Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

People are weird.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

You know he’s going to shit a cat.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

If America since Jan 2025 hasn’t broken your heart, you haven’t loved her enough.

White supremacy is terrorism.

We will not go quietly into the night; we will not vanish without a fight.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

You come for women, you’re gonna get your ass kicked.

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

Hey hey, RFK, how many kids did you kill today?

This blog will pay for itself.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

A fool as well as an oath-breaker.

The republican caucus is covering themselves with something, and it is not glory.

The way to stop violence is to stop manufacturing the hatred that fuels it.

The arc of history bends toward the same old fuckery.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

Wait, what?

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

You are here: Home / Politics / Republican Stupidity / Another Goddamed Crook

Another Goddamed Crook

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This time it’s Lester Crawford, former FDA Commissioner. Word says that he will plead guilty tomorrow to making false statements and conflict of interest during his tenure at the FDA.

On a semi-related note, I understand that HTML buttons don’t wear out. But even knowing that I have noticed that ‘Republican Stupidity’ button has started looking a little ragged. With any luck (see my post below) a Democratic sweep will help restore balance to the Force.

Reader Interactions

43Comments

  1. 1.

    Doug

    Guess I have to bookmark TPM’s “Grand Old Docket”.

    The Grand Ole Docket tracks trial dates, court appearances and sentencing hearings for players in the current array of national political scandals. But not just any crook can make it on the Docket – it only tracks perps who’ve been named by prosecutors in indictments or plea agreements.

  3. 3.

    Tsulagi

    ‘Republican Stupidity’

    Tim, the phrase is repetitious.

    Or just interchangeable. Sorta like Rush Limbaugh and oxy moron.

  4. 4.

    Mr Furious

    The photo caption in that article pretty much sums it all up…

    In this Feb. 15, 2005, file photo, Lester M. Crawford talks to FDA employees in Rockville, Md. Crawford, the former FDA chief, was charged Monday with lying about his ownership of stock in companies regulated by his agency. (AP Photo/Stephen J. Boitano)

    Since he’s pleading guilty, I guess we’ll miss the round of rightwing whines about how George Soros and the Dems are really behind this. The way things are going, immediate guilty pleas may be the best thing Republicans can do. Try to get it out of the papers before anybody notices…

  6. 6.

    ThymeZone

    when Bill Clinton was president, the House took 140 hours of sworn testimony into whether Mr. Clinton had used the White House Christmas list to identify possible Democratic donors. But in 2004 and 2005, a House committee took only 12 hours of testimony on the abuses at Abu Ghraib.

    Today’s Krugman.

    Even knowing how bad these Republicans are, just seeing this today is a jaw-dropper.

    Had enough yet?

  7. 7.

    RSA

    Another Goddamed Crook

    Wow. Thank God, I hope, that the Republican reign is coming to an end. Although it’s still entertaining to see headlines like Bush Appointee Resigns for Health Reasons–No, Really.

  8. 8.

    chopper

    when Bill Clinton was president, the House took 140 hours of sworn testimony into whether Mr. Clinton had used the White House Christmas list to identify possible Democratic donors. But in 2004 and 2005, a House committee took only 12 hours of testimony on the abuses at Abu Ghraib.

    file under ‘facts that make me very, very sad’.

  9. 9.

    Davebo

    The Red Staters have fired back at John Cole if anyone is interested.

    Frankly I’m amazed they have the morale to post on any subject these days.

  10. 10.

    Pb

    The Red Staters have fired back at John Cole if anyone is interested.

    Well, they acted outraged enough, but I don’t think they managed to refute his original point. Really, if the latest thing they can dredge up on this is a post from September that got zero comments…

    Bob Ney has plead guilty, further exposing the depths of corruption in the GOP, and Red State, the blog for conservatives and conservative thought, is silent.

    …then I’d say that they just proved his point, in spades.

  11. 11.

    Steve

    They loved John when he was voting Republican, they even let him post on the front page. It’s funny to watch them whine about his “unhinged rants” now.

  12. 12.

    Perry Como

    I’m surprised that RedState hasn’t focused on the campaign money Sen. Reid used for his holiday fund.

  13. 13.

    ThymeZone

    I’m not sure exactly what we’ve done to John Cole to invoke his trademark hysterical ire

    “Trademark hysterical ire?”

    Wow. Considering the crap his commenters give him, I consider it a wonder that John has only lost his temper a few times in over a year and half.

    Red State must be hard up for something to bitch about today.

  14. 14.

    The Other Steve

    I just glanced over at redstate… They’re averaging about 5 comments per post. Even then, they have the average intellectual curiousity as a Paul L rant about Harry Reid.

    Anyway, gotta go. Glenn Beck is doing an expose on Porn this week!

  15. 15.

