering his voting record. But it is something you don't often find anymore.

A week or two ago Coburn shocked a gathering by stating that Nancy Pelosi is a nice lady and that people should not listen uncritically to the deliverances of Fox News. When somebody challenged him about Pelosi, he asked if the person knew her? Well, said Coburn, he does; so he can say. That didn't go over well.

Whether Coburn survives this year's vote could be complicated by his possible involvement in the engineering of the payoff arrangement alleged to have existed between Nevada's GOP Senator John Ensign and his ex-mistress's husband. It could be that a friendship made him do something impolitic.

But even that displays a nonconformity that is anachronistic.

It is no secret that I am hoping for the self-destruction of the Republicult. The remnants of tolerance and unprogrammed thinking within it that are represented by a Tom Coburn or a Mike Huckabee weigh against that. But those gents are effectively isolated; while they may not be kicked out by the teabaggers, they also cannot be influential to the extent that they are unrepresentative.

For "better" no longer means anything. It has become a euphemism for "a bad lemming."

Thursday, May 6, 2010

VULGARITY VS. VENOM

Fox News, that bastion of objective journalism, had an online article (FOXNews.com, May 5, 2010) on President Obama reportedly having "once used the vulgar term 'tea-bagger' to refer to the Tea Party movement."

Needless to say, only Fox would deem this news. And why is "teabagger" to be thought of as vulgar ? The article says "'Tea-bagging' has been used as a derogatory term for the Tea Party movement because of its sexual connotations."

News to me. And I thought I had heard all the sexual slang.

This is a trifle esoteric. Wes Richards says he thinks it has to do with oral sex among females.

But I wouldn't dare use the alternative that Fox does, "Tea Party movement," or I would be accused of accusing these patriots of gathering to smoke pot. (They're for sure smoking something.)

What is strange also is that there was an article in the veddy veddy conservative National Review not long ago discussing whether the term "teabaggers" should be adopted or resisted. Looks like the Buckley crowd wasn't aware of the vulgar meaning, either.

The article relates, "Tea Party sympathizers were quick to respond. 'It is insulting to have him lecture on civility while being the least civil participant,' Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform said in a written statement. 'Obama, get out of the gutter, wash your mouth out with soap and grow up.'"

Mr. Norquist knew the vulgarism. Vulgarity is the medium in which he works.

And Mr. Norquist, who, as an oligarchist, is also an authority on civic virtue, has now accused the president of the United States -- that most civil and mature-minded of gentlemen -- of being "the least civil participant" in our national discussion. Not while Mr. Norquist is with us!

Whether or not the president was aware of the of the phrase's vulgar implication, it is in everyday use throughout the country; and his remark was made in private.

Mr. Norquist has also instructed the president of the United States to get out of the gutter, to wash his mouth out with soap, and to grow up. How's that for unreason and arrogance?

Somebody on the right said the lefties started this wild disrespect for the presidency by attacking Dubya. I seem to recall Dubya being equated with a village idiot. But Dubya actually did things to make sensible people angry with him, such as invading Iraq, damaging civil liberties, and turning opinion in the rest of the world against us. When someone hurts America, whether from malice or just from obtuseness and messed-up values, you can see why Americans would get mad and be resentful.

Obama, on the other hand, has done nothing wrong and has done much toward repairing what Dubya did to us. And if insulting Dubya was a fault, why are these great patriots compounding the example rather than setting us a better one?

I am very tired of outrageous dolts like Mr. Norquist. There is no getting along with him, and one gets burned by trying to contain his mind's toxins with rationality.

Mr. Norquist, sir, the term "teabagger" now belongs in perpetuity to you and your ilk. It is the sex organs of lesbians that should feel offended by being associated in people's minds with you.

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

LOOKING TO '12: SLIPPERY MITT

Willard Mitt "Mitt" Romney is the only Republican prospect who has the executive intelligence and skills to be an effective president.

He could be one, that is, if the policies he implemented were rational ones. He knows well enough how to be rational. The trouble is that he's willing not to be, if that's what it takes to win.


He ran the Olympics and aced that big job. Then he got himself elected gov of Massachusetts as a moderate Republican. He got his healthcare program through and was probably on top of things.


