George Will's Pot Calls Jim Webb's Kettle Black

What could be more hilarious than George Will, of all people, bemoaning leaders who "are insufferably full of themselves."

No, Will wasn't referring to himself.

Instead, he was attacking Senator-elect Jim Webb for snubbing President Bush at a reception for new members of Congress.

First off, we've always said here that Webb is no conventional politician. And we'd be disappointed if his election to the Senate somehow transformed him into one.

So we're not surprised that, as reported in the Washington Post earlier this week, Webb did his darndest to avoid mugging with Bush at the new member reception. According to the Post, Webb stayed away from the receiving line to shake Bush's hand and decided not to have his picture taken with W.

Despite trying to avoid the President, Bush managed nonetheless to find Webb. Bush asked "how's your boy," referrring to Webb's son Jimmy, a marine lance corporal fighting in Anbar province in Iraq. Webb responded, "I'd like to get them out of Iraq," obviously referring to all our troops, not just his son.

When the President pressed, "that's not what I asked," Webb said, "that's between me and my boy." (The Post didn't say whether Bush, who's known to have a short fuse in private, was testy in his follow-up.)

Well how's that for honesty in a politician? And it's about time someone stood up to the President, a notorious bully who, quite frankly, needs someone to tell him to stick it where the sun doesn't shine every now and then.

George Will, however, is mortally offended by what he calls Webb's lack of "civility." Webb, however, didn't seek out the President to be nasty to him. He was being civil by minding his own business just so as to avoid any confrontation.

In any event, Will is hardly one to describe anyone else in the world as "insufferable." George Will is the epitome of the pompous, arrogant columnist who thinks he's smarter than anyone else in the room. And this particular column of Will's is about as arrogant as you can get.

For example, in quoting Webb's response to Bush's initial query, Will inserts a gratuitous "[sic]" ("I'd like to get them [sic] out of Iraq"), as if Webb is some illiterate hick. Maybe Will just doesn't get it--Webb wasn't saying he wanted "him"--as in is his son--out of the war; he wants all of "them"--the troops--to come home. Presumably, if Webb really didn't want his son in Iraq, he could've pulled some strings, like our current President (and to be fair, our last one as well).

Will goes on, in his typical petulant "nyah-nyah" style, to criticize Webb's grammar in a recent op-ed piece for the Wall Street Journal. [To see the op-ed piece, check out the Curmudgeon's November 14 post: http://xcurmudgeon.blogspot.com/2006/11/senator-webb-op-ed-piece-in-wsj-on.html ]

It's no surprise that George Will, one of the leading apologists for the self-centered rich in America, was offended by Senator-elect Webb's WSJ piece on economic equality. Why, how dare a mere Senator-elect start "making waves," as Will puts it, so soon after the election.

Well, Mr. Will, Virginia's voters elected Webb to make waves, both on Iraq and the economy. And, in case you hadn't noticed, Webb's campaign motto was "born fighting" (taken from the title of Webb's excellent little history of the Scots-Irish in America). Get used to it.