John Montgomery Presents This Week's Creep Logo by Lynn Kauczka

June 2, 2001 The Republican Wing Nuts

It was supposed to be Party Time for the Republicans. They occupied the White House (by 537 votes) and controlled the House of Representatives (by 11 votes), the Supreme court (by a 5-4 majority) and the US Senate (by the tie-breaking vote of Dick Cheney, Vice President in charge of selling out America to the oil companies). As long as they maintained those numbers, they could do anything. With the intelligence and flexibility required to operate in such a delicately balanced political environment, they could have gradually led the country towards the conservative agenda they've been hungry for all these years. Utopia. The Promised Land. Praise The Lord. Hallelujah. Party Time.

Coulda been. But it ain't how it turned out. After only four months, they blew it. What happened? The Wing Nuts took over. Guys like Cheney, Karl Rove and Trent Lott are not stupid, but once they get a whiff of power, intelligence gets flushed down the toilet, along with all traces of diplomacy, tolerance and negotiating skills. The Republican Wing Nuts demand blind loyalty to their cause. Each party member must march, in rigid goose-step formation, to the orders carved into stone by the Higher Powers. No deviation tolerated! All heretics will be tarred and feathered, bound and gagged, and then unceremoniously kicked over the wall to those Godless heathens on the other side. Get the hell outta here, ya liberal bastard.

The latest heretic to incur the overbearing wrath of the Wing Nuts is Senator James Jeffords of Vermont. James has been a Republican in Congress for 26 years. His family has been Republican for generations. But he hasn't always followed the party line. James' most recent transgression was not supporting the administration's proposed tax cut, which Snippy had assured us would solve all our problems by halting the economic downturn, restoring California's electricity, and prolonging Al Sharpton's jailhouse hunger strike forever.

It looked like the tax cut had enough votes to pass without James, so maybe they should have just let it ride, eh? "Get serious," said the Wing Nuts. "We gotta teach this disobedient worm a lesson!"  Several days later, when a school teacher from Vermont received the Teacher of the Year award at the White House, James wasn't invited. Then the Wing Nuts threatened one of James' pet projects, the Northeast Dairy Compact, which is vital to Vermont, where there are more cows than people.

This unnecessary display of spitefulness by the Wing Nuts was arrogant, petty and childish, reminiscent of Newt Gingrich shutting down the government because Bill Clinton wouldn't let him ride in the front of Air Force One. Given the narrowness of the Republican hold on the Senate, it was also grossly stupid. James, who had endured his lonely position in the Republican party through the Reagan and Gingrich eras, realized the Wing Nuts had finally screwed themselves in a little too tightly. He left the party to become an independent, giving control of the US Senate to the Democrats.

"Good riddance!" was the cry from all the usual Wing Nut sources. The front page headline in the New York Post screamed out "BENEDICT JEFFORDS." The National Review called James the "RuPaul of American politics." Trent Lott, who lost his job as Senate Majority Leader as a result of James' move, refused to accept any blame. "There is only one person to blame for all this, and that's Jim Jeffords," he said, calling it "a coup of one." Trent pointed out that he'd tried to make James feel wanted by inviting him to join his barbershop quartet, The Singing Senators. Trent also contended that not much would change in the Senate because James "was often very liberal in his views and quite often agreed more with Ted Kennedy" than other Republicans.

More stupidity.

In the US Senate, what's important is who has control. The chairmen of all Senate committees will now be Democrats. The chairmen determine what gets debated and what gets voted on. Snippy did get his tax cut passed, but the rest of his agenda is now at the mercy of the Democrat majority in the Senate. The Wing Nuts' dream of packing the federal courts with conservative judges now sounds as faded as the three-piece Singing Senators.

And in typical Wing Nut fashion, this week James started getting death threats and now has to travel with bodyguards. Next week, look for one of those Vermont cows to hold a press conference accusing James of improper animal husbandry, with Linda Tripp, a bit of a cow herself, to supply the tapes. Ken Starr is waiting in the wings of the barn with a subpoena for the cow's mother.

The Republican party's party is over. These days, the only Republicans partying are the Bush twins.