Would-Be NC Congressman Clay Aiken, In His Announcement Video: I Am Nothing If Not All About the Veterans
Clay Aiken on His Party's VA Scandal: Sheeet, I Ain't Payin' no Mind to That

When Clay Aiken announced for Congress, I didn't link his video, because he was a Democrat and it was so damn effective.

After discussing his own hardscrabble upbringing, Aiken began talking like the Different Kind of Democrat we hear about during campaigns. (When they're actually in office, we soon discover they're the Same Kind of Democrat, which is to say collectivist zealot, identity politics warrior, tax-and-spend wastrel, and machine-politics favor-banker.)

Specifically, starting at 2:48, Aiken emotes:

But even though she [Republican Congresswoman Renee Ellmers] knew that voting for massive cuts to our military was bad for our country and bad for our district, she voted for them anyway, (stage whisper) ten times, after her party leaders told her to.

These votes hurt North Carolina, they hurt our military readiness, and they led to thousands of civilians at Fort Bragg being furloughed, cuts to child care for 5000 children who live on base, cuts to medical and dental clinics, and to counseling and survivor outreach, for families of fallen warriors...

This is what's wrong with Washington, that a Congresswoman would go there and vote against the best interests of North Carolina military families, and those who depend on the military for their jobs.

To do it when you know it's wrong is even worse.

And to do it when your national party tells you to, well, that's what, in the end, convinced me in the end to do something about it, then I couldn't complain if no one else did.

Note a lot of the cuts that Clay Aiken claims to be very bothered by are about healthcare for military people -- a lot of these programs sound like they might be funded by the VA.

And so now, what does this Crusader for North Carolina Military Families say when he's asked about the Democratic VA scandal?

Well, he says he can't comment because he's not paying attention to any of that.

The former American Idol runner-up offered a somewhat bizarre rationale, telling the Today Show because he was not in the publicly broadcasted Senate hearing and “hasn’t paid attention to those details” he could not say whether Shinseki should go.

“I think we have a lot of people who are making decisions without being in the room,” he said. “I’m not going to be one of those folks who wasn’t in the hearing and hasn’t paid attention to those details and wasn’t privy to that stuff and making decisions for that.”

Video at the link.

Wow, Clay Aiken sure lost interest in something he claimed to be intensely, emotionally interested in just a few months ago, didn't he?

If a man claims the central animating rationale for his Congressional run was veteran services, isn't he obligated to turn on CSPAN every now and again to check in with hearings about scandalous, corrupt administration of veterans services?

Doesn't he at least have to pretend he gave a shit about the One Thing he says spurred his Congressional run in the first place?

His evasion regarding a controversy threatening his party's political prospects sounds an awful lot like something your National Party might Tell You To Do, don't you think?

There was a little coda at the end of Aiken's video salespitch:

I'm not a politician (laughs), I don't ever want to be one.

The military families Aiken claimed were his foundational rationale for running may disagree.

Hat tip to My Awesome Memory.

posted by Ace at 03:13 PM

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