Hastert Shows His Stripes.

They are yellow. They are dirty.

All you have to do to chronicle Denny Hastert's decades of political wheeling and dealing is look at what he's shown us the last two days.

Yesterday was his dark-hearted "compromise" which very selectively left a tiny portion of school lunch money in the budget for poor children. That allowed him to claim a "victory" on the budget vote (by only two votes) away from the watchful eye of the public, in another vote held open (for as long as it takes) at 1:45 a.m. today.

This dark-of-the-night vote did not cut a dollar of the graft money Hastert and Don Young swallowed whole from your pockets for their own wasteful highway and bridge plans at home.

Today these two actions color the character of this mean-spirited, lying political animal just perfectly. No one is going to forget this demagoguery when attacking a man who has shown 1,000 times the courage and leadership Denny Hastert has ever mustered. Let's not forget Denny's "football knee" kept him out of VietNam, while Murza was highly decorated in combat in Southeast Asia.

Also today, after a near-defeat on the budget bill, Hastert took a moment to stab at House Democrats in another fine example of his demagogic style:

“Unfortunately, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle disagree. In fact, this bill gives us a pretty clear picture of what they are for. They are for raising taxes writing blank checks creating bigger government and saddling our children with mountains of debt. By opposing this bill, they are for disrupting America’s economic stability – the same stability that has given our workers jobs and paychecks to care for their families.

“Theirs is the wrong solution for America."

Denny: We've had enough of your "coaching" skills. And this is your style, no doubt. As a "coach," you're the kind of dirty, lowdown sonofabitch who would embarrass Bobby Knight.