Conservatives Practicing Soviet-Style Revisionism

When the USSR was still up and kicking, teachers were required to edit history books. They'd cut out or paste over pages, replacing them with content sent them by the Communist Party. Figures who had fallen out of favor with the party were airbrushed out of photos and any mention of them was pasted over with a new history -- as far as anyone was concerned, those people never existed. As a result, Soviet students grew up in a world without any real past or, at least, a past nearly as unknowable as the future. If Comrade X was a big figure in Soviet history one year, the next he might no longer exist.

The reason for this was what the right would call "politically correctness" run amuck. The party's ideology dictated that the party was flawless. Removing people from history wasn't seen as an act of censorship, but as retroactively correcting mistakes. By revising history, the party believed they were able to control it. And the populace became used to ever-changing truths and, for the most part, accepted the party's shifting versions of reality.

This Soviet style airbrushing of history is happening now in the US. Specifically, Texas. And the first figure to fall out of favor with the party and be airbrushed out of history is one of the founding fathers. Liveblogging a Texas Board of Education meeting the Texas Freedom Network reported that Thomas Jefferson has become the Texas version of Leon Trotsky.

9:30 – Board member Cynthia Dunbar wants to change a standard having students study the impact of Enlightenment ideas on political revolutions from 1750 to the present. She wants to drop the reference to Enlightenment ideas (replacing with “the writings of”) and to Thomas Jefferson. She adds Thomas Aquinas and others. Jefferson’s ideas, she argues, were based on other political philosophers listed in the standards. We don’t buy her argument at all. Board member Bob Craig of Lubbock points out that the curriculum writers clearly wanted to students to study Enlightenment ideas and Jefferson. Could Dunbar’s problem be that Jefferson was a Deist? The board approves the amendment, taking Thomas Jefferson OUT of the world history standards.

9:40 – We’re just picking ourselves up off the floor. The board’s far-right faction has spent months now proclaiming the importance of emphasizing America’s exceptionalism in social studies classrooms. But today they voted to remove one of the greatest of America’s Founders, Thomas Jefferson, from a standard about the influence of great political philosophers on political revolutions from 1750 to today.

[...]

9:51 – Dunbar’s amendment striking Jefferson passed with the votes of the board’s far-right members and board member Geraldine “Tincy” Miller of Dallas.

Jefferson is no longer in favor by the party. Having written about a "wall of separation between church and state," the third President of the United States and author of the Declaration of Independence is no longer "politically correct" among the wingnut crowd who insist that the founders wanted to set up a theocracy. So he's out, replaced with such non-founders as John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, Voltaire, Charles de Montesquieu, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin, and Sir William Blackstone. Also out, references to democracy.

This revisionist history isn't limited to Texas. It's being practiced in the talking points of the Republican Party. "During a Christmas Eve appearance on Fox News, I pointed out that most mainstream economists believe the government must boost the economy with deficit spending," wrote columnist David Sirota in January of last year. "That's when conservative pundit Monica Crowley said we should instead limit such spending because President Franklin Roosevelt's 'massive government intervention actually prolonged the Great Depression.' Fox News anchor Gregg Jarrett eagerly concurred, saying 'historians pretty much agree on that.'"

Sirota did what few people would -- he checked. Not only do historians "pretty much agree" on the exact opposite of what Crowley and Jarret were saying, but so do the vast majority of economists. But history didn't serve their argument well, so they broke out the airbrush and history was "corrected." This became a common Republican talking point during the debate over the stimulus package -- that Obama's spending would fail, just as FDR's supposedly had.

McClatchy's Steven Thomma has a great piece on the right's attempts to edit history to their liking and I suggest you read it. In he looks for historical revisionism among the Republican elite and finds plenty. Among them; Sen. Joe McCarthy was a hero, the Jamestown colony failed because of its socialism (in reality, it was a company town founded by the stock-issuing Virginia Company of London and didn't actually fail), that Alexander Hamilton wasn't in favor of a strong central government, and that Theodore Roosevelt hated the rich.

Of course, this is all provably BS, which goes a long way toward explaining the actions of the Texas Board of Education. Texas is the nation's largest purchaser of textbooks, meaning that Texas standards influence other state's textbooks as well. Like Soviet students, the students of Texas and many other states will learn the history that the party approved, not the history that actually happened.

