Wow; what can you say about a politician whose image is that of the mild-mannered, clean-cut do-gooder who is picked for a top Cabinet slot in the Obama Administration, only to pull out because he somehow forgot to mention in his tax returns that he’d received a gift of a limo and driver from a “business partner”? That little oversight saved him from paying about $125,000 in taxes (any guesses on the dollar value of that gift?) and now that it’s come to light, pretty much ended his political career. Too bad it’s about a decade or so too late.
Daschle’s PR people somehow got it into the heads of way too many people that he’s a ‘common-sense’, ‘regular guy’ ‘consensus-builder’, reaching across the Senate aisle to make buddies with the opposition in order to get things done. All of it is a crock of you-know-what; he was a partisan hack from the get-go, and it’s just sad that it’s taken this long for the realization of how duplicitous he’s been all these years to dawn on everyone.
The black eye that Daschle is getting in the media right now is just desserts as far as I’m concerned. That nice guy driving his rusty Oldsmobile instead of being chauffeured in a limo simply never existed.
I just thought of something; what would happen if you looked up the license plate number of that Oldsmobile? AJA 853 — Was it actually registered in Daschle’s name? I wouldn’t be surprised in the least if it belonged to some low-level staffer. Not sure if you could look something like that up 20 years after the fact, but it’d be interesting to find out.
I first noticed Daschle’s duplicity back in 1992 or so; I was a registered Democrat back then, and had even voted for Daschle a time or two. But I started to pay more attention to politics about that time, and noticed that Tom’s words and actions didn’t always align very well; ditto with Bill Clinton. All of that helped me to examine more closely what the two parties really stood for, and to examine more closely the people representing both parties. When I first registered at age 18, I really didn’t know what I was doing and picked the Democrats in part because I liked the sound of ‘progressive’ and ‘liberal’ (and also because I thought Mom & Dad voted Republican), but in examining things more closely I discovered that my beliefs and convictions were more in line with the Republicans than the Democrats, and the Democrats were led by some people of pretty questionable character. The Republican leadership, while not perfect, was definitely better in my judgement, so I switched boats and have never looked back. I’ve since looked around at other parties, but for now the Republicans best represent what I hold to be true.
Color me disappointed; disappointed that it took this long for light to shine on Daschle’s true nature. But it puts me in an even deeper funk over what’s to come with the Obama Administration. God help us all.