In what appears to be the worst idea since Waldo Jeffers decided to mail himself to his girlfriend, the powers that be in the Republican party have apparently sat down,thought about it, and then decided to drive Colin Powell out of the GOP:
CHENEY: Well, if I had to choose — in terms of being a Republican — I’d go with Rush Limbaugh, I think. My take on it was that Colin had already left the party. I didn’t know he was still a Republican. […]
SCHIEFFER: And you said you’d take Rush Limbaugh over Colin Powell?
CHENEY: I would. Politically.
It was one thing to hear Rush babble out Powell last week- having Cheney say this is kind of crazy. Powell was the guy who sold Dick Cheney’s excellent Baghdad adventure, and now he isn’t good enough for the GOP.
Kind of amazing. Four decades of military service, National Security Advisor, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Secretary of State, and they don’t want him.
Polish the Guillotines
I’m getting paranoid to the point of believing Cheney’s got some kind of mole network entrenched in the government that’s preparing a coup d’etat.
scott
Cheney’s going all in on the crazy.
He’s on the wrong side of history, and he knows it.
asiangrrlMN
Well, Powell has served his use, and now he’s dead-weight to them. He’s beginning to speak his mind, which is never acceptable to the right. Rush gave voice to the GOP mindset when he waxed indignant about Powell supporting Obama. In Rush’s mind, they (the GOP) took Powell into their fold (as long as he touted the party line), and now, he’s backstabbed them. In other words, he got uppity.
The question at this point is, why would Powell want to stay in the GOP?
As for Cheney, it appears that he has the most to lose if there is an investigation into the tortures. He’s a chickenshit bully who can only tolerate being in a position of power. He’s not any longer, so he doesn’t know what to do.
DougJ
I know what you mean, my god, he was like an octopus, hands all over the place.
JK
I’ve never visited Wyoming, but from what I’ve seen of it in photos and on tv it appears to be a breathtakingly beautiful place.
I’d gladly pair for a plane ticket and personally drive Cheney to the airport so that he could reconnect with Wyoming’s wondrous majestic landscape and finally STFU.
aimai
I can remember when the Republican party was full of grand old time serving generals, and corporate CEOs and upper class scions of wealth and privilige, and college presidents, and white shoe law firms. Now, what? they *want* officially to the party *left by Joe the Plumber?*
aimai
CalD
Colin Powell is just someone that Dick Cheney never gets tired of stabbing in the back.
Jon
It will be interesting to see if the Cheneys and Rushbos of the GOP will be victorious. I would think that, at some point, instinctual self-preservation would take over, and these extremists would be tossed out. But even if that happens, it might be too late for the GOP. Depending, of course, on how the Democrats do in the next few years.
Exhibit B: Be the Party of No.
Pb
Mad props for the random Waldo Jeffers reference; woo Velvet Underground…. :)
And, yes, Dick Cheney, still crazy, film at 11…
YellowJournalism
If I had to choose, I’d take Colin Powell over Cheny and Limbaugh as human beings. In fact, I didn’t even know they were still human beings…
Notorious P.A.T.
Well, Limbaugh could have done all those things too, if he didn’t have a boil on his ass cheek.
Hunter Gathers
The entire damned party has gone full in on the crazy. Gingrich was on Fox this morning and spewed out every GOP talking point, no matter how insane. Get ready to hear more of this: “Obama wants to put terrorists on welfare”.
They are giving crazy a bad name.
Mr. Stuck
Nolo contendre. Rush has a four hundred mill contract, and a draft deferment for a hole in his head. The other head.
That’s Cheney’s kind of Republican.
MattF
Well, the ship is sinking and various rodents are scurrying around. Powell, as ever, is bending with the wind and looking for a porthole– Cheney, as ever, is gathering his comitatus for a suicidal last stand. But none of that changes the fact that the ship is sinking.
AhabTRuler
Yes, but if you had to choose between John Cale and Lou Reed, which would you choose?
DougJ
I didn’t know they were still Republicans.
asiangrrlMN
@AhabTRuler: Both.
bago
When a guy involved with My Lai, Grenada, Panama, and Gulf War 1 is too liberal for Cheney…
OriGuy
Steve Benen mentions several people who say that the Republican party is acting like a cult. I think the next step is “shunning” like the Jehovah’s Witnesses do. They’ll refuse to appear on the same TV set with apostates like Powell and Specter. Then they’ll avoid even using their names.
LD50
Mo Tucker.
I dunno, John Cale’s first language is Welsh. Gotta admit, that’s pretty damn cool.
