The new Know Nothings

This woman writes for UK's The Guardian. She makes some interesting points, to say the least.

In their quest to convince voters that America is in danger, Republicans are lying about 9/11 and baldly denying history


Megan Carpentier

More than 150 years ago, a disparate group of anti-immigrant, conspiracy-minded Americans became sick of traditional politicians and started a grassroots movement to take political power from the hands of those they no longer trusted. When asked by outsiders what their movement was called, they were ordered to answer, "I know nothing," leading others to call them the  Know Nothing party. The movement, however, was co-opted by the traditional parties and undermined by policy disagreements, and many members eventually folded into the Republican party. Some things, apparently, don't change as much as we'd like to believe.

Republican leaders, and the 20-somethings crafting their made-for-television talking points, are apparently counting on the fact that their base still knows nothing, or is at least willing to forget what they do know. Not content to blame the Bush-led Wall Street bailouts on President Obama, or the shoe-bomber reprise on Obama's security and intelligence policies that were nonetheless instituted by his predecessors, Republican thought-leaders like Mary Matalin, former White House press secretary Dana Perino and former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani have decided that there is one big thing that just couldn't have happened on the Republicans' watch: 9/11.

Perino started the re-write of history in November, baldly stating: "We did not have a terrorist attack on our country during President Bush's term." Matalin picked up the torch shortly after Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab set his crotch on fire, claiming that Bush "inherited the most tragic attack on our own soil in our nation's history."

Who buys this stuff?

Most astonishingly, former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani – who made his national political reputation on the tragedy of the 2,752 people who died from a terrorist attack in the city he led – told Americans on Friday: "We had no domestic attacks under Bush." In the wake of widespread disbelief that Giuliani would repudiate the deaths in his own city in an effort to defend an unpopular former president who presided over not one by two attacks by foreign terrorists on American soil – not including the anthrax attacks – Giuliani was forced to admit he did, indeed, remember September 11th. That is, undoubtedly, a relief to both his wife and his political advisers, if small solace to the families of those whose deaths he seems happy to use as a political weapon against the opposing party.

Repeat something, even a lie, long enough, and some people will believe it. And Guiliani, thrice-divorced, will say anything.

In the end, though, the brain trust – such as it is – of the Republican party wouldn't be attempting to re-write recent history if their focus groups and polls didn't show that  truthiness pays political dividends. Shortly after Perino's comments, polls showed voters trust Republicans more than Democrats on issues of national security and that 63% of voters think that "political correctness" – a refusal to disobey laws prohibiting racial profiling – was the root cause of the failure to prevent one soldier's attack on his colleagues at Fort Hood.

Republicans have apparently decided that they can improve their standings with Americans if they can convince them, despite all evidence to the contrary, that terrorist attacks only happen when Democrats are in power. Republicans seem perfectly and increasingly happy to slough off all responsibility for the things that happened and that they caused during their watch, as long as it brings them back to power. The question for Americans ought to be what they'll do with that power when they get it back. Last year, they weren't so keen on keeping Republicans in power. This year, many of them seemingly know nothing about that.


George Santayana once said: "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." In this country, Republicans are trying hard to make sure Americans cannot remember the past in which a Republican president ignored a security assessment warning of the attacks of 11 September, in which he chose to prosecute a war against a country that wasn't, at the time, harbouring the terrorists that attacked us, or in which a terrorist without a Muslim name or Islamic appearance boarded a plane and attempted to detonate his feet. And they certainly don't want us to remember anything about a Republican president who told Americans that he didn't know nothing about the location of the person who masterminded the biggest terrorist attack on American soil, nor did he care. If you know nothing, and no one else does either, you apparently can't be held accountable for anything.