Seriously, how many scandals does it take?
It seems like every time another scandal breaks with this administration, there is this hope that this one will be the one, the one so blatantly obscene that it cannot be denied or parsed, the one that will finally make this disgusting regime we find ourselves under fall. So let's recap. We've had:
1. The Downing Street Memo: no one gave a shit, no one paid attention.
2. Abu Ghraib: no one high up on the chain of command is punished. Rush Limbaugh says the soldiers were just having a good time
3. Katrina: Halliburton gets the rebuilding contract.Newt Gingrich blames the residents of the 9th Ward, for being too stupid to get out of the way of the hurricane.
4. The Plame Affair: Libby convicted, may or may not be pardoned by Bush. Oh, also Plame outed herself, the dumb bitch.
5. Walter Reed: It was all those slovenly veterans' fault.
6. The US Attorney Scandal: Clinton did it.
It is enough to make me want to bash my head against a brick wall. The Democrats have finally got the balls to subpoena the relevant parties but Bush will fight it allll the way to the Supreme Court. And you know what? He may win. And his supporters in the pundit world and in the blogosphere keep on tapdancing. I guess when you've gotten to the point where you're parsing the definition of torture you can justify anything. But the cognitive dissonance is maddening. This point has been made over and over and over and over and over again, but since Tony Snow is now attempting to eat his own words, I think it bears repeating. These were the same people who tried to impeach Clinton for getting a blowjob. Even thinking about it makes me want to scream. Can they just publicly clarify that Democrats and Republicans will have completely different legal standards applied to them from here on out.
I try to be optimistic, and tell myself that it is almost over. But I know it can still get worse, in so many ways. Bush has been the president since I was 15 years old. Half of highschool and all of college, I just tried not to think about it. Pondering it, for me, only leads to rage, and then sullenness and depression.
