HOW QUICKLY THEY TURN!

Guests on the Weekly Gang-up:
Eugene Robinson, Washington Post columnist,
Byron York, White House correspondent for National Review and author of "The Vast Left Wing Conspiracy"; Byron York? Kudos!,
Linda Wertheimer, NPR Senior National Correspondent.

Poor Rep. Murtha, like all "useful idiots" of Lenin fame once no longer useful your fate is either to be cast aside or just plainly stabbed in the back. I guess, to paraphrase the late Ann Richards, he was born with a "political foot in his mouth". On the way to the elections a funny thing happened to Rep. Murtha. He not only accused American troops of atrocities, without the benefit of trial or presumption of innocence, but he also asked for a "redeployment" of those same troops to the "strategic" location of Okinawa! As result he became the darling of the liberal media and the Bush-hating left.

On the way to the elections Murtha was their man but now that the Democrats want to present their version of a kinder and gentler, and not to mention "conservative" Democratic Party, he is no longer useful. The ink on the ballots was not dry yet when Democratic apparatus in the media was bringing back what they kept silent throughout; Rep. Murtha's involvement in ABSCAM. The question is, will the Democrats be able to hold on to the pretend and superficial "conservative" coalition they have put together, when the likes of James Carville and the Clinton "ex machina" is already calling for the head of Howard "Yee Haa" Dean?
The Democrats who were so apparently willing to overlook Rep. Murtha's propensity for corruption are still mum about Rep. Jefferson of Louisiana being caught with $90,000 worth of "culture of corruption" in his freezer, not to mention the use of National Guard assets during Katrina's worth phase of rescue to retrieve that money from his upper class neighborhood. They are also silent about the possibility of having an impeached federal judge as Chairman of the Intelligence Committee. Yet, their are aghast at the rehabilitation of Sen. Trent Lott, who not only had to go through serial apologies but had to have his head roll in order to appease the racially sensitive gods for unprepared remarks during a birthday celebration for the late Sen. Thurmond.

However, in a similar event in nature, Sen. Christopher Dodd said of former KKK leader Sen. Bird, that Sen. Bird was "a man good for all times". Did those times include the Civil War, Jim Crow, the Civil Rights struggle? Was Sen. Bird good for all times? Why the double standard in the media which led to a two week barrage against Sen. Lott until he resigned?

All kinds of generals and pundits, also on the way to the elections, were paraded through the liberal media echoing the words and position of Rep. Murtha. Now the same media is parading the same generals and pundits saying that an immediate withdrawal from Vietnam, er.., I mean Iraq, would be disastrous. Yes, the Democrats have finally achieved their parallel with Vietnam that they so had been wishing to have.

In an ironic twist of fate the analogy or parallel that opponents of the intervention in Iraq have been looking for from the beginning has been found: Democrats are seeking a political solution to a military problem. Irony of ironies, they have created for themselves a Nixonian quandary. Soon we will be hearing of a new version of "Peace with honor".

All Botoxed-up And Ready To Go!

Guests in the weely Gang-up:
Tom Gjelten, correspondent, NPR and is working on a book about Cuba, Sebastian Mallaby, columnist, Washington Post
Moises Naim, editor in chief, "Foreign Policy" magazine.

After disappearing for the last weeks of the elections she is back and ready to decorate!

Well, congratulations to the Democans! When the going gets good the good gets mushy. The elections simply mean this, when the economy is good it leaves voters time to complain or concentrate on other things. The same thing that happened to Bush 41 has happened to Bush 43. Although the economy was on a rebound during the last year of Bush 41 the electorate concentrated on Bush's failed promise of "no new taxes". And the same thing happened to Gore. Although the Clinton/Gore team left the economy in a fair to good state the electorate simply got tired of scandals and indictments. Gore just paid the price.

Now the Democrats interpret the results of this election as a homecoming from the moderates and the center to a left wing, "move on.org" Democratic Party; nothing further from the truth. In order, to win this victory the Democrats had to hide not only Rep. Pelosi and Reid but almost went into panic when Sen. Kerry once again showed the true colors of what the Democratic Party has become.

