Sorry about the slowdown around here. I do have a movie review coming up in Taki's one of these days of Kevin Spacey's biopic Casino Jack about the life of GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff. As you may recall about a half decade ago, the Democrats thought that the Abramoff scandals would drive the GOP into the wilderness for 40 years. It was that big a deal, or so it seemed at the time.
Yet, exposure of the megalomaniacal Abramoff has more highlighted the idiosyncrasy and general craziness of Abramoff's personality. I think I've finally figured out the secret of Jack Abramoff's outsized persona, something that the movie hints at repeatedly but nobody else in the punditry seems to have picked up on.
One clue: How did George W. Bush greet Abramoff?
I always thought that Abramoff should have been given the K Street Good Citizenship Award. He managed to become incredibly rich by engaging in incredible sleaze, without ever corrupting any significant function of government. All Abramoff did was improperly influence the Allocation of Indian Casino Rights (AoICR).
ReplyDeleteHuh? Who cares? Does it matter whether AoICR was run honestly or improperly? I am old enough to remember when the Federal government did not even have AoICR and the country somehow managed to clunk along just fine. Moreover, AoICR is the sort of program that is just about impossible to run honestly. It entails the allocation of huge sums of money (“swag” in the Federal lexicon) based on necessarily subjective and incomprehensible criteria. Even Secretary of Interior Bruce Babbitt, the Dudley Do-Right of American government, got caught up in the AoICR scandal. And Mark Warner, another honorable and very bright Democrat, made his initial fortune quite legallly when the early cell-phone licenses were allocated in similarly irrational ways, before they were auctioned.
So Abramoff tilted an inherently corrupt process for doing something the Federal government should not have been doing anyway. Contrast this with the blocking and tackling of Washington lobbying efforts, tilting to your client’s advantage the performance of essential government functions, like Defense spending, highway and transport funding, research priorities, education subsidies, entitlement policy and, oh yes, bank regulation. Remember that one?
We pay immense costs, both in over-spending and in ineffective or perversely malfunctional government, for this sort of corruption, which Abramoff carefully avoided.
Abramoff was a do-no-harm saint, I tell you.
He was known in high school as Abraham Jackoff!
ReplyDeleteSteroids? Roid rage? He was on the juice?
ReplyDelete". . . about a half decade ago, the Democrats thought that the Abramoff scandals would drive the GOP into the wilderness for 40 years."
ReplyDeleteScandals just don't have the impact they used to. It's pretty clear that politics is a mix of lies, money, and unabashed power-tripping. That the sort of people who thrive in this milieu may find themselves "compromised" from time to time, doesn't, I think, raise a whole lot of eyebrows.
As for either party being driven into the wilderness, we seem stuck with both forever, and not a dime's difference between the two. It's like expecting "change you can believe in" based on who wins the Super Bowl.
'roids baby, roids.
ReplyDelete"He was known in high school as Abraham Jackoff!"
ReplyDeleteThat's what Tim Noah said he "referred to him" as.
Convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff says President Bush knew him well enough to joke with him about weightlifting. "What are you benching, buff guy?" Abramoff said Mr. Bush asked him...
ReplyDeleteAsked about the former Abramoff associates' accounts, the White House said Rove and Abramoff were leaders of a young Republicans group decades ago...
According to Vanity Fair, Rove's relationship with Abramoff was deeper [sic].
Rove dined several times at Abramoff's former restaurant in Washington, Signatures, and was Abramoff's guest in the owner's box of the NCAA basketball playoffs a few years ago, sitting for much of the game at Abramoff's side, Vanity Fair reported...
"Deeper"?
Was that said with a wink and a nod and a nudge of the elbow?
From the grooveyard of forgotten iSteve favorites:
Karl Rove's Autobiography
Monday, March 15, 2010
isteve.blogspot.com
Karl Rove's righthand boy comes out of closet, finally
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
isteve.blogspot.com
Dubya was right - that is one big, buffy hunk of a Jew.
ReplyDeleteYowser! Pass the kosher champagne!
In the link, Abramoff recalls Bush saying to him, "What are you benching, buff guy?"
ReplyDeleteThis sounds very typical of the former president. The collegiate cheerleader was overly impressed with people who were in shape. I read somewhere that he used to talk about exercise during cabinet meetings and would chide overweight members of his staff. Perhaps the reason he played beta-dog to Vicente Fox but alpha-dog to Tony Blair was that he thought Fox could kick his ass, while he figured he could kick Blair's.
Paul Teutul Sr., the pumped-up old guy on the "American Chopper" show, claimed that you always had an advantage in a business negotiation if the other party knew you were physically stronger than him.
If Jack helped you off a horse, would you help jack off a horse?
ReplyDelete(Sorry! I think of that dumb joke every time I see that name)
The Democrats were fools if they thought that any scandal would last very long. Americans have always been just so cynical about politics that no scandal ever seems to have legs - it's just expected. The Grant administration was the most spectacularly corrupt in history, yet Grant himself was reelected in a landslide in 1872. The Harding administration was also corrupt, yet the Republicans won the next two presidential elections. The bad taste from the Nixon administration didn't last long, as Reagan won twice by large margins. Even the spectacular Clinton scandals, which certainly cost the Democrats the 2000 presidential election, are now largely forgotten.
ReplyDeleteIs he gay?
ReplyDeleteIs he like Max in Once Upon a Time in America?
ReplyDeleteIndian Casinos 'owned' by the sons of Sitting Bull, controlled by the sons of Abraham.
ReplyDeleteScandals don't persevere for a number of reasons. And the perception of what is scandalous shifts constantly.
