WASHINGTON, Feb. 20 (UPI) -- This here's the 338th Report ta the Folks Back Home from the (More er Less) Honorable Billybob, cyberCongressman from Western Carolina.
This week they's three subjecks, n a definition ov a local word. Plus, a touch ov song n dance, which yer Congresscritter only does on occasional karaoke nights (much ta his later embarrassment).
So I'll turn this over ta ma able assistant, J. Armor, Esq.
Buncombe Rides Again, and Again
Three things happened last week which seemingly have zero connection with each other: the mini-filibuster of the Estrada nomination in the U.S. Senate, assorted anti-war (actually anti-American) street demonstrations, and the remake of "The Music Man," broadcast on ABC. But there IS a tight connection between these, provided by an obscure congressman in a speech given almost two centuries ago.
Felix Walker was a back-bencher from Western Carolina (just like yer Congresscritter). When the Missouri Compromise came up for a vote in the House on Feb. 25, 1820, he started to give a speech when the other members wanted to vote. Over objections and catcalls from his colleagues, he persisted in his long-winded remarks. As he explained, it wasn't for the House, it was "for the people in Buncombe County," in other words, the folks back home.
Apparently, at that time the Journal of the House was like the Journal of the British House of Commons; nothing was printed as having been said, unless it was actually said. That journalistic integrity has long since disappeared from journals of Congress, but is still observed in Britain. Occasional viewers of C-SPAN might wonder about this common colloquy on the floor: Member: "Permission to revise and extend?" Chair: "Without objection, so ordered." Well, that's the permission to stick in the Congressional Record things that were never said on the floor. But I digress.
Because of Congressman Walker's rambling speech "for Buncombe," a new word entered the language. The word "buncombe," derived from the most populous county in Western Carolina, now means "political clap-trap." It is also written as "bunkum" or simply "bunk." Most dictionaries, like Merriam-Webster's Unabridged, misdefine the source and the meaning of this common word. But the Oxford English Dictionary, bless its literate soul, names the correct source, gives the right definition, and offers several examples of its use. And a good word it is.
All three subjects this week are classic examples of buncombe. Let's begin with the filibuster-that-is-not-a-filibuster in the Senate over the nomination of Miguel Estrada as a judge on the U.S. Circuit Court for the D.C. Circuit. The votes are there to confirm Mr. Estrada. But his opponents, who are a majority (but not all) of the Democrats in the Senate, are so far preventing that vote from taking place.
It is not, yet, a formal filibuster. No senator has yet officially announced that intention. Majority Leader Bill Frist has not yet held the opponents' feet to the fire, insisting that they do what they claim, and hold the Senate floor 24 hours a day. That will probably happen when the Senate returns from its current recess. What happened last week was an "extended debate." I listened to 10 hours. It was a mind-numbing experience, not recommended for the faint of heart.
That debate contained the essence of "buncombe." There is nearly endless, mindless twaddle which contained the necessary elements -- a member of Congress with intent to deceive, and an audience elsewhere which is the target of that deception.
Included was a dialogue between Senators Harry Reid of Nevada and Patrick Leahy of Vermont. Each praised the other as a paragon of achievement and honor. Leahy even went so far as to quote the former majority leader of the Senate, Mike Mansfield, whose advice to this new senator was "always keep your word."
Lost in this mutual slathering of compliments (which are common on the floor of the Senate, and gust to hurricane force during filibusters) were the following facts: Leahy earned the nickname "Leaky" when he released intelligence information, caused "assets" to be lost, and was evicted from the Intelligence Committee. He also broke his word to Sen. Strom Thurmond in the closing weeks of the last Congress. Reid is known for campaigning for office on the Balanced Budget Amendment, and then voting to kill it on first opportunity.
A second telling dialogue took place between Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois and Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia. Durbin asked whether his colleague "was aware of the speeches of Winston Churchill about the rise of Germany prior to World War II." Byrd said yes. Then Durbin had the gall to compare Byrd's rambling warnings against going to war now, with Churchill's warning that England must prepare for war then. He had it exactly wrong. Byrd was like Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, who knew Germany was building up its weapons. But Chamberlain refused to speak truth to the people of England, vainly assumed that Hitler could be "reasoned with," and signed the Munich Pact in 1938. That "peace for our time" resulted in war, less than a year later.
Sen. Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts weighed in with a long speech that condemned every decision ever made by the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in which any woman, any union or its workers, or any "person of color" (with bows to other Democrat-favored groups) lost their claims. The implications were two-fold. First, any time such a favored client lost a case, it had to be due to bigotry by the court instead of being merely obeying the law as written by Congress. Second, the continuation of such horrors should expected, if Mr. Estrada joined that court. Neither assumption was either stated explicitly, nor examined.