The Democrats had to support center to conservative Democrats in order to establish their left wing leadership on top of the key positions they believe rightfully belongs to them. But what they are missing is that it is not the Democratic Party that has won but the "Democans": the electoral demographics made of conservative to center independents, Reagan Democrats and new Republicans that felt left down by the lack of assertiveness of the Republicans when they not only controlled the bully pulpit but "the whole kit and caboodle", the ones that elected Sen. Lieberman.

Across the country every major social conservative issue from gay marriage to affirmative action was rejected by the voters. The Democrats have fooled themselves in believing their own propaganda and their own polls about the "war in Iraq". They have confused disapproval for the lack of conclusive vigor in the conduction of the war with approval of the withdrawal "plan" of the Democrats for Iraq.

It will be amuzing to watch how the portrayal of the war in the media will evolve from now on. It will be in the same manner that we now do not hear calls from the Democrats for investigations of voting machines even though they had preemptively claimed that fraud would keep the Republicans in power. Calls for recounts anyone?

Both parties need to learn something. When you win the majority you have to act like the majority. If the Democrats learn and apply this knowledge they will remain in power. If they listen to the electorate that put them in power and not to the left wing fringe, they will become once again the party of Sam Nunn, Joe Lieberman, JFK, Zel Miller, maybe even LBJ. If not they will temporarily remain in power as "Democans", sustained by an electorate that can just as well become "Republicrats".

"I was sorry before I was for it" - The Mea Culpa Syndrome

















Guests on this week's Gang-up:
Susan Page, Washington bureau chief for "USA Today"
Michael Duffy, assistant managing editor, TIME magazine.
Todd Purdum, "Vanity Fair".

Politicians are not the only people born with the propensity to put a foot in their mouths every now and then, although some seem to have an innate ability. Of course, the DR Show, which according to the screener "can't take" my call today, towed the line the rest of the media is towing regarding Sen. Kerry's latest podiatric accomplishment.

Sen. Kerry insulted those members of our society who are voluntarily serving, not "stuck" in Iraq. The so-called apology issued by Sen. Kerry is as much an apology as a further insult. First, we fail to see what the original joke was. Second, he insults our intelligence, which obviously he believes we do not have, by telling us it was a "botched joke".

But this latest flap and apology "dance and pony show" is only indicative of two things. One is the double standard applied to Democrats, and second, the very state of the Democratic Party.

Had a Republican made the same comment he would have to go on a two-week tour of public apologies plus he would be required to resign whatever position he or she would hold. Compare statements and apologies by other Democratic Party members and you'll see - if you are honest with yourself - Biden about Pakistanis, Clinton on Indians and so on. But that is not the big issue.

The issue is how apologies have become political and PR tools, not signs of real remorse and repentance. At one time a political party will see demanding an apology as a way to humiliate an opponent, at another time when applied to them an apology may be issued but without a real admission of wrong doing. Most political apologies today are issued "if anyone has been offended." There is no real conscientious admission of having issued an objective offense. In other words, an offense can be uttered knowingly, and then one issues a conditional apology to save some face while the offense remains not purged.

But in the case of Sen. Kerry what we see is a clear pattern of disdain not only for a branch of service of which he has hoped to be Commander-in-Chief, but mostly for those who actually filled its ranks. But the otherwise humorless and sanctimonious "politically correct" crowd now pretends that we see a joke where there was none but upper class condescension.

What I find really stunning and a threat to the democracy we all love as liberals is how partisan the media has become. It is not even hidden anymore.

Last week the hoopla was about Mr. Mathew J. Fox and statements that Rush Limbaugh did not actually made. Ms. Rehm was rightfully indignant but only based on the information she got from her community of colleagues in the media. Now she takes the word of The New York Times and without the same level of indignation she felt for comments that Limbaugh did not make she uncritically accepts the hook, line and sinker of the Kerry camp. I am disappointed.

Republicans or conservatives put their foot in their mouth and they have to go on "apology tours" and even resign their posts as if we lived in the USSR. Democrats put their foot in their mouth and we get an apology "if we are offended" because we are so dumb we probably have just "misinterpreted" their jokes, their high class sense of humor. The Democratic Party is no longer the party of immigrants, working and middle classes. It has become the party of power at whatever cost.

In the meantime, history will have the last laugh. Mr. Kerry can forget about his presidential aspirations.