You may know too much for the party's good, but the airbrush can make sure your children don't.

-Wisco


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RNC's Steele Dragging the Party Down

There is no doubting the fact that Democrats are in a bad place right now. Polls show that, unless things change, Republicans stand to gain some real ground in Congress this fall. Of course, anything can happen between now and then but, for the time being, things look pretty bleak for dems. In my opinion, this has more to do with the inability of Senate Democrats to get their act together and behave like a party than anything -- although, there's some blame to be cast in the house as well. Bart Stupak and his crowd also decided that the best thing to do in an election year was to drive a wedge into their own party. The entire intra-party healthcare debate reminds me of the sheriff in Blazing Saddles holding a gun to his own head. Only, in this case, holdout Democrats carried out the sheriff's threat.

Party discipline? What's that?

If they want some good news, Democrats aren't going to be able to look in their own backyards -- that place is a wreck. They're going to have to look to the mess in the neighbor's yard. Luckily, that place is a wreck as well and sitting atop the rubble is Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele.





Things are so bad over at the RNC that they've begun slaughtering scapegoats. Politico reports that RNC Chief of Staff Ken McKay has resigned, "becoming the highest-ranking official to depart the committee" after the big lesbian/bondage-themed striporama scandal. But as soon as Steele tries to put one flap behind him, he jumps head first into another.

Politics Daily:

Republican National Committee chairman Michael Steele -- who really can't afford another 'holy ----" story after a GOP staffer dropped $1,900 at a lesbian-bondage themed Hollywood club and a top conservative called for an RNC donor boycott -- has hired a new "special assistant for finance."

Although described by many as a smart, gifted and glib fundraiser, Neil S. Alpert, 31, who began work on March 29, probably won't do much to burnish Steele's image as a money manager.

This is the same Neil S. Alpert who in July 2007 was ordered by the District of Columbia government to repay nearly $70,000 in unauthorized expenses and unaccounted money from a pair of local baseball groups he had chaired. He was also fined $4,000.

"Several [D.C. Baseball] PAC and association board members and advisers told me they wanted the matter referred to the U.S. Attorney's Office for prosecution," writes PD's Annie Groer, "but that they understood $70,000 was 'too small' an amount for law enforcement to pursue. They also concluded that filing a civil suit would be too costly for the loosely organized, all-volunteer boards."

So Steele fires one guy over an expenses scandal and hires someone who's basically an embezzler. Needless to say, that probably wasn't the wisest way to go. Republican donors could be excused for feeling less than reassured by the moves.

But that's just Michael Steele. Apparently, there's something seriously wrong with the man. Poor impulse control, maybe. He's almost Bushian is the way he just barrels ahead with whatever strikes him at the moment, without any regard for -- or even awareness of -- the consequences. This is the same guy who sent out a fundraising pack with the number of a phone sex line on it, spent thousands of dollars on private jets, swanky hotel rooms, and limousines, promised a "hip-hop makeover" to lure young people and blacks to the GOP (a makeover that resulted in a seriously awful website -- and pretty much nothing else), and then accused the critics of all these foul-ups, bad ideas, and mismanagement of racism.

"Most people are reevaluating whether there’s a way that the chairman can be sidelined so we can get through this without hurting our electoral chances," a "longtime ally of Michael Steele" told Greg Sargent. "If it was as simple as firing the CEO than that would happen."

But getting rid of Steele is unlikely. Two-thirds of the party's 168 committee members would have to vote to remove him and apparently the votes aren't there. Maybe Republican holdouts are worried about how it would look in an election year; it'd just highlight the fact that the committee is in chaos. Instead, they're working on marginalizing Steele, by attempting a private fundraising campaign.

And, even at what would seem to be the bottom, Steele has managed to make things worse. His racism comment isn't going to fly well with a base already tired of accusations of bigotry from the left. He's already insulted small donors once, now here he is doing it again. "It's the worst thing he has done," Sargent's contact told him. "This kind of thing drives small donors crazy. People will grin and bear [Steele] as much as they can -- until the fundraising dries up." I remind you, this person is described as a "longtime ally of Michael Steele." Imagine what his actual enemies are saying.

