Working from that premise, all these 'New' Democrats and 'New' 'Progressives' should always be viewed skeptically. Whether it's Arianna Huffington or John Aravosis, the fact that they managed to step out of the gutter shouldn't let you forget what's on the bottom of their shoes. They'll never call themselves "liberals" because they spent the bulk of their lives deriding liberals and attacking them. To call themselves liberals would suggest that they truly had experienced some transformational conversion.
So what they do is burn out all their friends on the right, sense a change in the current and rush over to the other side. Why is that a problem?
It's not if you watch them with a detached amusement.
Don't expect ethics from them and you won't be surprised when Aging Socialite's Cat Litter Box is offering up 'blog posts' by George Clooney that Clooney never wrote. Don't expect a left sensibility and you won't be surprised when Arianna thinks the thing-to-do is to make 'jokes' about special-needs children. Or when she declares Hugo Chavez a "Marxist dictator."
They may have stepped out of the gutter but, never forget, they bring the gutter along with them. Not having had any real conversion, they utilize the same tactics they did as conservative Republicans and launch the same sort of attacks.
Case in point, John Aravosis who was Ted Steven's go-to-legal-boy for years and years (1989-1994). Ted Stevens who was found guilty of failing to disclose 'gifts' (bribes) in a federal court last fall. So you might think Aravosis would know a bit about what qualifies for crooked senator -- but you'd be wrong.
Friday, John Aravosis was reminding the world that Republicans and racism are frequently go together like gin and tonic. Having little else to do with his time, he decided to issue an edict, that US Senator Roland Burris should resign his Senate seat.
Maybe John had tossed and turned all night dreaming of Keith Olbermann and wanted to embrace his own warm nutty?
Who knows, who gives a damn?
What is known is that Senator Burris hadn't broken any laws and wasn't accused of breaking any.
But some Republican males see an African-American and it makes them go limp in head and crotch as they tremble in fear. The fear manifests itself in hate. And hate allows Aravosis to hiss that it's time for Burris to step down.
Because? The Illinois State Senate impeached Governor Rod Blagojevich last week.
And?
If you're asking that, you're not thinking like a racist Republican trying to play 'progressive'.
Here's reality on Blajojevich, he was impeached and removed from office. He wasn't sent to jail or prison. That's because he hasn't been found guilty of anything. (And we remember an impeachment motion for a mayor that stumbled for just that reason. The mayor did resign . . . after he was found guilty of breaking the law.) Blagojevich may be guilty of taking bribes or paying bribes or knowing of bribes or fixing the state lotto.
Or he may be completely innocent.
Patrick Fitzgerald, the prosecutor who has made political hay of his indictments against Blagojevich, doesn't exactly have a track record that comforts. This is the man who refused to take Plamegate any highter than Scotter Lewis Libby.
Maybe Fitzgerald has a case, maybe he doesn't.
Maybe Blagojevich ends up convicted, maybe he doesn't.
If he doesn't end up convicted, a number of people will be condemning the impeachment. So if you're a state senator in Illinois (all voted to impeach), you are probably praying night and day that Blagojevich gets convicted.
Regardless of whether he is convicted or not, he was within the duties of his office to appoint someone to fill Barack Obama's Senate seat. He chose Roland Burris. The Senate accepted Burris' appointment and he was sworn in. (Burris is pictured below with Illionis' other US Senator Dick Durbin and with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.)
John Aravosis writes that the senator "will always be judged by his original sin." "Original sin"? Oh goodness. Leave it to a gay Republican to toss around "sin" when he's got no point. Truly, Republicans do not convert, they just remarket themselves.
"He put ego, and loyalty to a now fallen governor, ahead of his state and his country." That's Burris' 'sin,' according to Aravosis.
First off, Burris is over seventy-years-old so if that's his first so-called 'sin' in life, good for him! Truly, good for him. Second, it's just the sort of pompous, bulls**t Keith Olbermann (another 'conversion' story) would spew so, of course, it's not rooted in reality or anything verifiable.
What is verifiable is that Republican 'progressive' Aravosis has a history of bigotry and not all in the distant pass.
"That's because far too often the Democrats don't give a damn about anybody who isn't a minority or starving to death," hissed Aravosis. While working for Ted Stevens (and still in the closet)? No, in January of 2008.
Yeah, LGBT is a minority but White Republicans -- especially those who spent years in the closet -- tend to forget that and scream and hiss about those 'damn minorities'.
That is the mindset that allows a John Aravosis to hiss at Roland Burris, a man whose character was judged by his Senate colleagues (for those who have forgotten the hoops Burris was forced to jump through to be seated) and found to be strong. No recent senator (and we're having trouble remembering any senator -- though Gore Vidal might be able to think of someone) has had to go to the lengths Burris did after becoming a senator just to be seated. He did all that was asked of him and he did it with dignity.
That last part ("he did it with dignity") may be what most upset John Aravosis.
Regardless, consider last week a gift from 'progressive' John Aravosis -- a lesson that few people ever truly have a political conversion. People may become less liberal or less conservative. Few have a truly transformative experience. Revisionary history likes to pretend otherwise -- the same revisionary history that likes to turn John Dean into a hero instead of the convicted Watergate crook he is.