Liberalman Liberalman Liberalman Liberalman…

Don’t say his name again or he’ll come queer up your kids!

And give your money to welfare queens.

He’ll destroy the Army and spend us broke.

He’ll turn all the child molesters loose with hugs and flowers.

He’ll let terrorists dance a fandango on the American Eagle, and give them therapy (Karl Rove, trademark pending.)

And he’ll make me wait Five Whole Days before buying a bazooka!

Bastard!

Without my ‘zooka, how the Hell am I supposed to defend my family against the terrorists and child molesters and welfare queens and fags and their Evil Liberalman Overlord with the Army all sissified!

Oh fuck! I said his name again!

Run for your lives!

OK, you remember Bill Clinton, right? ‘bout so tall. Played a workmanlike sax. Used to be President of these here United States. After a decade of Republican Deficits, he balanced the budget year after year. Appointed a whole lot of Moderates. Implemented NAFTA, which pissed me the Hell off, but there it is.

He signed Welfare Reform into law, which, flawed as it was, worked as well as it did only because it did not just lop single-women off at the knees, kick them to the curb, and scream, “Get a job, bitch!” In other words, the Modern GOP idea of Personal Responsibility.

Instead it helped sustain them and kept them moving towards employment with a combination of job-readiness training, skills training, child-care, peer-support, transportation assistance, food assistance, the EITC tax-credit program and increase in the minimum wage. Instead of hewing to some idiot-dogma based on bigoted and inaccurate stereotypes of Welfare Queens (Example: the primary users of the patchwork of programs that are always lumped together and called “welfare” are White women. Example: The largest single group that most benefits from the Food Stamp program are called “American Farmers”.) it was intelligent and compassionate and very focused on the outcome of creating workers who could sustain themselves and their families.

Say, whatever happened to that Clinton fella?

Oh yeah; I remember. For his good work, the Republican Party hunted him harder than they’re hunting Bin Laden…and finally Impeached him.

(Tiny aside -- One hear’s Freeper comments on the internets, and here, and via email that all come down to this: “We Impeached Clinton! Bwahaha! Live with it Liberals’” as if this were a withering rebuke from which no man can recover.

To which I can only say: Are you kidding me?

Do you have any idea how fucking de-lighted I am that you nose-mining shit-flingers impeached Bill Clinton?

Do have any idea how many quantum levels easier you have made it to make the case against the GOP? When we can project the lies and treason and moral squalor of the Bush Administration – about which you will not whisper a single peep – against the scrim of your own words. Those million breathless pronouncements of Towering Indignation and Inconsolable Outrage we all endured year after year after year over such things as blowjobs and hair-cuts and single, failed real estate deal.

History will record Clinton/Bush-2 era thusly.

A relentless, seven-year war on Clinton based largely on lies and slander – led by Republicans.

An attempted coup-by-impeachment -- led by Republicans.

An election pilfered – by Republicans.

The greatest single attack on our homeland in history – while the Republicans slept.

The ruthless use of post-9/11 national trauma to ram through a nakedly partisan agenda – by Republicans.

Lying us into, fucking up disasteously, lying about the fucking-up thereof, and then disastrously losing an entirely unnecessary war – Republicans.

Making war on Science because Science makes Jerry Falwell wet the bed – Republicans.

And all of this happened while the GOP controlled most of all of the government...and yet continued to whine that they’re a persecuted minority of People of Faith.

And History will record that while the Republican Party fucked up every single thing they touched, they remained remarkably united on one issue: that everything that went wrong was somehow the fault of the dreaded “Liberalman!”)

-- End of tiny aside.

And on to...

A gentleman named David Hoggard, who is a self–described Moderate Republican that was good enough to link to one of my posts (Good on you, David) and give it some genuinely thoughtful consideration. He didn't rant or namecall, and had the wherewithal to muse out loud about the problems he sees in his party, and since I’m very Old School about such things, and believe every bit as much in conversation with reasonable men and women as I do in working the body of irrational dopes and cowardly Freepers until they poop digital blood, I think Mr. Hoggard deserves a thoughtful reply.

