Fear and Loathing on Capitol Hill: The GOP Caucus Is Decadent and Depraved

Fear and Loathing on Capitol Hill: The GOP Caucus Is Decadent and Depraved

Posted on | June 5, 2012 | 6 Comments and 0 Reactions

“They are our representatives; we would like some representation.”
– Ace of Spades, June 4, 2012

FROM AN UNDISCLOSED LOCATION
“Where are those spineless Republican bastards in Congress when we need ‘em, huh?” I shouted, trying to explain to a couple of young Beltway professionals the concept behind National Day of Blogger Silence. “They expect us to carry their message and fight their fights, and here we’ve got bloggers getting SWATted and bloggers going to jail and not a single Republican on Capitol Hill has said a f–king word! Not so much as a g–d– two-minute floor speech or a two-sentence press release statement!”
A couple of passersby on the sidewalk glanced over at the patio of the Pennsylvania Street bar where I was, uh, exercising my First Amendment rights — not to say ranting like a madman — earlier this afternoon. Having come to Capitol Hill for a meeting, I’d bumped into these two D.C. professionals who are young friends of mine, though not quite protegés, although one of them was someone whom I once advised to stay away from the Culture 11 debacle. She didn’t listen, and now doesn’t even mention on her LinkedIn profile her involvement in that infamous New Media catastrophe. But I digress . . .
Avoiding the temptation to tell my side of the Brett Kimberlin situation in straight-out gonzo mode has been easier than I thought. Obviously, the sheer craziness of this bizarre three-week saga — forced into a fugitive existence because I was covering the story of a notorious terrorist-turned-pseud0-progressive activist — lent itself to a Thompsonesque telling. Your average Republican doesn’t understand the gonzo method, however, and the story is serious enough that it deserves to be told in the measured tones and straightforward narrative style of Neutral Objective Journalism, even while my life turned into a freakish carnival of high-intensity weirdness.
Then on Monday the demented swine behind “Breitbart Unmasked” decided it would be a clever idea to go after Ali Akbar, and Ace of Spades announced his Day of Silence plan, which a lot of people don’t seem to understand.  So I decided to come to Washington, D.C., today, wearing a Serious Business Suit for a meeting where I had about two minutes to try to explain to Serious People what this is all about and why it matters.
Kind of a stressful experience and, in retrospect, it probably wasn’t a wise decision to grab a tall cup of strong coffee during the meeting, seeing as how it was my fourth or fifth cup of the day. I did OK in the actual meeting — anyone familiar with the convoluted Kimberlin/Rauhauser story can appreciate the difficulty of boiling it down to a two-minute impromptu pressentation — but afterward, I was a bit torqued up, so when one of the young professionals expressed mystification at the Day of Silence idea, I went off like a skyrocket.
“Maybe you don’t understand it, but I understand exactly what Ace is saying,” I said, puffing a Marlboro outside a Capitol Hill tavern. “It’s not that we’re not going to blog at all on Friday, but that we’re all going to put up one big post about this Kimberlin situation and nothing else.
“No election news, no policy stuff, no snarky jokes at the expense of the usual MSNBC douchebags — just one post about the way these left-wing monsters are attempting to silence us, and that’s it for the whole f–king day. Because, see, there’s some guys in Congress who owe us, big time, and Ace damned well knows it.
“You may not remember the ‘Crazed Ewok’ stuff Ace was posting about GOP challengers during the 2010 mid-terms, but I do. We’ve been carrying their water all this time, raising money for campaigns and pushing their message, and now when we need some help, those cowardly motherf–kers act like they never even heard of us? They’re going to sit up there in their offices and let us be gobbled up by these monsters and not say Word One about it?  Oh, hell no.”
It was at that point that one of the young professionals said that maybe Darrell Issa could do something.
“What?!” I roared. “You don’t think Issa’s people know all about this crap? Oh, yeah, like maybe we can get a briefing on the Hill or a meeting with some staffers next week or whatever. F–k that! We need action. We need action now — not next week or next month — now! Today! Immediately!”
The young D.C. professionals were clearly disturbed by the vehemence of my discourse, which was loud enough to be overheard by passersby on the sidewalk next to the patio.
“Hey, I’m sorry I got a little worked up there,” I said, putting out my cigarette and quieting my voice. “Probably shouldn’t have had that cup of coffee. You see how serious this is.”
Yes, of course they could. And so I said good-bye to my friends and got in my car and drove over here to an Undisclosed Location on K Street, where big-shot lobbyist types in $1,500 suits are lighting up Cohibas and laying down enormous bets on Scott Walker’s margin of victory tonight in Wisconsin.
If Walker wins by less than 5 points, these guys will be short a few grand tomorrow morning, but as long as Walker wins — and my Cohiba-smoking lobbyist pals are 100% certain he will — they’ll be happy even if he doesn’t “cover the spread.”
“Just imagine,” one of them said to me, “the look on Ed Schultz’s face — that fat blowhard is going to be the biggest idiot on TV!”
My big-shot K Street pals have offered to buy the drinks at their private Scott Walker Victory Party here in D.C. tonight, and my wife says she understands I need a break from all this stress, so it looks like I’ll be forced to accept their invitation. Surely my readers won’t begrudge the fugitive this one night of leisurely amusement, laughing it up at Ed Schultz’s embarrassed explanations of why Scott Walker stomped the crap out of that doofus Democrat from Milwaukee and his corrupt union buddies.
Living well is the best revenge, they say.

– Robert Stacy McCain, Whereabouts Unknown