Posted on 11/25/2004 9:43:08 AM PST by Jose Roberto
AUSTIN, Texas -- Dan Green of New York City says of the election results, "You can't be depressed now, the worst is yet to come." Following that good advice, I intended to keep my indignation dry and save the outrage for when it is really needed, kind of like saving room for the pumpkin pie after Thanksgiving dinner. If we're going to get through the next four years, we have to pace ourselves, I concluded.
But here it is, not even three weeks into the new Bush regime, and already I'm jaw-dropped, you've-got-to-be-kidding mad. Here's the record so far:
-- Republicans somehow managed to squirrel an obscure little provision into the appropriations bill that gives congressmen or their "agents" the right to look at your IRS return and make what use of it they will. This perverse item was apparently the brainchild of Rep. Ernie Istook of Oklahoma, who is such a hopeless chucklehead it's often hard to take him seriously as a menace. He's chair of the transportation subcommittee of the appropriations committee, and in that position clearly needs to see your tax return. He also voted for funding for light rail in Salt Lake City (he's Mormon), but against light rail funding for Oklahoma City.
What is it with Oklahoma? Even Istook is likely to be out-dumbed by Oklahoma's new senator, Tom Coburn, who believes "lesbianism is so rampant in some of the schools in southeast Oklahoma that they'll only let one girl go the bathroom" at a time. No evidence could be found for this peculiar claim. He also described state legislators as "a bunch of crapheads." While I do not agree, I am sympathetic to the perspective.
-- Sen. Ted Stevens, who as usual has larded the appropriations bill with an outsize package of goodies for Alaska, assured the Senate that Istook's amendment would be deleted before the bill was sent to the president. He begged, he pleaded. "Do I have to get on my knees?" he asked.
Quick, someone check just how much more in federal spending the 250,000 citizens of Alaska are getting than the rest of us.
-- Also stashed away inside the appropriations bill was a provision imposing a domestic gag rule on abortion: no federal money to agencies that require doctors, hospitals or insurers to provide abortions, cover them OR give referrals to abortion providers. Sailed right through the House. Hey, why not put a new abortion restriction in the appropriations bill, along with the kitchen sink?
-- Republican House leaders rejected the 9-11 commission's bill on intelligence reform. Eighty percent of Americans want the intelligence reforms, and our safety is directly at stake. But hey, we're just chopped liver: The reforms would take power away from the Pentagon. And as we all know, we just can't have that.
-- The Senate voted 65 to 30 to set funds aside for a special category of "priorities," including a new presidential yacht.
-- It's really fascinating to watch the Republican slime machine at work on Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle. Earle is one of the longest-serving district attorneys in the entire country. His constituents have been re-electing him since 1976. He was one of the first prosecutors in Texas to create a victim assistance program and helped start the Austin Children's Advocacy Center to help abused kids.
He's pretty much a local hero around here, and no D.A. gets that way by being "soft on crime." Earle is death penalty advocate. He is also noted for going after corrupt Democratic politicians in this state, even though he's a Democrat himself. He was willing not only to take on the slam-dunk cases, but also some tough ones just to remind everybody that the law is to be obeyed.
Earle is such a careful craftsman of prosecution that Time magazine selected him as their main example for a major 2003 article to explain how DAs like Earle might bring some resolution to the death penalty debate. Earle has experienced both the good and bad of the death penalty -- consequently, he has a special review procedure for cases on which his office seeks capital punishment.
He is widely admired among his peers, and his innovations are often copied. This is the guy the Republicans are blithely dismissing as a "crackpot." Since Earle has been in office almost 30 years and has a fine national reputation, it's ludicrous to dismiss him as a "runaway district attorney." Does anyone at Fox News ever do any research?
-- As though things on the legislative side weren't bad enough, Bush and Cheney are moving to make the executive branch all-powerful. You can already see several of the unfortunate characteristics of the first term being intensified in the second. The emphasis on secrecy is already more pronounced, as is the selection of people for loyalty rather than competence.
