I Am An Idiot

Zoot inadvertently deleted all the comments in this posting. She’s sorry for trashing everyone’s remarks—it was entirely by accident, she says. Feel free to file your complaints with , who cleverly managed to preserve her own posting while deleting mine.

If you ever doubted that the Republican leadership is as cynically manipulative as Joseph Goebbels’ Reich Ministry of Propaganda, today’s New York Times story, House Passes Court Limits on Pledge, should convince you:

WASHINGTON, Sept. 23 – The Republican-led House of Representatives approved a measure on Thursday that would bar federal courts from ruling on the text of the Pledge of Allegiance. Democratic critics called the bill unconstitutional and unnecessary.

By a vote of 247 to 173, the House adopted the measure, which its Republican authors said would prevent federal judges from striking the clause “under God” from the pledge as it is recited in classrooms, as well as at the opening of every Congressional day.

The cover story, that Democrats, atheists and lesbians are scheming to take god out of the Pledge of Allegiance, is catnip to the drooling mad right wing. It’s also camouflage for an attack on the constitutional separation of the three branches of government.

It’s 1933 all over again: under the cover of “protecting” Americans’ religious freedom, the Republicans are engaged in the great Synchronization, insuring that no branch of government can oppose their ideological agenda. This is not a battle over the single issue of keeping the words “under god” in the Pledge: it’s a battle for control of the system itself—a fight not just over a rule, but over who gets to make the rules.

Sixty years from now, people will look back at the Republican party and wonder how Americans allowed themselves to be led over a cliff by a band of ruthless ideologues. Citizens of other countries will shake their heads at a leader who wouldn’t be competent enough to hold down a job at Starbucks, but through family connections and an aptitude for viciousness, managed to fail his way to the top of the U.S. government. Americans born in the next decade will read history textbooks and marvel at an electorate that shut its eyes to the signs of moral corruption and naked lust for power in the Republican party; an electorate that supported politicians who turned the United States into a vast concentration camp under the cover of piety and patriotism.

Is This Any Way to Run (or Judge) A Horserace?

Two thoughts about politics this morning.
The Bush-Cheney apparatus carefully hand-picks its audiences for campaign appearances, to the degree of weeding out anyone who won’t sign a statement affirming their intention to vote for the Republicans in November. I have to wonder if this is an effective strategy. Of course it prevents the candidates from being publicly embarrassed by tough questions or hostile voters, but by definition the campaign isn’t reaching many undecided voters, much less Democrats who might be persuaded to defect. Do they believe they can win with just the party faithful? On its face the policy seems self-defeating, but the polls suggest otherwise.
One reason the news media uses to justify its close attention to the horserace aspects of the election (often at the expense of substantive policy analysis) is that the effectiveness of a campaign can give voters a sense of how effective the candidate will be as president. It seems logical enough, but again, the facts suggest otherwise. Bush-Cheney ran a more effective campaign than Gore-Lieberman, but even Republican lawmakers are now questioning the Bush administration’s competence on the war in Iraq, the war on terror, and the economy. It’s baffling to me that voters can look at Bush’s record over the last four years and want to return him to office, but it’s even more difficult to understand how the would-be professionals in the media can still think that competence on the campaign trail will translate into competence in the Oval Office.

Not Just Another Liberal Handwringer

Neal Pollack’s ATTACK! is a must-read:

The second night of the Republican National Convention, I turned on Fox News. I enjoy watching Fox about as much as I enjoy eating my own turds for brunch. But if you want to understand why this country is rotting from within, you need to stare into the oozing mouth of the monster.