Pontius McConnell (or pin it on the people)

“I am innocent of the blood of this just person. See ye to it.”

                                                                                                                        ~ Pontius Pilate

The Republicans want to have their cake and eat it too. It was about a month ago that accusations started surfacing that Judge Roy Moore, the GOP candidate for an open Senate seat in Alabama, had a hankerin’ sometime back for teenage girls. I suppose that’s alright if you’re a teenage boy. Problem was he was allegedly trolling for youngsters when he was in his thirties. Dirty business.

Pilate - The original McConnell

When the allegations surfaced some prominent Republicans howled in outrage that Moore "should remove himself from the race and the RNC pulled it’s support. As for Trump, he kept mum on the whole thing. After all you can’t condemn sexual predation when you’ve been caught bragging about your own predatory behavior.  As for Moore, he not only stood his ground but has been downright defiant about the whole affair.

Now we’re four days from the election and the tone has been changing.  Some prominent Republicans and the RNC are falling in line behind Moore because it’s apparently better to keep your majority than to take the moral high ground.  Gotta keep that agenda alive no matter what it says about your integrity. When it’s all done the Republicans will keep trumpeting themselves as the Christian, family values party because they figure that a few months down the road the electorate will have forgotten all of this and they’ll have moved on to other issues of the day - “but, but her emails.”

What I find particularly onerous (and there’s plenty of indecency all around) is Mitch McConnell’s tactic of setting up a scenario whereby the GOP absolves itself of any dishonor.  Last Sunday on ABC News’ This Week McConnell said, “I’m going to let the people of Alabama make the call.”

What else can you say about this other than it’s a perfect example of the Republican Party’s self-proclaimed association with the teachings of The Bible.  McConnell essentially went to the Pontius Pilate playbook and washed his hands of the issue.

Latter day Pilate?

So now if Moore loses McConnell has an opening to lament that the GOP lost a Senate seat while blathering some hollow bullshit about the prestige of the Senate being kept intact. And if Moore wins then it’s all on the people of Alabama.