Ooo, so sorry, Republican congressional candidates. Looks like George Bush and Dick Cheney have
invited themselves into your campaigns. Meet your new running mates.
In Georgia, Bush drew sharp partisan distinctions as he belittled the opposition to the war, which is proving a powerful pro-Democrat issue: "The Democrat approach on Iraq comes down to this: The terrorists win, and America loses," he said.
Who's writing this guy's stuff, anyway? Howard Dean? `Cause it couldn't get much better for Dems.
Oh, wait, wait - yes, it could:
(Also available at My Left Wing)
Cheney told "Your World With Neil Cavuto" that insurgents in Iraq had timed the increase in violence - October has been the fourth-deadliest month for U.S. troops, with more than 100 killed - to the U.S. political calendar.
"It's my belief that they're very sensitive to the fact that we've got an election scheduled," he said.
OMG, and I thought Dick Cheney and Karl Rove were smart. Shows what I know. Karl! Stay away from that KoolAid®! That's for the kids, not for you!
Yeah, heh. "Very sensitive," those insurgents. I can see it all so clearly:
SCENE: Inside an abandoned munitions dump somewhere in al-Anbar province.
RASHEED, sitting on what used to be an office chair, flips to the third sheet of a computer printout sitting on the overturned empty ammo crate beside him. Sunlight pours in from the blown-out window to his right, illuminating the dust particles floating in the air and the flies buzzing around. He is holding a pencil in his teeth. He makes a mark through one line of the printout, then reaches for a half-empty cup of bitter Iraqi coffee sitting on the ammo crate. He takes a sip from the coffee, sighs, puts the cup back down, then starts to dial a number on the satellite phone. After dialing four numbers, he consults the computer printout, then finishes dialing.
RASHEED
[with thick accent]
Goddamn country codes.
[sound of phone ringing at receiving end of call]
[sound of phone being answered, children squealing in background]
WOMAN ON PHONE
Hello?
RASHEED
Uh, hello, my name is Rasheed and I'm a volunteer with Insurgents for Webb. Are you a registered voter?
And what's really funny about this, Mr. Vice President, is that you actually expect Americans to buy it!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
Whew. That's funny. Fuh. Knee.
(NB to the vice president: Check your Ramadan calendar. U.S. casualties in Iraq have peaked every year around Ramadan - except in April 2004, when the insurgents were obviously very sensitive to April 15 - you know: income-tax day. `Nuff said.)
Poor Republican congressional candidates. I mean, it's not like every Democrat is lucky enough to have an opponent as colossally stupid as a George Allen or a Katherine Harris or Rick Santorum or Conrad Burns. But now that Gee Dubya and Oilman have invited themselves into every race by making their breathtakingly stupid comments - hey! It's open season!
I can almost feel the cringing that must be going on among those Repubs who thus far have been able to avoid being playfully groped by BushCo in this race, who have artfully ducked every time the White House coattails swept too close for comfort:
Oops, I'm outta town that day - sorry, Mr. President!
Oops, I'm on a fact-finding mission to the Northern Marianas that weekend - sorry, Mr. Vice President!
Oops, I think I'm washing my dog that day - sorry, Mr. President!
Heh, heh. No more. Now, George and Dick are every Republican's running mate. By demonizing every Democrat running - and, for that matter, most Americans, as clammyc points out in his diary today - Dumb and Dumber just made the battle local, and personal. Republican congressional candidates can't be happy about it.
It's like we're back in junior high. I can see the scene at lunchtime now:
Most of the Republicans are eating with their heads assiduously kept down, surrounding their lunch trays with their elbows wide, taking up as much room as they can, glancing furtively around hoping - HOPING - that Shrubya and The Big Dick will just Keep On Walkin' right past their lunch table.
But Darth Veeper (with the ominous grey cloud that follows him everywhere) and the Chimperor, oblivious to social nuance and to their own pariah status among the Kewl Kidz, insist on barging in and taking a seat, striking up a conversation where none was sought - heh-heh, heh-heh.
All the other poor Republican Kidz can do is manage a weak chuckle before turning away to roll their eyes and silently plead despairingly to their friends, beseeching without words for their friends to rescue them.
Cheney's less popular than the loud kid with B.O. and food always stuck in his teeth, into whose jock strap someone once sprayed Nair between gym periods. It's like you're just waiting for that moment in the movie when one of the adolescent Republicans turns to Dickless and Dumbya and says, "Don't you get it? Nobody likes you!" Looking at Georgie Porgie: "You're weird, you're stupid, you laugh at all the wrong times, you're mean, and your mother is a witch!" And to He Who Must Not Be Named: "And you're just creepy!! What are you eating today" - gesturing at his lunch tray - "dead baby?"
Cheney's attack on Democrats helped Republican candidates about as much as, well, Darth Vader making a similar pronouncement. I can hear it now:
[sound of resonant breathing: inhalation, exhalation]
[inhalation]
There is a tremor in The Force.
[exhalation]
John Laesch has caused great harm to our plans.
[inhalation]
The Force is strong in this one.
[exhalation]
He must not be allowed to win.
[inhalation]
Remember -
[exhalation]
- a vote for John Laesch is a vote for the Dark Side.
[inhalation]
Hmm. Might work with the "Imperial Storm Trooper" demographic.
Otherwise, mmm, not so much.
I think what's happened here is that Someone In Charge has made the mistake of believing his own propaganda. Bad idea - for them, not for us.
See, as Jim Jones so graphically illustrated, the idea is that The Guys In Charge aren't supposed to actually, y'know, drink the KoolAid®, if you take my meaning. 'Cause, um, y'know, bad things can happen to them if they do.
But it appears the folks at the White House are too far gone. A Democratic Congress would bring on "A Cataclysmic Fight To The Death"? - sounds like Guyana, ca. 1978, to me. Or maybe Waco, ca. 1995.
But Georgie Porgie wasn't done yet when he attacked Democrats:
"The Democrat goal is to get out of Iraq. The Republican goal is to win in Iraq," he said. "You cannot win a war unless you are willing to fight the war."
(- of course, first you have to start a war, but that's another story.)
So, lemme get this straight:
Y'mean, George, if Democrats get elected, Iraq might not be the Central Front In The War On Terror!®?
GASP! Why - that would be awful!
Y'mean, if Democrats get elected, the economy wouldn't look like it does now???
That's horrible!!!
Y'mean - y'mean - y'mean, if Democrats are elected, they might try to do something about GLOBAL WARMING??!?
Y'mean - if Democrats are elected, they might decide to abandon Iraqi cities??!?
Oh, no - wait: that'd be our steadfast allies, the Brits. Whaddathey think, they're French, or som'in'?
Y'mean - if Democrats are elected, they'd create a safe haven for Osama bin Laden and the Taliban??!?
Oh, no - wait: that'd be our steadfast allies, the Pakistanis. Whaddathey think, they're Democrat, or som'in'??
Oh, I see: Democrats are pessimistsss. Sss. Sorta like Izz-LOMM-ick Feh-shissssts. Sss.®? Hmmm?
"There were people who said we couldn't succeed after World War II, we couldn't succeed after the Cold War, and fortunately the leaders then didn't listen to the pessimists. We've had pessimists throughout our history say America can't do things."
And then we've had abominable administrations who've lied about everything they've ever done.
And what's worse: they're ugly and their mothers dress them funny.
