There's another old saying, Senator: Don't piss down my back and tell me it's raining.

While bitching about AIG this week I was accused of being a "populist." Obviously "populist" along with "teleprompter," "post facto" and "Dodd" are the words of the week for the kiddies over at "Wingnut Street." (The most dysfunctional children's show ever conceived.)

I've argued politics on the internet since Al Gore invented the damned thing, so when I tell you that there's little that can jar me anymore you'll know where I'm coming from. This "populist" as an insult thing left me at a loss for words.

In the first place "populism" is not on it's face a dirty word. Popular anger at the elites in our society is as American as apple pie or making fun of Brittany Spears. It's certainly more a part of the American tradition than mounting some pathetic those same elites.

There's something deeply troubling about some middle class schmo grovelling in defense of people who would not toss him a rope if he was drowning. Can "Renfield" be used as an adjective?

(Peter Lorre voice) "The Master has a contract to suck her blood. Stopping the Master from feeding is unconstitutional." (/Peter Lorre voice)

So I was very happy to see E.J. Dionne's defense of populism in today's Washington Post. Dionne gets it--

"We are at the beginning of a great popular rebellion against those who showed no self-restraint when it came to lining their own pockets. Their entitlement mentality arose from an inflated sense of their own value and of how much smarter they were than everyone else.

The sound you are hearing in response to the AIG payoffs -- excuse me, bonuses -- is the rancorous noise of their arrogance crashing to earth.

Yet there is much hand-wringing that this populist fury is terribly perilous, that the highfliers who could not control their avaricious urges have skills essential to repairing the damage they caused in the first place."

I believe it was Jesse Jackson who said "it's not 'trickle down' economics, it's 'trickle on' economics with poor and the middle class on the receiving end."

Couple that idea with the John Vernon quote at the top of this post. "Don't piss on our backs and tell us it's raining." We know better than that, we're not that stupid. It's your folks that are catching and eating flies.

There's another old saying, Senator: Don't piss down my back and tell me it's raining.

One of my favorite simian bloggers responded ably to my challenge to identify victories achieved by the Democratic congress since they took over in 2006. Without re-opening that particular can of worms, I do want to take issue with his comment that "I must have been one of those kids that got everything I wanted for Christmas as a child."

No, no I didn't.

In the end I don't think the analogy works very well when you factor in the fact that Santa isn't on my payroll and my local congressman is. One of them works for me and the other's a chubby elvish freelancer. (Both like milk and cookies.)

But, for the sake of argument, let's run with the analogy. Let's say you wrote a letter to Santa reminding him that you've been a good little boy or girl and listing out some of the things that might make good gifts, if he was in the mood. At the top of the list you put the things you really, really wanted like a shiny red bike or that Malibu Barbie you've had your eye on. At the bottom of your list was things like baseball cards or school supplies.

Now let's say Santa skipped everything else on the list including the bike with the only gift you had under the tree on Christmas morning was school supplies. It'd be hard not to be disappointed, no? Especially when your elephantine brother who constantly misbehaves gets everything he wants.

You'd find yourself asking what the point is of being good in the first place? You'd start to wonder if there was any justice in the world. You'd probably find yourself getting to the place where you had no use for Santa since he doesn't listen anyway.

You'd ultimately wind up voting Santa's sorry ass out of office the first chance you got since he was an ungrateful son-of-a-bitch who doesn't give a rat's ass about people like you who leave cheap cookies rather than the gourmet cookies he enjoys.