The International Writers Magazine:Reality Check

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TOM DELAY – ROAD KILL • James Campion Remember Trent Lott? Everyone loved him. Especially Republicans. He was the face and breath of the GOP Washington comeback, a steely-eyed straight-laced God Boy in the mold of the New Right. But then he uttered some questionable observations about a celebrated racist fossil named Strom Thurmond, things about how if Thurmond has been elected president a hundred or so years ago we wouldn’t have all these problems around here, or some other ridiculous ranting. Then he was gone.

Poof. Histoire, as the French would say; histoire like another Republican champion by the name of Newt Gingrich. Now we have Tom Delay. He soon will be gone. But it doesn’t matter, Republican or Democrat. They have more waiting in the wings. There is always someone else, like that "Body Snatchers"” movie. They grow them somewhere, mostly the university law programs, specifically in the south where they produce political manure with toothless abandon. And, let’s face it; we cannot help but vote for these guys. Shit, I can’t get enough of covering them. We are blindly smitten with slick talking greasy-haired power ties telling us we’re immoral slobs while they launder funds and redistrict all over the joint to fix the game.

So now Tom Delay, after about two-dozen ethics charges against him in as many years, acts like Bill Clinton, the man he hates. And, of course, we get the predictable hemming and hawing and PR trips to FOX NEWS, where he acts like Rubin Hurricane Carter. "I was framed!" Yes, he is a victim. And I’ll be playing centerfield for the Yankees next season. Delay, for his part, is quite good at defending himself. He ought to be. He does it an awful lot. If he were a crack head or a sex addict, it would be more interesting. But he is a cheater, and we don’t like cheaters, unless they cheat for us. And Delay only seems interested in cheating for his own gain. That ain’t cool. And unless you consider being the Majority House Leader above the law or a case of earning the right to screw the system, then chances are you have seen the last of Tom Delay. Just like Trent Who? and the other white-haired piker who is now a pundit or a cast member of A Surreal Life.

This is what happens in Washington. It’s like High School. You get one fuck up, then you are branded, and then you can’t get the good pot or a descent date. You’re ostracized. But Delay had to see it coming. He’s been around awhile. Once he got all preachy and dumb during the Terri Schiavo case he had a target on his back. No one likes strangers directing their destiny in speeches. People actually prefer cheaters to those who tell them how to run their lives. This is a country built on violent reprisal for those who try and tell us how to run our lives. Look it up. It’s all a matter of permanent record.

The other prime reasons Delay is a doomed man are the recent rumblings about Senate Majority Leader, Bill Frist’s insider trading like a riverboat gambler. The Frist thing is sketchy, but turns up the heat on who the party will inevitably turn its back on. Someone has to be thrown from the ship. It’s taking on water and there’s another Supreme Court nominee to consider and an election 13 months away. The president’s approval ratings are at an all-time low and the Katrina disaster had the federal government, whether fair or not - and momma told me life is anything but fair - looking like a gaggle of lazy, confused dunderheads. Then there is the not-so mysterious case of Bill Bennett.

Bennett, a former Reagan poof and Drug Czar for a nation swimming in drugs, is the Empower America, rid the world of smut and rock music dickweed who was busted a few years ago failing to make good on monstrous gambling loses. Apparently he is one of a trillion rightwing criminals (G. Gordon Liddy, Ollie North) with a radio show. Actually, everyone has a radio show. I would check your calendar; you’re on in ten minutes. Anyway, this jabbering buffoon told a caller last week that although abortion is a sin and an abomination, it might just reduce the crime rate if more black children were aborted. Now although I despise everything about Bennett, and, of course, think his projection of unborn criminals spuriously inaccurate, despite glaring numbers that some 70% of crimes are committed by African Americans, I admittedly have espoused in this space that there are not enough abortions; black, white, green or otherwise. And anyone shocked or in disagreement with this statement should take a ride on a New York subway or drive through downtown Baltimore or check out some parts of the southeast of the republic. Either that or watch more television for the best examples of how accelerated abortion trends could benefit the national gene pool. Then again, we wouldn’t have to listen to Bill Bennett’s nonsense if someone had been prescient enough to dump his fetus into the toilet. But I digress considerably. The deal is about to go down for Delay, win or lose. This war in Iraq has reached a Lewis Carroll kind of bizarre. I half expect the Walrus to show up at these Senate hearings. In fact, I think Donald Rumsfeld, who apparently has nude pictures of the Bush girls, which he’s successfully used to bribe our Boy President to keep his job, may actually be the Walrus. Goo goo g' joob.

Alas, Delay will be allowed to stick around. They all are one way or the other, aren’t they? But his wings are effectively clipped. His days of pontificating are all but through. He’ll probably beat one or two of these raps on technicalities and other law-speak loop holes, collect a paycheck and look smart, but as far affecting the national political landscape...that ship has left the dock without him. And for now, I guess, it will have to do.
© James Campion October 10th 2005
www.jamescampion.com
realitycheck@jamescampion.com

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