ReplyDeleteFor example, Jimmy Carter was a crook. Who remembers that? Bert Lance was as corrupt as Spiro Agnew, but it's been forgotten.
Part of the reason is that recent scandals tend to push aside earlier scandals.
For example, Whitewater receded after the Monica business. There were just so many inches of headline space available. Hillary took a large very obvious bribe in the form of cattle futures, but it had been forgotten by the time she ran for office.
Bobby Kennedy apparently was concerned that Jack's sex activities in the White House would get him impeached while he lived and/or stain his reputation after his death. I'm sure he would be amazed at how Clinton's similar sex activities in the White House have been forgotten and forgiven.
Kennedy - a weak and bumbling President - is now is revered. Clinton, who sold Presidential pardons is also. They look strong and virtuous next to Obama.
With more information available today, each President seems worse than the previous one. This tends to help the reputation of our former politicians.
It wasn't always so. Talleyrand when visiting the new nation was amazed that Hamilton had to actually work to support his family. He assumed that a finance minister would just skim enough off the top to manage very well indeed. Certainly every government he knew in Europe behaved that way.
Most of the crooks have been Democrats. Partly this is racial. There is almost no such thing as an honest black politician. Blacks are crooks or bums at at least four times the rate of whites. This must never be mentioned of course. Protecting black pols means that Democrats are required to excuse bad behavior. You can't say anything bad about Rangle because he's black. That sets the bar very low for everyone else.
Albertosaurus
Not really on topic, but you did mention movies, and a guy with a name ending in "-off"; has anyone suggested "Weekend at Bernie Madoff's" as the title of a remake? Comedy gold, I tell ya.
ReplyDeletethe life of GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff
ReplyDeleteHe wasn't a "GOP lobbyist", although the media did a good job of making everyone think otherwise. I'm sure Hollywood will assist in the deception.
Jeekers, Henry Canaday, you make a fairly good case for Abramoff being a venial sinner.
ReplyDeleteSo steroids, eh? Definitely an issue within the Steve Sailer competency sphere. Looking forward to the essay.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous got it.
ReplyDeleteThis made me wonder what the modern version is of the "Foley file" that Heinlein described in _Double Star_. (Or maybe Bush had a funny bump on his back, like at that one debate where people were theorizing that he was getting radio hints for the debate?)
ReplyDelete"Democrats are disappointed that Spacey doesn’t play Abramoff as the locus of all evil, the second coming of Keyser Söze."
ReplyDeleteI'll bet Demcorat Jews are somewhat relieved since the image of a Jewish crook fleecing everyone--in the era of Madoff and Wall Street bailouts--may have 'antisemitic' overtones.
But it's still interesting that the Jewish crook we get from Hollywood is a Republican though there are many more Democratic Jewish crooks. The message is Abramoff didn't do bad things because he's Jewish but because he's a Republican. It's like apologizing for crimes committed by Soviet Jews as 'crimes committed by communists than by Jews'.
PS. Jack was a handsome guy, in many ways more waspish than Jewish in looks. He coulda been one of the guys in Madmen.
Apparently he is now selling kosher pizza
ReplyDeleteThis text
steroids
ReplyDeleteThe most interesting things about Jack Abramoff seem to have fallen down the memory hole.
ReplyDeleteAbramoff hosted the 911 hijackers including Mohammed Atta on his SunCruz boat the week of 911, and was implicated in the murder of the former SunCruz owner.
Sounds like the Jewish Mafia to me.
Well, considering they cast the gay Kevin Spacey in the lead role...
ReplyDeleteAbramoff has five kids.
ReplyDeleteAbramoff's wife is played in the movie by Kelly Preston, who is married to John Travolta, so that casting might be a convoluted in-joke, I guess.
But, generally speaking, five kids ...
But, generally speaking, five kids...
ReplyDeleteObama has two kids.
Rahm Emanuel has three kids.
Mitch McConnell has three kids [by his first wife].
For example, Jimmy Carter was a crook. Who remembers that? Bert Lance was as corrupt as Spiro Agnew, but it's been forgotten.
ReplyDeletePart of the reason is that recent scandals tend to push aside earlier scandals.
Also the general public has a shorter memory and greater forgiveness when it comes to republican scandals. They are much less forgiving of the democrats, with the exception of Clinton.
Someone should investigate Jack the Jock's high school years, and see if he had in his parents' backyard a secret death camp for nurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrds.
ReplyDeleteBuff guy makes you think roids?
ReplyDeleteMakes me think gay.
Apparently, that's how people can tell. The gays love to work out.
But roids? ok. That's uninteresting.
Five kids and obsessed with golf, ice hockey, and Zamboni machines.
ReplyDeleteSounds straight to me.
Five kids and obsessed with golf, ice hockey, and Zamboni machines.
ReplyDeleteYeah, but sometimes the guys who are leading the double lives go all-out to try to prove their masculinity [in an attempt to maintain the charade].
Like pretending to care about basketball and the NBA [although there you could argue that it's a fascination with all those half-nekkid sweaty black bodies].
The message is Abramoff didn't do bad things because he's Jewish but because he's a Republican.
ReplyDeleteWhich is pretty amusing when you consider what it was he was sent to jail for. From wikipedia:
Although Federal tax records show that various Indian tribes donated more than $6 million to the Capital Athletic Foundation, less than 1% of the money went to athletic programs, the stated purpose of the foundation. The majority of the funds went to the Eshkol Academy in Maryland, an Orthodox Jewish school founded by Abramoff in 2002.
I suspect that minor detail will be downplayed or completely ignored in the movie.