Joe Scarborough Is a Fucking Idiot

When I saw this headline:

“When is the president going to be as brave as Dick Cheney?”

I just about did a spit-take with my  week-old Colt 45 found under my couch  raspberry cappuccino (almond extract, duh) - yes, Dick Cheney was SOOOOO BRAVE when it came to defending gay marriage back when he was one of the most powerful men in the world. Remember all those knock-down drag-out fights he had with Bush and Congress? Weren't they so inspiring?

THIS GUY HERE explains why Cheney was given a pass on the issue:

Republicans want their politicians to be hardcore, but if you're a GOP pol, you get a pass on certain issues if they affect a group of which you're a member. That's why John McCain, a torture victim, was able to get away with saying that waterboarding is torture. That's why Dick Cheney, father of a lesbian, was able to get away with positive words about gay marriage. That's why, more recently, the usually extremely hardcore congressman Allen West, an African-American, was able to get away with expressing outrage at the death of Trayvon Martin.

These carve-outs for Republicans basically track with right-wing thinking about empathy: If an issue doesn't affect you personally, or an affinity group of yours, why should you give a crap about how it affects other people?

This is exactly what I wrote about Republican blind selfishness HERE.

Cheney was allowed to say something positive about gay marriage because of his daughter, but didn't have to actually DO anything, and now he's "brave."

For a party that gets all squishy that someone should be President because she doesn't want her kids eaten by bears during soccer practice or because someone's a nice family man who found Jesus, they sure don't seem to mind someone who didn't have the guts to come out swinging for his own daughter when there might have been actual consequences, do they? Now Cheney is just another of the Bush Administration pussies going around cashing in on what "gee, they REALLY wanted to do" while in office. You know, like when Lincoln went on Oprah claiming that he really, really had wanted to free the slaves, but didn't because of polling, goshdarnit!!