Jeff Flake's mendacity is really quite impressive, even for a Republican senator. On his Facebook page today he points to a column "written by The Arizona Republic's Joanna Allhands," which, he explains, "captures the complexity of the [recent gun-vote] issue better than anything I've read."
I just read it myself. It captures nothing, it elucidates nothing, in fact it actually evades complexity by merely linking to a local-news segment with Sen. Flake, who brazenly lies in the interview about the background-check bill. He says it covers all private sales--it does not--which the government then keeps a record of. It doesn't.
The Arizona Republic's piece, that aforementioned piece by one Joanna Allhands, the one titled "Defending Jeff Flake"? It describes the guts of Flake's mendacity as a "nuanced view." The opinion piece wraps:
Flake reviewed the amendment as intellectually as possible and made a judgment call, knowing full well that it would tick off both sides.
Is that not what we say we expect from our lawmakers?
So in the end what Flake has is a bit of a Dick Cheney-NY Times-Meet the Press-thing going. He first comes to a political conclusion, whereupon he feeds the media information as to that conclusion, and then the media complicitly regurgitate his original bias, and presto--he points to the media as an enlightened, independent source of defense for his conclusion.
When your mendacity sinks to Dick Cheney's level ...
No, no! No politician could sink to the level of Dick Cheney. It's more like:
Cheney = worse than Hitler
Flake = a smarmy Mussolini
...or in Dantean terms:
Cheney = Satan
Flake = one of the guys He's chewing on
...or Speilbergish:
Cheney = The Emperor Palpatine
Flake = bastard hybrid of Darth Vader and Jar Jar Binks
Posted by: W Caulfield | April 30, 2013 at 03:32 PM