Cumulative Impact: Summarize Team Bush-GOP Crimes & Scandals
xxdr_zombiexx | 12.26.05
Moving into 2006, I, personally, feel a real flicker of hope. Alex Cockburn:
Start with Bush. Never at ease before the cameras, he now has the glassy stare and mirthless smile of a cornered man with nowhere left to run. Nixon looked the same in his last White House days, and so did Hitler, according to those present in the Fuehrerbunker. As Hitler did before him, Bush raves on about imagined victories.
And, Yes, that feeling is subject to immediate quashing with the next news article I happen across, but when I sit back and survey the horizon, the sheer number of Republicans running afoul of the law is what fuels that flicker of hope.
There are many signs that Team Bush - meaning, for this specific article "all Republicans who work for or (still) support George Bush, Dick Cheney and the Neocons" - finally really has become vulnerable to application of "the Law", however tenuous it may be at this time. "The Law" is on to them but still pussyfooting around. It may get better now that we are past the Holiday Season but I am all for anything that can keep the pressure on this process.
We are a long way from being out of the proverbial woods. People in America, the ones whom we progressives and liberals have been "the opposite of" are waking up to a very bad smell. Bush is losing appeal, to put it in "popular terms". We can exploit this at this time, but our words have to reach their ears. With GOP control of the TV this is really quite a task. We need to make the most of any media space or time we get. We need (I need) to be able to cram any paragraph full of these references.
Actually, it's more than just "running afoul of the law. It's a lot more than "missteps" or "mistakes" or "poor judgment" or an unfortunate "misspeaking". It's richly embroidered pattern of complete disregard (if not unbridled disdain) for the Law and the Constitution of the United States of America.
And it's actually even worse than that. It's the utter meanness of spirit. It's unmitigated disdain for the poor, non-whites, the elderly, families, you and me. In a word: Katrina.
In 2 words: Tom Delay.
3 words: lies, lies, lies.
In a torrent of angry words: the PATRIOT Act, Halliburton, Tax Cuts for the Wealthy, Jobs and the lack thereof, putting corporations ahead of people, Torture, Rendition, Terri Schiavo and catering to America's Religious extremists, Homeland Security as one of the biggest pork barrels in history, Then there is the whole spying on Americans thing. And I didn't even need to mention 9/11 or Iraq. Oh, yeah, the world hates us too.
Whew. That's quite a list of "accomplishments" but you know that barely scratches the proverbial surface. It's hard to really pull it all together in a short space, at least for me. Each one of those topics/scandals is rife with smaller sub-scandals or related issues, such as is illustrated with the Abramoff Scandal, which is interacting with several other less-sensational cases. Thus this thread.
There is a relatively obscure Monty Python skit called the "Summarize Proust Competition". It's just what it sounds like: well-read people attempt to summarize the writing of Proust, renown for tediously detailed verbiage, not that I have ever read more than a few pages. (And Yes....it was a very silly skit.)
What I want to suggest - both as something fun and serious at the same time - is an exercise in Summarizing the span and breadth of Team Bush-GOP Crimes and Scandals. The reason is that there has to be a way to cram as many scandal references into our speaking with others as is possible in the shortest period of time. I get distracted and disorganized trying to remember them all and am always seeking a more organized way to present this, but it's hard work
1 goal would be to string together the most inclusive list in the shortest possible space. For the practical payoff of using such text as the body of an LTE I would be ideal to keep it all to 2 paragraphs.
Another goal could be called the ""Meme Goal": distilling a collection of scandals to illustrate the essence of the mean-spirited GOP-Team Bush hypocrisy. They bend over backwards to interfere in the life of Terri Schiavo, solely to whip up support with the religious fundies, then turn around and slash aid for the poor to heat their homes." .
There are many examples of this to be brought forth and phrased in a salient fashion. A collective effort should bear some nice fruit, given the sharpness of many people who regularly visit and post here.
Happy Summarizing and Happy New Year!
Doc