In the run up to the 2004 presidential election, I had this intense debate with my active Mormon Utah brother who insisted that G.W. Bush just had to be God's president and by implication, that if G.W. Bush were a Mormon he'd be a member of the quorum of elite doctrinaire and God-guided leaders of one of the most cookie-cutter societies in the country.

The title of this article is the beginning of the only paragraph I remember him writing as we argued about Bush and Kerry.

Right ....

So now what about this absurd behavior of the current crop of so-called republican statespersons?

Am I now justified in a declaration that I may never vote for a republican again?

Washington State continues to demonstrate that acute grass-roots level wisdom that has left us free from our shame had we cursed ourselves over the past six years with one or two senators with (R) behind their name.

Imagine, if you will, that the national Republican marionettes campaigning in Washington State had actually won. Imagine then a Senator Nethercutt (R) and a Senator Barney Fife McGavick (R) sitting on the asses of cowards and taking marching orders from blindly partisan-at-all-costs American traitors like Mitch McConnell.

Try to imagine - if you will - those two republican automatons approaching anywhere near the political courage of Republican Senator Hagel (for whom I might be persuaded to cast my vote.)

There is absolutely no way Nethercutt and McGavick could justifiably ever compare to Hagel, not in political credentials nor personal experience.

And little imaginative effort is needed to detect from the direction of Dave Reichert the smell of what party fear does to politicians.

So maybe I COULD say that despite the courage of Hagel and Ron Paul I'd never vote for a Republican again ... never ...

But then I don't believe in committing to the irrevocable unless I'm looking into my wife's eyes.

Despite having moved out of the Dem party and feeling more comfortable as a conservatively liberal or liberally conservative independent (all labels are self-promoting anyway, eh?), I'm tempted to not vote for a republican ever

okay ... not any of the current crop ... ever.

But, despite the opinions of some popular state Demo supporters, I could be tempted to throw my vote away on someone like Ron Paul with whom I don't agree on everything, but whose words sound like he means what he says and says what he means.

Well, marriage with Democrats has not proven to be all it was supposed to be. But at least a vote in their direction wouldn't be wasted. The next national election will be won or lost by Democrats who will or won't find a way to separate themselves from a reflublican bunch of self-interested and traitorous crooks who remain too stupid to disassociate themselves from the man who will forever be the national presidential joke.

But other than being persuaded of honest opinion from Hagel or Paul,  how could I ever vote for any of today's reflublicans?

I'm astounded and embarrassed for them, each and every one of them. But especially embarrasing are those whose votes have dissed our troops, dissed my soldier, dissed military families, dissed my family - certainly dissed any nobility behind the actions of those who are serving their country more nobly than its politicians.

Today's crop of Republicans, lead by Rep Boehner himself, are the ultimate patriotic wimps.

You know it and I know it.

As for who has the votes to override the President?

That rationale has never been an argument of persuasive power unless you assume that the job of shutting down the president's agenda was completed on that Tuesday in November, 2006. Everything else would be merely mailing it in.

Right.

I personally voted with the expectation that we would send warriors to Washington who would fight tooth and nail, who would be willing to win inch by inch - continually forcing Bush into a confrontation with his own lies, ignorance and arrogance.

... continually forcing Bush to veto and re-veto, to speechify and re-speechify until his republican flying monkeys became totally and self-consciously overwhelmed in shame and chagrin.

I didn't support sending a few politicians to Washington to cast a few votes and call it done.

I sent them to a bar fight with broken beer bottles, night sticks and a stubborn insistence on winning even if all the tables and chairs are overturned and smashed.

I didn't vote to send in bean-counters ... er, I mean ... vote counters, who would keep their great coats buttoned shut and their pistols holstered until they had 60 guns.

Besides, that kind of gentleman's override vote would have been anti-climactic and unsatisfying. I wanted to see more greed, hypocrisy and political self-interest revealed over the course of the bar fight.

I had hopes there would be more Republicans than Democrats with egg or something smellier on their kissers, but definitely sour-mugged villains standing in the glare of public awareness.

But now, I guess I'll have to take any house-cleaning these political janitors can manage since all they seem to be interested in is janitoring.

Just don't you believe that their spines will only be straight and strong if or when they have their 60 coward-removing ball-brassing votes.

That's not very much gumption and not enough determination to get rid of the American version of Suaron and the Orcs if you ask me.

Their kind won't go away with a vote unless they can see and hear an outraged American electorate spitting in their direction and cursing the day they were first voted in.

Then, the message will have been sent.

Heck, maybe if the electorate took that kind of action, the spineless would get their 60 votes and could proceed with their little hankies un-mussed.

This American Veteran declares that impeachment should be on the table

... and on a plate more sizzling than fajitas.

© Arthur Ruger 2007