Last week’s F on F detailed how, in its post-election stupor, the new Democrat Party has adopted the tactics of totalitarian dictators and pro-slavery nullification advocates.  That would be bad enough, but it doesn’t stop there.  In their drive to concoct alibis for the abject failure of Hillary Clinton, today’s Democrats also are doing a credible impersonation of a bygone Democrat boogeyman, Joseph McCarthy.  For the historically challenged, or those too young to remember, Joe McCarthy was a big, boorish, alcoholic Republican Senator from Wisconsin.  McCarthy was a virtual non-entity until, during the Red-scare hysteria of the early Cold War, he gained notoriety with allegations that there were communists working throughout the U.S. government.  In truth, there were some communists in the government, and for what it was worth, McCarthy did expose a few.  But he got carried away, making wild claims without any evidence.  Such tactics, i.e., making wild claims without any evidence, came to be decried as “McCarthyism.”  Keep this in mind as we go along.  The Democrats lost an election that they expected to win, not only expected, they thought they had it won before election day.  But they lost, and taking a page from the book of Il Duce Obama, since it never can be their fault, then it must be the fault of someone else.  Who?  The Russians.  How’d they do that?  They hacked the election.  How would one do such a thing?  It’s a secret, don’t burden us with the facts.  Trump colluded with the Russians.  This is not a claim that originated after election day.  July 24, 2016 – New York Times –   “Robby Mook, argued on ABC’s This Week that the [DNC] emails were leaked ‘by the Russians for the purpose of helping Donald Trump’ citing ‘experts’ but offering no evidence.”  Remember those last four words.  The Democrats did cite “evidence,” reminding us that Donald Trump said during the campaign that he would like to “get along with Russia” if he is elected.  Whoa, the smoking gun!  There’s more.  The same Democrats who laughed at Mitt Romney in 2012 when he said that Russia was our main foe, turned around in 2016 and claimed that Trump’s weakening of the Republican Platform on Ukraine was proof of collusion.  Aha!  Then, some Trump “associates” spoke to Russians.  Paul Manafort, who left the campaign long before the election, was one.  Carter Page, who advised Trump for about 10 minutes, was another.  Manafort has categorically denied that he ever discussed the election, and no one has contradicted that.  Page spoke to the representative of a Russian business.  He called the allegations a witch hunt.  No other evidence was forthcoming, but you know how Republicans and Russians lie, so they must be guilty.  Despite the failure to produce any evidence of collusion, Democrats are still singing the collusion song.  Democrat Senator Chris Coons made headlines when he claimed, “There are transcripts that provide very helpful, very critical insights into whether or not Russian intelligence and senior Russian political leaders, including Vladimir Putin, were cooperating, were colluding with the Trump campaign at the highest levels to influence the outcome of our election.”  Even Andrea Mitchell wasn’t convinced, asking whether such transcripts actually exist.  Coons responded, “I believe they exist.”  That’s certainly evidence, See e.g., Joe McCarthy – “I have here in my hand a list of 205 communists.”  So – “if transcripts exist, and if they actually say what I want to believe they say, that’s evidence of collusion.”  And, of course, if your aunt had balls she’d be your uncle.  There even are some in Media who are tired of hearing about Russian collusion.  Bill Moyers notes that despite a summer spent investigating collusion, “Law enforcement officials say that none of the investigations so far have found any conclusive or direct link between Mr. Trump and the Russian government.”  That’s right.  Obama’s DNI James Clapper told ABC News in March, there is no evidence of Trump collusion with Russians.  Most of the collusion nonsense comes from a totally uncorroborated British dossier. Obama CIA official, Michael Morell, has said, “On the question of the Trump campaign conspiring with the Russians here, there’s smoke, but there’s no fire at all,” adding, “There’s no little campfire; there’s no little candle; there’s no spark.  And there’s a lot of people looking for it.” “The British dossier leads nowhere.” Journalist Glenn Greenwald writes, “Many Democrats have reached the classic stage of deranged conspiracists wherein evidence that disproves the theory is viewed as further proof of its existence.”  Yet, Democrats remain obsessed with collusion, to the point where Rolling Stone reporter Matt Taibbi has called it “an exercise of conspiratorial mass hysteria.”  Democrats indulge this hysteria every night when MSNBC host Rachel Maddow continually pours wet coals on an already dead fire.  Maddow claims that Russia has compromising details on Donald Trump’s sex life, “which will be used to blackmail Trump into removing troops from Europe.”  After the Access Hollywood tape?  Really?  Maddow says, “If the worst is true, if the presidency is effectively a Russian op, if the American presidency right now is the product of collusion between the Russian intelligence services and an American campaign — I mean, that is so profoundly big, we not only need to stay focused on figuring it out.  We need to start preparing for what the consequences are going to be if it proves to be true.”  Gee, Rachel, that’s a lot of “ifs.”  And again, “if your aunt had balls, etc.”  But there is evidence of collusion with Russians.  This just in  – The U.S. President told the Russian President he’d be better able to accommodate Russia after the election.  Trump said that?  No, that was Obama in 2012.  Wait, this just in – a U.S. Senator contacted the Russian Premier and invited Russia to interfere with a U.S. election.  Was that Jeff Sessions?  No, it was Ted Kennedy and Yuri Andropov in, appropriately enough, 1984.  Sessions was criticized anyhow, for saying the Hawaiian islands are in the Pacific Ocean.  Here’s a bulletin.  I was out there, and there was water all around them, so Sessions probably was right.  But, wait, this just in – in 2016, a U.S. lobbyist took $170,000 from Russian bankers to end U.S. sanctions against Russia.  Paul Manafort, right?  Wrong!  It was Tony Podesta, the brother of Hillary’s John Podesta, whose hacked emails started the whole collusion mess.  Yes, the new Democrats are doing a poor impression of the old cold warriors.  Their plan is to denounce anything the Trump Administration says or proposes.  Democrats have threatened to “shut down the government” if Republicans: a) appropriate money for a border wall; b) try to defund Planned Parenthood; c) try to repeal Obamacare; or d) appropriate money to enforce immigration laws already on the books.  I guess that’s “progressive.”  And their tactics might work, too.  Even though the Democrats are saying THEY will cause a shutdown, many Republicans are afraid THEY would be blamed.  After all, if the Congressional Republicans had balls, they might be leaders.