So if Democrats are heading for a crash in November, they may have RNC chairman Michael Steele as an airbag. The GOP's fundraising has always been party-centric; switching that to a private campaign in an election year will be a real problem for them. Democrats have a good extra-party funding apparatus through unions and groups like MoveOn.org and the GOP may find that difficult, if not impossible, to match. And, despite the fact that Democrats are down in the polls, they're still doing better on the fundraising front than Republicans.

When the smoke clears on election day, Democrats may very well find themselves battered and bruised. But, thanks in part to Michael Steele, they'll probably be able to say one thing about it honestly.

"It could've been worse."

-Wisco


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GOP Hypocrisy -- Again

Over the weekend, the media and the blogosphere were abuzz with the story that Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens may retire. With the justice being 89 years old, this shouldn't surprise anyone. And, given recent history, it also won't surprise many to learn that things will probably get very stupid. It won't make any difference who President Obama nominates to replace Stevens, that nominee will be painted as a terrorist and/or (probably "and") a communist.

If we've learned one thing in recent years, it's that elected Republicans are reactionaries and that the reactions their jerking knees lead them to is always completely out of proportion to the facts. We've also learned that Republican voters, aided by talk radio blowhards and lunatic conspiracy theorists on FOX News and the internet, are panicky grandmas who are afraid of their own shadows and, worse, are almost eager to be frightened into a stampede of sheep. If Glenn Beck or Michelle Malkin say that the Obama nominee wants to kill everyone, then they'll be more than happy to believe what confirms their own paranoid fantasies.

Wait, did I say that "things will probably get very stupid?" I guess I misspoke. There is no nominee and things have already begun to get stupid.

Huffington Post:

The second-ranking Republican in the Senate suggested on Sunday that the party would filibuster the next appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court, if that nominee were deemed to be outside of the judicial mainstream.

"It will all depend on what kind of a person it is," Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) declared during an appearance on "Fox News Sunday." "I think the president should nominate a qualified person. I hope, however, he does not nominate an overly ideological person. That will be the test, and if he doesn't nominate someone who is overly ideological, you may see Republicans voting against, but I don't think you will see them engage in a filibuster."

What makes for an "overly ideological" judge? We got a little preview of that. Arlen Specter was interviewed at the same time and told Chris Wallace that maybe we needed someone to balance out the court.

"I am a little troubled by what Arlen said," Kyl countered. "Don't have somebody coming in with preconceived attitudes. I'm going to be tough on the executives or I'm going to be for the little guy, we've had too much of that."

We've had too much of judges "standing up for the little guy?" Really? If Democrats don't grab that quote and run with it, someone's just not doing their job. It's about the dumbest damn thing I've heard in a while, as well as being nowhere near true.

And is Kyle actually threatening to filibuster a judicial nominee? Here's Kyle in 2005 on eliminating the filibuster when voting on judicial nominees (the "nuclear option"):

For 214 years it has been the tradition of the Senate to approve judicial nominees by a majority vote. Many of our judges and, for example, Clarence Thomas, people might recall, was approved by either fifty-one or fifty-two votes as I recall. It has never been the rule that a candidate for judgeship that had majority support was denied the ability to be confirmed once before the Senate. It has never happened before. So we're not changing the rules in the middle of the game. We're restoring the 214-year tradition of the Senate because in the last two years Democrats have begun to use this filibuster.

"[W]hat would occur as a result of the question that will be asked to the presiding officer in this debate is basically, is it the tradition of the Senate to have an up or down vote to give these nominees an up or down vote with the majority vote prevailing or is the last two years the real precedent of the Senate to require 60 votes?" Kyle said on the same program. "And I think that the presiding officer will say no the tradition of the Senate has been that a majority vote prevails."

By the way, all the Republicans called filibustering judicial nominees "unprecedented" and all the Republicans were wrong.

But more important is that Kyle is basically arguing that when Democrats filibuster a judicial nominee, it's a disaster of historic proportions. But when Republicans filibuster a judicial nominee, it's democracy in action. I'm getting awfully damned tired of typing out the word "hypocrisy" every other time I write about Republicans. It's tiring. I wish they'd just knock it off and try honesty for a change.

I'm torn over which offends me more, the Republican belief in my stupidity and inability to remember five years back or the idea that the American public needs to be protected from someone who'll "stand up for the little guy" -- i.e., the vast majority of the American public.

