Three Seemingly Partisan Observations, But . . .

Mon. Jan. 30, 2012:

1.  My Republican friends have told me that the Obama administration sometimes shows breathtaking incompetence, "unsurprising for a former Chicago community organizer with minimal business or governing skills."  For example, Eric Holder "is the most inept Attorney General ever," and Hillary Clinton "has made mistake after mistake at State."  Today's NYT lead story, about Iraq's outrage regarding U.S. drones, lends credence about one State Department faux pas:  "The State Department needs to get through its head that it is not an agency adept at running military-style operations," said a Brookings Institution [hardly a conservative think-tank!] military robotics scholar.  It does seem as if someone should have explained & justified continuing protective drone use with Iraq's government, as a precondition for withdrawing all U.S. troops from Iraq.  Did U.S. commanders drop this ball?  State Department folks?

2.  When is somebody going to call Republican Congressional loudmouths on their theme that President Obama "stopped governing months ago" to "go into total campaigning mode"?  On the one hand, it is only as true about Obama as it has been  for every president since Andrew Jackson -- only President John Quincy Adams (1829-1833) may have been blissfully ignorant of the need in a democratic republic to begin campaigning for re-election as early as his 1st Inaugural Address.  And on the other hand, such Republican criticism relies on sublime ignorance amidst the U.S. electorate, regarding the nature of past presidential electioneering & governing -- and there, alas, it is probably correct.  ["Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people" -- H. L. Mencken].  In fact, nearly all Republican campaign statements so far have been shibboleths playing to our fellow citizens' fears & ignorance.  It would be too much to expect Sarah Palin & other merchants of Tea Party instincts to curb their base reflexes.  But the Republican "establishment," at least, should be expected to care enough about our democratic republic's future to demand much more of its standard-bearers.

3.  Did anyone else happen to see Bob Schieffer's CBS Face the Nation program this past Sunday?   morning?  If so, you too got treated to "Exhibit A" of partisan spokespersons on both sides, exploiting Schieffer's hospitable air time for tired old boiler-plate bashings -- Michelle Bachmann, Reince Priebus, and Allen West on the right, and Debbie Wasserman Schultz on the left.  This is particularly sad, because the senior newsman Schieffer represents a bygone era of relative bipartisan courtesy & grace.  Yet there were all his guests, fulfilling the depressing ritual of insulting viewers' intelligence with another rhetorical arms-race of ridiculing the opposition.  Schieffer:  "Are you tacitly agreeing with Gingrich's charge that Romney is a liar?"  "Oh, no!  OUR candidates are all honest."  No wonder all U.S. politicians are in such foul odor.  Grab your lantern, and we'll join Diogenes's search for one honest political creature, to help save the USA's democratic republic.