Selective Memories Serve GOP

By Bill Gallagher
Created Oct 10 2006 - 7:51am

- from the Niagara Falls Reporter (posted here with permission) [1]

DETROIT -- They forget the most memorable and monumental events. From
reports that a U.S. representative was hitting on young congressional pages
to a specific warning that al-Qaeda was planning a major terrorist attack to
the entire year of 1972, the most important people in Washington are prone
to serious and serial memory lapses.

Convenience? Coincidence? Or maybe House Speaker Dennis Hastert, Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice and President George W. Bush are so focused on
running the country and spreading democracy around the world, lesser matters
of the past just drift away.

These people who can remember the birthdays of the grandchildren of big
campaign donors just seem to forget, when the truth will show what slaves
they are to lies. Anyone who believes the Busheviks buys lies and detests
the truth.

Speaker Dennis Hastert lied through his teeth when he initially claimed --
as he did to the Chicago Tribune on Sept. 29 -- that he "was not aware until
last week of (Foley's) inappropriate behavior." He also told the Tribune he
is the victim of a vast left-wing conspiracy. "The people who want this
thing blown up are ABC News and a lot of Democratic operatives, people
funded by George Soros," Hastert said.

Actually, Mike Hudson, the Niagara Falls Reporter editor in chief, is behind
the plot. He's been under the weather recently and needed a little fun when
not watching the baseball playoffs. Rush Limbaugh is right. The whole affair
was a setup, and now I offer the world exclusive that Hudson orchestrated
the whole thing from his hospital bed.

The entire Republican House leadership and many others on Capitol Hill knew
that Rep. Mark Foley had a sexual fondness for teenage boys who worked as
pages, and his despicable behavior toward them was not a surprise to many.
The whispers were there for all with ears to hear.

The Republican leaders lied about what they knew and covered for Foley until
ABC News exposed his sexually charged e-mails and forced his resignation.
Absent the news reports, the Republican leaders would never have said boo
about what they knew about Foley and would have continued to support his
re-election.

House Majority Leader John Boehner had a rare moment of truthfulness, which
he then quickly retracted, returning to lies. Boehner told the Washington
Post he had "learned this spring of some 'contact' between Foley and a
16-year-old page," and told Speaker Hastert, who "assured him 'we're taking
care of it.'"

As soon as the Post reported Boehner's explosive admission, he quickly
denied saying it and claimed the story that he had informed Hastert of
Foley's behavior was "not true."

What is true is that Boehner is a liar. He hid from the damning truth and
settled for the dark limbo of lies to protect himself and the other
Republican leaders.

Rep. Thomas Reynolds, R-N.Y., admits he learned about Foley's e-mails
"months ago" from Rep. Rodney Alexander, R-La., and "told the speaker of the
conversation." But as head of the Republican House Campaign Committee,
Reynolds chose to forget about the sordid matter, urged Foley to seek
re-election and took $100,000 from Foley's overstuffed campaign war chest.

Only when he's forced to testify under oath will we learn the extent of his
duplicity. But beyond his lies, Reynolds wins the prize for putting on one
of the most loathsome and disgusting displays of political exploitation in
modern times.

I've been watching national politics closely for nearly half a century and
have seen some pretty sordid people and things. But when Reynolds trotted
out a bunch of children and used them as stage props at a news conference
where he tried to defend his indefensible conduct, we witnessed a new and
nauseating low.

Reynolds looks up at pond scum. He urged Foley to run for re-election
knowing of his penchant for writing sexually charged notes to teenaged boys.
Reynolds was more concerned about keeping the Republicans in control of the
House and fostering his own ambitions than he was in protecting children.
And then he was quick to exploit other children to mask his horrific deeds.
I trust the voters in Reynolds' Western New York district will discard this
career politician and give him the boot from the office he's disgraced.

All the slimy Republican leaders deserve ignominious defeat. They took a
problem that should have been dealt with quickly and severely, and turned it
into a political protection game. They made it a partisan issue and
Republican secret when the head of the three-member board that supervises
the pages hid Foley's transgressions from the panel's sole Democrat. The
board is supposed to be non-partisan, and the members are chosen to oversee
the selection, education, housing and general welfare of the high school
students who run errands, answer phones and deliver messages for members of
Congress.

Rep. Dale Kildee, D-Mich., was perfect for the page board. The former high
school Latin teacher is one of the most decent and respected members of the
House and he's been on the board for nearly 20 years. The Republican
leadership decision to exclude Kildee from dealing with the Foley problem
says all we need to know about the partisanship that is at the root of the
scandal. The party that wraps itself in "family values" opted to keep the
dirty little secret in the Republican leadership family.