I guess in the end I can combine the two -- and a lot more -- by saying I'm offended by the shamelessness of the Republican party. Because Sen. Jon Kyle, Republican of Arizona, just announced he'd filibuster any nominee who'd promise to protect the American people from getting screwed.

And he said it as if it was a good thing.

-Wisco


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GOP Backs Away From Repealing Healthcare Reform

Healthcare reform is the worst thing ever. It will destroy the economy -- such as it is -- and shutter small businesses. Woe be unto the nation, for surely we are doomed.

Still, there's hope on the horizon. We've got elections in November and, once Republicans run all the Democrats out of office, there won't be any healthcare reform anymore. "Every [GOP] candidate who is running a campaign in November 2010, that will be one of the first questions and the first ads that will want to ask, 'Are your health care costs lower now by virtue of passing this health care bill?' I think the answer to that will be no, they are not," Republican Senatorial Committee chairman John Cornyn said a few weeks ago. Yup, Republicans are going to run on repeal and no two ways about it.

For his part, President Obama, clearly intimidated by Republican promises to run on repealing his landmark legislation, can't surrender fast enough.

"Be my guest," Obama said in the first of many planned appearances to sell the revamp before fall congressional elections. "If they want to have that fight, we can have it. Because I don't believe the American people are going to put the insurance industry back in the driver's seat."

The president and Democrats are obviously on the run.





Despite the fact that running on repeal would be the smartest move anyone ever had, Republicans have blinked. Rep. Jack Kingston of Georgia, who had previously pledged to work for repeal, now says he won't. "There are a lot of things in this bill I think you and I certainly like," he says. He's not alone. Over at The Wonk Room, Igor Volsky put together this handy list:

- Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN): "The fact is that s not going to happen, OK? Corker said today at Vanderbilt University. He also said last week that repeal is probably not going to be practical."

- Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC): "It may not be total repeal at the end of the day, said Burr in a radio interview. It may be a series of fixes over the course of this bill getting enacted that allow us to change and possibly bend that cost curve down."

- Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX): "The focus really should be on the misplaced priorities of the administration&Candidates are going to test the winds in their own states. & In some places, the health care bill is more popular than others."

- Rep. Mark Kirk (R-IL): promised to lead the charge on repeal just two weeks ago, he now refuses to answer when reporters "asked repeatedly 'if he wanted to repeal health care reform.'"

For his part, John Cornyn is sticking to his guns -- except when he's not. Repeal it is... maybe... if you call it something else... or call an election cycle a "repeal."

"Whether you want to call it repeal, or whether you want to call it a referendum I don't think makes a dime's worth of difference," Cornyn told Talking Points Memo's Brian Beutler. "I think the point we're trying to make, and I think those who are talking about repeal are trying to make, is that this will be the issue that will define the November election."

Of course, "repeal" and "referendum" don't mean the same thing at all. That's why they're two different words. Cornyn might as well have said, "Whether you want to call it swimming, or whether you want to call it a birthday cake I don't think makes a dime's worth of difference."

That didn't fly with the teabaggers -- which is a problem for Republicans -- so Cornyn tried to have his birthday cake and swim it, too. "Make no mistake about it: I fully support repealing this Washington takeover of health care and replacing it with a bipartisan bill that lowers the cost of health care," he's said more recently.

The GOP has painted themselves into a corner with their own over-the-top rhetoric. They've convinced the base that reform is a catastrophe, so they can't support it after the fact. But there's real danger that support for reform will gain ground between now and November, so they can't really put all their chips on repeal either.

In response to this new reality, they do what Republicans do; have it both ways. The answer to whether or not they're for repeal depends on who's doing the asking. The party's reactionary mindset prevents them from foreseeing this sort of thing. They just react to what's happening today, then do the same thing tomorrow. We saw the same lack of foresight in their support of Bush's invasion of Iraq; the whole thing was based on lies, but no one ever seemed to give a moment's thought to what would happen when those lies didn't actually pan out -- which was inevitable. There's a cliche that Republicans are playing checkers, while everyone else is playing chess, but even in checkers you have to think ahead. Republicans are playing pinball, whacking away at the ball when it comes close to the flippers and hoping for the best.

