Gay Patriot

If leaders of the other party have innovative ideas, let’s hear them. But if they have no ideas or policies except obstruction, they should step aside and let others lead. . . . . One approach is to lead, to focus on the people’s business, to take on the tough problems, and that is exactly what our party is doing.
The other approach is to simply do nothing, to delay solutions, obstruct progress, refuse to take responsibility. Members of the other party have worked with us to achieve important reforms on some issues, yet, too often, their leadership prefers to block the ideas of others.

–President Bush (via Polipundit)

For as long as I have been a Republican, I have heard critics of the GOP tell me what my party is all about. I’ve heard that we’re a bunch of money-grubbing selfish businessmen, that we’re white Christians who hate Jews, that we don’t welcome blacks and on and on. And on. You’ve heard the criticisms. You’re familiar with the insults. You’re aware of the name-calling. Now the chairman of the Democratic National Committee has joined the fray, telling everyone what Republicans are.
On Monday, Hillary’s rhetorical mentor, Howard Dean claimed that most members of my party are “not very friendly to different kinds of people, they are a pretty monolithic party ? it’s pretty much a white, Christian party.” And yet so many who describe the GOP in such terms, it doesn’t seem Mr. Dean has spend much time among Republicans. Indeed, his latest broadside reflects not on the reality of my party, but rather appeals to the narrow prejudices of certain members of his own party.
Very often when I come out as a Republican, some express shock that I, who am fluent in three languages, read widely, and have a variety of intellectual and artistic interests, could identify with a party of troglodytes (or other such demeaning terms). These people insist they know what Republican are all about. We’re not people who read books and talk about ideas. We’re just supposed to self-righteous, greedy bigots.
But, like Mr. Dean, few of these people so firm in their convictions of what defines a Republican, have ever attended a Republican meeting — or taken the time to get to know real Republicans, to ask us what drives us, to learn of our interests and to understand our political views. Too many seem unwilling to challenge their own prejudiced views of the GOP, its members and supporters. Not familiar with Republicans themselves, they define us not as we are, but as they want us to be.
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Not content to be regarded as one of the worst presidents in U.S. history, Jimmy Carter now seems determined to become the worst ex-president in U.S. history. While Bill Clinton, the only other living Democratic president, has largely refrained from attacking his Republican successor’s foreign policy, Jimmy Carter has made it his business to lambaste President Bush. (Indeed, some of Mr. Clinton’s recent statements have shown support for Mr. Bush’s policies, even for the liberation of Iraq.)
Now this failed former chief executive is at it again calling on the United States to close down the Guantanamo Bay prison. To be sure, Mr. Carter did fault Amnesty International for calling the prison “the gulag of our time,” but by publicly asking his nation to shut down the prison, he only helps reinforce the false impression that American officials have committed gross violations of human rights there.
To be sure, allegations have been raised about inappropriate conduct by guards and investigators, but those charges have been investigated and when substantiated, the guards (and investigators) responsible have been disciplined or dismissed. The military has adopted new policies to prevent such violations from recurring.
Mr. Carter’s call, however, suggests that our government has not taken action against the allegations. Not only that. By addressing this issue in a public forum, he helps those who wish to exaggerate the severity of those allegations. If Mr. Carter were truly concerned with what was going on there, he could contact the White House privately and work behind the scenes to effect change. Unlike most Americans, former presidents have means to communicate directly with the incumbent and his closest advisors.
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It looks like New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton has been drinking some of the snake oil served up at Howard Dean’s Democratic National Committee. According to the New York Times, at a “Women for Hillary” fund-raiser yesterday, the Empire State’s junior senator accused the GOP of “being mad with power and self-righteousness.” Seems she was a little mad herself in explaining the failure of her party, the Senate’s minority party, to stop this alleged power grab:

I know it’s frustrating for many of you, it’s frustrating for me. Why can’t the Democrats do more to stop them? I can tell you this:I can tell you this: It’s very hard to stop people who have no shame about what they’re doing. It is very hard to tell people that they are making decisions that will undermine our checks and balances and constitutional system of government who don’t care. It is very hard to stop people who have never been acquainted with the truth.

Funny thing for a Clinton to accuse someone of “not being acquainted with the truth.” I do hope there is video footage of this event and the RNC gets a copy of it. It would certainly undermine Mrs. Clinton’s attempts to position herself as a centrist.
This is just another sad example of the mean-spirited accusatory rhetoric which has replaced debate in the Senate’s Democratic caucus. Mrs. Clinton’s angry string of accusations have no relationship whatsoever to actual Republican attitudes or policies. Indeed, I’m sure that she–as well as her husband and his allies–faulted such angry rhetoric when directed against him when he was president.
During the 1990s, many on my side of the aisle went a bit overboard in their criticism of President Clinton. Now his wife is proving that she’s no better than the worst of his critics. Perhaps she’s just showing her true colors. This speech certainly suggests that her attitudes are closer to those of Howard Dean than they are to those of mainstream America.
Alexander K. McClure offers some rather sharp criticism of Mrs. Clinton’s speech at Polipundit. Hat tip: Drudge.
UPDATE: Seems like NY Daily News columnist Michael Goodwin agrees with me that Hillary is a Dean Democrat. Hat tip: Polipundit.