Here are Mr. Hoggard’s words:

Will you be remembered as a 'Bad German' or a 'Good German'?

I got the above link from Lex after reading his post quoting Driftglass' lecture and questions for moderate Republicans; a moniker that fits me. Even though I didn't vote for President Bush last time out, Driftglass speaks to people of my political persuasion thusly...

(Modesty forbids me…)

… So which will it be... good German or bad German? Why can't there be third choice and still remain a figurative 'German'? Moreover, I see just as much bad in the fringes of the Democratic Party as I see in the fringes of my own GOP. My party's 'fringies' happen to be in control of my party right now, so is that fact reason enough to bolt from a party who's central tenents originally appealed to me? Is it best to fight for a shift back to the middle, or abandon the GOP for the Dems whose Michael Mooreish side irks me as much as DeLay?
We need a leader for the party of the middle course. When she comes along, I will switch affiliations so fast it will make your head swim.

David,

Thank you for grappling with this issue publicly. That takes nerve. It’s time for some plain talk on these subjects, so let me point out just two of the most crucial errors that every Moderate Republican I know just keeps making.

1. The Moderate “All things being equal…” Defense for inaction is frankly nonsense. It is the the recourse of Republicans who mourn – as you do – that “I see just as much bad in the fringes of the Democratic Party as I see in the fringes of my own GOP.”

Really?

Where exactly, are the millions upon millions of Socialist/Communist voters who are the exact and balancing opposite of the Unreconstructed Segregationists, Dominionists and gay-bashers upon which this Brave, New Republican Party is built?

Where are the hundreds of rabid, Marxist Congressmen and Senators who dance in perfect counterpoint to an unholy Hosts of Wingnut Legislators like Frist and Santorum and Brownback and DeLay?

Where are the powerful Socialist Lobbying Blocs who, on the Left – like (among others) the Credit, Pharma, Petroleum, Telecomm industries on the Right – write their own laws and deregulate their own industries through their avatars in the Congress?

Where is the Leftwing keiretsu of defense contractors, formerly run by Al Gore and still operated by Al’s friends, who are profiteering to an unheard-of level on a war that Al started?

Where are the Liberals who have lost or plundered $9 billion of your tax dollars in Iraq?

Where is the Lefty Regnery Press?

Where are the dozens of Radical Leftwing Billionaire funded think-tanks that exist as a perfect, mirror opposite to the likes of the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute?

Where is the Liberal 700 Club…and all of the rest of the multi-billion-dollar Radical Christian Left propaganda infrastructure?

You see where I'm going with this, right?


David, Moderates have been carefully lied to for the past thirty years, and your “Good German” question is sadly right on the money.

You have been carefully and deliberately taught to fear “Liberalman!”: a Liberal bogeyman cobbled together out of stereotypes and viscerally-targeted keywords by Hate Radio and the leaders of your Party using tactics that were old when the likes of Josef Goebbels was plying his filthy trade. And if you think I’m kidding or being hyperbolic, please just swap out the phrase “Dirty Liberal” for “Dirty Jew” and go read Reich literature for yourself.

Or go look at the transcript of Newt Gingrich explaining to Congressional Republicans how they all needed to use a pre-approved list of “special” words and phrases to always describe Liberals as “weak” and “traitorous” and so-forth.

It’s all there in black and white: Doing nothing more clever than taking page after page straight from the Nazi Propaganda playbook and drilling it into your skulls, the Leaders of your Party Leaders have led a calculated campaign to convince you that millions of your fellow citizens who simply don’t agree with you on some political issues are actually Enemies of the State. Betrayers to be driven into the sea for the sake of the Purity of American Values...as a part of a campaign to fake-up a Liberal Monster to keep you scared and obedient.

