Republican Hypocrisy Never Ends

[erpowers]

There are really no words to explain Republican hypocrisy. On last nights Scarborough Country there were at least two examples a Republican hypocrisy. The first is the fact that Scarborough had David Horowitz come on his show to talk about Ward Churchill's comments about September 11th. With all the horrible things Horowitz has said about liberals he has no justification to go on anyone's show to talk about what anyone else said.

Then on the roundtable that included Rachel Maddow and two other radio hosts. The Republicans host made the claim that the government has given the AARP $1 billion. The government gives Wal-Mart a billion dollars every few years. Halliburton lost $9 billion dollars in Iraq and has probably stolen more than a billion dollars from the government. We pay about $32 billion every year for the S&L scandal. If this lady and other Republicans want to talk about the amount of money given to AARP they need to be willing to talk about the larger amounts of money that the government has given to other groups and companies.

[ktowntennesseedem]

1. Hypocrisy is NOT in their vocabulary,

and most of their loyal minions are either too dumb or too lazy to comprehend the contradictions in almost everything they say.

[Bostonian]

2. Please provide details.

The government gives Wal-Mart a billion dollars every few years. Halliburton lost $9 billion dollars in Iraq and has probably stolen more than a billion dollars from the government. We pay about $32 billion every year for the S&L scandal.

Links, please.

I am especially interested in the Wal-Mart claim.

[erpowers]

4. Some Books Some Links

To find out about Wal-Mart you could go to Jim Hightower's website and look through his daily commentaries. Last year a report came out that said that state and local governments gave Wal-Mart about $200 million to build their stores. If that is a yearly rate it will take about 4 years to give Wal-Mart $1 billion. This is giving hundreds of millions of dollars to a company that makes billions of dollars a year.

There have been reports that $9 billion in recontrustion money could not be found. To find this you could just look up Halliburton and $9 billion. If you search the New York Times for Halliburton you will find at least one story that point out the number of times Halliburton has stole money from the government. In addition, you could go to Henry Waxman's website and he has a list of things Halliburton has done.

Finally, to find the $32 billion for the S&L scandal you could read either the 1996 or the new edition of the book Take the Rich off Welfare. You do not have to read the whole book. There is a section in the 1996 edition just about the S&L scandal. This book also talks about Halliburton and the amount of money it stole from the government.

[erpowers]

5. Some More Links

You can go to www.progress.org and go to the bottom of the page and click on economic justice. Then scroll down and click on corporate welfare shame page. Then click on corporate welfare search engine and look up Wal-Mart. You could also look up Halliburton on this page. The stories on this page just talk about the corporate welfare Halliburton gets. Another website you could go to for Halliburton is www.halliburtonwatch.org. To find more information on the saving and loan scandal just look up Saving and loan scandal in any search engine and you should find an indymedia page with links to other pages dealing with the scandal.

[TN al]

3. Try this on for size...

...They are all such flaming hypocrites because of the religious influence of their party. Being religious requires a tremendous leap of faith and with that faith they can be assured that they are right no matter what the facts at hand are. Taking that as a given, being a republican is part of the faith that makes them a christian. So they are able to be such hypocrites and still believe that they are morally superior and that it is impossible for them to be hypocrites in the first place because they are only doing God's work anyway.

[gratuitous]

6. Or try this one on . . .

There are any number of religious folks who aren't hypocrites, and who try as best they can to live out their lives according to the tenets of their faith. When they're wrong, they admit it, and through their faith, their own resolve, and the assistance of their faith community, try to do better in the future.

Republicans are proof against their own hypocrisy because the community that surrounds them (and by that I'm referring to their own political community and the larger world of the media) doesn't hold them accountable or responsible for their misdeeds, if misdeeds they are.

Part of the Republican mindset, at least in the last 15-20 years, seems to be a bright-line divide between what they say amongst themselves (the intra-course) and what they say for public consumption (the inter-course). What they say for public consumption doesn't count. Say whatever will advance the cause and whatever will gain more votes. The end (power) will justify whatever means are used to gain it.

Amongst themselves, Republicans are no more pious than a jackhammer. But when they go out to gull the public, they love to use the language of piety and religion, knowing that it will gain them support, but with no intention of following through on their pious prattle should it become politically inexpedient.

Many of the reporters and commentators in the media are fully aware of this bright line divide, but remain silent. I have no idea why; it may be to protect their inflated salaries and maintain their exalted but unwarranted position in this corrupt system, or it could be something else. Certainly the examples and the evidence slap them in the face on a daily basis, and yet these journalists continue to stare thoughtfully into space, wondering what impact Tinky Winky's gayness or Spongebob Squarepants' connection with tolerance might have on our nation. Meanwhile, young men and women in our military are dying by the dozens each week, we flush another billion or so dollars down the toilet, and the government programs we all have agreed to support and fund to help the most vulnerable of our fellow citizens get curtailed or cut.

But it would be inconvenient to the ends of power to point that out, and so our national discourse limps dysfunctionally along, with people being told they should be vitally concerned about the sexual orientation of a cartoon character while ignoring the hungry family next door.