“The point Mr. Bunning was trying to make was a reasonable one: At some point, Congress has to stop borrowing and spending, even for worthy purposes.”

This wasn’t Rush Limbaugh talking, or some Fox News talking head. This was the Washington Post, in an editorial, validating the Kentucky senator’s lonely stand in which he single-handedly placed a five-day “hold” on a $10 billion bill to pay for extended unemployment benefits and other popular programs.

Bunning’s symbolic protest was vilified by the Democrats and disowned by most Republicans. As the Post editorial pointed out, it was “spectacularly bad politics,” giving the Democrats a perfect foil to symbolize the heartlessness of “the Party of No.” Courage and principle are often, and perhaps, sadly, always bad politics.

Efforts to paint Bunning as some kind of renegade monster, like the embarrassingly partisan tirade by Leo Girard, President of the United Steelworkers, faltered on an absence of respect for reality.  Out of work citizens are suffering? The country is out of money. The bill would help the average American? The country is out of money! Girard argues that Bunning should have chosen a less important bill to make his point, but then that wouldn’t have attracted any attention, would it?  Bunning, who is not running for re-election in his state of Kentucky, was obviously not making the stand to hurt anyone, but to sound a very loud alarm. He deserves respect for doing so, because, as the Post said, he is right, and the dangers of running up huge deficits and debt are real.

Girard accuses Bunning of hypocrisy, because he voted against the “Pay-Go” provision the Democrats passed that was supposed to ensure that any new expenditure was paid for by a corresponding cut in spending or increase in revenue. It is obvious Bunning and other Republicans opposed “Pay-Go” because they recognized it as a deceitful stunt, and Bunning’s hold called attention to why. The benefits extension violated the principles of Pay-Go. There is nothing hypocritical about calling attention to phony and cynical budget management tactics.

Senate Majority leader Harry Reid also called Sen. Bunning a hypocrite, though not in so many words, by noting that he had voted for tax cuts and unfunded wars during the Bush years. This dishonest/idiotic argument, increasingly heard from Democrats these days, is beneath contempt. Its gist is that if you once voted irresponsibly, integrity dictates that you must forever support irresponsible bills. The subtext of Reid’s reasoning is that once one Administration creates a huge deficit, it relieves the next Administration from fault for making it infinitely larger.

With few exceptions, Republicans were no better in their reaction to Bunning. Few rallied to his side, making it clear that while they regarded condemning out of control spending as a useful political weapon against the Democrats, they had no stomach for it when there was some political risk involved. True, Bunning’s stand would have been significantly more courageous if he had to face voters in November, but in this wasteland of political knaves and cowards, he qualifies as an Ethics Hero nonetheless. Enshrined with him is the reliably Democratic and liberal newspaper that refused to pile on with its ideological brethren, and gave a much-maligned conservative Senator his due for making an important statement that needed making.

Now what?

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Update: For the record, here is the Op-Ed in Bunning’s name that ran in USA Today, explaining his conduct.