Brass Tacks

Over the weekend I made the serious mistake of linking from Slate to an op-ed in the Washington Post by a Fellow named Peter Wehner about why Republicans like Obama. It reminded me of the old expression "Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas." I mean, that's how I felt after I read it -- itchy, squirmy, and a little disgusted at how I had contaminated myself by reading the piece. The gist of the Fellow's argument was that Republicans dislike Hillary Clnton because they remember the "mendacity and ruthlessness of the Clinton machine." He called the Clintons "unprincipled." My God! Compared to whom? Those lions of integrity, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice. Michael Mukasey, Alberto Gonzalez, Karl Rove, Michael Gerson? For sheer mendacity and ruthlessness, not to mention actual lawbreaking criminality, you can't really beat any Republican you can name. (For real outrage, I recommend Glenn Greenwald's Saturday column on the subpoena issued against James Risen of the New York Times.)

Anyway, Wehner yammers on about Obama transcending divisions and moving away from the "politics of rage." But Wehner has a warning for Obama -- if he continues to adhere to all the the views that have defined him in the public mind, and all of the beliefs that he has hitherto demonstrated, Republicans won't be able to support him. In other words, Obama is a great guy, and all he needs to do to get elected is to become a Republican.

Now, no one is surprised when a Republican advocates political and personal corruption -- that's what Republicans live for. That's why they can write pieces like this one for the Washington Post and still work for thinktanks such as the one the Fellow Wehner works for, "The 'Ethics' and Public Policy Center." From his op-ed, you know that the Fellow Wehner, Senior though he may be, wouldn't recognize an ethic if it whacked him in the face.

Here is why Hillary Clinton is mistrusted by liberals. It has nothing to do with ruthlessness or mendacity, except insofar as she has done exactly what Wehner advocates for Obama. In his HuffPost blog on January 30, Robert Scheer put it better than anyone:

"Isn't it disturbing that Sen. Clinton has received more money than any other candidate of either party from the big defense contractors? Why have the war profiteers given her twice the campaign contributions that they sent to McCain, if not for the expectation that she is on their side of the taxpayer rip-off that has seen the military budget rise to an all-time high? It's for the same reason that the bankers, Wall Street traders and other swindlers who produced our economic meltdown fund Clinton."

And this in addition to her continued lack of shame over her support of the Iraq war. In other words, Clinton did do what the Fellow Wehner advocates -- she failed to fight for liberal principles and she accepts money from enemies of liberal policies. Not content with one corrupt Democrat, the Fellow Wehner wants the other, more charming one to corrupt himself, too.

That at this late date there exists a human being, such as the Fellow Wehner, who admits that he once accepted blood money from the Bush administration and helped the administration promulgate lie after lie and crime after crime, does boggle the mind, and in fact is sufficient reason in itself for the "politics of rage" to last, like McCain's Iraq war, for a hundred years, or at least until the mess the Fellow Wehner and his cronies have managed to make of the government and the world while in power is cleaned up. Can Clinton do it, in spite of being in the pocket of the war machine and the finance machine? We don't know. Can Obama do it, in spite of not really seeming to understand the vicious ruthlessness and mendacity of the Republicans?

We don't know that either.

The underlying question of this primary and this election and the next four years is this -- was it the Clintons themselves who aroused the ire of the rightwing to such an extent that the administration they formed was unmercifully harassed from before the inauguration of 1992 to after the 2000 election, or were the Clintons simply the Democrats who happened to be there when the rightwing decided to take over? Everything the rightwing (and the media) latched onto about the Clintons, from Travelgate to the runway haircut to Monica Lewinsky seemed to me at the time to be merely a gambit in a slow-moving coup d'etat that was crowned in 2000 with the Supreme Court selection of the unelected George W, Bush. The one virtue of the Bush administration has been that their policies are so bankrupt and their members so incompetent that all but a few Americans can now understand the emptiness of the Republicans and their avid desire to destroy the U.S. in the pursuit of corporate power. The real danger of the next four years, as I see it, is that the election of any Democrat will trigger the rightwing deathsquads in all their different guises -- the media deathsquad, that hounds the president with nonsensical stories of scandal and distracts him from his business; the survivalist NRA deathsquads that pull off home-grown terrorist attacks, like the Oklahoma bombing; the lobbyist deathsquads, that gut all socially conscious or beneficial legislation, such as universal healthcare; the religious deathsquads, that harass and torment anyone who doesn't conform to a narrow and authoritarian social model; the thinktank deathsquads that propound deadly theories about the perfection of the "free market" or the horrors of "islamofacism" or the non-existence of climate change. It would actually be nice if the Fellow Wehner is telling the truth, that it is the Clintons personally that are the problem, because then the election of Obama would indeed signal a change. But if the goal of the corporatocracy is what it has seemed to be -- the permanent replacement of American democracy with a global imperialist empire and oligarchy of wealth, then Obama doesn't have a chance -- he will either be corrupted or destroyed.

