TODAY'S GOP -- TWELVE WAYS OF LOOKING AT HYPOCRISY

TODAY'S GOP -- TWELVE WAYS OF LOOKING AT HYPOCRISY

If you are male, blue suited and testifying before a panel of like-minded men in the Senate, your anger is appropriate.

But if you are female, dungareed or tank-topped and protesting in the halls of Congress or on the steps of the Capitol, your anger amounts to mob rule.

If you are McConnell, ignoring the Constitution by icing a President's nomination to the Supreme Court during his last year in office, you are strategic.

But if you are Feinstein, holding a letter from a victim of sexual assault because she does not want it made public, and then only  disclosing the letter once it has become public through no fault of your own, you have perpetrated "the most unethical sham . . . in politics."

If you are Graham, sitting on the Senate Judiciary Committee, it's ok for the FBI to ignore scores of witnesses who might have corroborated the claims of two victims of sexual assault.

But if you are Graham, sitting on the Senate Judiciary Committee, a complete investigation of the leak of one victim's letter to an opposing Senator is needed to preserve the integrity of the Senate.

If you are a male Republican Senator sitting on the Senate Judiciary Committee, it's appropriate to silence yourself while the  victim of sexual assault is in the room, ostensibly out of respect and sympathy for the victim,  and allow a female prosecutor to question the victim.

But if you are that same male Republican Senator sitting on the Senate Judiciary Committee, it's appropriate to reclaim the podium as soon as the victim has departed, pretend her accused assailant is the real victim, and believe him but not her.

If you are Trump, Jr., it's now a scary time for men who can be accused decades later of sexual assault.

But if you are the millions of women who have been assaulted, the fact that you said nothing at the time  because you would have been told you "asked for it", or attacked as delusional, means it really didn't happen.

If you are a Republican member of Congress, voting for tax cuts that enrich the already-wealthy and balloon the deficit, you are a creating economic growth and jobs.

But if you are  Democrat, voting to provide health care to those who do not have it or for a stimulus to recover from a a near Depression, you are mindlessly enlarging the deficit and providing a windfall to "takers" at the expense of "makers".

If you are Canada, saving American diplomats from the Ayatollah in 1979 by hiding them in your embassy and helping the CIA secret them out of the country, you are our ally.

But if you are Canada, obeying international agreements on trade and tariffs in 2018, you are a threat to our "national security" sufficient to enable the President to unilaterally impose tariffs on your aluminum and steel.

If you are the European Union, preserving the peace for over seventy years on a continent that had previously been the site of two world wars and the fascist-sponsored Holocaust, you are the solution to an historic problem.

But if you are the European Union, some (but not all) of whom do not spend 2% of their GDP on defense, you are a deadbeat taking advantage of  NATO and ripping off America's taxpayers.

If you are Russia, you declared cyber-war on America in 2016, hacked the Democratic Party's computers, tried to hack voter registration files in a number of states,  and created thousands of fake accounts on social media to help elect Donald Trump President.

But if you are Mueller, the investigation into that Russian interference is a "witch hunt" and a "hoax."

If you are Anonymous, secretly "thwarting" the President's "misguided impulses" and "preserving our democratic institutions until after he is out of office," you are a  patriot.

But if you are the New York Times, disclosing those "impulses" so that voters can vote the President and his enablers "out of office," and thus preserve our democratic institutions the old-fashioned way, you are "fake news."

If you are Trump, climbing to the top of America's greasy economic pole on the back of tax evasion and corporate bankruptcies, insulting any and all who get in your way, and pathologically lying, you are an authentic, self-made man.

But if you are Hillary, using (as did her predecessors) a private email server, you belong in jail.

If you are John McCain, you are turning over in your grave.

But if you are Lindsey Graham . . .

You don't care.