There is nothing tough or folksy about Fred Thompson. He is but an actor—a con man—who has spent years honing both his tough-guy and down-home demeanor to fool the public. Thompson is the ultimate faker—a flimflammer with a red pickup truck that is being brought out by the GOP for his next scam on the political stage.

Here’s what the mainstream media won't tell you about Snake Oil: He’s spent a good part of his political career in craven endeavors. From 1975 to 1992 Thompson was a lobbyist for corporations such as Westinghouse and General Electric, and most notoriously, the Tennessee Savings and Loan League.

Actors make good con men and con men make good actors. And in 1982, Thompson was vigorously lobbying for legislation to deregulate the Savings and Loan industry although he knew it could destroy the foundations of the institution. The deregulation that ensued gave the thrifts the freedom to invest in risky speculations and gamble away the savings of U.S. consumers.

The Savings and Loan debacle was the crowning moment of the Bush Oligarchy. Over one thousand thrift institutions collapsed and hundreds of thousands of Americans lost their life savings. The ultimate cost of the crisis was $150 billion and George H.W. Bush bailed out the thrifts to the tune of $125 billion, which contributed greatly to the largest budget deficits this country had ever seen to that point. These deficits heralded the 1990-91 recession, one of the lowest points of our nation’s economic viability since the Great Depression.

John Kenneth Galbraith called the Savings and Loan Scandal, “the largest and costliest venture in public misfeasance, malfeasance, and larceny of all time.”

It was Thompson who hoodwinked this country into compromising the original mission and values of the Savings and Loan. Thompson was the shill who called for the industry to change from one that provided low-interest mortgages and secure savings to a large venture capitalist network—one that failed, in part, due to the ham-handed handling of the Bush Family and the first Bush Administration.

In March 2003, Thompson did the bidding of the Bush Family once again and linked Saddam Hussein to the root cause of terrorism and advocated preemptive war. Thompson appeared in a national television commercial by the conservative group, Citizens United, which called for the invasion of Iraq. In the commercial, Thompson persuasively stated: “When people ask what has Saddam done to us, I ask, what had the 9/11 hijackers done to us—before 9/11.” We are now in the midst of a quagmire, a war with no end. Thompson is, in part, responsible, being the salesman of this war.

Thompson worked his con on this country and fleeced it twice before, and let’s not let him do it again. Another con perpetuated by Thompson can once again devastate this great nation.

I urge everyone out there to remind their voting friends of Thompson’s role in two of America’s greatest scandals and also to remind them that the red pickup is only being brought out only to sell us even more snake oil.

I urge all the Kossacks out there to remind their independent and moderate friends of Thompson’s role in two of America’s greatest scandals and also to remind them that the red pickup is being brought out only to sell us even more snake oil. (And don't forget to recommend this diary, if you can, thanks!)

This diary entry is crosslinked from the Liberty in Crisis blog.