The GOP warns that Obama has made the United States fiscally ineligible for membership in the European Union -- not that we would want that sort of thing, because we're the United States of America. That and other political news in today's TPMDC Saturday Roundup.

Full-size video at TPMtv.com.

No one who has followed Pat Buchanan over the years will be surprised by him using a questionable term like "scrub stock" to describe non-white foreigners. Well, no one outside of DC, at least. The real issue is why Buchanan's jingoistic nativism has not disqualified him as a member of the elite punditry who gets to spend hours each week playing the cranky old uncle on MSNBC.

Late Update: TPM Reader TL takes exception:

Why does David Kurtz let Pat Buchanan off so easily? Labeling him as merely a "nativist" is tantamount to a slap on the wrist, and in light of the over-the-top, inflammatory innuendo in his article could even be perceived as a strange nod of agreement. ...

Pat Buchanan ... was born in 1938 and understands full well the meaning of "blood-and-soil" and "scrub stock." His article is an endorsement -- even embracing -- of full blown Naziism, and the worst of Naziism (if there can be such a thing).

It's not the "dip" into an "obscure racist phrase" (in TPM's words) that is so disturbing -- it's the use of three phrases and the ideology behind them, tied together in one article, that rise to a level I've never witnessed in recent mainstream political discourse: "blood-and-soil," "scrub stock," and "(m)ost Americans remain visceral patriots. It's in their DNA."

This rises to a level that would likely, ironically, put Buchanan in prison in today's more enlightened Germany, but might have earned him an officer's commission in the SS in 1938, the year he was born.

Right-wing extremist congresswoman denounces attacks on right-wing extremists.

Say this for him: he didn't end up pulling a Coleman.

Went out with some dignity.

Full-size video at TPMtv.com.

TPM Reader JS:

Let's say that all of the sudden, due to the catastrophic onset of a once-in-a-generation crisis, it no longer becomes possible to deny that the elites at the head of a societally important institution have a record of rampant violation not just of the law, but of our most cherished American ideals. Do you:

A) acknowledge that the institution itself has failed in fundamental ways, name and prosecute the true bad apples to the fullest extent of the law, and overhaul the system in a way that essentially wipes out many of the vested interests that have kept it going; or

B) attempt to patch up the existing system by agreeing to keep up various now-discredited fictions and illusions in exchange for a few hard concessions from the elites, all in the hope that the whole monstrosity can limp along until the crisis has passed, at which point it can recover and all of the elites can go back to business as usual

Obama is, by nature, a consensus seeker with inhuman levels of ambition and talent, which means that on both torture and on Wall St. bankster criminality he instinctively reaches for B), which is the (impossible) option that attempts to please everybody at least a little. But what we really need is A), which would seem to someone like Obama to be the most dangerous option, necessitating as it does the social trauma of genuine collective soul searching. You'd have to be able to gamble that America can tolerate this kind of huge rupture -- like the lancing of a boil -- and come through it all intact, and Obama is not a gambler.

Republican Jim Tedisco concedes to Democrat Scott Murphy in the razor-thin election in the NY-20. The concession came in a phone call from Tedisco to Murphy, Eric Kleefeld reports.

Murphy should send Al Franken flowers. The special election in New York was March 31, nearly five months after Franken's win in November, yet Murphy will be seated first.

The Minnesota congresswoman takes to the floor of the House to claim that the TSA is going to start picking pro-life, pro-gun conservatives out of the security line at the airport for extra scrutiny.

An article I enjoyed -- though 'enjoyed' may not be the right word -- about Christopher Buckley's new memoir about his parents. Makes me interested to read the book.

Check out Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) as she shamelessly pretends to be giving fellow Tennessean Al Gore a chance to "clear the air" while really impugning his integrity during today's hearing on the Hill -- a transparent effort that's not lost on Gore.

Have you no sense of decency, ma'am?

Late Update: Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA) tries, but he can't top Blackburn for pure disingenuousness.

If we can't get back to militarism and torture, we're going to become a Banana Republic.

Which Republicans have given Rush the best apologies? The competition is fierce. But we've assembled a slideshow list of the top contenders.

More on torture, from TPM Reader PB:

I think something else tends to get lost in the current arguments about torture. The whole issue has been framed as "moving forward" and looking to the future (good) versus doling out "retribution" and dwelling on the past (bad). This is not merely the Republican framing of the issue, as Obama and many Democrats seem to have accepted this framework.

But this framing is entirely wrong. A better way to look at is that we can either choose to do something about the fact people were tortured by the United States government, or we can choose to ignore it. Either outcome will have a profound effect on what happens in this country "moving forward."