AhabTRuler
@asiangrrlMN: Bzzzt. Trick question! The correct answer is Brian Eno (did you remember to carry the Robert Fripp?).
Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse
Poser. :P
Edit: Goddamnit, Ahab, just when are you going to marry me already?
opium4themasses
@AhabTRuler: Pfft you’re wrong. The correct answer is always Picard.
Kris
I doubt this will help with minority recruitment.
Way to go Cheney!
Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse
Picard is NEVER the answer. Why? This.
PeakVT
I don’t understand why Cheney is attacking the one person who has enough stature (deserved or not) to single-handedly destroy whatever is left of the Bush administration’s reputation. It’s not like he’s pinning some blame on Powell, who would probably be willing to take the hit.
LD50
By my count of ten, the head won’t move.
JK
@AhabTRuler:
I’d choose Dick Wagner and Steve Hunter who helped create the most amazing, kick-ass verion of Sweet Jane of all-time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FdWPeHFAMk
AhabTRuler
@Comrade Mary, Would-Be Minion Of Bad Horse: [ Blush ]
Woody
Powell was a loyal soldier.
More, perhaps, to the Corps (I know, he’s Army; a figure of speech) than to the Constitution he swore to uphold and defend.
He’s majorly flawed in my book both by his willingness to lie for the Busheviks, but also already for what I think was complicity in cover-ups of atrocities in Nam.
I really don’t understand why the Dims are so happy to have these GOPuke cast-offs and retreads.
Surely, with a choice among Steny Hoyer, Jack Murtha, Jane Harman, etc, to say nothing of the Blue-Dawg contingent, the Dims already have a fine collection of miscreants with reliability problems of their own.
Dennis-SGMM
CHENEY: No, Bob, I’d say that the verdict of history is still out on Mr. Hitler. I think that he had some darned good ideas.
Comrade Jake
Well, that and he picked the winner in the last election. That’s what really burns them, more than anything else, that Powell got it right when so many of these asshats had it wrong.
I’m sure many of us will never be able to forgive Powell for selling the Baghdad adventure, but his appearance on MTP to endorse Obama was a thing of beauty. Let’s not forget that in that same appearance, he committed the sin of asking why it would matter if Obama were a Muslim, when they’d been giving their lives for this country just like everyone else.
JK
@AhabTRuler:
I’ll see your Brian Eno http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ba7a9pZM6_I and your Robert Fripp http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g9ghKS5UxmM and raise you Bryan Ferry http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USJq2RwnlyU
Napoleon
I hope the Sunday shows continue to turn to Cheney, Gingrich and company over the next 3 1/2 years if they need a Republican. Those guys are golden for the Dems.
asiangrrlMN
@Woody: It’s not a question of embracing Powell–not to me, anyway. I just find it telling that the one person of the Bush administration who has admitted that it (the administration) fucked up is the one being drummed out. It’s more about what it says about Cheney and his cronies than about what it says about Powell.
wag
As a lifelong Dem, I only have one work for Powell.
Welcome.
jenniebee
Technically, if you’re talking about parties that don’t cater to JtP, the Democrats got there first. And we were the party that was entirely happy with the arrangement. Also.
Krista
Wow — that kind of tells you everything you need to know right there. Rush may not be the leader of the Republican Party, but is he its public representative? You bet your bippy. I guess Rahm Emanuel was right!
Enjoy, Republicans! A thrice-divorced, pill-popping, draft-dodging blowhard is the face of the party of family values.
Bobbob
I think President Obama should nominate Colin Powell for the opening on the Supreme Court. Just to see what would happen. I think he is just as qualified as any that are already on the bench.
Little Dreamer
@asiangrrlMN:
Unless you’re Rush Limbaugh.
I just wanted to clarify that.
Little Dreamer
@Dennis-SGMM:
You know, it’s strange that I just happened to say to TZ last night that I bet Cheney thought HItler was a good guy.
Texas Dem
What’s interesting in all of this is that, looking strictly at the political optics, I think the GOP has a decent talking point on relocating the GITMO prisoners to the US. Most people approach the closing of GITMO in the same way that they deal with nuclear power plants. Great idea in theory, just don’t put one in my neighborhood. It’s the NIMBY problem all over again. But Gingrich and Cheney are the last people who should be making the argument. When we see respectable Republicans like Lugar slamming Obama on closing GITMO, then you’ll know he has a problem. But every week that Gingrich and Cheney remain the face of the GOP is golden for the Dems.
AhabTRuler
@JK: Well, then I am going to put a little more terminal english on this next one: Fire!
Comrade Darkness
Powell was the guy who sold Dick Cheney’s excellent Baghdad adventure, and now he isn’t good enough for the GOP.
