THE CUT-AND-RUN PARTY

BILL FRIST


Never rains but it pours; at least, that seems to be the case for Republicans these days. A brief recap - the Foley mess and subsequent coverup controversy that may actually lead to the resignation of House Speaker Denny Hastert; the fact that Condi Rice was briefed by George Tenet about the looming threat of al Qaeda on July 10, 2001, yet she failed to mention this under oath in front of the 9/11 Commission and it adds credence to the notion that the Bush administration didn't spend enough time on terror issues pre-9/11; the possibility that the GOP might lose control of either one or both houses of Congress. And now this; sit down because it's a doozy: Bill Frist thinks it would be a good idea to allow the Taliban back and incorporate them into the fledging Afghan government. Everyone remembers the Taliban, right? They're the guys who actually "provided aid and comfort" to the fellas who flew a couple of planes into American buildings and killed 3000 people on 9/11. Yeah, that's right! The Taliban is the government the so-called coalition of the willing overthrew back in 2001. And now Frist thinks it's a good idea to let the come on back. From the International Herald Tribune (h/t Daily Kos):

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said Monday that the Afghan guerrilla war can never be won militarily and called for efforts to bring the Taliban and their supporters into the Afghan government.

The Tennessee Republican said he had learned from briefings that Taliban fighters were too numerous and had too much popular support to be defeated by military means.

Amazingly, this guy is the leader of the Republican Party in the Senate and a presidential hopeful in 2008. For the so-called Party of National Security, this sounds an awful lot like cutting and running. This right here could win the Democrats both houses of Congress. For years we Dems have been calling bullshit on their national security credentials. Bill Frist has gone and made our case for us. We could not ask for a bigger gift. Honestly, from a political standpoint, this could not have been a better couple of days for the Democrats. The talking points alone have made it all worth it. Everytime a Dem appears on television, they should start each interview with a recitation like, "Well, the GOP wants to cut and run in Afghanistan and surrender to the Taliban; the GOP protects and enables sexual predators; the GOP has a pre-9/11 mindset; the GOP is soft on fighting the real war on terror." I could go on, but I get the feeling that the GOP will do something else even stupider in the next day or so that will make these problems look like molehills to the coming mountain.

POINT/COUNTERPOINT

BILL FRIST


Since I rarely borrow so judiciously from other's writings for a single post, please allow me this. Via Bob Geiger's blog:

How did Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) commemorate Constitution and Citizenship Day, when he returned to the Senate floor on Monday? In an odd twist of logic, he blamed the minority party for how little work has been done in the 109th Congress.
September 17, which fell on Sunday, celebrated the ratification of the United States Constitution and Frist used that occasion to announce that Senate Democrats are actually the reason that the last 20 legislative months have been proclaimed the "Do-Nothing Congress."
"Too often my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have inhibited the fulfillment of our duty," said Frist, after a stirring reading of the preamble of the Constitution. "They have relied on obstruction and thrown up roadblocks at every opportunity. They have let politics get in the way of sound policy and purpose. That is unacceptable."

Poor Fristy. I mean, he's only got 55 senators who just happen to be long to the same party as him. How can he be expected to get anything done with that darn minority party getting in the way. Instead of pointing this sort of obvious fact out, Minority Leader Harry Reid had this to say instead:

"This Republican Congress has wasted 20 months on horse slaughtering; the Schiavo case, dealing with someone's personal relationship, which should not even have been before this body; gay marriage; the nuclear option; flag burning; repealing the estate tax," said Reid. "But they could not find a day for some time to look at the President's mistakes, missteps, and misconduct, which have hurt American security and plunged Iraq into a civil war -- not a day."

Reid expounded on the lack of Congressional oversight over the last few years:

"During the Civil War, President Lincoln was faced continually with oversight hearings by his Congress. Of course, we know during World War II, there were a number of commissions. The most famous was that conducted by Senator Harry Truman of Missouri, which led to his becoming Vice President. Some say, but for that he would not have been chosen as Vice President."