    ThymeZone

    The face of modern politics — the “Stealth Pac.”

    I got an expensive four-color flyer in the mail today from one of these groups suggesting that I call — ahem — Republican Senator Jon Kyl (up for reelection this year) and thank him for getting us that great prescription drug plan through Medicare.

    I don’t think there is anything that pisses me off more in politics than stealth candidacy and stealth advocacy. Both of which the GOP now seems to have down to a science.

    I’d vote against these turds for this reason alone.

    the group claimed that none of its ads or direct mail messages were intended to affect the outcomes of elections. That claim is particularly dubious in the cases of communications praising Talent, Taff and Beauprez for endorsing a Medicare prescription drug bill in the U.S. House. None of the three was in Congress at the time and, thus, none was in a position to vote on the bill.

    Apparently the reservoir of dishonesty from which these people drink is just bottomless.

  17. 17.

    DougJ

    It’s Clinton’s fault. Isn’t this more or less was Socksgate was about, only Socksgate was much worse.

  18. 18.

    Bob In Pacifica

    Is it really stupidity? How about a new button for corruption? Stupid isn’t necessarily a crime, and criminals are only stupid if they’re caught. Or something.

  20. 20.

    CaseyL

    RS only averages 4 comments per post these days. Tacitus has shut down. Macho Nachos hasn’t posted on his blog since October 2005. No End But Victory posts are about anything but NEBV, and average 0 comments. Belgravia’s lost most of its RW commenters. JOM still gets hundreds of comments – by people who turn up practically nowhere else. Kevin Drum’s stable of raving loon regulars seems to be reduced to two or three.
    Freeperville still seems pretty lively, and I guess LGF still is, too.

    But I wonder where most of the stalwarts went. People like TallDave, Defense Guy, Tbrosz – I haven’t seen them commenting in their old hangouts for quite some time, now.

    I’m not sure what the disappearance of the most egregious wingnuts signifies. Are they staying strictly in the nuttiest of the nuthouses? Do they only come out when the Zeitgeist is on their side?

  23. 23.

    The Other Steve

    But I wonder where most of the stalwarts went. People like TallDave, Defense Guy, Tbrosz – I haven’t seen them commenting in their old hangouts for quite some time, now.

    They all went over to the site which shall not be named.

  26. 26.

    MAX HATS

    I just glanced over at redstate… They’re averaging about 5 comments per post.

    Probably because everyone else was banned.

    When I first got into blogs, I heard RedState was a esteemed right-wing site. Some commentator posted a long conspiracy theory about how the real brains behind the Plame outing was the New York Times. I critisized that as civily as possible, given the insanity, and was immediately told by the administrator that I had recieved my “first and final warning.” Some guy is rewriting The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and I’m the problem for noticing the lunacy.

  28. 28.

    Steve

    Crawford was a Clinton appointee. Why not file it under Democrat Stupidity? (Or both?)

    I assume this is some kind of spoof attempt, but it’s not very well executed.

  30. 30.

    Paddy O'Shea

    Clinton gets blamed for a lot of things because he is our country’s last real president.

    The current fellow doesn’t really do much beyond reading the speeches other people write for him, so what would be the point of holding him responsible for anything?

  31. 31.

    Lee

    This is not a “But But Clinton!!” post, I am actually curious to see if this administration is really an outlier with crooks.

    Anyone keeping a count of Clinton’s Crook Count versus Bush The Lesser’s Crook Count?

    or even comparing crooks across various administrations.

  32. 32.

    Faux News

    Some guy is rewriting The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and I’m the problem for noticing the lunacy.

    Ah, why I love reading RedState! I have read posts where wingnuts advocate violence/death against muslims, liberals, abortion clinics/staff and not a peep from the moderator. In contrast, I have seen newbies post civil comments like yours pointing out the myriad of problems with Republicans and get banned. The rest of the braying jackasses howl with laughter at a “whale” (Troll) being banned on their first post.

    Andrew Sullivan is correct. The conservative movement has been hijacked. Reagan must be rolling over in his grave.

  33. 33.

    Pb

    Anyone keeping a count of Clinton’s Crook Count versus Bush The Lesser’s Crook Count?

    Well, that depends, first we’ll need a working definition of ‘crook’. Because for some reason I think the good folks over at, say, the Clinton Body Count might have an axe to grind…

  35. 35.

    DougJ

    I don’t think that John would allow this, but I’d like to go back over to Scrutator and rig it so that every time there’s a new balloon juice post, Scrutator tracks back with “It was Clinton’s fault.”

  36. 36.

    jcricket

    Remember what’s important a a time like this – Asserting that Iraqis are deliberately dieing so the NY Times can “write bloody headlines”.

    And just when you think there’s no way to sink any lower, let’s ratchet up the threats to the independent judiciary by allowing citizens to sue judges for their rulings.

