dick armey, tea-bagging moron

Sometimes I see something that spurs me to dust off the password and add something to this semi-retired blog. This Washington Post story from Dana Milbank about Dick Armey did it today.

Milbank rightfully skewers Armey for not getting his history right in Armey's speech criticizing Washington (a place, as Milbank points out, where Armey has spent a lot of time and made a lot of money).

First, at his luncheon address to a bunch of tea party types, Armey said "Jamestown colony, when it was first founded as a socialist venture, dang near failed with everybody dead and dying in the snow."

Bzzz, wrong. Jamestown, founded in 1607 before Marx or anybody else had really come up with "socialism" - heck, before we really even had "capitalism" - was founded by a bunch of entrepreneurs looking to make a quick buck. Well, it wasn't so profitable, and it was also mismanaged and many people did starve. But NOT because it was a government venture - it was a PRIVATE enterprise, the only government role was permission to do it.

Hey Armey, I thought you were a history professor?

The other history Fail is even better. A questioner asked how come tea baggers like Alexander Hamilton when Hamilton was well-known as an advocate for strong central government?

Armey hemmed and hawed, then said basically "Says who?"

Says EVERYBODY including Hamilton himself, back in the day. As Milbank noted, "Hamilton favored a national bank, presidents and senators who served for life and state governors appointed by the president."

Governors appointed by the PRESIDENT. You don't call that strong central government.

As is so often the case with Republicans, you have to ask yourself, is Armey stupid enough to not know two pretty basic facts about American history that many high school students, let alone college history professors, know? Or is he willfully misrepresenting the facts - that's lying - to advance his reactionary political cause.

I think Armey is plenty stupid. But in this case, I think he was lying ... and was counting on a compliant, foaming-at-the-mouth group of teabaggers not to have the school learning or independence of thought to know these facts, nor to challenge Armey on them.