In a recent interview with the Seattle Times, Dave Reichert made a point of emphasizing his bipartisanship:
“It’s about solving problems,” he said. “This bickering back and forth is a waste of time. It’s tiresome. I just think sometimes it gets childish.”
Childish bickering, huh? Well take a look at Reichert’s approach to bipartisanship, as he describes it before a roomful of Republicans back in 2006:
“Hardest thing in the world to do to be nice to a crook, let alone someone who took your best friend’s life. But it’s my job. And in America, how hard is it for me to put my arm around a Democrat, if I can put my arm around Gary Ridgway?”
Reichert takes a touching story about a colleague and friend, tragically shot and killed in the line of duty (just get a load of those dramatic pauses)… and uses it as a setup for a punchline about Democrats. A cop killer and a serial killer, equated with Democrats. Right back at you, Dave.
But I guess that’s bipartisanship, Dave Reichert style.
“A cop killer and a serial killer, equated with Democrats.”
I thought he was being charitable. He could have equated Democrats with traitors.
While we equate Republicans with corrupt politicians and war criminals. Wait….oh, yeah, they are.
While we equate Republicans with corrupt politicians and war criminals. Wait….oh, yeah, they are.
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And Microsoft has been a big contributor to some of these war criminals:
http://www.opensecrets.org/pac.....=C00227546
I’m sure a few employees have left the company on principle, eh?
I know quite a few people who listen to Limbaugh and Hannity daily, and visit right-wing websights for their news & views. They are very “insular”, and they don’t get their news from any other sources. They are discouraged from doing so, on the grounds that listening to anything else is exposing themselves to “negativism”, and that even the MSM is “left-wing propoganda” (despite all the evidence to the contrary). These guys won’t even read Fortune Magazine or the Wall Street Journal!
Anyway, these are the types of people Reichart has to meet with to secure his base and raise his money for any campaign. They don’t think he’s “conservative”, they think he’s not right-wing enough! So he tells them what they want to hear – that he’s really “one of them”, that he considers anybody left of Attila the Hun to be the equivilent of a serial murderer and a traitor to his country, but he sometimes has to pretend to get along with them because, well, he needs their cooperation from time-to-time, no matter how distastefull it might be. And the wingnut crowd applauds, agrees that he is “one of us” after all, and bless his campaign with prayers of support and cash.
I know this, because I’ve been to similar meetings, albeit with other candidates. As I said, I’ve know quite a few of these people, and they seem to think that if they keep inviting me to these meetings, then one day I will see the light and be converted. Since I am an Evangelical Protestant, they think that there is still hope for me yet, if only I could be “converted from my back-sliding ways of consorting with Democrats”.
Now, it’s true that politicians have been doing this as long as there is recorded history – telling one thing to one group, and another to another group. But some do it more often than others, some are more honest than others, and that’s not an excuse for allowing yourself to get lied to in an era when there is a camera in every meeting, and YouTube available to post it for all to see.
But with respect to Reichart, he reminds me a bit of a fellow I used to work with. This guy was good part of the time, and a rat the other part of the time. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out whether he was a good guy who felt he needed to be a rat occassionaly to get ahead, or whether he was basically a rat who felt like he had to pretend to be a good guy sometimes in order to get ahead. I finally concluded that it didn’t matter – he still acted like a rat when it counted, and he should be treated accordingly.
@4 I know quite a few people who listen to Limbaugh and Hannity daily, and visit right-wing websights for their news & views. They are very “insular”, and they don’t get their news from any other sources.
Insular thinking is a problem on both the left and the right.