Josh Marshall is hopping mad about Republican Sen. James Inhofe, who, during yesterday's Senate hearing into U.S. military abuses at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, said, "I have to say, and I'm probably not the only one up at this table that is more outraged by the outrage than we are by the treatment."

Marshall responded:

I don't think I can remember a more shameful spectacle in the United States Congress, in my living memory, than the comments today of James Inhofe, the junior senator from Oklahoma. Clearly, it is part of the RNC talking points now to shift the brunt of the media storm from the abuses themselves to the political storm they've created.

Really? "RNC talking points?" Are these part of the RNC Talking points?:

"These allegations of mistreatment, if proven, represent an appalling and totally unacceptable breach of military conduct that could undermine much of the courageous work and sacrifice by our forces in the war on terror. This is not the way for anyone who wears the uniform of our armed forces to act." - U.S. Sen. John Warner, Republican from Virginia;

"...There will be a full accounting for the cruel and disgraceful abuse of Iraqi detainees. Conduct that has come to light is an insult to the Iraqi people and an affront to the most basic standards of morality and decency. - President Bush;

"But certainly they've caused an awful lot of damage... And I can assure you that they're going to be prosecuted to the nth degree, whatever the military code of justice does allow." - U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss, Republican from Georgia;

"...In recent days there has been a good deal of discussion about who bears responsibility for the terrible activities that took place at Abu Ghraib. These events occurred on my watch. As secretary of defense, I am accountable for them and I take full responsibility." - Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld;

"Last year, several members of the United States military disgraced the uniform. By abusing enemy detainees, a handful of miscreants broke our laws, embarrassed our country and created an international incident." - U.S. Rep. Duncan Hunter, Republican of California;

"I've been proud to be a military intelligence officer for over 30 years in the U.S. Army. I'm proud to be a Vietnam veteran. But I think like a lot of folks who saw these images, I'm not proud of what took place at the Baghdad Central Correctional Facility.

It doesn't reflect our values. It doesn't reflect my values or yours or those of the American people or those of the majority of our soldiers. And it also -- and I think this is really important -- it doesn't reflect our rules, our laws, our regulations." - U.S. Rep. Rob Simmons, Republican from Connecticut;

"These acts are deplorable. There is no excuse for what happened to those Iraqi prisoners." - U.S. Sen. Bill Frist, Republican from Tennessee.

The list could go on all day.

Marshall continues:

But no one that I saw at least rose more naturally to the effort than this man. No one else's heart seemed so matched to the deed, with his snarls at "humanitarian do-gooders" (i.e., the Red Cross) trying to monitor compliance with the Geneva Conventions.

How'd the Red Cross do at monitoring al Qaeda's compliance with the Geneva Conventions for Nick Berg? Or other U.S. POWs during the early stages of the Iraq war? Or does the Red Cross' concern for compliance only count when Americans aren't the victims or prisoners?

America's greatest moments in the last century came when she tempered power with right and toughened, or sharpened, the edges of right with power -- World War II, then the post-war settlement that framed the Cold War are the clearest, though certainly not the only, examples.

Does he mean after Harry Truman nuked Japan? Or when Ronald Reagan pushed the SDI and scared the bejeesus out of the Soviets? What does he mean by "post-war settlement?" The deal where we turned our backs on Stalin's genocide? (If the New York Times can turn its back on that, a blogger can, too. Right?)

More:

But here you have Jim Inhofe lumbering out of his cave and on to the stage, arguing that we can do whatever we want because we're America. Inhofe's America is one that is glutted on pretension, cut free from all its moral ballast, and hungry to sit atop a world run only by violence. Lady Liberty gets left with fifty bucks, a sneer, a black eye, and the room to herself for the couple hours left before check out.

Actually, here's where the deception about Inhofe comes into play. Marshall's cave metaphor only goes so far. He says Inhofe argued "that we can do whatever we want because we're America." Well, that's one way to put it. Another is to let Inhofe actually speak for himself:

And I hasten to say, yes, there are seven bad guys and gals that didn't do what they should have done. They were misguided. I think maybe even perverted. And the things they did have to be punished, and they're being punished. They're being tried right now and that's all taking place.

How does Inhofe's remarks calling them "perverted" and saying "the things they did have to be punished" equate to "we can do whatever we want because we're America?" Inhofe is interested in blaming and punishing the people who actually were involved in the abuses.

But Inhofe, in Marshall's view, says the unthinkable: That trying to smear the entire country, Armed Forces and Executive Branch for the misdeeds of a few rogues is an outrage. Or, even better, let Inhofe speak for himself:

I have to say when we talk about the treatment of these prisoners that I would guess that these prisoners wake up every morning thanking Allah that Saddam Hussein is not in charge of these prisons.

When he was in charge, they would take electric drills and drill holes through hands, they would cut their tongues out, they would cut their ears off. We've seen accounts of lowering their bodies into vats of acid. All of these things were taking place.

Inhofe also brings to Washington a different perspective. He's a senator from Oklahoma which - until Sept. 11, 2001 - was the site of the worst terrorist attack ever on U.S. soil. Once one gets to understand how true atrocities affect their victims, things have a way of falling into perspective.

Certainly, it puts the business of "shameful spectacles" into perspective.