Lipstick On A Pig

(Graphic snagged from davepear.com.)

So the State of the Union address was delivered last night by President Obama, followed by 2 --count 'em, 2-- responses from the GOP.  I didn't watch/listen to any of it.  I was in a relatively good mood and didn't want to spoil it.  I imagine I'll have a few comments later in the week.

What I do want to comment on is the attempted "re-branding" of the Republican party, hence the graphic.  Leonard Pitts, Jr. had a pretty solid analysis of just what is going on with that alleged change in focus. 

Maybe the party is finally over.

Meaning not simply the Grand Old Party, but more specifically the bacchanal of the bizarre and carnival of crazy to which it has lately devolved. So obvious has this devolution become that even Republican stalwarts have been heard to decry the parody of a party the GOP has become.

Except now we see signs suggesting maybe a corner has been turned. There was, for example, that surprising bipartisan consensus on immigration reform, which one would have thought about as likely as a Ted Nugent concert on the White House lawn. And Politico reports Karl Rove has started a super PAC whose mission is to keep the more .?.?. ahem, colorful candidates from winning Republican primaries. Politico also quotes what it calls a high-profile strategist who said party leaders are now trying to "marginalize the cranks, haters and bigots" they until recently portrayed as courageous truth tellers. ...

So yes, signs are plentiful that something is afoot among the Republicans. But what does it mean? ...

 One might hope.

But one might be well-advised to gird that hope with wariness, given that this is the same party whose leaders, as reported on PBS' "Frontline," held a meeting in 2009 and chose obstructionism as a political strategy. Note that, even while repeating his "stupid party" admonition at a GOP meeting in Charlotte last month, Jindal assured his audience this did not mean rethinking or even moderating the party's hardcore - and frankly, out of touch - stands on issues such as abortion and marriage equality.

No, he explained, he's talking about changing the packaging - not what's in it. Putting lipstick on the proverbial pig, in other words.   [Emphasis added]

 Bingo!

Evidence of that cosmetic change came yesterday when 22 GOP senators voted against the Violence Against Women Act.  We'll see what the House Republicans, many of them from the Tea Party wing, will do to it, probably by the end of the session.

Besides, as we liberals learned the hard way, hope is not a very good strategy.