Not in the Right

Reading Pat Buchanan's op-ed piece in today's SF Chron, you'd think that Mark Felt rammed an airplane into the Pentagon, based on the former Nixon speechwriter's reaction to the revealing of Deep Throat last week. Pat, never one to mince words (white Americans need to breed at the rate of non-whites in order to keep the race competitive) continues to spew his reactionary, caustic vitriol in any direction, which, of course, is at everything, considering that he's so far right, he'll hit everyone from George Bush to Hitler. Nixon as a hero, "ending a war with honor" (Vietnam, which, well, I'm not going to touch this) to Linda Tripp as one with "moral courage." Isn't wiretapping illegal? I dunno, either I could ask Linda or G. Gordon Liddy, someone who also used to work for Nixon.
"After 1964, Nixon led his party back to victory after victory, culminating in the 49-state landslide victory of 1972." Victory isn't winning when you play on people's fears and ignore the basic civil rights denied to ethnic minorities and women (see Richard Nixon, Southern Strategy) or remember your history to see how Nixon did all he could to rig the election.
I personally see a man with little to no objectivity (as well, honestly, as relevance to today's political culture) being taken seriously in an age when people are not heroes (unless you're 21, blonde, female and attacked by non-white people you've just declared war on using cooked evidence) but people with agendas (we all have them, just like ol' Pat). To think that the GOP or the Nixonites have the moral high ground on this one is an absolute joke. But, I must remember that the Bushies also claimed to have the high ground until November 3, 2004, when it just didn't matter any more.

The governor of Texas yesterday signed an anti-abortion bill on the campus of a private Christian school. I can't remember who said it (and I just read the damned thing, too) but why do we place all of our faith into people who do not have faith in people? This Texan just holed himself up in a symbolic Alamo (like the Branch Davidians) and is waiting for the "Mexicans" to begin firing. This isn't political grandstanding? Cowtowing to the religious right? Thomas Jefferson just did a backflip in his grave.

Frist and the reactionary right in the Senate are doing all they can to stonewall a bill expanding the ability to research using stem cell material. I'm just as terrified as the next person about playing God, designer kids and creating the uberman, but banning al forms of research because it's the destruction of life? Five bucks says Rick Santorum (c'mon Steve and Chris, here's one for the Santorum!!!) will try passing a bill banning masturbation. It's the destruction of life-giving material, right?