After archconservative Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore was exposed for a history of sexual molestation and assault targeting teens as young as 14, many Republicans backed away from his campaign. At long last, we had found the line; this was the previously-mythical boundary beyond which at least a few Republicans would not go.
Brietbart coatrack and ex-top Trump adviser Steve Bannon, however, was not among them. Bannon helped organize a counterattack against Republicans who believed Moore's past history of child molestation disqualified him from public office; he appeared at rallies warning Moore's followers that establishment Republicans were selling them out, and led a cynical offensive against Moore's accusers. Bannon did his level best to assert that the Republican Party was a safe haven for molesters; he, like Donald Trump, suggested both that the allegations against Moore were fictional and that even if they were true, molestation was less important than voting for the next tax cut.
While Trump is still untouchable in the wake of that historic and party-humiliating campaign, Steve Bannon isn't. For many in the Republican Party, it's payback time.
[M]any Washington Republicans have no intention of patting Mr. Bannon on the head. They intend to kneecap him before he has the chance to recover.
“First is to dry up his money,” said Scott W. Reed, the chief political strategist for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a pillar of the Republican establishment, explaining how top Republicans in Washington were making a new round of calls to donors across the country to press them not to donate to Mr. Bannon or the candidates he supports.
“Two is to try and drive a wedge between him and Trump to the point where Trump is questioning him and his judgment,” Mr. Reed added. “You win, you win. You lose, you’re a loser. And that’s what Bannon has to wear around his neck now. A big L.”
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BLAST FROM THE PAST
On this date at Daily Kos in 2005—The Islamic Republic of Iraq:
I wonder why the war boosters think elections are in and of themselves a reason to declare "mission accomplished" (yet again) in Iraq.
What good are elections if the violence continues? What good are they if Iraq's infrastructure is in shambles? What good are they if Iraq's economy continues to founder.
"Wait!" the triumphalists will interject, "Elections show that Iraqis want democracy, and democracy will work to reduce the violence."
Of course, lots of things were supposed to reduce the violence—Saddam's capture, the first elections, the second election, the capture of myriad "Al Qaida number twos," the supposed training of a new Iraqi army, and so on. Forgive those of us underwhelmed by such rosy predictions. Reality has made a mockery of all previous expressions of optimism.
But I wonder, would the triumphalists still think this last round of elections was a success if it brought to power a fundamentalist Islamic party with strong ties to Iran? Because that's what appears to be happening.
Funny that -- we've expended hundreds of billions of dollars and thousands of lives to give Iran what they most coveted -- a friendly Iraqi government.
And the wingnutosphere is celebrating.
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