tom daschle can eat a big fat dick.

sorry to be so nasty about shit, but seriously, who outside the beltway thought this guy was or is anything but a joke? i mean, he makes harry reid look like a freakin' action hero. he got rolled as majority leader. he got rolled as minority leader. look up 'hapless' in the dictionary, and he's the noun in the example sentence.

this is the guy who was supposed to push comprehensive health care reform through congress? the guy who couldn't even articulate a rationale against going to war in iraq?

i dunno. all the inside baseball players seem to think he would have been super-effective at making it happen, but i just don't see it. i mean, the guy couldn't even get it together to threaten a filibuster, or invoke cloture. and he's supposed to get the republicans (or even the blue dogs) on board for a giant rewrite of our totally-fucked-from-top-to-bottom health care system? i'd laugh if i wasn't one of the umpteen million americans who're just one serious injury or illness away from being a debt-slave for the rest of my truncated life.

i mean, he knew this would come up. and he didn't even see fit to tell obama, not until a month after his nomination. he knew there was supposed to be a new sheriff in town, and that things were supposed to be different. that lobbyists weren't gonna be running the show anymore. but he just wanted back in soooo bad, he just couldn't help but clap his hands and believe in fairies, just like he did when he was in office. i mean, for an incumbent to lose his seat, much less a guy who holds a position in the senate leadership, does not bode well for the guy's judgement or effectiveness. seriously.

and while i'm at it, what the fuck is up with the democratic bench? i mean, i expect republicans to be dirty-ass motherfuckers. it's kind of their thing; they only enter government so as to help the private sector screw the public more effectively, at least anymore (i think once upon a time conservatism actually stood for something, but that time is long past). but are there really not enough capable folks in the democratic party to fill one branch of government who don't think and act like the rules that apply to everyone else don't also apply to them? i mean, nancy killefer was one thing, that kind of oversight i can understand: it's complicated stuff, and she was only off by a few hundred bucks. but tom daschle (and tim geithner, who i don't even want to get started on) was on the senate finance committee. they write the fucking tax code. and he owed a hundred-odd thousand dollars in back taxes, which means hundreds of thousands in undeclared income, which if i did it would land my ass in some seriously hot fucking water.

as for obama, i'm somewhat less upset. as john cole at balloon-juice pointed out, in this case, the system worked. obama set high standards. daschle didn't meet them, and he didn't even make it to the senate for confirmation hearings. obama's people should've vetted him better, and he shouldn't have put his name in the hat in the first place, and though it's a bit of a shiner for barack, it ain't all that bad, as these things go. what i really wish is that the who's who could learn how to keep their fucking noses a little cleaner. the same rules are supposed to apply to everybody.

what's the old saying? they come to washington to do good, and they stay to do well.

think we're gonna have to do something about that.