But we have to save some room for when it gets worse, so I'd like wish absolutely everybody, including the Bush administration, a swell Thanksgiving.
She could organize a pity party with other liberal hags such as Helen Thomas, Eleanor Clift, Ann Richards and Katie Couric.
Come on now you know why Molly has her period anyway don't ya?
Cause she deserves it. Some are bleading heart liberals others
just bleed. Wah Wah Wah. Sorry Molly 4 more years of Bush and Cheney saving your ass like it or not! Wan Wah Wah
I thought Ivins was dead. Wasn't she real sick?
Why would they have to "save room" for more b*tching and moaning? They've been at it for 4 years, and I have no doubt they'll keep it up for the next 4 too.
Incessant complaining is one thing that will never be in short supply for the libs.
Just ignore the has-been, Ivins. She's mad because she's an ugly leftist feminist and is rapidly getting old. That anyone pays for her mindless rants shows what passes for brains in the MSM.
This is just how the ole girl gives a little meaningful fun to her branch-water, wet brained life. She can't help it. She was born that way.
Without some looming, omnipresent Darth Vader-like evil force stealing milk from babies, usually in the guise of Republican lawmakers, to do battle with, she'd be just another Texas Democrat rocking on the front porch, cussing the noisy traffic as really important events leave her in the dust.
Molly is one of those who hoped to ride the ignorant intransigence of tobaccky spittin', Repuublicin hatin', Yellow Dog Democrats to a reign of unchallenged Bolshevisim at all government levels.
However, her fellow socialists in control of the Democrat Party over played their hand and couldn't quite get over to the publc that it was a Repressive Hate Crime to comment negatively if a couple of purple-haired, stud-faced, queer Nambla members chose to adopt a few pre-teen boys and raise them to properly revere the value of individual "diversity" and tolerance.
She and her ilk perhaps moved a little too quickly in those "post-Clinton and Here Comes Hillary" high times. Too many people weren't buying what they were selling, and had trouble with concepts like "Billy Graham is a tottering old Hitlerian threat to all cherishable Human Values" whereas Whoopi Goldberg and Michael Moore represent Truth, Democracy and the American Way.
Hence, Bush is re-elected and the Republicans increase political power. This has to be rather traumatic for a pin-head, reactionary, socialist doctrinaire like Molly. She can either rant that 'things are worse than ever, yet the worst is yet to come'--or she could become a born-again conservative Christian who is "evangelical"
to the greatest feasible degree" like Hillary did. Obviously, she coose the former as her course of action and probably had no real choice in the matter as a Grand Wizard Communist Commissar of the 3rd Degree.
These people were fun to watch for a while, but now they are tiresome. I find myself wishing that what they say of Bush were true, and he would send them off to Gitmo or some other internment camp never to be heard from or spoken of again.
Forget that. If you want to see something truly funny, give Molly Ivins some Viagra and watch her get taller.
One thing I truly love about this new century is the growing irrelevance of people like Ivins, Dowd, and their imitators who were touted as being so important during the nineteen-ninties- AKA, "the decade of fraud(s)."
Eventually dipsh!ts like Ivins, Thomas and Dowd will realize they are irrelevant and exist only for the entertainment of us more intelligent life forms. The more they squirm, whine and bitch the more laughable they become. And as long as they're doing so we can find comfort in knowing things are going well for our side.
All kidding about the source aside, I never thought that I would ever live to see the day when the Republicans managed to make the Democrats look like the party of fiscal responsibility. What the hell do we need a presidential yact for? The last four presidents have managed to limp along without one, why the sudden need for Bush?
I'm surprised Molly can write on that thorozine, it's pretty powerful stuff.....
Who on earth would sleep with that cross between a horse and cow?
Quick, someone check just how much more in federal spending the 250,000 citizens of Alaska are getting than the rest of us.
BTW I don't recall hearing one word of protest from Ivins when KKK Senator Robert Byrd was creating the finest highway system in the country in that booming metropolis of West Virginia by way of legislative pork. Ann Coulter was right...to liberals history did start this morning.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.