What was the Truman Commission? It was to determine what was going on with World War II. Was money being wasted? Were troop levels right? Korean war hearings were also held, and the same for the Vietnam war. But for this war, none--even though this war has taken longer than it took to settle the differences in the European theater in World War II. Soon it will be the same amount of time that we were able to beat Japan."

Reid absolutely excoriated Majority Leader's bullshit. To come with such weak game like this just illustrates more and more how absolutely hilarious it is that Fristy still believes he is a viable candidate for president in '08. The guy is a clownshoe; a sockpuppet for the Bush regime. Giving him four years in the White House after eight years of the Bush nightmare/debacle/horror show would be the equivalent of putting a loaded gun in Uncle Sam's mouth and pulling the trigger. Let's not let that happen.

SECRET WEAPON

BILL FRIST


I was originally going to title this missive "Lapdog" but it just seemed to obvious. I went with "Secret Weapon" because I believe that Bill Frist is an often overlooked component when it comes to the national dominance of the GOP over the last four years. Installed in 2003 as the Senate Majority Leader, Frist has perhaps had closer ties with the White House than any majority leader in recent history. And it is through these ties that Bush/Cheney/Rove have effectively controlled almost every piece of legislation to come out of the Senate, and to a larger extend, out of the entire Congress itself.
I made a comment over at one of the big blogs, and I opined that there is a big difference between Bush crony and a run-of-the-mill Republican. Former Senate leader Trent Lott is what I would call a Republican while Frist is a Bush crony through and through. I did a little Wikipedia search on Lott in order to refresh my memory of on the whole Lott/fall from grace thing. For those not aware, Lott was slated to become majority leader in 2003 after the Republicans gained seats in the '02 midterms. A month after the election, Lott was in attendance at Strom Thurmond's 100th birthday party and he had some complementary things to say about Thurmond and his run for president as a Dixiecrat in '48. Here's what he said, courtesy of Wikipedia:

"I want to say this about my state: When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We're proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over all these years, either."

Though the remarks can be read a number of ways - a tacit approval of Thurmond's racial segregation platform all the way to a meaningless compliment to an very old man on his birthday - they caused quite an uproar. A number of Republicans brushed it off as more of the latter than the former and I tend to wonder if the thing wouldn't have died down over time if not for Bush expressing his moral outrage a few days later. It was Bush's remarks that effectively ended any hope of Lott gaining the majority leader position, allowing Frist to assume the position with Bush's full support. Lott has maintained on a number of occasions that it was the Bush/Rove machine that drove him out of the leadership position, and it is a position he still holds. To me, it makes an awful lot of sense. Granted, Rove didn't stick his hand of Lott's ass and play "ventriloquist" with him, making him say what he said, but Bushco certainly didn't miss this opportunity to remove a senator who was not as controllable as they might like and replace him with someone who apparently doesn't mind having Rove's hand you-know-where.

All of this brings me to today's announcement that Fristy is once again being the good little White House stooge as he actually threatens to filibuster (and here I thought only obstructionist Democrats did that sort of thing) a national security bill because it does not allow Bush to torture people. The current bill have strong bipartisan support in the Senate and it would appear that the Republicans that crossed the aisle on this subject are firm in their commitment to not allow the United States to further lose its moral authority in the world by allowing torture. He has made his intentions clear that the bill as written and supported by a majority of the Senate is dead and will not be allowed to pass. He has effectively drawn a line in the sand and he will not waver from standing from standing with Bush on this.
Frist has been a key contributor to the notion that there really isn't any sort of checks and balances among the three branches of government. His actions on this bill are another clear indication of this concept. In Bushworld, the president is king and Frist apparently sees himself as a faithful servant, always ready to do the king's bidding. I find it mindnumbingly hilarious that Frist envisions himself a viable candidate for president in two years. He'll be retiring from the senate next January, no doubt to clear up his schedule to campaign. It's just amazing that a guy who has acted as Bush's inside man in the Senate can somehow expect voters to not to notice that for the past four years he's been nothing but a stooge for the White House.
It'll be interesting the watch if nothing else.