You’re are bitch until we say you aren’t our bitch. Then you get your ass lost.
Damn it’s hard out here for a pimp.
Little Dreamer
@YellowJournalism:
How can anyone be so sure that they really were human beings to begin with?
JK
@Krista:
Subtract one divorce, take out the pill-popping and you can add Newt Gingrich and Rudy Giuliani.
JK
@AhabTRuler:
Clever counter move, now I have call on one of my big guns: Frank Zappa
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvlJc8ilD5o
asiangrrlMN
@Little Dreamer: Well, I had an unspoken ‘token’ written in there, so that leaves out Rush. In other words, they were kind enough to let a Negro rise in their party as long as he spewed their bile. (See, Rice, Condi). The minute he goes off-script, he’s expendable.
@Comrade Darkness: Still harder to be a ho.
Dennis-SGMM
@JK:
Caught a clip with accompanying article over at HuffPo of Newt’s appearance on Faux News this morning. He made Gene Wilder’s breakdown scene in “The Producers” look like a model of restraint:
MattF
Whoa. Ol’ Newt has jumped the shark. Or vice versa. Or something.
Dennis-SGMM
@MattF:
Newt just didn’t jump the shark, he fucked the shark.
asiangrrlMN
@Dennis-SGMM: Newt IS the shark.
Persia
@Texas Dem: Except there are people who apparently want the Gitmo detainees in their backyards. Which sort of hurts the talking point.
AhabTRuler
@JK: Perhaps something jazzy?
JK
@Dennis-SGMM:
Thanks. It never ends with these creeps. I need to check out some clips of Steve Allen, Ernie Kovacs, Woody Allen, or Monty Python as an antidote to these insane Republican statements.
Cheney’s remarks remind me of Mark Shields’ observation that there are two kinds of political parties: those that seek out converts and those that hunt down heretics.
asiangrrlMN
@Persia: Shut up! They’re Commie socialist pinkos, um…..
asiangrrlMN
Damn. Damn. Damn. Stupid moderation.
@Persia: Shut up! Those that will take the detainees are commie so c i a list pinkos!
Or something like that.
JK
@AhabTRuler:
Very good clip, I’m game for jazz.
Miles Davis and John Coltrane have a message for you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGrUDAzlXzI
jTh
Well, (as an intermittent reader) I’ve been terribly confused about John’s Velvets’ bona fides for ages, so I’m really relieved now.
And DougJ’s comment at #4 really seals the deal. Zing!!!
(Also: always nice to see some Eno-love, in any quarters, though I obviously lack the wit to ratchet up any notches.)
MattF
It’s time for a technical solution. What we need is better fart detection.
D-Chance.
The Republicans continue to circle the wagons. The smaller the wagon train, the tighter the circle. Right now, the circle has gotten so small that Larry Craig no longer has to have a wide stance to tap his neighbor’s shoe.
Cheney backing Limbaugh is no surprise. I think Cheney made more appearances on Limbaugh’s radio program than on every other media outlet combined during the Bush years. The two are very close, or at the very least Cheney found Limbaugh to be the only outlet where he could directly spout the talking points with absolutely no debate and then have a 100% positive spin and reinforcement marathon for the hours/days that followed.
What does surprise is that Cheney would risk antagonizing Powell even further, given that Powell has yet to release his “tell-all” book… something that could permanently sink the Republican party should he go with a full frontal assault on Bush/Cheney.
AhabTRuler
@JK: Tsk. Such a callous attitude towards children. As a remonstrance.
Left Coast Tom
During the same interview this past Thursday in which he advised the GOP to Stay The Course and double-down on teh crazy, Darth Cheney said:
Cheney being his usual asshole self
Yet he just won’t do it.
JK
@AhabTRuler:
Great video.
It’s out of season for this clip, but if you’re bringing Vince Guaraldi into the discussion
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Meg0GQESqZc
Bulworth
Cheney and the torture-tea party remind me of the McCarthy jihad in the early ’50’s, which among its last crowning acts of discombobulation turned on–of all people–General George C. Marshall, the former U.S. military Chief of Staff during WWII, and former Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense during the Truman years, and ultimately against the U.S. military itself before finally disintegrating in a slop of drunken madness.
Rick Taylor
He did support the Democratic nominee for the Presidency. That’s a better reason for declaring someone not a Republican than that they voted for the stimulus bill.
YellowJournalism
You’d have to add in a little cross-dressing for that last one.
Then again, you never know…
gnomedad
@D-Chance.:
Like Black Bart’s family wagon in Blazing Saddles.
kommrade reproductive vigor
For some reason, this comes to mind.
