On the Contrary

I was awakened on Tuesday morning by my clock radio tuned to NPR and Senator Foghorn Leghorn (Shelby of Alabama) ranting at Timothy Geithner and basically calling for his resignation over the bonuses at AIG.  In my groggy state I remember thinking, “and just where the hell were you when the Republicans in Congress were spending like drunken sailors and cutting taxes, emptying out our treasury?”  Here is a guy who can rile up a crowd of know-nothings, but rioting in the streets and burning down the town doesn’t solve any problems.

What is really ironic is that Senator Foghorn Leghorn doesn’t want to nationalize these banks/companies, yet he is outraged when these private owners ignore government wants and desires.  By the way there was an amendment put on the legislation for TARP II to prevent bonuses, but good guys like Shelby, oh I am sorry, Senator Foghorn Leghorn, did not want the federal government dictating to these wonderful private bankers who are our saviors, and killed it in conference.  Talk about blowing smoke out of both sides of your mouth or other orifice of your body.

I see the same mentality in my own state in what is called the “Howard Jarvis Taxpayer Association”.  They are against everything.  “We are taxed too much.  Just cut spending.  Waste is everywhere.”  This group was named after the gentleman who led the crusade for the famous Proposition 13 that put a cap on all property taxes and started California’s skid into insolvency.  What they are good at is saying no to anybody’s ideas, but their own ideas are either nonexistent or nonsensical.  Let’s face it.  If we want what we want, we have to pay for it, but the point here is that it is so much easier to say no than to come with a plan to deal with the issues that face us.

When President Obama was putting forward his three-phased plan for dealing with the economy, what you heard from the Republicans and some yellow dog Democrats was “I have some concerns.”  Okay, you have some concerns.  What are they and what is your solution?  And that is where blowhard becomes the operative word.  They can throw stones, but they can’t build anything.  “I don’t like the stimulus package because it raises the national deficit.” Okay, then what is your approach to stimulating the economy?  Tax cuts?  That didn’t work last time and that also empties out our treasury and raises the deficit so how does that help?

So what we have is the Obama team trying to deal with these tough issues, and what we get from the Republicans and quite a few conservative Democrats is sniping and political point scoring.  It doesn’t get us anywhere.  Returning to Senator Foghorn Leghorn, what has he done lately to solve the problem?  Oh, I forgot.  He is still questioning President Obama’s citizenship.  That ought to stimulate the economy.  Sure the Obama team has made mistakes.  They are learning as they go.  It is not perfect, but they are trying.  The blowhards are just blowing, without any realistic alternatives.  It is always my pipe dream to put them back in charge and watch them sputter, but the damage to the country would be just to great.

Meanwhile in China, they are using this crisis to invest almost a trillion dollars in infrastructure investment to better position themselves when the economy comes back (In Downturn China Sees Path for Growth). They can do this because they are awash in funds from their booming economy.  So the next time you hear the blowhards start attacking to score political points, ask them this:  “When we were booming in the early 2000s and our financial markets were awash in cash, how come our treasury emptied out and our deficit grew?  Was it because you guys had no plan and could not raise taxes to be ready for a day like today?  Why should we believe anything you say now?” The fact that we haven’t tarred and feathered these guys and then turned them over to the Taliban for re-education is beyond me.

Apparently the honeymoon is over.  The conservatives have raised their ugly heads and we are going to see how they will work to make sure that change will not be easy.  Today was the tip of the iceberg, but you can expect much more.  First there was a delay by Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas) of Hillary Clinton’s nomination to Secretary of State.  He got nothing tangible, and she was confirmed, but he probably made points with the right wing wing-nuts that form his base.  Oh his argument sounded minimally reasonable, that he was just protecting the nation from possible influence by contributors to her husband’s activities, but the reality here is that he was probably curing favor among the Hillary haters in his party.  So much for getting a team in place and start working on our problems.

But wait, there is more. President Barack Obama’s Treasury Secretary nominee Timothy Geithner faces grilling by the Republicans.  Now I will give them their due here in that failing to pay income taxes is a big boo-boo, and even more troubling is his part in the original failures in the financial markets and his role in the Bush administration’s bail out.  But the arguments in his favor are that he knows how this system works and maybe how to control it.  So with some dithering, he will be confirmed.  They just want to make it hard under the guise of asking all the right questions.

But here is where the conservative’s real colors come out and that is the confirmation of Eric Holder for Attorney General.  The Attorney Generals Office is where the Bush Administration did real damage to our democracy because they subverted justice.  It needs fixing fast.  This is the office that justified torture, politicized its attorneys, and used the rule of law to try to subvert elections.  Eric Holder was doing fine until he told the truth:  Water boarding is torture.  Unlike his predecessor who they loved, he knows torture when he sees it.  Uh-oh.  Cat is out of the bag.

So what the conservatives really want is an agreement that Holder will not prosecute.  Now the dance they will perform is that good people doing what they thought was right in difficult circumstances should not be punished, let’s move on.  Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson (another Texas Neanderthal) tried misdirection saying she is concerned about Holder’s stand on guns and the 2nd Amendment, and they need to ask more questions.  This one is total misdirection.  The issue is torture and they want to delay till they get an agreement not to prosecute.  And that would be a great big mistake, but let me explain by letting you hear how I think Mr. Holder should answer their new questions:

Senator Foghorn Leghorn (Senator Mitch McConnell/Arlen Spector, take your pick):  Mr. Holder, do you really think laws were broken?

Eric Holder:  Well Senator Leghorn, like my predecessor Judge Mulcasey who couldn’t really decide if water boarding is torture until he had studied it which you guys seem to like just fine, I can’t tell if laws were broken till I investigate what really happened and I can’t do that till you confirm me.

Senator Leghorn:  Well Mr. Holder, certainly you understand that good people were just trying to do their job and we don’t need to prosecute those that just thought they were following orders?

Eric Holder:  Well Senator Leghorn, I believe that it is my job to enforce the law.  Are you saying that the law doesn’t apply to some people and I should pick and choose which laws I should enforce?

Senator Leghorn:  No, No, of course not Mr. Holder, but surely you understand that people were just trying to do the right thing.

Eric Holder:  I believe that we must investigate what really happened.  Then based upon the facts we will decide who knowingly broke laws and who thought they were following legal orders and then take the appropriate action.  To do anything else would be to ignore my responsibility as Attorney General.  Is that what you are asking me to do Senator?  Don’t you think the law applies to everyone?

Senator Leghorn:  Yes, Yes, of course  Mr. Holder, but I have to tell you that because of your stand on the 2nd amendment I will have to vote against you.

Eric Holder:  But Senator Leghorn, there are no issues before the justice department that impact the 2nd Amendment and the Supreme Court has ruled in the Washington D.C. case.

Senator Leghorn:  Are you challenging my authority?

Well you get the drift.  These guys don’t want to hold anyone accountable, especially if they were carrying out what these guys facilitated.  Truth is a little inconvenient so lets just ignore it.  They really don’t want change.  They want things back the way they use to be.  You have seen nothing yet.  Wait till we get to discussing the bailout package.  At least Rush Limbaugh was honest today when he said he wanted to see President Obama fail.  They are a great bunch aren’t they?