Now that some Republicans are coming out and saying something akin to "Today's Republican party is not the Republican party that I joined," I guess we should applaud if it weren't so damn sad.
I find everything George Bush has done to be exactly what he said he'd do. He promised smaller government. What would be more effective to decrease the size and the power of a central government than to bankrupt it? Why not make sure your friends take a HUGE cut on the way out, say, by launching an illegitimate war and outsourcing everything from k-duty and laundry to computer maintenance? In Florida, his brother Jeb promised to empty the state buildings in Tallahassee. So the people elected him, and he just fired state workers. Kids were lost in the foster care system because no one came to work. State biologists were given the boot. Some jobs were outsourced to private companies who now charge the state twice the cost and some were just canned--he attempted to get rid of the state library-- but citizens, mostly Democrats, stopped him.
Today, Jane Smiley writes about public confessions of Republican surprise. She, too, wonders how could you think that it wasn't all coming to this? She describes the current administration as a bully gang. "Everything, every value, that the Republicans have held up for my lifetime as desirable has been pointing us in this direction...when you reject common humanity, value profits above people, practice sectarian religion, feel contempt for the choices of others, exalt wealth, conflate consumersim with citizenship, join exclusive clubs, daily practice unkindness rather than kindness, and develop theories, such as those of free market capitalism, that allow you to congratulate yourself morally for selfishness and short-sightedness, then being a gang member is in your future."
Where's Bobby Kennedy when he's needed?
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