Every political conservative I ever met was a both a hypocrite and a liar-- by nature. This week we saw the quintessential Republican, Tennessee Congressman Scott DesJarlais (who represents Murfreesboro, Lynchburg, Shelbysville and the suburbs west of Chattanooga), vote against the right of a woman to exercise Choice in her own reproductive health. Only 4 Republicans voted against their heinous bill introduced by closet queen and anti-woman psychopath Trent Franks (R-AZ) but DesJarlais's vote was special. DesJarlais had encouraged his ex-wife to have two abortions and pressured one of his mistresses-- one of several very young patients of his medical practice who he drugged up and raped-- to abort his love child. But it's on foreign policy that this GOP penchant for shameless, bold-faced lying with such alacrity is most troublesome for the country-- and the world. And they get away with it because their target audience is, by nature, ignorant, self-selected morons who wouldn't know the difference between Paraguay and Laos. When Reagan ran a brutal primary campaign against President Jerry Ford, he claimed Panamanian military dictator Omar Torrijos, a progressive but anti-Communist authoritarian who worked very closely with the U.S., was a "Marxist" who was grabbing the Panama Canal from the hapless Ford and Kissinger. During the Florida primary Reagan said in Winter Park:
State Department actions for several years now have suggested that they are intimidated by the propaganda of Panama's military dictator, Fidel Castro's good friend General Omar Torrijos. Our State Department apparently believes the hints regularly dispensed by the leftist Torrijos regime that the canal will be sabotaged if we don't hand it over. Our government has maintained a mouse-like silence as criticisms of the giveaway have increased... I don't understand how the State Department can suggest we pay blackmail to this dictator, for blackmail is what it is. When it comes to the Canal, we bought it, we paid for it, it's ours, and we should tell Torrijos and company that we are going to keep it.
But Reagan lost the Republican primary to Ford, and it was Jimmy Carter who sent Ford packing in November. And it was Carter who finished the negotiations Ford had started to hand the Canal and Canal Zone back to Panama. Four years later, Reagan ran against Carter and blasted him for "giving away" the Canal. (Reagan, by the way, had the CIA assassinate Torrijos shortly after he was inaugurated president, not because of Castro or the Canal per se but because the Reaganites believed he was too sympathetic to the Nicaraguan Sandinistas who had recently toppled the fascist Somoza regime the CIA and far right Reaganite elements in the U.S. backed.) Why bring up Panama-- which the U.S. helped create by using military force against Colombia-- and Reagan now? We're headed into GOP primary election season and this post should serve as a warning in regard to the ceaseless barrage of GOP bullshit headed in our direction about places that most of their base are frightened of and/or know nothing about-- from Libya, Yemen, Iran, Syria, and Iraq to Venezuela, Russia and any other miserable country the candidates can use to frighten paranoid right-wing imbeciles. Good example: the line of unadulterated bullshit Rubio and Cruz are feeding hapless GOP audiences about the negotiations with Iran.
Three rebellious foreign policy hawks pushed for a tougher Iran bill. In the end, two of them-- both with 2016 hopes-- gave in to the overwhelming consensus in the chamber. The Senate easily passed legislation Thursday that hands Congress a formal review of any U.S.-Iran agreement to limit the Iranian nuclear program in exchange for relief from sanctions. GOP Sens. Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz, and maverick freshman upstart Tom Cotton, had pushed to make the bill stronger. But even though they were denied the chance for votes on their amendments, Rubio and Cruz ultimately agreed with the Senate consensus as the bill passed 98-1, with only Cotton voting against it. ...[I]n the end, Republicans agreed with the bill that provides oversight, more information for lawmakers, and at least an avenue--however unlikely to muster a veto-proof majority-- to try and block the potential agreement that many GOP lawmakers contend will be a bad deal.
All four of the Senate GOP 2016 candidates-- Rubio, Cruz, Rand Paul, and Lindsey Graham-- were cosponsors of the initial version of the bill introduced in late February by Corker and Democrat Robert Menendez, then the Foreign Relations panel's top Democrat.
It seems safe to guess that we're in for endless heaps of Iran campaign bullshit ahead.
