Congressional conservatives (definetely among the most babyish, annoying bunch you could find) and the President are relying on American's ignorance to gain a political advantage. These shameful folks have realized that they cannot win on the substance of issues, so they have to result in red herrings that fool the American people by either lying to them outright, or deceptively misleading them. 

    Two examples in the last week prove just how low Conservatives will go. National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Tom Cole (R-OK), talked about how he plans to highlight the Democrats' tax increases during the fall recess. The Washington Post Reported the other day:

"To Republicans eyeing the upcoming election season, the details of the tax increase was not at issue. A tax increase is a tax increase. "We can just say they're raising taxes because people have such a low opinion of the Democratic Congress that they are certainly willing to believe that they are raising their taxes," Cole said. "

Of course, just saying that the Congress is raising taxes apparently makes it so, despite the fact that under the current budget resolution, not one tax is raised. (The conservatives claim that since Bush's tax cuts are set to expire in three years, that the Democrats' budget represents the largest tax increase in American history). Other proposed increases in other bills include those on equity fund managers (invariably multi-millionaires), smokers and oil companies.

The second example occurred yesterday at the White House when President Bush derided the Speaker of the House for saying that the 22 billion difference between the President's budget and the Congressional budget is "insignificant." Bush said, "Only a lifetime Washington politician would believe $22 billion is insignificant." What a great applause line. Except for those of us who care about the truth, the difference represents .7% of the $3 trillion budget. The administration and congressional conservatives are hoping that Americans are ignorant enough that they will take these baseless assertions and adopt them as the truth. 

     This, of course, is not surprising for a party that:

    -Called a bill making it easier for unions to organize, " taking away a worker's right to secret ballot.

    -Called a minimum wage increase , " a rebuke of small business"

    -Called a bill to limit the tours of duty for our soldiers "undermining the work of our generals in the field"

     Frank Luntz must be so proud.