Of Foxes and Hen-Houses...
For the last eight years, our ears have been assaulted by a constant cacophony of caterwauling from the political left in this country, to wit that their political opponents on the right are outright crooks, villains who act with callous disregard for the 'working families' they claim to defend (I hate this phrase: it sounds as if Mom and Dad had to sell the children to the black, Satanic mill, churning out piecework for pennies on the dollar per hour).

The 'evidence' is nothing of the sort. Democrats will tell you that all republicans care about is the modern-day robber barons of Wall Street, that the Bush Administration has been criminally-lax in ferreting out fraud, corruption and theft in the corporate boardrooms, since Big Business lines republican pockets. Were it not for all that dirty money entering the republican coffers, this latest financial meltdown would never have happened!

The dems tried hard to hammer this mantra home, forever, and it never took, until, of course, the markets collapsed, gasoline became more expensive than a healthy kidney, and the republican party suddenly decided to give money away on a scale not seen since the bad, old days of 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina. Then, when the airwaves were full of stories about executives at AIG enjoying vacations paid for by taxpayer bailout funds, the CEO of Merril-Lynch escaping with a $100 million golden parachute, when the CEO of Enron can call the White House -- directly -- as his company crumbles, the spectre of Jack Abramoff, Randal "Duke" Cunningham, and so forth, the dems could (plausibly) make the case that republicans were simply helping out their friends on the taxpayer dime, and the fact that the banks and insurance companies and other recipients of the TARP funds given away so far refuse to account for it, and the Bush Treasury Department refuses to demand that information, continues to lend credence to the charge.

But, of course, the dems never point to their own, real crooks.

Chris Dodd is currently the subject of a Senate Ethics Committee investigation over allegations that he received sweetheart deals on two mortgages from Countrywide Financial, the largest private mortgage broker in the land -- or at least it was, until it went bankrupt. Dodd sits on the Senate Banking Committee, you see, and his job is not to accept special mortgage deals from Countrywide; his job was supposed to be overseeing the mortgage market, and ensuring that Countrywide and other lenders like it, and FreddieMac and FannieMae (the two government-owned mortgage lenders) were solvent, strong and capable. Of course, when it was brought to Dodd's Committee's attention that Freddie and Fannie were in dire straits, Dodd looked the other way. Probably because any investigation of Freddie's and Fannie's problems would have discovered criminally-lax oversight on the part of the democrats (particularly Dodd and Rep. Barney Frank, House Banking Committee, who was sleeping with a member of Freddie's board!), who not only had conflicts of interest with regards to their committee responsibilities, they had them with their personal business dealings, as well.

As of this date, Dodd has promised to turn over all the pertinent information and documents regarding his mess, and has yet to do so. Several months or so after the investigation into his activities began. As for Frank, he's obviously taken the tact that if he simply doesn't admit guilt and complicity and attacks his detractors viciously, while hiding behind his victim status as a homosexual, the whole thing will blow (no pun intended) over. Both men should be horsewhipped, on Pay-per-View, for their shocking behavior.

One of my personal favorites, New York Representative Charles Rangel, is also up to his armpits in alleged illegal activities. These range from not reporting rental income (to the tune of $75k) on his income taxes, illegally using a rent-controlled apartment in Harlem as a campaign office, somehow managing to get control of three other rent-controlled apartments in NYC, using campaign funds to pay his parking tickets, accepting a 'donation' to a foundation of his (Rangel's)from an energy executive who lobbied Rangel hard to come through for him on some piece of legislation or other. And that's just what we know so far --- new shit about Rangel is revealed every week. I would not be surprised if any day now a bevy of young women emerged from the woodwork, all claiming Charlie Rangel is their baby-daddy. At the rate at which the doo-doo is piling up around Charlie, I would actually consider laying a bet on a love-child or two, and then I'd double-down, figuring Charlie pulled a Jesse Jackson and paid the mommies off (only with taxpayer money and probably no-show government jobs).

Rod Blagojevich, Governor (for now) of Illinois is up to his eyebrows in a Pay-for-Play scandal involving the potential raffling-off of Barack Obama's soon-to-be-vacant Senate seat. It's a scandal that grows by the day, and has even tarnished Rep. Jesse Jackson, Junior, who was compelled to call a press conference to protest his non-involvement in any such scheme. Even Obama himself was forced to deny, vehemently, that neither he nor his staff had anything to do with this attempt to wrangle a bribe for Blagojevich. To keep the wolves at bay, Obama and his staff conducted a 'thorough investigation' of their own activities, which lo and behold!, they passed with flying colors...until it was proven that Obama's Chief-of-Staff-to-be, Rahm Emmanuel, had only met/spoke with Blagojevich over the Senate seat something like 10 times.

Now Obama's pick for Commerce Secretary, Bill Richardson, who was perhaps the most able and experienced, democrat politician in this country, and Governor of New Mexico, has had to withdraw his name from consideration for the post. Why? because he may be ass-deep in a bribery scandal, too!

We won't even get into Hillary Clinton, nominal pick for Secretary of State -- her list of crimes is too long to get into, and only God knows where her husband's 'Foundation' (a.k.a Bill's slush fund) gets it's money. Rumors are it's Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Pakistan, Egypt, amongst others, and I wouldn't be surprised to see a cancelled check with "Osama Bin Laden" on the signature line.

And who could forget Rep. Jefferson, he of the freezer with $90k in cash stuffed into it?

And republicans are crooks? In this light, I would tend to think that republicans are hardly crooks; when a repub gets nailed for something it's usually for something like soliciting gay sex in an airport men's room. Perhaps you are a closet pedophile. Maybe, on a good day, you took a bribe in the form of having your billiards room refinished for free. The point is, democrats have criminal activity down to an art form.When republicans get caught doing something, it's a matter of looking hypocritical, foolish, or both.

When Dems get caught, actual cash --- great, big bundles of cash --- has actually passed from hand to hand.

If anything, besides the screaming hypocrisy of the pot calling the kettle black, what all of these incidents seem to indicate is a pattern which, only in retrospect, begins to make sense:

Democrats are criminals. Of this there can be no doubt. Republicans, on the other hand, are grossly incompetent. When Barack Obama and the democratic party promised "Change", I'm not certain this is what they had in mind; changing incompetence and stupidity for naked graft.

Of course, it has crossed my mind that in the case of Richardson and Clinton, Obama floated their names absolutely knowing that the former was mired in a scandal that is perhaps bound to ruin him, and that the latter would bring her own scandals in the form of her husband with her. And that both would fail to be confirmed because of it. In one fell swoop, the two best democratic contenders for a 2012 primary would be severely wounded before they could even announce.

But I digress...

This is what government in America has been reduced to. It should make you sick to your stomach.

Update: Victor Davis Hanson weighs in, in a similar vein,from National Review here. Even more in this vein courtesy of Right Wing News here.