Right-Wing Rhetoric, Still Shrill and Mindless

The dictionary defines the word "huckster" as "a person who employs showy methods to effect a sale, win votes etc. ..." and notes "the crass methods of political hucksters." Today the Republican Party is trying to sell a story rejected in several election cycles, yet the media is providing it with endless opportunities to intone its effete message.

One of the sillier issues that animates some discussions is the so-called "defense-of-marriage" stand by people who feel "opposite marriage" is endangered by marriage-minded gays, although why this should be so is puzzling. To be drawn into this debate is to deflect attention from matters of far greater import. At some point, the disrupters should be made to understand they are free to think as they will, but if marital partners feel threatened they should seek out the offices of a good marriage counselor and leave serious problems to serious problem solvers.

Although this issue seems to be losing steam among younger, more progressive voters who tend to ignore extreme ideological positions, many conservatives refuse to accept any challenge to their partisan set of 'values.' When party leaders say they understand the needs and hopes of 'the people' but are unwilling or unable to come up with anything more than excuses for eight years of policies that have brought the country to its current state of disrepair, who can trust them?

But as the Republican leadership addresses what it regards as critical elements that will propel it back into power, what does it come up with - - an attack on Nancy Pelosi for comments about what the CIA told members of Congress, though others have complaints similar to hers. Utah's Republican Representative Bishop wants a 4-person bi-partisan panel to get to the bottom of Pelosi's charges. But be careful what you wish for Mr. Bishop, because if callers to the Washington Journal are any indication of how the country feels, people of all political persuasions would like to know a lot more about how our intelligence agency operates including how we ended up invading Iraq, for starters.

As for one of its "new" approaches the party has begun airing a remake of the infamous "daisy commercial" from the sixties to assail President Obama's decision to close the prison at Guantanomo. His decision has become a cause celebre for people on the right who think they have found a way to revisit what they see as Obama's Achilles heel and their favorite wedge issue - - national security. Recent polls show, however, that Republicans are losing ground on that front as well.

And exactly what have we done to deserve the onslaught of misinformation and self-serving detritus being delivered by former vice president Cheney and his daughter, Liz? They are absolutely everywhere. He has appeared on almost every major network with Liz following close behind. She has her father's back and is no doubt grateful for the job he provided for her in the Bush State Department, to say nothing of husband Philip Perry's various government appointments. Neither of these fatherly examples of largesse are particularly pleasant reminders of the way the Bush White House operated.

Especially disturbing, as Joe Conason wrote in a February 2007 Salon.com article, was Perry's position as "General Counsel to the Department of Homeland Security." As Conason points out, "...the true scandal of Perry's career in government ...is less about blatant cronyism and more about corporate cronyism." At DHS, Perry spent his time "obstructing federal and state regulation of the nation's chemical industry" allowing the industry, under his protection, "to decide whether and how to improve the notoriously lax security at their plants" which made them vulnerable to infiltration and attack - - so much for national security when corporate interests are at stake.

This is not a proud heritage and it is a sad commentary on our media that they are willing to include Liz as a panelist on Meet the Press, This Week, and for a long segment on Morning Joe. It's bad enough that her father is still huckstering the same tired propaganda without hearing it from Liz too. In some catalogues tee shirts are shown with an arrow pointing sideways and the words "I'm with stupid." There should be a special one for Liz that says simply "I'm with Daddy."

There's some serious Cheney fatigue out here. One can only hope cable networks and columnists will come to realize that and leave the Cheneys to communicate with the only people who still believe what they're selling - - the ever-faithful, gullible right-wing base.