That brings us to the second subject, the various anti-American and anti-Jewish rallies in the United States and elsewhere that were billed as anti-war rallies. The prime mover behind the rallies in America is the Workers World Party. A little history is in order. The WWP was formed in 1956 as an off-shoot of the Communist Party. Some communists broke with the USSR that year, because they could not stomach the invasion of Hungary, the slaughters in the streets, and the perfidious murder of Gen. Pal Maleter under a flag of truce.
It is neither an exaggeration nor a canard to call the Workers World Party, "stalinist." Although Stalin had died three years before the slaughter in Hungary, his policies still ruled in the USSR then, including the idea that any number of deaths by any means, were justified in the service of the socialist state. The WWP therefore supported the slaughter in Hungary. And being consistent to their "principles," the leaders of the WWP have traveled to Baghdad and to Pyongyang and issued statements supporting the stalinist, socialist murderers who are the dictators of Iraq and North Korea respectively. Of course, they support a similar murderer in the form of Cuba's Castro.
These are the prime movers behind the "peace" movement in the United States. The mainstream media are beginning to wake up and report on these folks. But the media have not yet accepted the advice of Deep Throat of Watergate fame, "follow the money." There will be another such anti-war rally in D.C. on March 1. The permits have already been granted.
There will be a couple hundred tour buses in town that day. Each will have its name, address and ICC number on its door. It would be a simple matter for a competent reporter read that information, contact the tour operators, and find out, ultimately, where the money came from to pay the $100,000, give or take a penny, for those busses. I won't hold my breath waiting for that.
Am I suggesting that all of the glassy-eyed, sometimes nose-pierced, sometimes obscene demonstrators are stalinists? Not in the least. After all, buncombe requires both the leaders who intend to deceive, and the followers who are deceived. The ignorance of the many is as essential as the duplicity of the few.
We turn to the last example of buncombe from last week. A special, three-hour presentation of "The Wonderful World of Disney" on ABC Sunday night, offered the treat of a remake of "The Music Man," starring Matthew Broderick and Kristin Chenoweth. That is one of the greatest musicals ever committed to stage and screen.
Robert Preston, as Professor Harold Hill, was magnificent on both stage and screen. It was a tough assignment for Broderick to step into those shoes. Broderick did a more than adequate job, but was too technical. There was not enough of the rascal in the role. There was too much Leo Bloom and not enough Ferris Bueller, as Felicity Fahrquar noted.
Recall the essence of Harold Hill's scam. He had to invent a problem in River City, Iowa, that could only be solved by the creation of a boys' band. As he sang in the show-stopper, "trouble, with a capital 'T', and that rhymes with 'P', and that stands for pool." Back beat of a chorus of townsfolk, "Oh, we got trouble, trouble, trouble...."
Are you beginning to see the pattern, here? Speaking buncombe calls for presenting an imaginary problem, followed by offering an attractive but imaginary solution to that problem.
Miguel Estrada, therefore, cannot be one of the most skilled and accomplished Hispanic lawyers who has ever lived, one who will, as he testified under oath, "follow the precedents of the Supreme Court." No, he is a right-wing extremist from the seventh circle of constitutional Hell. "Oh, we got trouble, trouble, trouble...."
Saddam Hussein is not a lying, thieving, torturing, and murdering psychotic who will do more harm in the future than his already substantial harm to date. He is merely the leader of a sovereign nation who has "done nothing to us." His downfall will cause incalculable harm and cost to the United States. "Oh, we got trouble, trouble, trouble...."
Saved by the love of a good woman, Professor Hill suddenly sees his own errors. As he tells Winthrop Paroo, "I always think there's a band, kid." And miracle of miracles, at the end there IS a band. The buncombe turns out to be true. Fade to closing credits and the stirring rendition of "76 Trombones."
Ah, but "The Music Man" is fiction, as most love stories are. So it is both permitted and required to end well. The nomination of Miguel Estrada and the War against Iraq are both real. The buncombe cannot be magically explained away at the end. It must be confronted, overcome, and exposed.
I believe that Miguel Estrada will be confirmed, and will become one of the best judges to serve on the federal bench, like the late, great Judge Learned Hand. And I am certain that within weeks the weapons of mass death that Saddam Hussein has repeatedly told the UN he does not possess, will be revealed -- first on the battlefield killing mostly Iraqis, and then in vats in the basements of buildings captured by American troops.
I am equally certain that none of the purveyors of buncombe in these matters, will admit publicly the deceptions they have engaged in. Issue come and go, but buncombe is forever. Abraham Lincoln had it right, "You can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time. But you cannot fool all of the people, all of the time."
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(About the author: Congressman Billybob is fictitious, but prolific, on the Internet -- the invention of John Armor, who writes books and practices law in the U.S. Supreme Court. Comments and criticisms are welcome at [email protected]).
