TOO
MUCH, TOO SOON
It
all started when the Dade County canvassers decided to take
the ballot-counting out of public view, bar most of the media,
and retire to a small side-room of the county administration
building to count only the disputed ballots, rather than –
as previously voted – recounting all of Dade County's
returns in full public view. The Dade County canvassers had
arbitrarily barred the public and the media from most of its
deliberations, and this latest ploy was the last straw for
Republicans. As the Los Angeles Times put it:
"The
stunning flip-flop that changed the momentum of the presidential
race Wednesday came after a horde of shouting, shoving protesters
– many wearing suits and ties – stormed an upper
floor of a downtown skyscraper here. An elections department
receptionist fled her desk in panic as angry Republicans pounded
on the door. Nearby, a cordon of police guarded the county
Democratic Party chairman. With mayhem breaking out all around,
the besieged elections chief, David Leahy, switched off the
vote counting machines."
NOSTALGIA
Dade
County Democrats, never all that eager to go into the vote-manufacturing
business at the behest of the Gore campaign, backed off and
decided to stick to their original ruling: since they couldn't
meet the Sunday deadline for a complete recount, they weren't
going to conduct a recount at all. The scene in Dade County
brings to mind – and this is a generational thing –
that old New Left slogan so popular in Chicago during the
riots that marked the 1968 Democratic Party convention: as
cops beat the antiwar demonstrators to a bloody pulp the protesters
would chant "The whole world is watching! The whole
world is watching!" – their gleeful accusatory tone
confident in the knowledge that the whole world was indeed
watching, and what they saw wasn't very pretty.
A
GHOST RETURNS
Today,
William Daley – the son of the mayor who unleashed those
Chicago cops on demonstrators and more than a few reporters
– runs the Gore coup operation. His blunt, thuggish features,
like those of his father, perfectly embody the ruthless machine
politician for whom the law is an instrument of corruption.
As he deploys armies of lawyers and political hacks to steal
what he could not win at the polls, Daley II reminds us of
that old saw of Karl Marx's that history does indeed repeat
itself – the first time as tragedy and the second as
farce. This is one farce, however, that seems never-ending.
MUSIC
TO MY EARS
This
Thanksgiving – and I write this when most of you are
just about to tear into that turkey and scarf up as much gravy-laden
stuffing as you dare – we have at least one thing to
be grateful for: the Republicans, it seems, have finally begun
to understand the enormity of what is happening, and have
gone on the offensive. Since my last missive jeering the GOP
leadership for their pansy-like passivity, they have appealed
to the Supreme Court of the United States, the Florida state
legislature, and launched lawsuits in 13 Florida counties
demanding that overseas military ballots be counted. What's
more, they have done everything but run TV ads denouncing
the Gore coup in no uncertain terms. While Bush has largely
retained his "above the fray" presidential airs, the rest
of the GOP leadership has come out swinging. It may be too
late, but nevertheless the rising cries of "coup," "putsch,"
and even accusations of the Gore camp's treason is
music to my ears.
EXTREMISM
– NO VICE?
It
is no longer considered impolite or even "extremist" to come
right out and say the 's'-word: congressional Republicans
are not hesitating to say that Al Gore is brazenly stealing
this election, and conservative leaders are even angrier.
When Bill Bennett said it on CNN's Capital
Gang, Mark Shields, Al Hunt, and Margaret Carlson
erupted in fury, as Bob Novak smiled and looked on approvingly.
David Tell's analysis of "The
Gore Coup" in the Weekly Standard fumes that, even
if Bush manages to triumph in the end, look "how close we
will have come to having the central processes of our democracy
upended by the fanatic ambition of a single demagogue." This
is truly an amazing turn of events: the neoconservatives,
who once derided the "theocons"
and the Buchanan Brigades for their revolutionary populism
and fiery rhetoric, have finally seen the light! What's next?
– will Norman Podhoretz and Midge Decter now organize
the Upper West Side Militia?
TRIVIALIZING
THE COUP
Gore's
plea that "both sides tone down the rhetoric," besides being
part and parcel of his "presidential" pretensions, is a shrewd
tactical move, because not naming what is going on
is key to a Gore victory. Such a prohibition can work only
to the Democrats' advantage, which is why Gore's fellow coup-plotters
in the media are now taking up the question of conservative-Republican
"anger" and its apparent dangers. A Los Angeles Times
piece by Steven Braun is entitled "Conservatives Dust Off
Impeachment Outrage," and subtitled: "Incendiary comments
have even some on the right fearful of the effect it will
have on votes." Who are these "some"? In support of the headlined
thesis, Braun cites an obscure figure whom practically no
one has ever heard of, one Marshall
Wittmann of the Hudson
Institute, who somehow manages to trivialize the attempted
overthrow of the American republic: "This is impeachment,
the sequel." Wittmann avers that "There is a shared sense
that the rule of law is being undermined." Well, uh, yes,
in the sense that perjury and an attempted beer hall putsch
both violate the rule of law: but then, a pickpocket and a
murderer are both considered criminals. The Times piece
goes on to cite Wittmann as saying that "he understands the
visceral need for conservative thinkers to give air to 'their
real feelings. There are good reasons for doing so. But the
rhetoric on both sides also contributes to a deepening cynicism
about Washington,' Wittmann added. 'You wonder a little where
the adult leadership is.'"
A
THANKSGIVING PRAYER
If
it is "adult" to pretend that this is a tea party, and not
a life-and-death struggle for the survival of the Republic,
then conservatives and all who would resist the Gore coup
should treasure and glory in the spirit of youthful rebellion
that yet lives in the breast of those well-dressed Republican
demonstrators in Dade County. Without them, Gore would have
certainly stolen this election without a fight – although
he may succeed in stealing it yet. The sort of conservative
likely to be consulted by the Los Angeles Times may
be horrified by the populist and frankly revolutionary air
of Republican rhetoric, but the rest of us are encouraged
– and perhaps moved to think and feel that all is not
lost, at least not yet. The New York Times trotted
out old Nixon hack Leonard
Garment to denounce "both sides" for "playing with the
rules" and employing populist "will of the people" rhetoric
– but none of this is very convincing. You don't denounce
someone who is chasing a thief down the street yelling "stop,
thief!" for being "divisive." Or do you? In the world Al Gore
and his minions are readying for us, no doubt this is the
case. But we aren't there yet – and we can thank
God, this Thanksgiving, for that.
A
NOTE TO THOSE WHO LIKE LINKS
I
am sorry for not providing the links to the Los Angeles
Times article referenced above, but it is that newspaper's
unfortunate policy to make all of their past articles unavailable
after a single day, whereupon you have to pay them money to
read it. This, of course, is the typical method of media phonies
who don't like to leave a record of their journalistic failings
behind. And we can't post it on FreeRepublic.com,
as we normally would, because the
evil Times has sued that website for permitting
people to post LA Times pieces in their entirety. It's
people like that – who don't want you to remember what
they said yesterday, because it proves how wrong they are
today – who really fear the Internet, and with good reason.
At any rate, sorry for the lack of links: write to the Times
and tell them to get off of FreeRepublic's back.
|
We
may be losing our old Republic as the courts and the
lawyers hand the election to Al Gore, but – in
the spirit of the holidays – let's look on the
bright side: Republicans are getting radicalized.
The whole nation saw, yesterday, a sight that I never
thought I would live to see – Republicans, many
of them in suits and ties, conducting a 