The Fellow Wehner and his cronies are warning us already, but the warning is hard to read. A lot depends on your sense of how ruthless they are. My sense is that they are deadly ruthless. I hope I'm wrong.

Comments

[Dap]

Dear Ms. Smiley,

If there is *ONE* thing in this case you are *NOT*, is, wrong. Trust yourself on this one.

Without ruth, is the Neo-Fascists middle name.

Agape.

[vsign]

What the Republicans will say about Barack Obama will be true. He is a politician like everyone else. He plays the race card and the sympathy card to get votes. He is loose with the truth to get advantage. He has the personality of a dictator. He is anti woman and anti gay and anti anyone over 50, despite his lofty rhetoric. He is willing to divide the democratic party and construct a new coalition, to get power. His past accomplishments amount to little. He is running and playing on the guilt of white people. He thinks he is superior. Forget the past and go with the future - young people unite and bring down the old people. On and on and no one brings him down to size. I almost hope the republicans do.

[davidly]

The contentiousness is only theater to convince you that there really is opposition, and not just two right wings. I doubt that even the majority of the players in this farce are aware of this reality, they actually think they have opposing interests, but they only serve one.

The sooner we begin to understand this paradigm, the sooner we can begin to lead ourselves, instead of being led around by the noses.

[sebocd]

he will either be corrupted or destroyed.­..(or resist and prevail)

Obama has a secret weapon. It's called reflexive empathy and it is the difference between artificial intelligence based on quanta and authentic human intelligenc that is always informed by feeling but never overwhelmed by feeling. Don't worry about Obama. He's wise as serpent with no hidden aggenda
And this "ready for day one" Clinton cleche we've been hearing ad nauseum seems to me to be more about the old status quo "got'cha" mind games. We deserve better than than this and we can have it too. Yes we can.

[esl]

Jane, you really disappoint me. Get ready for all the mud coming Obama's way. The sad part is they may not have to make up stories about Obama. They can just check the Chicago newspapers. Rarely has someone from Illinois been elected to higher office without having some shady connections. Well, you Obama lovers will get what you deserve I am sad to say.

[Puller58]

It takes a congress. That should be the book of the month club choice. Face it, the president proposes and the congress disposes. Congress will not go along with initiatives that cut into their fundraising ability. Obama, Hillary or McCain cannot dictate to congress for that simple reason. Follow the money. While many pundits on the left despise Nadar, does anyone think the parties are all that different? Besides, how many presidents broke their campaign promises once they got into office?

[WorkingClass]

Obama is in no danger from the oligarchy. He is their own. If they didn't want him they would have simply frozen him out like they did to Edwards. The GOP is a broken tool. The Democratic party will be our new rulers on behalf of the oligarchy. As long as our "elections" can be controlled by lies and misdirection, we may avoid the dogs and the lash. There ain't gonna to be no "new deal" this time around. The rulers will make the same mistake they always make when they reach the zenith of their power. They will squeeze and bleed the working class until they (the workers) are forced to take matters into their own hands.

[Macready]

Great blog Jane . . .and very scary . . . the death squad Republicans are I suspect "My sense is that they are deadly ruthless." I too hope you are wrong but doubt it very much ... it will matter little to them who becomes prez . . . they will certainly have an easier time corrupting bllary . . . that is why real Democrats and not DlCers have to take both houses of Congress . . . but these guys will not give up easily . . . this is another reason why impeachment has to happen . . but I suspect pelosi is too in bed with the DLC and the neoc-cons in the WH to care

certainly one thing the new president will have to do is to end the MSM monolopy but Murdoch . . . freedom of the press has to be restored . . . but it is going to be a long nasty fight . . .

[DLSteinhardt]

Like it or not, presidents can lead when they inspire the people. If Obama is elected, the people will be inspired. Yes, power will corrupt tend to corrupt him, as it tends to corrupt everyone, but we will at least have a president whose values are intact at the start, rather than the cynicism of the other candidates.

[DCNana]

As one who experienced the grief of the assassinations of JFK, MLK and Bobby, I'm afraid too, but the cost of giving in to fear and cynicism is the loss of our country. It's true we can't say for sure what Hillary would do, but we do know what she and Bill did not do: they didn't rally the Democratic Party when the election was stolen, or when we were being lied to about Iraq, or when we were demoralized and divided and disorganized. At that time, they were the only ones who could have and I think they failed us. Hillary didn't lead the Democrats in the Senate to use every method on the books to stop Bush-Cheney from destroying the country (as the Republicans have against our doing anything to help the people). Instead, they went to the White House to have their portraits hung, and Bill has done their bidding every time they've asked. Instead of leading the fight against the Bush travesty of a government, they've appeared to condone it. In contrast, Senator Obama says words matter. His saying that thrills me to the core. I hope you'll use your great talent with words to help him rally the people to listen to his words, and to support his effort to give us the courage to face our fears and to dream once more.