Last week or the week before, the RNC took a big steaming one on Steele. This week former VP Cthcheney says he prefers the fat racist fuck to Powell.
If the GOP runs their Party of Lincoln ads again … ever, people will either laugh themselves sick or throw things. And we’ll have another round of GOP hot shots scratching their heads over why polls show the average African-American would prefer death by fire ants to voting R.
Fine, whatever. But it sure is hard watching this amount of clueless.
John Cole
@jTh: TBH, I really don’t care much for the Velvet Underground or Lou Reed. I only listened to them a lot because a girl I was with for a couple years loved them.
In fact, the only reason I can really think of to listen to the Velvet Underground is to try to get laid. There is too much good music out there to justify sitting in a dark room listening to music that makes you want to /wrist or do heroin or both.
kay
The crawl on CNN is “Cheney: Powell not a Republican”.
I don’t think Dick Cheney has the power to strip a private citizen of his or her political affiliation.
The former Vice President is having a really difficult time adjusting to private life. He’s simply refusing to acknowledge that he’s not the Vice President anymore. I’ve never seen anything quite like this.
gbear
1) Cheney is a dink. Hard to add any more to that. Let him talk until his heart blows up.
2) I used to love seeing this Portishead video in the clubs. Thought I’d add it to the mix today. Sing it, Shirley Bassey.
Nylund
That was indeed a very excellent Velvet Underground reference.
But John, for every gloomy Velvet’s song there is an equally fun and uplifting one. Do songs like Sweet Jane, Rock & Roll, Foggy Notion, What Goes On, Some Kinda Love etc. really make you want to slit your wrists or do smack?
What is great about the velvet undies is that there is a song for pretty much any imaginable mood.
Dennis-SGMM
@kay:
Cheney was pretty reclusive when he was in office. He’s probably having more trouble adjusting to not having any power. Having to pay out his own pocket for those transfusions of baby’s blood is probably making him grouchy too.
Redhand
Spot on! The only thing that surprises me is that CBS gives this criminal air time to spout his torture-defending, fear-mongering bullshit.
I would love for an aggressive journalist (does such a thing still exist?) to take the wood to this bastard with some real hard-hitting questions about the torture scandal rather than give him a forum to spin it as he likes. Too bad Dick can’t be forced to do a guest appearance on The Daily Show.
El Cid
Again: this is the principle of Republican homeopathic medicine, in which the more dilute they become, the fewer particles per population, the stronger they imagine themselves to be.
I think that it’s a perfect match for the rest of their anti-science, primitivist, sympathetic magic view of the world, and I hope they keep at it.
AhabTRuler
Accuracy check.
Jymn
One can only hope Dick Cheney doesn’t suffer the same end as that experienced by Waldo Jeffers!
Walter
It’s okay for an ex-vp to spew this kind of nonsense. Meanwhile, the wingnuts and the Media are all upset over Wanka Sykes making a joke about Rush. I hate the Media more and more everyday.
asiangrrlMN
@AhabTRuler: This is a great song. Shirley sure can sing.
@Redhand: Therein lies the rub. Rachel said on her last show that she has been trying to get an interview with Cheney, but he has thus far refused. He knows she will eviscerate him, and he can’t handle it.
kay
@Dennis-SGMM:
While many, many Americans really disliked President Bush, I was most offended by Cheney. I don’t even think it’s close.
I have worked for a Cheney. A lot of people have. The nasty, ruthless self-serving climber that gets promoted over and over based on intimidating people who get in his way, and scheming.
That bullshit where he lowers his voice and dips his chin and stares down the person who dares to question probably worked like a charm, his entire career. Worked for the interests of Cheney, I mean.
It makes me sad that I saw the same behavior from the manager of a mobile home manufacturer in Indiana who I had the misfortune to work for, back in the day. It succeeded there, but you like to think that won’t fly at Cheney’s level. It did.
burnspbesq
@JK:
I use a snippet from the Wagner/Hunter intro to “Sweet Jane” as my ringtone. I once spent two months learning both parts. Genius.
Mike in NC
Chevy Chase was on TV last week and with all the weight he’s gained he’s taken on a disconcerting resemblance to Dick Cheney. Now all he has to do is practice talking out of the side of his mouth.
gbear
@AhabTRuler: Oops.
DougJ
I really, really love the Velvet Underground. And you say it makes you want to do heroin like that’s a bad thing.
JWW
I kind of find you blind on a street corner,
Gen Powell, as I served with him, has always had an agenda. While active he served us well, but always worked towards his own future.
He has chosen his ground, let him stand it. He does not need your bottom feeders too defend him.
