I don’t think it would be possible to find a couple of chickenshit cyborgs more off base in their calculations regarding the Iraq War than John McCain and Hillary Clinton. Though perhaps in their respective cases it’s more repugnant than normal given how much original thought they’ve both devoted to the actual policy in play as opposed to the “position” that might be popular in 2008. It’s sad to think about, but realistically, there isn’t any number of murdered Americans or Iraqis that could compile in a day, week or month that would impact their “position” one way or the other. Half of the soldiers in each of their districts could die over there on a single day and it wouldn’t phase them in the least.
A vote is to take place on a resolution that disapproves of the President’s tactical surge in Baghdad, and the so called ‘maverick‘ is getting as far away from DC as he can. He doesn’t want to be anywhere near a debate on the Iraq War, because he knows better than anyone that it is a debate he cannot benefit from in any way whatsoever. His opinion on the war is as arbitrary as his opinion on abortion, immigration or the minimum wage. The same can be said about Hillary, and with this dynamic at play, where it seems like half of the Senate is running for President already, there is absolutely no hope of ever accomplishing anything meaningful in the time between now and the end of the primaries.
The problem I have with all of this is the fact that while Senators like McCain and Clinton simply refuse to do their jobs for a couple years, the noise machine in Washington is more than happy to follow them around and report on their movements just as often as it reports on the real world. It’s a Page 6 diversion from the details involving actual people and actual events that manages to derail the train more often than a story about Britney Spears shaving her head or Anna Nicole Smith dying. The same blow hards that lament entertainment news stealing the spotlight from politics will often become the hypocrite without even realizing it, by parsing the different words used by someone like Hillary from one week to the next as if it actually means something.
‘Isn’t it interesting how just two months ago she was using this phrase to describe Iraq instead of what she’s saying today…’ It really isn’t. And for you to be paid per word to delve into such a thing, is about as meaningful as knowing the exact time and location of Hillary’s last bowel movement. In fact, if you could scoop that tidbit also, you’d have two headlines of equal significance that came from the exact same place!
Which is revealing in a way, since you have to figure that’s where a lot of these press-pass wearing star fuckers are taking notes from in the first place. As far up there as they can possibly get. Hell, Libby’s about to start his prison term and Judith Miller is still enjoying the warmth of his colon during these cold winter days and nights. He works on something related to fusion and Iran, and before it’s halfway through the small intestine she’s got 500 words pecked out.
So the love of oneself in how important the people they suck up to are can surely lead to a war, as we know all too well. Now it’s going to lead us through a nauseating season of American Idol, one that never ends, while all around us the empire is catching fire. McCain is going to perform a cover of that Lionel Richie song ‘Dancing on the Ceiling’, while the streets run red in Iraq. Hillary is going to juggle while riding a unicycle and still attempt to belt out a Simon-friendly rendition of ‘I’m Every Woman’. Chimps with press credentials are dousing their heads in KY for the post performance lunge that might get them right up in there.
McCain, Clinton, the news hounds, all potential ass clowns.
Now if they only start talking about Mary Cheney’s lesbianism again…
That whole thing is too close to what ‘crossing the streams’ did in Ghostbusters.
The real reason McCain has completely sold out to the evangelicals this time around is he’s read David Kuo’s book and now understands that Bush only pandered to those people while never really believing in anything they stood for. The level of gullability is enormous, so he’s just going to play the game.
At the same time he’s completely ruined the solid reputation he’d spent an entire career trying to create. His fall from grace is so much sadder than Kerry’s really, as he’s never been able to let his loss go. It has ruined him in so many ways.
On the nose.
Al, it isn’t healthy to be this bitter.
On the other hand, it isn’t sane not to be.
What to do, what to do.
In some ways, the enduring lesson of the 60’s is the futility of change. Not everyone has a price, but enough people do. And you don’t need to pay ’em all off–just enough. After that, all the screaming, cajoling, gnashing of teeth or eloquent rhetoric in the world won’t get them off their broad asses to find the remote, much less demand something different.
Even if the tide rises to new heights, there are no heights so high that the water can’t be rolled back in a fraction of the time it took to get it there. But even the greed heads know this can’t hold for long. Without a radical course-change, we’ll all be speaking Mandarin in 20 years. It didn’t have to be this way. But once there was no one else reaching for the last piece of cake, we lost all sense of proportion.
Or perhaps our a prior lack of same rewarded us with the lone seat at the table. But without anyone to slap our hand for reaching, we’ve knocked over the salt cellar, the candles and spilled wine on the cloth. Now we handicap the race as they climb all over each other to be the one to wield the serving fork.
Is there a whit of difference between them? Of course there is. The margins have never been more important. Yes to habeas. No to rendition. Yes to privacy. No to reading your mail, tapping your phone or telling you who and how to fuck.
But what you may never see is a plate-captain who is willing to share with the kids’ table, who is willing to say, “if you don’t dole this out right, all you’re doing is making your own ass ripe to be tomorrow’s main dish.” The going rate is just too high. And deep down, you and me and everyone else who punches a clock or keeps a “fantasy portfolio” because a real one is just so much pie-in-the-sky acid trip unlikely or lays awake at night until three in the morning thinking of his kids and sweating the cost of feeding them, clothing them, getting them to a Dr. or god forbid, actually paying for college, all of us, know that we’ll always get the shaft. Always. And we realize that right now it’s a gold-plated special from some outfit in West Hollywood with plenty of lubricating jelly and it could be much much much worse.
Just imagine what could happen if you missed three or four paychecks.
Now shut the fuck up and pass me the remote. I want to see if Hillary still thinks Saddam Hussein had something to do with what happened in New York five and half years ago that somehow justifies a river of blood and treasure. Take your filthy feet off my Ikea coffee caddy and pass me another slice of pizza, you ungrateful stiff.