[ConcernAmerican]

Jane the republican party don't have a machine, they have a SHREDDER. As a volunteer, I can see the worries in hardcore Republicans if Hillary is the nominee; any of their candidate can't defeat her in general election but Obama CAN and WILL easily defeated by them. Another thing Obama and his campaigners and supporters have not anticipated many lifelong democrats will vote for republican and many will stay at home instead of casting their vote for Obama. The sentiments from Independents are a bit more different, between Obama and McCain, they'd vote for McCain. They're looking for experience and track records which Obama doesn't have.

If this trend continues, we're going to have another Republican President in the Whitehouse next year. I'm a lifelong democrat, but I'd vote for any Republican candidate in general election over Obama. I'm not sold out on this inspiring words and hopes and dreams, I want a leader not a preacher.

Our country is facing all kinds of problem right now the next President must tackle head on, we have NO time for ON THE JOB TRAINING. Too much is at stake in this election, we can't afford to nominate someone who's experience is a community organizer. The court hearing of Syrian born Antoin "Tony" Rezko will start February 25.

Between a bachelors degree and common sense, I'd take common sense anytime of the day. I've seen college graduates dumber than a rock, can't get a job and still living with their parents.

[libdude]

Ms.Smiley, I really don't think it would have
mattered in the slightest who was in the White
House when the Clintons were there. Any Democrat would have suffered the same
treatment. The Repubs had been trying to destroy the Democratic Party from at least the Nixon era, and probably before then. After the criminal Nixon left Washington with his crooked tail between his legs, the savaging of Democratic presidents and presidential candidates--in retaliation for their party's unpardonable offense of demanding justice and adherance to the law by the President--became simply business as usual, and continues in that slimy vein today. Nice post, Jane.

[ltfcrazy]

I agree that someone will try to destroy or corrupt him. There's no doubt in my mind that if he doesn't play ball there will be an assassination attempt. I would put twice as many secret service on Obama as on anyone else and make sure he is kept away from open areas until his second term is over at the very least. He is going to take a LOT of money away from a LOT of greedy and unprincipled people and they aren't going to smile and cough it up. That is exactly why we must nominate and make him president. If the status quo is scared of him, he is definitely out to make the world a better place for ALL of us and not just the rich.

[Guitarsandmore]

Unfortunately, Jane Smiley, you are not wrong. The patriotic right wing extremists who are dedicated enough to give their lives for their country are also warped enough to believe that right wing dogma and doctrine are more important than the constitution, the rule of law, your life, my life, and most certainly Obama's life. Getting an endorsement from the Kennedy's with the curse they carry with them might as well be the kiss of death.

We need to send all of the right wing on a mission somewhere on an island in the South Pacific and tell them they have to stay there and fight for the next hundred years otherwise they would be admitting defeat. This war would not be funded of course which would make it more of a challange for them; fight with bows and arrows and such.

The left wing can stay here and run the country as it should be run.

[RogerHWerner]

The problems in our government aren't just about money. Money's part of the problem: Those with it have a vision for America's future that's been in the making for generations and it bodes ill for most Americans unless one enjoys second class status.

I'm opposed to violence. When French Republicans and Russian Communists won their respective revolutions, they killed off individuals representing old ways because they understood old ways won't just go away; not as long as someone is alive to remember them. After the Gilded Age, we had the first era of progressivism and after 1920s, we got the second. Americans should have learned something from these two periods of excess: For a while, we did and even Republicans got with the program. Then came Civil Rights, Vietnam, the Oil Embargo, and economic stress few Americans knew existed. Life wasn't supposed to get worse only better. So, voters were seduced by the words of Reagan; then came Bush I, Clinton, and today we have the worst of the lot. The old ways die hard.

Reagan wasn't an accident. His election was planned and part of a larger scheme that culminated with Dubya; a plan that hid under rocks and bushes since the New Deal, based on rolling back reform and regulation to the "good old days" where rapacious greed would be encouraged within and outside of law (since regulatory apparatus was gutted what one could get away with was a lot).

I'm not suggesting we shoot everyone who supports Conservative government and economic ideology (the thought has crossed my mind!). I believe we must take steps to ensure that once these cretins are removed from office and politically defanged, voters caring about government that supports what's in the best interest of all Americans not just a few individuals with money and power must do whatever it takes to ensure that those who wrecked so much havoc can never again crawl out from under their rocks to do so again. I don't know what this will take but it is imperative it be done.