"I was outraged to learn that the House Republican leadership kept to itself
the knowledge of Mr. Foley's despicable behavior toward the House pages,"
Kildee said. "We have an obligation to those kids. They're 16 years old,
they're away from home, and we should stand 'in loco parentis.'"

Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., the chair of the page program who handled the
Foley coverup for Hastert, didn't even tell the other Republican on the
panel. Rep. Shelly Moore Capito, R-Va., said, "I feel we should have been
informed. I'm absolutely disgusted by what I'm hearing and was caught
totally unaware."

The Republican leaders in the House have forgotten that some people do have
memories. Come November, they'll remember who lied and covered up, and throw
the bums out.

In an administration with so many lawyers, PhDs, MBAs and former corporate
CEOs, it's mind-numbing to hear how forgetful they are. It's stunning how
Dr. Condoleezza Rice's steel-trap mind and awesome memory just break down at
the most inconvenient times.

When she was testifying before the 9/11 Commission, Rice struggled to
remember the title of the Aug. 6, 2001, presidential daily briefing memo.
Rice talked with the speed of summer lightning, but she just couldn't recall
that the PDB was titled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." Poor Condi.
She had to be helped to remember the document she had brushed off as
"historical information."

Rice still can't recall who told her that those specially coated aluminum
tubes Saddam Hussein had, as she repeatedly claimed, "could only be used for
nuclear weapons." Rice must have forgotten all those intelligence reports
that demonstrated the tubes were used for conventional weapons and had
nothing to do with an Iraqi nuclear program.

"I don't remember a so-called emergency meeting," Rice whined when
confronted with Bob Woodward's report that George Tenet, then CIA director,
briefed Rice on July 10, 2001, on his concerns that al-Qaeda was planning an
attack and she had better get people focused on that real possibility.

In his book "State of Denial," Woodward tells how Tenet and his top aide,
Cofer Black, were so alarmed by a rising flood of intelligence warnings that
al-Qaeda was plotting something big that they drove to the White House for
an unscheduled meeting with Rice to underscore the urgency of the moment and
"get Rice to kick-start the government into immediate action."

While Tenet and Black felt their "blood boiling" over the threat, Rice
simply "brushed them off." When White House records confirmed the meeting,
Rice had to shift her lies.

She then told the Washington Post, "What I am quite certain of is that I
would remember if I was told -- as this account apparently says -- that
there was about to be an attack in the United States. The idea that I would
somehow have ignored that I find incomprehensible." No, Condi didn't ignore
the warning. She probably just "forgot" about it.

Of course, she -- and Tenet, for that matter -- forgot to tell the 9/11
Commission about this pivotal meeting two months before bin Laden's boys
committed mass murder. Even when Rice saw the memo of Aug. 6, 2001, again
warning what Tenet feared was coming, there is not a scintilla of evidence
that she took any action.

Frankly, I don't think Bush even bothered to read it. He tends to ignore
matters that don't interest him. At the time, he was resting at his ranch,
clearing brush and dreaming about a missile defense program that would
enrich military contractors and ensure a steady flow of money for Republican
campaigns. Bush forgets about that now. In his twisted memory, he was always
focused on protecting us from terrorists, at least when he wasn't looking
for an excuse to invade Iraq and thinking about more ways to cut taxes for
the super-rich.

George W. Bush does have a pretty good memory for names -- especially the
names of elite members of his "base." He does a decent job of memorizing his
lines: "cut and run," "stay the course," "they hate our freedoms."

But Bush remains the only healthy adult I know of who cannot remember or
account for his whereabouts for an entire year -- 1972. Bush was assigned to
the Alabama Air National Guard, where he was supposed to fly planes, which
the taxpayers spent a million dollars training him to do, thus enabling him
to avoid duty in Vietnam.

Bush doesn't remember a single person he served with, and other pilots --
known for their camaraderie -- can't remember ever seeing Lt. Bush. By his
own admission, Bush was a serious substance abuser in those days, and that
certainly might account for his memory lapses. But wouldn't someone
somewhere in Alabama have seen Bush wasted in some bar? Bush was AWOL,
hiding from his responsibilities and ducking duty.

Four decades later, he puts thousands of young Americans in the line of fire
in a civil war and terrorist-spawning pool his madness created. The war in
Iraq will never be settled militarily -- a lesson from Vietnam Bush has
forgotten.

The American people can act in November, end one-party rule in Washington
and begin dismantling the Bushevik regime, a political horror show I want to
forget.
_______
BILL GALLAGEHR

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"A little patience and we shall see the reign of witches pass over, their
spells dissolve, and the people recovering their true sight, restore their
government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we are
suffering deeply in spirit,
and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous public
debt. But if the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have
patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an opportunity of winning
back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles are at
stake."
-Thomas Jefferson