THE MYTH OF MORAL SUPERIORITY IS SHATTERED: First, congratulations to Washington Monthly for their timely and useful new blog. Paul Glastris has been kind enough to offer me some occasional real estate, and I intend to make the most of it until he comes to his senses. Let’s begin with the biggest story of the week. But what is it? Is it that Jack Abramoff showered Bush aides with gifts, perhaps illegally, and that they in turn gave Abramoff insider info? Is it that the Bushies were (once again) caught lying about how close Abramoff was to Team W?
In the sweep of history, no doubt, the biggest story is Iraq. And Bob Woodward’s latest blockbuster: that Pres. Bush and his fellow chickenhawks have been lying to us about the level of violence in Iraq, is surely a development that historians will be talking about a hundred years hence. (I love the Bushies’ response: “This is nothing new.” They’re right of course. It’s nothing new that the Bush White House lies. All the time. But for them to be so brazen and blasé about their mendacity is pretty amazing.)
But in my world – campaigns and cable television – nothing matches the Mark Foley story.
I’ve long believed each party has its wrongheaded conceit. Many Democrats have a need to feel intellectually superior, while many Republicans have a need to feel morally superior. Both aggravate the hell out of me (a not-so-bright sinner); neither is remotely true.
But let us now say that as of the Third Day of the Tenth Month in the Year of Our Lord 2006, the Conservative Myth of Moral Superiority has been crushed.
ABC News reports that as long as five years ago, key Republican staffers knew that Foley was a potential danger to children, so they warned pages to stay away from him. And as we’ve all learned in the past few days, House GOP leaders from Dennis Hastert (R-Fat Hypocrite) on down knew something about Foley’s inappropriate behavior and did nothing.
GOP Congressional Campaign Chair Tom Reynolds (R-Soon-to-be-Minority) learned that Foley had been sending inappropriate emails to an underage boy who had been a page in the spring of this year. He did not call the cops. Did not call the FBI. Did not even call the toothless hounds at the House Ethics Committee. But he did take $100,000 from Foley for the NRCC, a contribution the New York Daily News called “unusually large.” Think about that. Reynolds knew Foley was having some sort of inappropriate contact with a child, but he took $100,000 from him. And his spokesliar says he’d be willing to take the rest of Foley’s remaining $2.7 million war chest. Reynolds’ flak didn’t say the money ought to go for counseling and compensation for the children and families this animal harmed. He said Reynolds would like to get his greedy, slimy political mitts on it.
Why? Power, baby. As Henry Kissinger (R-War Criminal) once said, “Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.” Like his colleagues in the GOP elite, Reynolds is so enamored with power, so seduced by the money that buys power, so enthralled with the Republicans’ one-party rule that he turned a blind eye to a red flag every dad in America would have noticed.
Tony Snow (R-Hair Spray) similarly has lost his moral bearings. The former Fox host (as if) told CNN’s Soledad O’Brien yesterday, “I hate to tell you, but it’s not always pretty up there on Capitol Hill. And there have been other scandals, as you know, that have been more than simply naughty e-mails.”
Naughty emails, Tony? Naughty emails? Is there anything more callous, more cavalier, more corrupt than laughing off a sexual predator as “naughty”?
The Capitol needs a change. Hell, it needs to be fumigated. And as the stench and filth of GOP sleaze slowly oozes away, let us never forget that these slimeballs, these dirtbags, these moral midgets think they’re better than you and me.