I know. The congressional subpoenas for Rove and assorted White House folks are old news. Subpoenas here, subpoena there -- is the truth in any of them? Will we ever know? Would we even believe them if they testified factually (not a "I do not recall" chant) under oath? I doubt it. You can lie to some of the people some of the time and not get caught. You can even lie to all the people one time and not get caught. But when you do get caught, it doesn't matter whether you lie or tell the truth or "do not recall" because nobody will believe anything you say. That's the problem the Bush White House has now. Nobody believes a word they say anymore. All we want from the Bush administration is more resignations, the more the better. Better nobody in charge than the foxes guarding the hen-house now.
So on with the new news -- the Minnesota bridge collapse, the toxic toys from China , tainted food from China, the stock market two-step, and a mine disaster. All proof enough that almost nothing the federal government is in charge of making go right, goes right. The only inspiration to come of the recent China hazardous trade is that the Chinese seem to have a solution to incompetent officials -- the firing squad. Maybe we should give that a try as soon as we get somebody to testify under oath as to who is responsible for what.
Then there's the political news -- the straw vote in Iowa -- perhaps a glimmer of hope after all. Not in Romney, the guy who came in first, the guy who hired buses to ferry Iowa folk into his air-conditioned tent, the one who explained that none of his five sons was serving in Iraq because they had more important things to do, like get him elected (guess the Bush twins didn't volunteer for military service after 2001 because they were helping Dad get re-elected in 2004). No hope and no surprise there -- not Romney's big-spender win, not when the other well-financed candidates didn't bother to show up.
The hope comes from the fact that some Iowa Republican voters are not easily bought with air-conditioning and barbeque. The surprise is that the guy who told the Iowa Republicans, "I can't buy you; I can't even rent you," and didn't, came in second. Way to go Mike Huckabee.
Could it be that Mike Huckabee is the right man in the right place at the right time? (You have to admit that the name makes you think of Aunt Bee and "Mayberry RFD" and other warm and fuzzy things long past.)
Huckabee thinks so, and apparently other folks now think so too. If Huckabee swears on the Bible he thumps that he'll close the borders, get us out of Iraq, make it illegal for medical providers to charge more to care for the uninsured than is reimbursed by Medicaid for the same procedure or by health insurance for the people who can afford insurance, and he shows he has sense enough to understand that you can't export middle class jobs and still have a middle class to buy stuff from Wal-Mart and make mortgage payments, then I might even vote for him.
You never know, Huckabee might have a chance. Stranger things have happened. Huckabee now has as much chance of making it into the White House as everybody thought Jimmy Carter or Bill Clinton had a long, long, time ago. Maybe all Mike has to do now is keep on running like Jimmy and Bill did and let the other guys prove to the voters who they really are: Bush-brain men beholding to their big campaign donors who are not likely to change anything if they can help it. If Mike Huckabee and Ron Paul team up, the Republicans might even be able to pull enough liberal voters to beat Hillary!
