Somewhere the great Preston Sturges is smiling—and the inimitable Akim Tamiroff as well—as the GOP pretends to be the "reform party"

As often happens in the Age of Bush, you don't know whether to laugh or cry.

Rachel Maddow got it right once again this morning when she registered her astonishment on Air America that, in response to the Abramoff-centric scandals threatening to engulf the national Republican Party, GOP strategists making believe that they're some kind of "reform party" have turned to—get this—Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum!

(If you're wondering about the photo of beloved American funnyman Jerry Lewis, don't worry, we'll get to that.)

The Newtster, of course, laid the groundwork for the whole GOP-K Street conspiracy with his takeover of the House of Representatives. And Senator Rick is the party's present-day designated "enforcer." I mean, you can't make this stuff up!

How can you not think of the Great American Political Film, Preston Sturges's 1940 The Great McGinty?

McGinty himself, played by that lovable lug of an actor Brian Donlevy, is nothing but a thug and muscle guy when The Boss, played with hilarious thick-accented irony (which only writer-director Sturges could have imagined) by the inimitable Akim Tamiroff, taps him to run for mayor. With The Boss's hand-picked and hand-operated hand puppet of a mayor beset by corruption scandals, The Boss sees a big working-class (though not actually working) lug like McGinty as the perfect antidote. He asks him how he'd like to run for mayor as the candidate of the Reform Party.

When McGinty, less than overwhelmed, wonders sensibly how The Boss can get him the Reform Party nomination, The Boss explains, again in that delicious accent: "I am the Reform Party."

(My apologies for the cheesy colorized photo of The Boss and McGinty, above. It was the best I could find on short notice. As my extremely conservative friend Dennis would likely say, "Good enough for government work.")

Well, if the best the Republicrook establishment can come up with by way of reformers is a pair of twisted loons like Newt and Rick, give me McGinty any day.

Elsewhere on the "reform" front, the Washington Post reports: "After Abramoff, a GOP Scramble." About the only encouraging news is that not many House Republicans seem to share Tom "The Hammer" DeLay's delusion that he can return to the majority leadership in this lifetime. Of course, from that premise we proceed to a prospective intraparty bloodbath (good!) that can only be described as loon vs. loon.

I did note, though, that among the dark-horse candidates—in the event, apparently, that House Republicans decide to go for veteran leadership—is none other than California's Jerry Lewis! This may be the best news to come out of Washington since President-unelect George W. Bush tapped much-loved New York Yankee right fielder Paul O'Neill to be secretary of the Treasury.

How about we have all those House majority leader wannabes line up and say, "LA-A-A-dy"? (I don't suppose, though, that Jerry's legendary popularity in France will be an asset with House Republicans.)

POSTSCRIPT

While searching for the McGinty photo, I stumbled across one of the film's most cherishable lines, which somehow seems especially apropos just now. It's uttered by one of The Boss's henchmen, who I see is identified only as "The Politician" (I never knew!), played by that indispensable member of the Sturges repertory company, the gruff-voiced, street-talking William Demarest. (Sorry again about the photo, which is way too late—more like the My Three Sons-era Bill Demarest. Oh well, good enough for . . . )

Expounding on the virtues of the political system he has grown up and flourished in, he explains to McGinty: "If it wasn't for graft, you'd get a very low type of people in politics—men without ambition, jellyfish."

My God, it's as if back in 1940 he had already met "Duke" Cunningham and Jack Abramoff and Tom DeLay and the whole crowd. No doubt in a sense he had.