There Was a Crooked Man

Who built a crooked house.

On purpose.

Way back in 2009 when Andrew Sullivan was still adorably bumfuzzled as to why-oh-why the GOP seemed to intent on wrecking everything it touched, I attempted to toss a little, elementary political education over the transom of his dorm-room Real Conservative bong-a-thon.

Since then, the lessons I sought to impart to Mr. Sullivan remain as sadly constant and true as the day I wrote them nearly five years ago.  Since then, Mr. Sullivan has tacked further and further Left, annexing more and more of the basic Liberal critique of the Right, filing off its serial numbers and re-marketing it as "True Conservatism"...all while denying that Liberals like us even exist.

None So Blind II

In which Andrew Sullivan is shocked to find that Republicans used their years running the country to wreck the country.

Sigh.

From his site (with emphasis added by me):

...
It is good to see the GOP pretending to be fiscally conservative again, but could any of them - just one or two apart from Ron Paul - concede that Bush and Cheney are the ones responsible for our current fiscal nightmare? They drove us so deep into the ditch that we have almost no fiscal lee-way to counter the kind of crisis they stumbled into at the end of their term. If we had retaied the fiscal health of the Clinton-Gingrich years into the new millennium, our range of possible actions right now would be far less dire.

Except since the beginning of time, the essence of politics has always been about deliberately depriving the opposition of as much choice and range of motion as possible. About deliberately forcing them down the path of your choosing by eliminating every other alternative.

How do you not know that?

For example, for the longest time Neoconservatives wanted to extend the American Empire into the heart of Middle East. So they used the crisis of 9/11 to gin up a pack of lies, roll 150,000 troops into Iraq, blow that country to atoms, fuel anti-American rage and terrorism where in never existed before, and then argued with a straight face that we could never leave Iraq….because of how fucked up everything was.

Or do you dirty terrorist-lovers want America to lose?!?

The whole object of the war was to strand us there; to arrange events so that no one could ever even whisper that maybe we should extricate ourselves from the Bush Clusterfuck without paying a fearful price. By mercilessly playing on the public's deepest fears and the Right's love of killing scary brown people, the Bush Administration would pitilessly cauterize every option except the never-ending occupation of Iraq and -- Bingo! -- the Neocons would have their Empire.

For decades, Conservative have also been equally open and clear about wanting to smash the federal government and replace it with an unfettered, unregulated corporate feudal state. Because Gummint is Evil, Evil, Evil! So Conservatives rolled the Bush Administration into D.C. with all its ruthless, calculated bumpkinism like a political IED and detonated it. And Conservatives cheered as their Decider smashed and bankrupted every bit of government he could lay his hands on…applauded as he hog-slaughtered the “fiscal health” of its predecessor without a backwards glance…and now fanatically oppose any action to address out economic crisis that does not begin and end with more tax cuts.

Because Conservatives HATE the government. Or don’t you remember?

Jesus, man, it was in all the papers. For years and years and years. C’mon and work with me here.

Unbridled loathing? “Booga-Booga; the Liberal Gummint is out to get you”? Hulk Smash? Starve the beast? Drown it in the tub?

On every radio and every teevee?

Ring any bells?

The text or subtext of a billion tons of Conservative direct mail campaigns?

The first paragraph of every Conservative phone-banking effort?

Ten seconds of every thirty-second Republican campaign ad?

The thesis statement of every wingnut begging letter and fundraiser?

The fucking Guanine and Adenine in your fucking political DNA?

And since hating government (in its Evil Liberal puppet masters) is THE central organizing principle of the Conservative Movement, how can it possibly surprise you that, as Iraq follows 9/11, Conservative policies and politicians have brought us to this moment.

That however many lies it may require and however much pain it may inflict on the public, Conservatives see economic collapse in America as a good thing. A righteous cleansing and path back to power. As their golden opportunity to finally, once-and-for-all curb-stomp the Evil Socialist Gummint into oblivion.

What comes after is a little unclear, but depending on which RSS feed you subscribe to, I believe we either get a 1,000 Year Randite Reich, or The Rapture.

Why do Conservatives wreck everything they touch?

Because that's what American Conservatism is designed to do.



There was a crooked man, and he walked a crooked mile.


He found a crooked sixpence against a crooked stile.
He bought a crooked cat, which caught a crooked mouse,

And they all lived together in a little crooked house