Mullings: An American Cyber-column By Rich Galen

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Red Rover, Red (State) Rover

Rich Galen

Friday June 27, 2005

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National Democrats and their allies in the popular press were in full projectile sweat mode last week over a speech given by Karl Rove in New York.

Rove, in a speech to New York Conservatives said:

"Conservatives saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and prepared for war. Liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy for our attackers."

This was seized upon by the Democrats as being (according to Pat Healy's Sunday NY Times piece) "reckless," "nasty" and "divisive."

Let's review the past month or so:

Democratic Senate Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), speaking to a group of high school students about President Bush, tells them that "this guy is a loser." Bad enough, but the President was on a foreign mission at the time.
Democratic Party Chairman, How-Weird Dean says that many "Republicans have never done an honest day's work in their lives." No mention as to whether Democratic Senators Jay Rockefeller or Ted Kennedy were in the crowd at the time.
Democratic Party Chairman, How-Weird Dean gets another time at bat and announces that the GOP is largely "the party of Whites and Christians."
About 10 days ago the number two Democrat in the US Senate, Dick Durbin (D-IL) compares American military personnel in Guant�namo Bay to Nazi concentration camp guards.

The Dems were desperate to try and get a Republican - ANY Republican - saying something - ANYthing - which would allow them to jump around, hooting, screaming, and baring their teeth like a bunch of primates, in a National Geographic special, who have just spotted a boa constrictor in their midst.

Healy wrote (brilliantly, I think you will agree):

Of course, in Washington's theater of outrage, the actors want first and foremost to be heard. "You have to keep the language ratcheted up to stay on TV," said Rich Galen, a Republican strategist who once worked for Mr. Gingrich. "In order to make it into the next 15-minute news segment, you have to be closer and closer to outrage."

And it came to pass that I was asked to be on Fox to debate former New York Congressman Tom Downey on the Rove outrage.

Tom Downey is merely a former Congressman. I am a professional guest on cable news chat shows. Mr. Downey went first and said all the things you would expect a Liberal Democrat to say and sat back smugly. I couldn't actually see him because we were in different studios, but I feel certain that there was some smug oozing out of Studio Two.

I, because I am always prepared for these appearances, made a number of points:

First, it is important to note that Rove used the words "Conservatives" and "Liberals" rather than Republicans and Democrats. This, in Your Nation's Capital where careers can rise and fall on the inclusion of a semi-colon in a tax bill, is a major distinction.

Second, to pretend that what Rove said is the equivalent of Durbin comparing US Soldiers to Nazi prison guards is to "stretch the rubber band of logic to the breaking point." [I think I said that. I know I meant to say it, because I had rehearsed it in the car on the way in.]

Third, I had found a quote from Mr. Downey when he was a young Congressman opposing US military aid to Cambodia: Downey, the Liberal from Long Island, had said:

"The Administration has warned that if we leave there [Cambodia] there will be a bloodbath. But to warn of a new bloodbath is no justification for extending the current bloodbath."

I mentioned that in the ensuing years Pol Pot murdered some two million Cambodians, thus making Mr. Rove's sociological analysis correct - at least in his case.

As we walked back to the Green Room, Downey allowed as how he was surprised that I had found a thirty-year old quote and used it on the air.

"Welcome to the NFL," I said. Perhaps a bit ... smugly.

On the Secret Decoder Ring page today: A link to the NY Times piece, an amusing Mullfoto and a Catchy Caption of the Day.

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