IDAHO"S NEXT SENATOR: ?? Meet the New Hypocrite...

[L. Coyote]

Meet the New Hypocrite...
By Mark Schmitt
http://www.tpmcafe.com/blog/coffeehouse/2007/aug/31/meet_the_new_hypocrite

... TPM Cafe readers will remember Jim Risch .... at the time the acting governor. Referring to the victims of Hurricane Katrina, Risch said,

"Here in Idaho, we couldn’t understand how people could sit around on the kerbs waiting for the federal government to come and do something. We had a dam break in 1976, but we didn’t whine about it. We got out our backhoes and we rebuilt the roads and replanted the fields and got on with our lives. That’s the culture here. Not waiting for the federal government to bring you drinking water. In Idaho there would have been entrepreneurs selling the drinking water."

What a fitting gift to the nation, on the anniversary of Katrina!

... what makes Risch's nasty contempt for Louisianans all the more disturbing is that he was referring to the 1976 collapse of the Teton Dam, which was built entirely by the federal government, for the benefit of a handful of whining millionaire ranchers, and when it collapsed (which had been predicted) it was not the entrepreneurs of Idaho who fixed things up, but once again, the federal government, which rebuilt the irrigation systems and paid hundreds of millions of dollars in claims, far more promptly than in Louisiana.

I have a piece in the Guardian on this today (http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/mark_schmitt/2007/08/the_real_hypocrisy_of_idaho_co.html), in which I argue that this kind of hypocrisy -- in which one public position (we're self-sufficient, the rest of you people need to make it on your own) coexists with a completely contradictory public position (a slavish dependence on big-dollar federal subsidies) -- is far more consequential and dangerous than the trivial hypocrisy on which we tend to focus, when someone's public and private lives seem to be in conflict.

Indeed, the endless quest for Craig's brand of hypocrisy, and our tendency to overlook the grander self-delusion that fuels American conservatism (and which Larry Craig embodied as well), reminds me of a wonderful passage from Hendrik Hertzberg, almost twenty years ago, writing in the New Yorker about Gary Hart: ......

[Bjorn Against]

1. And people wonder why I am not celebrating Craig's resignation

On edit: Thanks for the post. K&R

[GeorgeGist]

3. Good point, re: celebrating Craig's resignation

But perhaps it's another breach in the levee that enables the welfare kings to 'play guitar' while the world drowns.

There may come a time for celebration after all.

[Sherman A1]

2. A well written piece...

Thanks for the link.

[Gregorian]

4. Let's see. I might be able to add a little insight to this.

Somewhere in this I sense that Risch is making a comparison between Idaho and New Orleans. And why not? After all, they're so much alike. The response from the government is blinding in it's difference. But that's not even what I'm thinking. You have people in New Orleans who are living a totally different life than those in Idaho. For one thing, the population density is more than just different. It's as different as the difference in how the government came in to help. In a reciprocal kind of sick way. In Idaho you have logging. Right off that implies contractors with heavy equipment. The kind of republican goons that make their money by deforestation. But never mind that. My take on this is that when that dam fell, these loggers might have (I don't know) rushed their equipment on lowboys to the scene. And therein lies the lack of "whining". Just a hunch. If I'm wrong, it hardly changes a thing. What an amazing story. Hypocrisy piled on top of more of the same. There is obviously another lesson in this. One about how Bush operated in New Orleans. But I digress.

[Left Is Write]

5. I'm already familiar with Jim Risch, thanks.

x(

[Major Hogwash]

6. The Govenor said today that he hasn't chosen anyone to fill Craig's seat yet.

It may not be Risch.

[L. Coyote]

8. Sounds like the trial balloon got popped.

[ToeBot]

7. It could actually be worse (believe it or not), Helen Chenoweth could still be available! nt