The Five Biggest Republican Lies

Now that the tabloids are diving in to do our dirty work on Palin for us, I’m going to proceed to something more fun: hitting these motherfuckers in the jaw.

So let’s get to it. Whatever half-hearing convention the Republicans cobble together in Minnesota this week, you’re going to hear the same lies they’ve been peddling for years. Under the weight of the Bush administration’s failures, though, even pretense is collapsing. Let’s finish off the job.

Here are their top five lies:

1. Republicans are Fiscal Conservatives

Bush is leaving office with the deficit through the floor. He’s burdening us with multiple money pits where American dollars, weakened by his policies, are tossed in to burn. Meanwhile, the Iraqi government walks off with billions. The party of Bush and Reagan has exploded deficits over the last thirty years while the one “tax-and-spend liberal” in office during that period left office boasting a massive budget surplus. In the last eight years, we’ve seen it spiraling even further with no-bid contracts for corporations that don’t even do the work for which they’re paid, mercenary armies financed by the ordinary Americans who oppose the Iraq war, and corruption scandals that make you feel like reaching for the nearest $400 hammer.

Then check the response to fiscal crises. So-called “free marketers” bail out failing banks like we were living in Red Moscow. You want to be a free market fiscal conservative? Put your money where your mouth is: let’s let Detroit compete on the “free market.” Let’s scrap all farm subsidies. Let’s see which American corporations could hack it without protection from their political buddies - especially Republicans. They’re all cowards and liars. Any “fiscal conservatives” in Minnesota should get laughed offstage.

2. Republicans are Strong on National Security

Republicans have been running against Jimmy Carter since 1980, despite the fact that Democrats have strong traditions of military service and tactical skill in wartime. So where is the proof that the GOP can win wars or keep our country safe? It was Democrats who won World War I and II, and it was Republicans who ended the Korean War, took American forces out of Vietnam, and demanded an exit from Somalia in 1993. By their own criteria they were cut-and-runners. Democrats were just as fierce Cold Warriors as Republicans were - so credit for success or failure (more of the latter) should be spread out evenly. Reagan forced the Soviets to their knees in Afghanistan? No, that policy began under Carter. Nixon was a hardline anticommunist? Well, he was the one to go to China. All through the Cold War both sides vied to see who was the craziest. And if you still believe that Reagan “won” the Cold War, are you sure it wasn’t more a question of internal Soviet weaknesses? We’re going to be paying hand over fist for Reagan’s “victory” for quite some time, as trends Republicans set in motion make our own government seem more and more Soviet.

Under Bush, the idea that Republicans keep us safer has become a sick joke. The Iraq War has created terrorists in places where there were none before, while distracting our military from real threats and problems. There are still holes in our security - at the borders, at the airports, in our cities - that Timothy McVeigh could drive a truck through. Talking tough isn’t the same as keeping people safe.

3. Republicans Defend Individual Rights

Another good joke. You want to tell me how Democrats might take your gun away? Let me ask you this: what good will the Second Amendment do you without the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth? Democrats are backing off on gun control, but gun lovers continue to vote Republican so that they can “protect themselves from the government.” I know you say your gun would defend you from a home invasion by police, but I think it’s important to have some laws on your side too - ie, ones that protect you from no-knock searches, warrantless wiretapping, having your name on terror watch lists for no cause, and the entire Patriot Act. Blame Democrats too if you like - a lot of this expanded authoritarianism goes back to the War on Drugs, and there both parties share blame - but don’t let Republicans off the hook. They’ve been shredding our Constitution for decades now, and the pace picked up under Bush. If you want to keep seeing prison populations shoot up while Americans fear government tyranny more, vote Republican this fall.

4. Republicans Represent Family Values

By their own standards, Republicans have failed to live out the values they affirm. A corrupt party full of self-loathing homosexuals (for whom I have pity) and child molesters (for whom I have only anger) can no longer claim to represent anyone’s values - whether it be conservatives or liberals. The affairs of Eliot Spitzer and John Edwards may be the ones that blow up in the press, but it’s conservatives who manage to wrack up new financial and sexual scandals month after month with all-too-predictable consistency.

All these scandals reveal the heart of Republican “values”: an ugly selfishness that distorts even Ayn Rand’s vision, a willingness, a need, to lie to everyone (including oneself) in the pursuit of a corporatist agenda. The powerful preachers cynically cheat and lie; the president cynically exploits national tragedies for votes but then fails to honor victims or veterans. One look at Obama and Biden’s families should tell you something - you may not like these men, you may not even respect them, but they live out their values in a way that’s powerful and honest.

5. Republicans Just Want Everyone to Have the Same Opportunities

When Republicans rail against affirmative action, universal health care, or social programs, they claim to want a society where everyone “starts in the same place.” But as we’ve seen above, Republicans always create at least two sets of rules. One for the politicians, another for the voters, One for the rich, another for the working and middle classes. One for the preachers, another for the flock. On every issue, Republicans are willing to look the other way for the powerful. They want illegal immigrants punished, but not the illegal employers who pay them. They want democracy abroad, but not if the wrong guys win. It’s clear now that with Republicans in power, predatory businessmen and idiotic ideologues are always first among equals - and when the check comes due, it’s the people, not the powerful, who pay.

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The country is sick of hollow Republican rhetoric. They’ve charmed a lot of people by appealing to bedrock American values like fairness, justice, courage, and family - but then have proceeded to sell out all of their values and all of their earnest supporters in favor of cynical corporate fat cats who couldn’t even hack it in a fair market.

This year, the slogans which long ago became talking points have finally become tattered cliches, piling up around John McCain’s feet like flakes of confetti. The party of Reagan? The party of Eisenhower? The party of Lincoln? I can’t even laugh at the way the Republicans have fallen - and the ways they’ve taken the whole country with them.

So watch them in St. Paul. Watch them trot out the same tired nonsense tricked out with some new gimmicks. Watch them preach and prattle, mask empty ideas with full-of-shit rhetoric, and cut and run from a president who eight years ago was saying many of the same things John McCain is saying now, about “change in Washington” and “compassion” and a whole bunch of other trash that’s now stinking so bad everyone can smell it.

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