Republican Is As Republican Does

Chris Bowers at MyDD explains that Republicans have not suffered tanking public opinion polls because of any "mistakes" they have made, rather the public's low opinion of Republicans is due to the fact that the GOP has done precisely what it had set out to do. The appalling Bush administration response to Katrina was purposeful, a direct and clearly intended result of the GOP's "hate government" agenda. The GOP House leadership response to Foley's sexploitation was purposeful, a direct and clearly intended result of cynical political calculation. The doomed-from-the-start Iraq war horror was purposeful, a direct and clearly intended result of Bush/Cheney/PNAC ideological imbecility. Social Security privatization, Terry Schiavo, opposition to stem cell research, torture, abolition of habeas corpus, spying on citizens without warrants, Bin Laden's getaway at Tora Bora, war profiteering, lack of armor for troops; all of 'em purposefully intended with easily foreseeable consequences, the obviousness of which serves as overwhelming proof the results are expressly what the Republicans wanted! The whiny GOP doesn't much care for criticism of its many successes. Indeed, Republicans don't even seem to understand why they're being criticized, because they think what they've done is good. So we have the spectacle of Hastert's now-routine stupidity on Foleygate, and the Bush/Cheney administration's routine stupidity on everything. Republicans desperately want to blame somebody - anybody - else for their political failures. But their attempts at scapegoating not only don't work, they compound their problems. Republicans can't - or won't - see that the plainly self-evident failing lies with their own ideological agenda and political beliefs. Stupid is as stupid does.