DeLay unclear about his own book

March 22, 2007

If you haven’t already seen it, this clip from last night’s Hardball was awfully amusing. Confronted with a quote from his own book, Tom DeLay denies the plain text. Shown the book itself, DeLay says he doesn’t have his glasses.

If I didn’t know better, I’d say DeLay didn’t actually write the book. Given that he has a ghost-writer for his blog, I suppose this shouldn’t be surprising.

For readers who can’t watch video clips at work, here’s the unedited transcript of the exchange:

MATTHEWS: OK. Let me go — you know one of the fellows we’ve had on this show on occasion is Dick Armey. We’ve had him on quite a bit. And I don’t know him that well. I didn’t have any problem with him. I didn’t have to work with him. I thought he was an OK guy. He seems sort of a Knights of Columbus type to me, a regular guy.

(LAUGHTER)

MATTHEWS: I don’t think he was Knights of Columbus. But he seemed like a regular guy. You say he was drunk with ambition.

DELAY: Actually that’s not what I said. What I said was he is blinded by ambition. Drunk with ambition is a quote of a cliche. I said.

MATTHEWS: Oh, well, why would I underline it in the book? Go ahead, continue on your thought, he was blinded by ambition, I’ll look for drunk.

DELAY: Look, what I did in the book, Chris, is I talked about all of our strengths and weaknesses and telling the story of what went on in the Republican majority over the last 12 years in this book, of course I’m going to talk about my strengths and my weaknesses and the players’ strengths and weaknesses.

I compliment Armey on the fact that he put together the Contract with America and he did a fabulous job in writing the bills of our agenda of the.

MATTHEWS: “He resented me for being the other Texan on the leadership team, and he resented anyone he thought might get in the way of his becoming speaker of the House. Beware the man drunk with ambition.”

DELAY: Read the sentence before that, it said “blinded.”

MATTHEWS: That’s what I just did.

DELAY: “Blinded by ambition.”

MATTHEWS: No. I’ll read the sentence here. “He resented me” — it’s right here in your book. You have got to read it.

(LAUGHTER)

MATTHEWS: I’m sorry, Tom, it’s there, I read you said he was drunk with ambition.

DELAY: Yes. That is the cliche. But right up here, I can’t — I don’t have my.

MATTHEWS: Well, you didn’t put it in italics.

DELAY: I don’t have my glasses on. Up here it says blinded.

MATTHEWS: OK, OK, OK. So it is blinded or drunk with ambition.

DELAY: It’s still a good book.

I can’t believe that Delay thinks there’s a huge difference between being “Blinded by ambition” and being “drunk with ambition”.

It’s hilarious to see it discussed by either one of those jerks, who were obviously blinded / drunk with ambition and a fundamental hatred of Democracy.

  • As a failed paperback writer, I know pretty much everything I’ve written (maybe not word for word) on my manuscripts and would come prepared in an “interview” to discuss my “work.” If he’s a real author then I’m a five time MVP of the Superbowl.

    I suspect the whole purpose of the ghost “writer” was that the publisher feared that a Delay original would be written in crayon and finger paint.

    Keep sniffing that roach spray and stay golden, Tommy.

  • This is so symmetrical with the “no oath, no transcript, no public testimony” B.S. If a RepubCo maggot doesn’t see or acknowledge what he/she/it doesn’t want to; it doesn’t exist. Even if they produced it themselves.

  • I’m sure it is still a good book, as he attests at the end of the clip. Just let me know when his ghost-writer is doing a public reading at Politics and Prose so I can save $25.

  • “I can’t believe that Delay thinks there’s a huge difference between being “Blinded by ambition” and being “drunk with ambition”.”

    I don’t know, Tom may be pretty dim in general, but I bet he can distinguish between the nuanced phases of power-craziness like the most obsessive sommelier knows their fine wines.

    “Well, Chris, ‘drunk with ambition’ is much more common in the early stages of power when you first experience the giddy thrill of being House Majority Leader. You just walk around with a powerful buzz 24/7 and say things like ‘I AM the federal government!!!” to lowly waiters and redistrict states outside of the census.”

    “‘Blinded by ambition’ comes more in the later stages when the hubris kicks in full-force and you tend to overlook the little details that brought you into power in the first place. This is the risky part where you tend to get indicted and spend a great deal of time in front of federal and state grand juries.”

    “Right now I’d say I’m ‘hung over with ambition’ or maybe in ‘ambition withdrawal. But then, ‘hair of the dog’ and all that, you know.”

  • It says a lot about America today when a major “news” program devotes any of its precious time to the book sales efforts of an indicted bug killer like Tom f*ing DeLay. That this exchange is fairly conclusive evidence of fraudulent authorship — and a vivid example of the Bush Crime Family’s instinct for never taking responsibility — makes it all the worse, but in a sane society it never would have happened in the first place. Hawking one’s book belongs on street corners, not TeeVee.

  • Speaking of people who are blind drunk with ambition, Newt Gingrich says that if/when Democrats finally put an end to Bush’s disastrous war, after that if there isn’t “a brilliant success”, then the whole mess belongs to the Democrats.

    It’s like a drunk stumbling out of a car that he crashed, and threatening the tow-truck driver that he’s going to sue if his car isn’t in perfect condition when it gets to the wrecking yard.

    “My argument is if they want to end the war, then take the responsibility,” Gingrich said during a lunchtime discussion with Washington Post editors and reporters. “If it’s a disaster after you end it, you own it. If it’s a brilliant success after you end it, you own it.”

    […]

    “If the 2008 campaign is a referendum on the past, the Democrats win,” Gingrich told The Post. “If the 2008 campaign is a referendum on the future, the Democrats will lose.”

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/21/AR2007032102109.html

    Hey Newt:

    1) Screw you, moron. It’s your disaster, even if someone else comes to clean it up. It’s not like it’s just about to start going really well, is it?

    2) Past results often indicate future performance. Your party sucked yesterday, and they will probably suck tomorrow, unless you get new management.

  • Your typical Texass goat-roper: uneducated (probably uneducable) and illiterate. Why the South always promote their political leaders from the bottom of the barrel is beyond me.

    Time for Hot Tub Tommie to retire to the double-wide and let the Caddie rust on the blocks out in the front yard.

  • I make it a habit to change to the History Chanel once I see Tom Delay, Newt, Anne Coulter,or fatso Bill Bennett on the tube. I’d rather watch the decline of the Roman Empre than watch the decline of the USA.

  • The upper classes have traditionally used book publishing as a backdoor conduit of funds to their choosen fronts from the middle class. It’s hard to trace sales, and anonymous people can buy in bulk. Hitler’s ‘Mein Kampf’ is a popular example. It was Hitler’s primary source of his personal wealth.
    So now the MSM is hukcstering to help to a man who is in lockstep with corporate thought. So surprise there.
    In an interview over the weekend with PBS’s Steve Inskeep, Mr. Delay made several revealing statements about himself and alcohol which Mr. Inskeep (agian, no surprise) failed to follow up on.
    If my interpretation is correct, Mr. Delay is an alcoholic in denial and differentiates between ‘hard loquor’ and beer and wine in consuming beverages.

  • I could be wrong, but watching the clip I would assume that DeLay was right. I would guess that the sentence “before that” — ie, before Matthews started reading, not the first one he already read — said Armey was “blinded” by ambition. Then, a couple sentences after DeLay describes Armey as blinded, he quotes a cliche about people “drunk” with ambition. So he is directly calling Armey blinded, then only indirectly (through a quote of a cliche) calling him drunk. If that’s right, then while he comes off silly, it’s totally reasonable for him to claim that *his* description was “blinded”.

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