George Santos, the Congressman who feigned 'Jew-ishness' to hide his shamelessness...

Bewitched, Bothered, and Embellished...

His Long Island constituents elected George Santos to the House of Representatives based on a series of lies fabricated to create a fictional candidate for Congress— a fake.  Santos’ campaign website was replaced today but with the help of the internet archive, Wayback Machine we can view the original:

George’s grandparents fled Jewish persecution in Ukraine, settled in Belgium, and again fled persecution during WWII. They were able to settle in Brazil, where his mother was born. His father, who comes from Angolan roots, was also born in Brazil. Both his mother and father legally immigrated to the United States in search of the American dream, where they began their new lives on the foundations of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

America used to be a country that rewarded hard work and entrepreneurship. But instead, Democrats have chosen to punish hard working Americans with tax hikes and rising inflation. Washington doesn't need another politician – it needs an outsider who will fight for entrepreneurs, small businesses, and hard working Americans.

George is a seasoned Wall Street financier and investor, with extensive work in capital introduction, real estate, capital markets, bio-tech and ETC. He participated in landmark deals on Wall Street, and worked his way up to being one of the youngest vice presidents in the industry.

George’s work ethic comes from his mother, who came from nothing, but worked her way up to be the first female executive at a major financial institution. On September 11, 2001, George’s mother was in her office in the South Tower. She survived the horrific events of that day, but unfortunately passed away a few years later.

Most if not all of the above is under question after a devastating New York Times expose published on December 19, entitled. “Who Is Rep.-Elect George Santos? His Résumé May Be Largely Fiction.”

“I am NOT a Fraudster”

The article has been in play since then without a response from Santos— until today.  In a WABC interview Santos admitted his lies, and rationalized their meaning:

“I’m embarrassed and sorry for having embellished my resume, I own up to that … We do stupid things in life.”

“...To get down to the nit and gritty, I’m not a fraud. I’m not a criminal who defrauded the entire country and made up this fictional character and ran for Congress. I’ve been around a long time. I mean, a lot of people know me. They know who I am. They’ve done business dealings with me,” he added.

One of his more colorful excuses, however, was reserved for his claim to be the grandson of Holocaust survivors.  In his fabricated resume, along with the more banal lies pertaining to education, professional experience, and the source of his income and campaign expenditures (he claims to have loaned his campaign $700,000), he stated he was an ethnic Jew — an assertion bundled among other questionable claims— he also represented himself as gay despite a record indicating he had been married— to a woman— until 2019.  In his statement of admission, he explained that he had never meant he was  Jewish, but—

“Because I learned my maternal family had a Jewish background I said                          I was ‘Jew-ish,’”

Ah, the distinction without a difference! While admitting to be a practicing Roman Catholic, Santos reserved the absurd contradistinction, an alternative possibility, or a consideration that he was a proximal Jew!

GOP Perspective

This is what now passes for truthiness in the Republican playbook of political gamesmanship.  Santos devised an unclear personal history that was sure to gain the attention of a trusting constituency of uninformed voters.  He was slightly gay, perhaps educated, mysteriously wealthy, and aspirationally Jew-ish, everyman— a fraud.

How is it about such ill-qualified candidates like Margie Greene, Tommy Tuberville, Matt Gaetz, et.al. that they all find a home among Republicans?  That the GOP not only accepts and defends their disqualifying traits but then elevates them?  Their political compass, like a clock with no hands, encourages a limitless opportunity for poor choices. The knowledge that Santos’ “embellishments” were well-known to Republican leaders was a source of great amusement as well:

Senior House Republicans were so keenly aware of alleged inaccuracies and embellishments in Rep-elect George Santos’s professional biography, that the topic became a “running joke,” multiple insiders close to House GOP leadership told The Post.

— NYPost, “House GOP leaders aware of George Santos fabrications: ‘A running joke,’“  by Jon Levine

The GOP is trolling itself as it promotes candidates who gain power without any semblance of character, without the faintest hopes of being leaders, of governing responsibly.  But then, we are reminded that this is not an aberration, not a singularity in their firmament.  Remembering that Ronald Reagan thought his remarks as Commencement speaker at Eureka College were a worthy punchline to his lackluster performance in the White House:

“Oh, you'll have some regrets along with the happy memories. I let football and other extracurricular activities eat into my study time with the result that my grade average was closer to the C level required for eligibility than it was to straight A's. And even now I wonder what I might have accomplished if I'd studied harder."

Cue the uninspired smirk and forced laughter.  Had he studied more he may have understood the heresy of opening his campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi, site of one of the most horrendous racial incidents of the Civil Rights era— or the ridiculousness of his unjustified disdain for the government which he identified as “the problem.”

This is the party that produced George W. Bush, the non-verbal president who inspired the term “strategery.” In 2003, Bush dressed up in a flight suit aboard an aircraft carrier with a “Mission Accomplished” banner as a backdrop, declared his Iraq misadventure over before it began.  The final troop pullout occurred in 2011 under his successor. The term, “strategery” was used as a joke among Bush II insiders and was later taken up by the dimwitted Sarah Palin who could see Russia from the back porch and was quoted in a moment of pathetic linguicide,

“Well, bless his heart, he's probably used to those in the political Beltway who perhaps aren't out there working, but they're talking and they're meeting people and they're doing their strategery,  ..."

— O'Reilly Factor (December 16, 2010). "Sarah Palin's TV Show Hurting Her Political Career?"

 The GOP couldn’t protect its own nominating process from anointing the least qualified candidate to have served as POTUS, whose scandals now provide a mitigating backdrop for George Santos’ outlandish masquerade.

For Mr. Santos, if that is really his name, there is still time to save himself from future embarrassment. As investigators poke even further into his muddled past, he could make his next statement as a self-parody on SNL. Pretending to be a Congressman, he would be a hoot wearing a yarmulke and rainbow-colored MAGA tee, if he weren’t so… evil-ish.