Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Desperation on the Right

“Beelzebub to the Seventh Level, Beelzebub to the Seventh Level. Bee paging Senator Joe McCarthy. Paging Senator McCarthy. Joe, get your skinny butt up here and bring John Birch and J. Edgar with you. Make sure Hoover isn’t wearing that damn frock. We’ve got problems in McCain land and you three are needed.”


Let see, in the past week one of the McCain-Palin surrogates suggested Barack Obama and many (Democrats) in Congress are “un-American.” Governor Palin, herself, implied Obama and Biden were “socialists,” and then—the coup de grass--Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Tex, senior Republican on the House Judiciary Committee and several other senior R’s asked the Attorney General to investigate the GSEs and, implicitly, the Congress for failing to pass GSE regulatory legislation, when the Republicans were in control of both chambers and George W. Bush was President!!

Mulder, Scully, are you listening? It hardly gets better than this.

But, it will, the nasty right wing poop throwers are out in force, because the GOP is facing significant congressional electoral defeats and its troops are panicking. That frenzy is forcing decent folks like Spencer Bacchus (R-Ala,) to sound silly, while whacko folks, like Rep. Michelle Bachman (R-Minn.), sound even more wing-nutty.

Bachman started it last week, calling for the “media” to investigate all of the “anti-Americanism” in Washington, which she justified by saying Obama recently hung out at corporate board meetings with Bill Ayers, the 60’s “Weatherman,” who served time for Vietnam War era domestic hostilities (when Senator Obama was 8 years old). Bachman not only wants the press to examine Obama, which it seems they have been doing, but she also wants the media to look into the entire Congress, too! (Has anyone heard her current rant, denying she said what she said, all of which was captured on national TV Uh, Michelle, and they have you on tape?)


Then, Governor Palin, after trying to escape her self-inflicted gaff of calling some parts of America more “pro-American” than others, suggested that Senators Obama and Biden have socialistic tendencies.

Socialistic tendencies………Hmm.

Socialism!

Socialism refers to a broad set of economic theories of social organization advocating state or collective ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods, and the creation of an egalitarian society

As my good friend John Buckley reminded me, “Socialism” looks like what Hank Paulson produced when Congress gave him that unbridled “financial bailout authority.” John said that Hank first rolled up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, ending their lives as shareholder owned companies and making them federal instrumentalities. The Treasury Secretary moved on to the federal takeover of insurance giant AIG, taking on all of its financial obligations. Still acting very “Leftist,” Paulson—channeling his best Karl Marx-- blackjacked several of the nation’s largest banks into accepting Treasury equity investments and guaranteed the debt and securities of dozens, maybe hundreds, of other financial institutions?

And that was just in a month’s time. Those damn Republican Socialists work faster than their D wannabees.


Are Paulson’s audacious acts the kind of socialism Governor Palin worries an Obama Administration will undertake? Maybe she fears a continuation of the Marxism that the GOP, without much Democratic input, decided was their chosen/preferred way to fix the nation’s financial and economic problems.

Or, is there another kind of “GOP pro-American Marxist Socialism,” which Paulson has been practicing? I guess we need only to wait for the next McCain-Palin press release to find out the answers.


Marxism and the Brothers!


What Lamar Smith (R-Tex) did this week is Marxist, too, but more Groucho or Harpo, than Karl!!

In a sequel to the “Gang that Couldn’t Shoot Straight” book and movie, the House Minority Leadership, acting through Smith and others, blew the whistle on themselves and asked Attorney General Michael Mukasey to investigate the nasty dealings of such thugs as Richard Baker, Jim Leach, Tom DeLay, John Boehner, and Mike Oxley, many in the Bush Administration, and a gaggle of GOP Senators and their Fannie/Freddie tormenters—since those public officials and the White House controlled the levers of congressional power when Fannie escaped getting nailed!

What a rogues’ gallery of perps and conspirators! Where’s a good guillotine when you need one?

The congressional descendants of Lincoln’s party argue that the GSEs failed to acquiesce to their demise. Fannie and Freddie refused to go along quietly with the GOP’s planned legislative beheadings and, instead fought the efforts, even employing some Republicans to do so! Shocking, shocking! What would Jack Abramoff say or do??

The House R’s want DOL to investigate that outrageous behavior investigated and name names!

Now, the reason the Democrats are exempt from this witch-hunt, obviously, is that the minute they took control of Congress in 2007, following the 2006 elections, they went to work on GSE regulatory reform legislation Those efforts became law this year, with broad GOP support.

So, where did those aforementioned R’s come up short—between 2000 and 2006--when they controlled everything? Maybe Mukasey does know?

I have a suggestion, since this investigation won’t happen in the next two weeks nor will it save those House GOP seats. The Republicans just should confess their guilt and seek contrition.

Institutionally and morally, there is a certain catharsis in coming clean and atoning for your sins.

I urge every single GOP Senator or Congressman--who thinks they have been manipulated by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac-- to give back any political contributions he/she received from Fannie and Freddie’s PAC, immediately, including those several $10,000 totals sent to House GOP Members. (See past three cycles of GSE political contributions.)

However, what could be far more valuable and enlightening to the public--in this GOP campaign to confess and do right--is if each of those House and Senate R’s would “monetize” (“Fed” terminology to put a dollar value on something that doesn’t necessary lend itself to quantifying) the bountiful, high quality, and “reaffirm my incumbency” press coverage/PR each of them obtained by joining personally with Fannie and Freddie in the dozens of housing initiatives announced all over the country, in their congressional districts, and in Washington.

Let Me Count the Ways…


I am referring to those huge politically valuable congressional appearances at all of the GSE bilingual housing fairs, where those GOP Member/Senators were asked to participate; the Partnership Office openings and regular briefings and reports, detailing GSE mortgage finance created in their cities and states, with those GOP pols present and taking credit; the ribbon cuttings on senior citizen housing events or handicapped housing facilities, which each company financed and which each managed to have some local Congressman/Congresswoman or Senator present, making appropriate comments; the hundreds of industry group meetings with local builders, Realtors, lenders, and consumers, where these now self-righteous public officials could bathe in the “GSE-provided” aura of being "housers,” ingratiating themselves to their constituents, and also getting valuable face time and introductions to local housing finance industry movers and shakers, who also were helpful at fundraising time.

Quantify the value received, convert it to dollars, and give it back. Re-establish your political virginity! Seek public absolution for your “GSE-driven fall from grace” and donate that money to a community group at work helping the less fortunate.

In doing so, repeat, “When we Republicans ran the Congress, we were ‘taken in’ by those damn GSEs and our elected Caucus leaders, too.”

Given what they seek, I think the R’s should relieve the Justice Department of this burden, simplify the AG’s tough job, and save the nation the expense. The House GOP guys and girls should join hands, walk down to the DOJ, hang their heads and offer AG Mukasey a “Pogo” explanation.

“Yep Son. We have met the enemy and he is us!”


Maloni 10-22-2008

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