Then he realized that in a weak field he'd have a shot at the '08 GOP presidential nomination. But the party was reactionary, while he had not been.


He resolved that dilemma with what was practically a religious conversion, ditching his dad's sane, flexible, centrist Republicanism and becoming a typical far-right fanatic overnight.


What that should convince anyone realistic of is that he would do anything to get to the White House. You want to be careful about electing someone like that because, once in the office, he might also do anything to remain there.


Nothing that Mitt says is fair or reasonable. He criticizes Obama constantly and for everything, because that's how you get support in the Republicult.


I've told you what my buddy George Ball said about Mitt: that he "has a kind of glossy insincerity that some Republicans like." Entirely true. It reflects a character flaw that keeps showing up.


I remember watching a debate some years back when Romney ran against Ted Kennedy for the Senate. Mitt was listing categories he had proposals for. Coming to the next one on the list, he practically shouted the word "WOMEN"! It was plainly calculated. I'm sure he expected that Ted would flinch or look guilty and that the camera would immortalize that moment; but the senator showed no more reaction than if he had said, "FED INTEREST RATES"!


I decided in that moment that I did not like Romney and could never trust him.


He's running full-tilt for '12 and is one of the frontrunners along with the going-nowhere Ron Paul and the from-nowhere Sarah Palin. And he is better than they are: sounder and more capable. So he can't be overlooked.


But I'm telling you here and now that he won't make it. The teabaggers won't have him because he's an establishment Republican, not an outsider. The Religious Right won't have him because he's a Mormon, which according to them makes him a non-Christian and an agent of Satan. The third large component of the national GOP, the Wall Street and big money types, would like him just fine. But the other two groups each have a veto.


If he had been prescient, Mitt would have changed parties 30 years ago. Then he might have gone all the way by now. But it doesn't break my heart that he didn't.

Sunday, May 2, 2010

LOOKING TO '12: OL' HUCK

Former Arkansas gov Mike Huckabee made a failed but not disastrous bid for the GOP nomination in '08. Huck is different from the others, and not just because he's a sometime clergyman who became an anti-obesity crusader. There's something else that's interesting about him.

You know, it used to be a prime ingredient of the successful politician that he could get people's votes just because he was able to make them like him personally and could impress them. They might not care for his stands on the issues, but he could get around that. "I don't usually vote for Dems, but just I gotta vote for ol' JoJo."

Obama has that quality, though today people seem more impervious to it than ever in the past. JFK had it. Reagan did. Ike did, more than any of them. But today's Repubs? Do you think anybody would support a Sarah Palin or a Mitt Romney in spite of their views rather than because of 'em? Shows you how things have changed.

Huck is a throwback. You might expect a Repub to be a throwback, of course. But he's a throwback to when people voted the person, not the party.

He does funny, atypical things. He has a twinkle, rather than rage, in his eye. He'll voice the usual nonsense with conviction, but then unexpectly he'll do something disarming. He'll suddenly praise Bill or Hillary for this or that. He'll say something generous. He'll say something that's actually fair. He'll take you by surprise. Not all the time, certainly, but enough for it to get noticed and soften folks up.

You can imagine someone saying, "That guy is pretty conservative for my taste, but I just freepin' like him."And that could amount to something at the polls.

A candidate who's personable could be a secret weapon for a party that otherwise seems determined to shrink its base with every intolerant and ill-considered position. When your issues hurt you, run a candidate who can make people forget about them.

What's with him? Perhaps it's just his temperament. Or possibly his training as a minister convinced him that something permanent matters, so that partisanship doesn't carry him completely away.

Of course, his record as governor was nothing exceptional. But again, once in a while he'd do something neat. When refugees from a neighboring state flooded into Arkansas after a natural disaster, he ordered the bureaucracy to forget the paperwork and get immediate help to them. That kind of thing.

Huck may not have the stomach for a run in today's climate. He seems to be hanging back. He has hinted that he may not go again.

And, let's face it, the teabaggers would be deeply distrustful of someone who isn't a hater, someone who doesn't think the other side ought to be exterminated. So he may be through.

It's a shame, in a way, that someone who makes the atmosphere less sulfurous is wrong for our time. But now, at least, those who vote against the GOP nominee won't have to do so with a twinge of regret.