Is this approach going to work for them in November? Assuming nothing changes, yes. But that's the GOP's problem; they always assume nothing will change. In any case, recent history shows it can't possibly pan out in the long run. Republicans running on repeal are running on an already broken promise -- it doesn't stand a chance in hell.

If it doesn't bite them in the behind this time around, it'll do it eventually.

-Wisco


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A Conservative Fundraising Plan I Can Get Behind

Guess what? The Republican National Committee's recent bondage-themed strip club scandal has the religious right up in arms. Who would've guessed? For the bluenoses, it seems the whole thing is a double-whammy; you've got an expenditure that borders on embezzlement and you've got boobs, lesbianism, whips, and chains.

Yeah, I guess it's not so surprising after all.

For their part, the party's fighting back. Unfortunately, they're doing it poorly. Andy Barr reports on an email that the RNC sent to Politico (and, you've got to assume, other news organizations) that points the finger at Democrats.

In hopes of redirecting incoming fire about its spending habits, the Republican National Committee on Wednesday tried to turn scrutiny to the spending habits of the Democratic National Committee but came up with nothing nearly as risque as almost $2,000 in expenses for a night out at a bondage club and on private planes.

It tallied up, instead, two years worth of catering, luxury hotels and limousine bills.

[...]

"The DNC spent at least $2,204,000 for luxury hotels and caterers," [RNC Communications Director Doug] Heye writes at the top of the e-mail.

Barr then summarizes the expenses for the reader and concludes, "The expenses are not outside the norm for a party committee -- nor, for that matter, is the vast majority of what the RNC spends." Of course, it's not the majority of the spending that's the RNC's problem, it's the booze-fueled stripper hootenanny part. And all of the DNC's spending is pretty normal. The RNC shoots for a competing scandal -- and doesn't even come close to scoring. The moral of this story: saying, "Your fly is open" -- then throwing a sucker punch -- doesn't always work.

I brought up the religious right, so I guess I ought to get around to expanding on that.

CNN:

The head of an influential social conservative organization urged supporters Wednesday to stop donating to the Republican National Committee and instead contribute to its own coffers or to candidates with like-minded goals.

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, made the plea in his "Washington Update" column posted on the organization's Web site following the revelation that the RNC paid for a night out at a risqué Hollywood nightclub.

"I've hinted at this before, but now I am saying it -- don't give money to the RNC," Perkins writes. "If you want to put money into the political process, and I encourage you to do so, give directly to candidates who you know reflect your values. Better yet, become a member of FRC Action and learn about the benefits it offers, including participating in the FRC Action PAC which can support candidates who will advance faith, family and freedom! To find out more about becoming a member of FRC Action click here."

OK, so it's a sort of self-serving argument, but there's a truism for political non-profits; if you're not asking for money, you don't have money. That's why nearly every communication you get from an organization includes some sort of pitch. As a former fundraiser, I understand this and I don't hold Tony's beg against him. Also, as a liberal who's a former fundraiser, I say that people should totally do what Perkins suggests -- mostly because it's an incredibly dumb strategy.

Political parties have campaign committees for a reason. They deal with insane amounts of money, sure, but it is a limited amount. You don't want to blow all your ammo on races that are sure losers and races you'll win in a walk, you want to take that money and put it were it's most likely to make a difference. To do this, you need a centrally coordinated campaign.

The biggest drawback to Perkins' idea is that the areas that'll give the most to their congress critter are the areas that are least likely to need the money. The districts and states with the most religious nut money are almost certainly red, red, red. And giving outside your district means you're most likely to give because of name recognition. This translates to already powerful incumbents or sure losers trying to unseat entrenched liberals that conservatives hate -- i.e., "Give now and help me unseat Nancy Pelosi!" I'm not saying that you shouldn't give to individual candidates, I'm just saying that if everyone does that and only that, it's a disaster. As I said, the parties put together campaign committees for a reason.

Of course, Perkins' FRC offers to supply that central coordination, but I guarantee those candidates would have to pass a purity test that even conservative stalwarts like Lindsey Graham would fail. He's not as interested in electing Republicans as he is in electing religious fundamentalists. A lot of that money will be wasted.

But never mind all that. To all you Republicans and conservatives out there considering bypassing the RNC, you should totally do that. Tony Perkins just had the best idea anyone ever had in the history of good ideas.

-Wisco


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