[I’m listening to those wienie-scarfing fucktards at NPR carefully frame Robert “Bob” Gates as a member of the Bush 41 team—the rational Republicans, so much better than Bush, so much more the natural ruling party…. Without, can you believe it, mentioning Gates as an Iran-Contra operative. Just unbelievable.]

It could be that the Republican tendency to lower the bar and exceed even the most cynical expectations for massive suckitude has somehow been eliminated…

That the Republicans, chastened, have returned to reality-based thinking…

That the Republicans, somehow, can undrink the Kool-Aid.

No, I didn’t think so. Bush’s trainwreck of a presser showed this clearly; all he could do is repeat the same inside-the-bubbdle talking points.

Anyhow, Robert Gates is a more competent VRWC operative than Rummy. And for those who remember Iran-Contra—arguably, where today’s Constitutional crisis has its roots—Robert “Bob” Gates is an old, old friend:

Owing to his senior status in the CIA, Gates was close to many figures who played significant roles in the Iran/contra affair and was in a position to have known of their activities. The evidence developed by Independent Counsel did not warrant indictment of Gates for his Iran/contra activities or his responses to official inquiries.

Gates was an early subject of Independent Counsel’s investigation, but the investigation of Gates intensified in the spring of 1991 as part of a larger inquiry into the Iran/contra activities of CIA officials.

Gates consistently testified that he first heard on October 1, 1986, from the national intelligence officer who was closest to the Iran initiative, Charles E. Allen, that proceeds from the Iran arms sales may have been diverted to support the contras. Other evidence proves, however, that Gates received a report on the diversion during the summer of 1986 from DDI Richard Kerr.

The issue was whether Independent Counsel could prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Gates was deliberately not telling the truth when he later claimed not to have remembered any reference to the diversion before meeting with Allen in October.

Independent Counsel made this decision subject to developments that could have warranted reopening his inquiry, including testimony by Clair E. George, the CIA’s former deputy director for operations. At the time Independent Counsel reached this decision, the possibility remained that George could have provided information warranting reconsideration of Gates’s status in the investigation. George refused to cooperate with Independent Counsel and was indicted on September 19, 1991. George subpoenaed Gates to testify as a defense witness at George’s first trial in the summer of 1992, but Gates was never called.

How very, very odd….

Anyhow, it looks like the Ruling Party has decided that the problem is not the operation—to replace Constitutional government with authoritarian rule—but with the operatives.

I mean, if I wanted to run a humongous program of domestic warrantless surveillance out of DOD, then Robert “Bob” Gates would be a great man for the job.

NOTE Just listening to—gag—NPR. No mention of Iran-Contra in their “Bob” Gates story at all. Just hagiography about his willingness to “ask the hard questions.” Always a tipoff that we’re talking about a made man…