Choosing to ignore profound and systematic violations of international law creates a bad precedent that can (and no doubt will) be followed by future administrations. The current administration might be inclined to have a "no torture" policy, but the next one might think more like the Bush Administration. What expectation would members of future administrations have of being prosecuted for violating the law if we don't hold the past one accountable?

In many ways the decision to "move forward" and pardon Nixon set the stage for Iran-Contra and the Bush administration's myriad law breaking. What future horrors will ignoring the fact that the Bush administration codified torture as a "legal" interrogation technique set the stage for? This is not a can that can be kicked down the road because we have other problems we have to deal with. But no matter what we do now, this is about what might happen in the future as much as it is about what did happen in the past.

It seems that the Republicans have brought forth Newt Gringrich as their counter-expert to Al Gore in today's committee hearing. He's now explaining how people don't really understand what's happening with the polar ice cap. Proud moment for America.

McCain: Accountability for torture makes us no better than a Banana Republic.

Dick Cheney apparently kept a file in his office marked "Detainees" (.pdf).

The document in question, obtained by Greg Sargent, is Cheney's request to the National Archives to declassify and release certain documents that he says "proves" that U.S. torture produced actionable intelligence.

In particular he requests two CIA reports: a 12-page report dated July 13, 2004, and a 19-page report dated June 1, 2005.

But note especially that Cheney's request identifies a specific folder marked "Detainees" kept in "OVP Cheney Immediate Office Files."

Late Update: I'll leave it to others more expert than I am in the timeline of the evolution of our torture policy to figure out where those two CIA reports fit in, but I'm a little surprised at first glance by how late those reports are dated, coming well after the 2002 capture of Abu Zubaydah and the 2003 capture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

Later Update: Ask and ye shall receive. Spencer Ackerman explains why those dates are significant. The point here is that by 2004-05, the Administration's self-justification for its torture policy was well underway. These reports are not contemporaneous accounts of what intelligence the torture yielded. Rather, the CIA and Cheney were papering the file well after the fact.

Now, I know some of you will say it doesn't matter whether torture worked or not. This is true, as far as it goes. But there's a large body of evidence not only that torture doesn't work generally, but that that it didn't work specifically when implemented by the U.S. (or didn't work any better than non-criminal methods would have worked). So while I've seen a lot of well-reasoned arguments about why the debate shouldn't be framed as did the torture work or not, I would say that is merely one part of a wide-ranging debate, and there's no reason to concede that point to Cheney's mendacity.

From TPM Reader CR:

One odd thing about this torture debate is that it's all about *us.* Whether we committed a crime, how it affects our collective soul, how the wheels of justice ought to move (if at all). But nobody is talking about the victims--it's as if torture were analogous to smoking the marijuana you grew in the woods behind your house. Something technically illegal, but something that only hurts yourself, so everybody else should just butt out.

But what nobody is talking about is who (apart from super-duper bad guys KSM and Abu Zubaydah) actually *was* tortured, how many people were tortured, whether any of them were children, what the physical and psychological results of that torture was, how many people died as a result of that torture, whether any of these people have since been recognized as harmless, and whether any of these people were American citizens.

Late Update: TPM Reader ZZ responds:

Following up on your post from CR, how has there not been more focus on OUR people who were actually asked to do these horrific things?! What becomes of the people who waterboard the same man 183 times?

Asking American ... to commit these heinous acts was a crime against them, as well. And their voices should be a part of this story and our sense of collective outrage.

TPM Reader MB disagrees:

CR raises some questions that merit consideration, but I think miss the point. If all of those questions were answered, and it came out that none of the detainees died and none were harmless or children or American citizens, does that make the torture okay? Of course not. Having any of those questions answered the other way only raises the outrage level, but does nothing to change the fundamental facts about morality and the rule of law.

In fact, I find it odd how few people are talking about the other ways this story *does* affect us. Give the government the freedom to torture, and they will someday use it on *us*, if they haven't already. Torture is a fine recruiting tool for Al Qaeda, which creates enemies for *us*. And so on.

TPM Reader CH wonders what became of justice for all:

I think there is a significant issue not being addressed in any sort of sufficient manner; namely, there were several people prosecuted and convicted as a direct result of the policies of the people who signed off on torture. These people were [I hate to say it] thrown under the bus as "a few bad apples". What is to happen to these folks? How come the policy makers, notably wealthy individuals, get off Scot free?

Some folks have already paid a pretty hard price, deservedly so, but they were the small-fry scapegoats.

We need to move forward and demand accountability from those who actually were responsible for the policy of torture as high as that goes.

Minnesota Supreme Court sets oral arguments on Norm Coleman's appeal of his loss for June 1.