The GOP: the party of crazy randomness.
Bill Kristol: we must exploit the populist rage at the AIG bailout!
Doughbob: we must not exploit the populist rage at the AIG bailout!
13 year old CPAC star and Twitter enthusiast John McCain: we should exploit the populist rage at AIG to make up some facile crap about how we shouldn’t have bailed them out!
Mel Martinez: we must not tell this company AIG which we, the government, own what to do about its bonuses!
(That last link has the bonus what-the-hell? of Chuck Grassley suggesting the proper response is the ritual suicide of business executives. Not your father’s GOP!)
They’re not intellectually bankrupt so much as gone deep in to intellectual hock to regain their fortunes buying commemorative plates and tulip bulbs. Look for Newt Gingrich’s new book “The Dumb Idea Bubble, And Why Now Is The Time To Buy”.
Seriously at some point when they’re done with this insanity they’ll have to convene some kind of GOP Year Zero retreat to learn basic political competence. “Item one: what is this thing you call a ‘memo’?”
March 17, 2009 at 8:14 am
Chief Wiggum: Gee, I really hate to spoil this little love-in, but Mr. Malloy broke the law. And when you break the law, you gotta go to jail.
Mayor Quimby: Uh, that reminds me, er, here’s your monthly kickback.
Chief Wiggum: You just, you couldn’t have picked a worse time.
March 17, 2009 at 8:17 am
When you buy an elephant, you can’t refuse to buy the manure that comes with it.
Jonah, I think the LA Times is well aware of that fact.
March 17, 2009 at 9:07 am
“Item one: what is this thing you call a ‘memo’?”
I seriously doubt that the GOP has already forgotten what message discipline is. It’s pretty much who they are.
March 17, 2009 at 10:01 am
Suicide is painless
March 17, 2009 at 12:12 pm
Wait, what’s wrong with ritual suicide of business executives?
March 17, 2009 at 1:32 pm
Wait, what’s wrong with ritual suicide of business executives?
Nothing; it’s just not the sort of thing you want to be half-assed about, as a political party.
March 17, 2009 at 4:15 pm
I, for one, don’t want anyone to be half-assed about committing sepuku. Talk about humiliation.
I do, however, wish to see perp walks for the next year and I want it with the full monty: cuffs, leg irons, dozens of flashing cameras, dark-suited FBI types and loads of bystanders. Make my day.
March 17, 2009 at 7:06 pm
I think “me Says” is right. The Repubs are right on message by framing this as an issue of how the party in power will handle this as opposed to how the party out of power might have handled it. What gets lost is the fact that the overwhelming majority of the upper cleptocracy at AIG is almost certainly Republican. Some Democrat with a pulpit needs to loudly point this out and make sure that the debate is less about how the Republicans would wield political power and more about how Republican citizens, just by acting the way Repubs do, can fuck us all.
March 19, 2009 at 4:41 am
Wait, what’s wrong with ritual suicide of business executives?
Well, it could be regarded as culturally insensitive or even offensive by Japanese people. It’s like: black singer stands up and sings a spiritual: not a problem. White singer blacks his face and does the same thing: problem. Non-Japanese executives should kill themselves in culturally appropriate ways; jumping off the Brooklyn Bridge, say, or shooting themselves in the library with their old service revolver.
March 19, 2009 at 9:20 am
Nah, I think this is exactly what it looks like. No official party leader, no message discipline. The press aids and abets both ways. It’s easy for them to find the Official Party Position when all they have to do is read the latest White House press release, and they can treat any dissent as marginal and unimportant. For the out-of-power party, anyone who’s vaguely prominent can get quoted – McCain, Limbaugh, Steele, a whole bunch of senators, reps, governors and too damn many pundits – and nobody can get real leverage to say, “hey, that’s not the Republican position!”