Monday, June 04, 2007

No mercy

In children's sports, there is often what is called a "mercy rule" -- if one team is ahead by an extraordinary amount, like, say, by 10 runs in the 4th inning, then the game is called 'over'. In retrospect, I'm not sure if the mercy is for the kids or for the parents, but certainly by the time a mercy rule applies, the parents are quite happy to show "mercy" to the losing team. Good game, good try, too bad, better luck next week, see ya!
In politics, there are no mercy rules.
Republicans are asking for one now, starting to plead for one. They think they should just be able to agree that its too bad the Bush presidency is such a failure but its really not their fault, nobody's fault really, no hard feelings, see you on the diamond next year when we'll have a new pitcher.
Not so fast.
This is starting to get fun.
TRex:
Well, we knew this day would come, and yet, who knew that it would taste quite so sweet? You see, my pretties, it seems that Peg Noonan was right when she said that the Right Wing base is cracking under the unbearable strain of the Bush administration's pro-corporate/anti-nativist stance on immigration. At this very moment, our enemies on the Other Side are fragmenting, breaking apart into a jillion little tiny glittering shards of impotent rage, and all right before our very eyes. Isn't it beautiful? . . . Ace has a message for us:
Message To The Left: I'm not saying you should impeach him, I'm just sayin', you know, go with your hearts.
Oh, nooooooo, not when he's making you all this unhappy. He's only there for another year and a half or so. I think we should leave him twisting in the wind for as long as possible just so he can continue to heap handful after handful of dirt on the coffin lid of conservatism.
I know I shouldn't enjoy your pain, Wingnut bloggers. It's spiteful and cruel of me; petty, bilious, and adolescent. And yet, seeing you all running around screaming like somebody kicked in your ant-hill, well...
Yay.
James Wolcott:
Bush is not a liberal, never was; he's a messianic narcissist of mediocre abilities who needs hacks around him to keep his ego from collapsing like a dam wall. He isn't spurning his conservative base on immigration because he's longs to make nice with Ted Kennedy, he's spurning them because they disagree with him and he can't brook disagreement. If he didn't listen to his own father, a former president no less, do you really think he's going to lose winks at night over what Laura Ingraham or the NRO gang has to say? His head hits that pillow like a rock and there's no reasoning with a rock.
Glenn Greenwald:
The great fraud being perpetrated in our political discourse is the concerted attempt by movement conservatives, now that the Bush presidency lay irreversibly in ruins, to repudiate George Bush by claiming that he is not, and never has been, a "real conservative." This con game is being perpetrated by the very same conservatives who -- when his presidency looked to be an epic success -- glorified George W. Bush, ensured both of his election victories, depicted him as the heroic Second Coming of Ronald Reagan, and celebrated him as the embodiment of True Conservatism.
This fraud is as transparent as it is dishonest. . .
Lance Mannion:
The Bush Leaguers have poisoned and broken and just plain fucked up everything they've touched because they are an administration of flunkies. You don't get a job in that White House unless you know it's your first and only duty to see to it that nothing the Government does inconveniences Bush's base or costs them a dime they don't want to spend or makes them feel the least little bit guilty about exercising their privileges.
The supply of intelligent, talented, diligent, responsible people who would willingly devote their lives to being flunkies and making other people rich, while unfortunately not miniscule, is limited. Cheney and Rove have had to fill in all over the place with the stupid, the naive, and the desperate for work because they are incompetent, the Michael Browns and Monica Goodlings, the Tim Griffins and Douglas Feiths of the world, who can't help but poison and break and fuck-up everything they touch . . . They've made a mess everywhere, from the Smithsonian to the FDA to FEMA to the Justice Department, from New Orleans to Baghdad, and it should be the next President's job to fix it, but the Insider Media has decided that the most important issues of the upcoming election are Hillary's ambition, Bill's decades old sex scandals, John Edwards' haircuts, and Obama's middle name.
Digby:
Listening to these phonies whine now about how Scooter didn't mean it and Lurita Doan never followed through and how the Democrats are "criminalizing" politics moves me not at all. In a world where Republicans hadn't impeached a president for purely partisan reasons, stolen elections, started unnecessary wars, pillaged the treasury and degraded the constitution I might be inclined to be compassionate toward someone like Doan, who was probably just doing what Karl Rove expected. Sorry, I'm fresh out of compassion for Republicans. As far as I'm concerned, Waxman should ruthlessly go after every single case. It is a moral hazard to allow these people to continuously get away with things of which they accuse others. It's got to stop.
Sadly, No!:
None of these former Bush cultists can admit that Dear Leader was the bee’s knees, gave them exactly what they wanted, was a living God, was the acme of conservatism. Because to admit that is to admit the fact that what they believe in — their ‘principles’, their ideology, all of which Bush personified — sucks and is a menace to humanity. It’s our job to deny them their grip, to kick them off the cliff along with Dear Leader. Because if we don’t, they’ll just find another Dear Leader, and the Cult will be restored. No mercy. Fuck these people.

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