He definately does not need you, “John Cole”.
There was a time where General Officers retired with honor, went home, relaxed, reflected and made peace with themselves.
Now they go home and make a call to DC or a news station!!!
Will
Cheney is correct. Someone with that kind of reality-based experience simply does not fit in the contemporary GOP. No one should scold the former vice-president for merely stating the obvious.
bill
“Enjoy, Republicans! A thrice-divorced, pill-popping, draft-dodging blowhard is the face of the party of family values.”
So what else is new? Their last standard bearer was a coke-snorting alcoholic draft-dodger with a two-digit IQ and a sadistic streak. More of the same.
jTh
Oh John, I get it now!
But that’s only a part of the Velvets catalog, earlier rather than later. And yeah, I think it’s amazing (and completely ahead of its time, subject-matter wise), but that’s not really the Velvets that I recommend to most people.
Rather, it’s 1) VU, the “lost” album released in 84 or so, 2) 1969, their great live set, and 3) Loaded, their last outing. Maybe that girl wasn’t so into that stuff?
The great thing about the latter Velvets is that they really dispensed with all the “rock” momentum of that era and went back to the business of rock’n’roll. It’s amazing songwriting and melodic invention, full of feeling, integrity, and even some laughs and silliness, all atop a rock’n’roll machine of a band. (This “return to basics,” incidentally, was probably the larger share of blowing so many minds and making them so influential to the next generation. You can really hear the Velvets influence in the momentum of Pretenders’ amazing first album, and in almost anything that was good in the late 70s.)
Points being: 1) of course, you don’t have to care, I’m just sayin’! But 2) it’s a rare day I sit around listing to “Heroin” either. But their rock’n’roll records are among my great mood-lifters. And it’s just really deeply good on a very fundamental level, with less flash and more just getting the job done.
You know, just FYI. ;-)
JK
@burnspbesq:
That’s a brilliant idea. I never get tired of hearing this version of Sweet Jane.
Sounds as fresh today as it did when I heard it for the first time.
Stoic
Hitler hated his generals, too. And as the Soviets advanced on Berlin, he would have had them all shot if he could.
Greg
Sure, we laugh, but let’s not forget these crazy loons have 40.5 Senators (counting Specter, not counting Lieberman), 178 Congresspeople, and 21.5 governors (Schwarzenegger, going in the opposite direction from Specter.) They ain’t dead yet, folks. We’re only just entering the “rabid, wounded beast” part suggested so memorably by Joshua Micah Marshall, and God help us if they gain seats in the 2010 midterm elections. I figure it’ll take a loss there, followed by a decisive loss in 2012, before the party begins to reform itself. Right now, a large portion of the party thinks it lost because it *wasn’t conservative enough;* it’ll take two more full electoral thumpings before they come to their senses again. In the meantime, we might be in some serious danger of either Tennessee church action or Oklahoma City action.
Mudge
I’m late to this post, but doesn’t anyone remember when the Bush administration really needed to get talking points to the dittoheads, Cheney would show up on Rush. I especially remember when Richard Clarke revealed how inept Bush was on terrorism before 9/11. Clarke was on 60 Minutes on Sunday, Cheney was on Limbaugh’s show on Monday. Cheney impugned Clarke’s character, etc. to be sure the dittoheads had the right things to believe.
Rush always carried their water, he performed a vital function for Cheney the entire 8 years. Rush is still important to them, Powell is not. Cheney’s statement makes sense and, once again, it reinforces the dittoheads, not that they waver much.
Barry
MattF
“Well, the ship is sinking and various rodents are scurrying around. Powell, as ever, is bending with the wind and looking for a porthole—Cheney, as ever, is gathering his comitatus for a suicidal last stand. But none of that changes the fact that the ship is sinking.”
Oh no, *Cheney* is not going to make a suicidal last stand; he’s got mucho dinero in the bank, and a life expectancy of anydaynow, considering his heart. He’s also lost the last political office he’ll ever have (on Earth; in Hell he might have a promising career).
He’s gathering whatever fools will gather for *their* suicidal last stand.
Bulworth
Cheney and the dittoheads are going to make George W. look almost, uh, moderate, by comparison.
ET
I don’t know if Cheney’s attitude suprises me. First, there really isn’t much separating Cheny from Rush philosophically.
Also, Cheney fundamentally doesn’t respect Powell. He respects the blowhard on the radio who has never done shit but talk. Cheney may have had increasingly important roles in government but he is all about the talk and behind the scenes power plays.
Mo's Bike Shop
“I covered up My Lai and all I got was this lousy T-shirt!”