Claude Allen Who?

The liberal media is crowing because Claude Allen, who used to work in the White House before he resigned without explanation last month, was arrested this week for trying to swindle Target and Hecht's stores out of $5,000. Who is Claude Allen? I had never heard of him before this week. Neither had conservative pundit Jon Podhoretz, who says he knows a lot of people who work at the White House and once wrote a book. If Podhoretz hasn't heard of him, he can't be very important. But Democrats are acting like he was a Bush Administration bigshot, when in fact he was just Bush's Chief Domestic Policy Advisor. What is so important about the guy responsible for the domestic help at the White House? Could anyone name Clinton's butler? Of course, we don't want someone working in the White House who is a thief, since he might steal the silverware, but this is hardly the scandal Democrats are making it out to be.

Democrats are so desperate to tar the White House that they have made outlandish claims for Allen's importance. They point out that Bush once tried to nominate him for a judgeship, but Bush once nominated Harriet Miers, too, so that doesn't prove anything. They claim that he was behind such policy initiatives as Abstinence-Only sex education classes that taught young people condoms don't work, fought against health insurance for the children of the poor because the program promoted family planning, and repeatedly audited AIDS charities that received Federal funding. Since when has the White House butler had this much power? Democrats act as if Claude Allen was the butler from Benson. Or perhaps they have been reading too much P.G. Wodehouse and believe that Bush is something like the dimwitted Wooster and that Allen is the clever Jeeves always getting him out of jams.

This is not the first time Democrats have desperately tried to make someone look more important than they are just to make the Republicans look bad. Had anyone ever heard of Jack Abramoff before his indictment? Democrats claim Abramoff was an important Republican fundraiser, when in fact not a single Republican can even remember having met him. Did they all suddenly get amnesia? Just because a Congressman rode on Abrammoff's plane doesn't mean they know each other. I've taken trips on American Airlines before but I've never met the airline's president. And just because President Bush reportedly asked Abramoff "What are you benching, buff guy?" doesn't mean they were bosom buddies. I've often said things like that to men I don't know at my gym.

After Hurricane Katrina Democrats similarly tried to blame Bush for the actions of FEMA head Michael Brown, who was so low on the totem poll Bush couldn't even get his name right, referring to him as "Brownie." And did you know who "Scooter" Libby was before he was indicted? It's a little hard for me to believe someone named "Scooter" was as powerful as Democrats say he was. Thousands of people work at the White House and there is bound to be a few bad apples in the bunch. I think we should celebrate the many people who haven't been indicted in the White House instead of villifying the few that have.

Jon Swift, Claude Allen, Bush, Scooter Libby, Michael Brown, Hurricane Katrina, FEMA, AIDS, Abstinence Only, Jack Abramoff, Benson, Jeeves, PG Wodehouse, Republicans, Democrats, Scandal, Politics, Carnival of the Clueless #37