Shameless Lindsey Graham's Boston Cracks Blow Up in His Face

BY JEFF STEIN

Does Lindsey Graham have a screw loose? Or is he just shameless in his latest attempt to wring partisan advantage from a national tragedy?

Whatever, his latest attacks on an American intelligence agency blew up on him Monday like a trick cigar.

A Cruz to Bear

It's hard to imagine a clearer demonstration of how whacked out the Republicans have gotten under tea party tutelage than the performances of Ted Cruz and James Inhofe during hearings to confirm Chuck Hagel as secretary of defense.

What planet are they from? Not since the last days of the booze-besotted, red-baiting Joe McCarthy has the Senate witnessed performances so wild, careening and conspiracy-minded that they wouldn't even make the final cut of The Manchurian Candidate.

As Foreign Policy aptly put it today: "Has freshman Ted Cruz jumped the shark already?

What's in Grover Norquist’s Private Files?

Thanks to Helen Gandy, the world never learned of the true reach of J. Edgar Hoover’s choke-hold on American politicians. According to a congressional inquiry and other sources, the notorious FBI director amassed secret files on the sexual and other peccadillos of politicians, entertainers, writers and officials, giving him immense blackmailing powers over his real and imagined enemies on Capitol Hill and elsewhere.

We'll never really know the whole story, because Miss Gandy, his longtime secretary, destroyed the files upon Hoover's death in May 1972.

It may turn out that tax maniac Grover Norquist also has his own Miss Gandy, primed to destroy the contents of his locked safe when the grim reaper comes. Until then, he's got the Republicans' cajones in his hands.

Norquist himself suggested his true grasp on power Monday night when he "took a pot shot at Rep. Peter King’s (R-NY) marriage,"  according to Raw Story's Arturo Garcia, after the Long Islander suggested he might abandon his no-taxes pledge after nearly two decades.

"I hope his wife understands that commitments last a little longer than two years or something,” Norquist fumed.

What other than the possession of embarrassing details on the private lives and messy business deals of Republican legislators can explain the right-wing lobbyist’s hammerlock on tax policy over the past quarter century?

Perry and Israel: Nuts

Evidently unable or unwilling to stop pandering to the right-wing lunatic fringe on issues ranging from social security to global warming, Texas Gov. Rick Perry accelerated his flight to the reality exosphere Wednesday by charging President Obama with a “policy of appeasement” toward the Palestinians.

"Appeasement" would come as a surprise to the long-suffering residents of Gaza and other Arabs--not to mention dissenting Israelis--who have been powerless to stop the steady encroachment of Jewish settlements under hard-line Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Gingrich wife worked for committee heavily lobbied by Tiffany

 At the same time Tiffany & Co. was extending Callista (Bisek) Gingrich a virtual interest-free loan of tens of thousands of dollars, the diamond and silverware firm was spending big bucks to influence mining policy in Congress and in agencies over which the House Agriculture Committee--where she worked--had jurisdiction, official records show.

Filings by Tiffany’s lobbyist, Cassidy & Co., and other government records show that the firm’s spending on  “mining law and mine permitting-related issues” in Congress, as well as the Forest Service, the Interior Department, and Interior’s  Bureau of Land Management shot up sharply between during the period when Callista Gingrich was chief clerk at the House Agriculture Committee.

Tiffany's annual lobbying expenditures rose from about $100,000 to $360,000 between 2005 and 2009, according to records assembled by the Center for Responsive Politics,  a nonpartisan government watchdog organization. 

The Forest Service, which comes under the committee’s jurisdiction, oversees mining, including silver mining, in federal forests.

Silver, of course, is a big part of Tiffany & Co.’s business.

On Thursday, Tiffany issued a statement denying that it had lobbied the Agriculture Committee or discussed mining isues with Callista or Newt Gingrich.  But is was also reported that Christy Evans, a floor assistant to Republican Whip Rep. Newt Gingrich and now a lobbyist at Cassidy & Associates, has represented Tiffany's on mining issues since 2000.

Gingrich’s campaign Web site makes no specific mention of mining in its description of his wife’s duties.

“During her tenure, the Agriculture Committee held hearings on a wide range of issues including biotechnology, bioterrorism, conservation, forest management, nutrition, rural development, trade, and welfare reform,” it says.

According to her filings, Callista Gingrich listed debts to Tiffany of between $250,001 to $500,000 on a “revolving charge account”  during 2005-2006. After she left in 2007, she was no longer required to report her finances.

The Washington Post’s Glenn Kessler wrote that he was “puzzled” by Newt Gingrich’s “claim that he had a ‘standard, no-interest account’ at Tiffany & Co.”

“Would Tiffany really charge no interest for that period of time on that amount of money?” he asked.