If there is one thing that Americans are good at, particularly of late, Republican Americans, it is manufacturing stories out of whole cloth. Our latest, great example is Chippy (there is no Chippy, I just felt like adding a name to go along with all of this) the Salt Marsh Harvest Mouse. You see, Chippy and his kind are endangered and might need some help to survive. Chippy and his friends also appear to be harmless and somewhat cute, even to one who isn't a particular rodent fan.
Enter the Grand Old Party. You see, unlike Disney, and some of the rest of us, the GOP doesn't think it matters a rats a$$ that Chippy and friends are cute, much less help the ecosystem they inhabit and thus be an important priority to help. Of course, it wouldn't help create jobs if they did happen to have $30 million allocated to help save them. That money would obviously simply be handed to them so they could waste it on alcohol, crack cocaine and tiny little whorehouses. So it is a crime to them that that very thing is written right into the stimulus bill! To help Chippy and his friends, who also happen to live in Nancy Pelosi's district, drink, get high and get laid!
Mike Huckabee decried the foul rodents on FOX News! Rep. Dan Lundgren (R-CA) decried them! The Washington Times wrote an article about them! Wow, what a break finding out about this! This could have screwed up everything! It represents less than 1/200th of 1% of the stimulus package! How did we manage to find out about this!
Well, according to Greg Sargent at The Plum Line:
Yesterday a House Republican leadership staffer circulated a background email, which I obtained, charging that GOP staffers had been told by an unnamed Federal agency that if it got money from the stim package, it would spend “thirty million dollars for wetland restoration in the San Francisco Bay Area — including work to protect the Salt Marsh Harvest Mouse.”The GOP staffer’s email didn’t say what agency it was. It didn’t say the money was actually in the package — just that an unnamed agency had said they would spend it on that if they got it.
But don't we need to verify this with someone who actually might know what is in the bill? I mean, this has been locked up tighter than a standard version Dick Cheney bunker. What does Pelosi's office have to say?
Well the Washington Times article has one line:
A spokesman for Mrs. Pelosi said Republicans "fabricated" the claim.
But, because their core constituency wouldn't think it matters a a rats a$$ that Chippy and his friends are cute, much less help the ecosystem they inhabit and thus be a priority to help, the Washington Times spends the rest of the article casting doubt upon that one sentence of fact (which, please note, only includes one quoted word) that comes from a source that might actually be credible.
What else does Greg have?
But I just contacted the House GOP staffer who wrote the initial email laying out this talking point, and he conceded that the claim by conservative media that the mouse money is currently in the bill is a misstatement. “There is not specific language in the legislation for this project,” he said.The staffer held to the claim that the mouse money would ultimately be spent, however, arguing that the bill’s passage would ensure that money would ultimately go to the unnamed agency. “If the bill passes, the project will be funded according to what the relevant agency told our staff,” he said. “The bottom line is, if this bill becomes law, taxpayers will spend 30 million on the mouse.”
What! Talk to the source of the entire controversy! What Voodoo Witch Doctor Magic is this!? OH!!! Journalism. Oops. We forgot for a second!
It is quite unsuprising that the "source" proceeds to defend the extrapolation that he/she initially made. Standard Bush-Cheynian "We think it will happen, therefore it must be so" GOP thinking.
Not to sound like a late night infomercial: But WAIT, Greg has more!
But Pelosi’s staff disputes even this point, arguing that the only projects being referred to here are federal wetland restoration projects — and that this wasn’t even Pelosi’s project to begin with, despite claims about “Pelosi’s mouse.”“There are no federal wetland restoration projects in line to get funded in San Francisco,” Pelosi spokesperson Drew Hammill said. “Neither the Speaker nor her staff have had any involvement in this initiative. The idea that $30 million will be spent to save mice is a total fabrication.”
Hey! More Voodoo Witch Doctor Magic! Why isn't he "chopping" up that long quote from the spokesman! OH! Yeah! My bad again! Actual journalism!
Now, I know that I am biased but I think that Nancy Pelosi, knowing that this has already been all over the news, isn't going to call this a "total fabrication" unless it's a total fabrication! She is many things but she is not that stupid. John Boehner, maybe, but not Pelosi.
So it is that Chippy is a non-starter as a story. At least for most of us. Somehow, even when the text comes out on the bill, disproving Republican claims, I am sure that Chippy and his friends will live on in right-wing neocon talking point sheets. So, do us all a favor, spread the word. Chippy and his friends are not going to get drunk, stoned and laid from this stimulus package. They should be so lucky. They will be lucky to survive extinction.
Have news organizations such as The Washington Times cut back so much that they can't make a couple phone calls? Somehow I think they know the original source. You can only wonder why. Laziness or something more?
Regardless, because of all of this, someday, an old grumpy House Minority Leader who has spent most of his life trying to become Speaker whilst it always remained out of reach will give an interview. And Eric Cantor will recall the utter horror of discovering funding for the Salt Marsh Harvest Mouse in the legendary Stimulus Package of 2009. ;)
Update:
They are still at it. As Greg and TPM are reporting they've decided to stick by the story that the money will find it's way to Chippy and company somehow. What's really sad about that is that this is the best they can come up with? Thirty million for Chippy? Less than 1/200th of 1% of the entire bill? Here's Rep. Tom Price on the House Floor:
This is no longer "almost" comical. Although I guess it plays well with the conservative base back home.
Comments welcome,
Pat McGovern
It's got electoral votes. It's what politicians crave.