    John has been refreshingly POed at the Republicans lately, so I hope that extends to other former GOPers like him. There isn’t an area of American life the current Republicans and their acolytes aren’t actively trying to ruin. And I’m not sure how much more we can all “take”.

  37. 37.

    jcricket

    BTW – I’ve had it up to FUCKING HERE with the whole “extremists on the left and right” equivalency. There’s exactly no one on the left with any power issueing death threats to judges or telling non-Christian (or non-Pagan) legislators they’re sinful, or using the brain-dead shell of a woman as a political rallying cry.

    The worst on the left are people like the ELF, who have exactly zero popular support and regularly get arrested.

    Every single FUCKED UP thing, at a national level, in the past 6 years is a result of total GOP dominance of every branch of government. With the added bonus of emboldening our domestic whack-jobs (as shown in any number of posts on right-wing blogs these days, or all the initiatives sponsored by wingers across America).

  38. 38.

    Daniel DiRito

    Crawford joins a long list of disgraced Bush appointees and he is one further reminder to voters of the hypocrisy within the GOP…the party that has used morality and values to garner the support of a large block of evangelical voters. It has become increasingly obvious that many of these discredited appointees and politicians were simply motivated by power and profit far more than by their religious values.

    As we near the November election, I can only hope that voters take the time to evaluate the divide between the actions of the GOP and the rhetoric they have used so effectively for the last decade. Further, when history records the events since the launch of the “Contract with America”, one would likely expect that it will be concluded that the Republican Party abused the trust of their constituents and reneged on much of that contract.

    Read more here:

    http://www.thoughttheater.com

  39. 39.

    Bombadil

    I agree with Bob — change it to “Republican Corruption”.

    You should be able to use that button for another 3 or 4 weeks before it wears out, too.

  40. 40.

    Pb

    ‘Crook’ would be someone found or plead guilty to a crime committed while in office.

    Even that might be a bit slanted, due to the partisan witch hunts conducted at the time:

    After the longest independent counsel investigation in history, the prosecutor in the case of former Housing Secretary Henry G. Cisneros is finally closing his operation with a scathing report accusing Clinton administration officials of thwarting an inquiry into whether Mr. Cisneros evaded paying income taxes.

    The legal inquiry by the prosecutor, David M. Barrett, lasted more than a decade, consumed some $21 million and came to be a symbol of the flawed effort to prosecute high-level corruption through the use of independent prosecutors.
    […]
    Former officials of the Justice Department and the I.R.S. dismissed Mr. Barrett’s conclusions in appendices attached to the report, saying the findings were the product of an inquiry that was incompetently managed from the start.

    After being indicted on 18 felony counts, Mr. Cisneros pleaded guilty in 1999 to a misdemeanor charge of lying to investigators. He was later pardoned by President Bill Clinton.

    It’s pretty impressive–Clinton ended up with manufactured scandals that were still thoroughly investigated, which don’t really stack up to the laundry list of actual scandals George H. W. Bush was involved in–S&L, Iran-Contra, BCCI, Iraqgate… The principal people in those scandals are generally doing rather well, often with positions in government (or perhaps in their news arm), probably some lobbyists in there too…

  41. 41.

    The Other Steve

    The worst on the left are people like the ELF, who have exactly zero popular support and regularly get arrested.

    I’m not even certain ELF is a leftist group. I don’t know any leftists who sympathize with ELF. Leftists would rather see education on environmental awareness, not burning cars and houses.

    But PETA is starting to become a righty group. There’s a lot of overlap in mentality with the pro-lifers.

  42. 42.

    jcricket

    Steve – I would agree with you. My point is that even if you concede the ELF or PETA is the “far left”, none of those groups have any popular support or power. No one from the Democratic party meets with the ELF or PETA. At “worst”, the ELF is a group of arsonists with zero support from anyone but those to the farthest left of the green or socialist party (not exactly Democratic stalwarts, as we can see in the previous elections).

    On the other side you have the militia/”Patriot” movement, the Minutemen, Dobson, Falwell, Malkin, Coulter & Limbaugh. All of whom enjoy far more popular support (oh, and pre-jail David Duke?) and political support from the official Republican party. They all regularly spout eliminationist rhetoric (or worse) and yet are invited to speak with GOP officials or at official GOP events.

    That’s why the Republicans have tried so hard to make the the ACLU or Soros or MoveOn the left-wing equivalents of the right-wing eliminationists. They need a bogey-man to inspire fear and terror in the hearts of American “swing voters”. I think it’s a long-term losing strategy, because Republicans have moved so far right they’re now stuck with tarring 86% of the public (those that believe the President lied about Iraq) as “terrorist sympathetizers”. How long will that continue to work?

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