ABC-TV "Dances" Its Way to Public Disgrace With DeLay

What's that sulfurous smell emanating from ABC-TV these days?

It's not that network's usual crappy new fall prime-time lineup, although it's pretty stinky.

No, it's Toxic Tom DeLay, aka The Exterminator, the unctuous little weasel now making a fool of himself (again) on ABC's dismal enterprise called "Dancing With The Stars." The very same well-tailored humanoid who was directly responsible for some of the most acrimonious and bitterly partisan sessions of Congress.

The same fancy dancer who was responsible for Bill Clinton's ridiculous, time-wasting impeachment, and whose reapportionment schemes gave us the likes of Goat Boy Gohmert, aka Texas Congressman Louis Gohmert, pointy-headed co-leader (along with Rep. Michelle Bachman, of course) of the Tin Foil Hat Brigade in the House. As one commentator put it this week:

"DeLay is responsible for some of the greatest miseries of our time, from the Patriot Act to the non-response to the destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina."

OK, but will he dance for us?

Thanks to the ethically challenged ABC programming geniuses who decided to let this grinning eel put on his fancy dancin' clothes and soften his image for the good folks on the jury at his upcoming felony trial.

What, were Gov. Mark Sanford, jailed Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham, and Dennis "Jabba The Speaker" Hastert unavailable for this year's festive dance-a-thon?

The New York Times' Maureen Dowd may well have summed up the bio ABC scanned before selecting DeLay:

"The former exterminator drove the loony Clinton impeachment, pushed the nutty Terri Schiavo legislation, gutted the House ethics committee, engaged in gerrymandering schemes, enhanced the pay-to-play political culture and made the Republican Party so sulfurously partisan, ethically suspect and God-centric that voters recoiled."

OK, but can he shake his booty? After all, ABC execs may well be saying in private, Glenn Beck turned us down. Something about uncontrollable gyrations and spontaneous sobbing episodes. Maybe next year.

I remember an interview former Clinton aide Sidney Blumenthal gave to NPR's San Francisco affiliate KQED-FM, in which Blumenthal put a very fine point on DeLay's thuggish tactics, and how The Hammer threatened even fellow Republicans on such things as the notorious, sleazy 3 a.m. vote to ram through the laughable prescription-drug bill.

"I had Republicans call me who were scared of the guy. They'd never been threatened by anyone before," said Blumenthal about ABC's latest dancin' fool.

So, has network TV reached the bottom of the barrel? Or is the barrel just getting deeper?

As offensive as putting smarmy legislative thug DeLay in a dance costume and asking him to smile for potential jurors may be, consider this:

Prince Rupert Murdoch's Fox Network once gave Pauly Shore his own series.

I thought that was the bottom of the barrel.

Now I'm not so sure.

Follow Bill Mann on Twitter: www.twitter.com/newsmann

Comments

[PatA]

I found ABC's contact page. When I filled the form out, wrote my message, copied and pasted from this column....hit submit..went to page that said "sorry, this page is no longer available"..
What wusses! We can't even send a complaint to the network.
I'll try to find the DWTS sponsors are.

[PatA]

I am trying to find ABC's email address. No luck. If anyone finds/knows it, please post it so we can voice our protest to TD being on DWTHs.

[PatA]

Smithn....how is this for remembering Delay? I live in Texas.
I am boycotting DWTS (dancing with the has beens) because Tom Delay is on it. He has done more damage to Texas than three other men could do!
He is a crook.....
I was absolutely shocked when I saw that he was going to beon the show. I think that Disney/ABC are desperately going for some political gold here. How about it?

[DeloresT]

Instead of simply boycotting this show, why not call or write to ABC and let them know how you feel. Also, how about letting their sponsors know?

[missmanners]

The only way I would watch Tom Delay dance would be in an old fashioned western with puffs of dust flying around his feet.

[musselmanm]

Dancing with the indicted?

[thinkingwomanmillstone]

Maybe they could get the Lockerbie Bomber next season or the prisons are full of murderers and rapists. Trafficante is out of prison and needs a job. I couldn't watch this when it was B list celebrities making fools of themselves, but this is way too much. No more ABC for me and protests to sponsors of this show are in order for me.

[fr33d0mhawk]

Tom Delays wife was being paid millions by a firm in the Marianas that kidnapped young women into sex slavery, and would force its sex slaves to have abortions. Tom Delay is on tape saying the bill to have the FBI investigate will never see the floor --to his sex slave firm's managers. Tom Delay even publicly admitted that forced abortions happen, but not as often as liberals would like to think. Tom Delay wraps himself in the flag and the cross, but was intimately invovled in sex slave trafficking and forced abortions, women crying, wanting to keep their baby, hoping that a baby would mean they could go home, but not on Delay's watch. If Satan exists, he lives in Tom Delay and anyone who supports him is in league with the devil. May Delay be put in prison for life and then go back to his home in the deep deep south, south of Hell that is.

[classicalgeek]

I am boycotting all of ABC this entire season, and their advertisers, too.

[fr33d0mhawk]

Please do, and do it becaue Tom Delay, on a segment aired by NPR, was on tape talking to the company in the Marianas that kidnapped young women and forced them into sex slavery, and completely against pro-life supporters, said he would never let the bill to have the FBI investigate ever see the floor. He was also on tape admitting that forced abortions do happen, but not as often as liberals would like to think. His wife was paid 1 million dollars per year by this sex slave company to get federal protection for forced abortions and sex slavery. Lets make this happen. ABC needs to know exactly who they are supporting. Do not let this drop. Delay proudly exclaims that his support of forced abortions and sex slavery is not prosecutable because it did not happen in the US. Once again we see the truth behind the pro-lifer movement, that they are for abortion as long as big business or big government force the women to have abortions after forcing them to turn tricks as kidnapped slaves.

[Smithn]

I did not watch ABC Dancing this year because of DeLay. And, until tonight I thought I was the only old fool left who remembered exactly how dispicable he was. I'm thankful for Mr. Mann's review--it took years off my attitude!

[helgathewitch]

The minute I heard he was on I realized that I never need to watch the show again. They completely lowered themselves this time. I find it apalling.

[polwonk]

Help!! My eyes are bleeding!!!!!

[MIvoter1231]

People want to watch reality shows? Here are two that are actual reality. "Deadliest Catch" and "Whale Wars." They are real people doing real jobs or working for real causes. Are they slanted to win you over to their cause? Of course they are. Do they ramp up some of the situations to seem more exciting? Yup.

Do you want to be the guys out there on any of the crab boats in Alaska's crab fishery in the middle of the winter? You want to be the person out there in -30 degree weather having to chop ice off the boat to keep it from capsizing? When you have the real US Coast Guard looking for real lost crab boats and their crews, there is no doubt about how real their life and death situations really are.

I could give a good God d@m about what happens to dancers, "real world contestants" or survivors. They are only after their 15 minutes or trying to prolong the 15 that expired years ago. Egomaniacs like Thomasina have absolutely no attraction for me and none of that garbage is ever allowed in my house.
History Channel, Discovery, Animal Planet rule the airwaves here.

[Checquoline]

When Sarah comes back from China she is probably gonna' dance too.

[helgathewitch]

Right, and we all know she is in good shape because of all that running she does. How do we know? Because she made a publicity stunt out of it wanting to challenge the President.

[ninthraphael]

i really think it is dehumanizing!

[GlenParked]

This tired show, which I've dubbed "Dancing With The Has-Beens and Wannabes", has definitely sunk to a new low. Perhaps we'll have the pleasure of Ted Stevens or John Ensign for next season's exercise in bad taste. Maybe they can even spin it off - "Felon Fandango"!