In order to control you when you start asking the very questions you are asking now.

Or, to steal a terrific little line from “The Usual Suspects”, “No one has ever seen him again. He becomes a myth, a spook story that Conservative’s tell their kids at night. 'If you don’t blindly support to GOP, Liberal Kaiser Sose will get you.'"

So no matter how low your party sinks, Moderates can always be brought back into line by fear of Liberalman! Exactly the same kind of shit that Joe McCarthy used to pull, waving around imaginary lists of non-existent Commies to keep the sheep docile.

It’s the same tired lie that Rick Santorum finally was called on two Sundays ago. Santorum is a vacant moron who has made his bones in your Party – become a Senator and possible Presidential contender in your Party – by doing one and only one thing: being the man who pushes hateful and ridiculous, Fundamentalist Conspiracy theories louder and more vigorously than anyone else.

He is an utterly shameless whore for an utterly shameful ideology…which is exactly why he prospers so bountifully in your Party. And exactly why he imploded when he was asked to simply name ONE of these evil feminists who he insists are really responsible for the problems with the American Family. Exactly why he re-imploded when asked to justify his contention that the world-wide Catholic Priest child molestation scandal was really a result of Boston Liberalism.

When it’s out it the open like that it sounds just as fucking de-ranged as it actually is, which makes people wonder how in the Hell a certifiable head-case like Santorum could be elected to anything, much less the U.S. Senate.

I don’t wonder: I know precisely how he does it. He has his Jerry Fallwell/James Dobson/Armageddonist Base already locked down, which means all he needs are the Moderates.

All he needs is people like you, David.

And he gets Moderates to act against their own interestes by harvesting the fruits of the Evil Boogeyman Story that your Party has sown for the last thirty years. It’s the same deeply intellectually dishonest tripe that has been pushed and pimped by the soft-selling Right Wing Apologists like David Brooks for years. That somehow, by some miracle, no matter what crimes and atrocities they commit, what lies they tell, what destruction the wreak…Moderates actually believe the Bad People on the Right are always somehow magically exactly equal in volume, velocity, intent, focus, power, influence, as the Bad People on the Left.

And therefore, since both side are equally awful, why not vote GOP?

Just look at your own comparison, David?

The “…Dems whose Michael Mooreish side irks me as much as DeLay?”

If you want to compare Michael Moore to, say, Mel Gibson, fine: that’s a legitimate critique. But Michael Moore is a gadfly, whose movie became a rallying point ONLY because the Party that controls every branch of government in this country– your Party -- categorically refuses to hold it’s leadership and President to account for some of the most criminal, repellent and ruinous behavior in modern history.

As I pointed out above, Clinton was about as Moderate and Centrist a President as you're likely to find, and yet your Party Leaders kept insisting he was a mad-dog Liberal and tried to gun him down like Dillinger. They impeached him over trivia, David, and yet your Party won’t lift a god-damned finger to stop what’s going on in the White House…won’t even acknowledge that there is a problem. What it will do is mercilessly slime and slander anyone who commits the unpardonable sin of dissenting from Dear Leader’s Infinite Wisdom.

Into this moral cesspit, Michael Moore had the nerve to point a camera, so is it really any wonder that he has gained some popularity among the millions of Americans who are frankly terrified with the way Republicans have mutated into obedient propaganda-spewing Stalinists? All marching lock-step right off the cliff and shrieking that anyone who doesn’t march right along into disaster with them is a dirty, Liberal traitor?

But at the end of the day, Moore makes movies not policy. Movies, not War.

Do you see how deeply brainwashed you sound when you compare a documentary film-maker to the second most powerful man in the GOP…and then throw up your hands and say, “See! See! They’re BOTH bad. How oh how can I possibly choose?”


2. Sorry, David, but Republicans got their license to call the people who run your Party “fringies” collectively revoked (as in “My party's 'fringies' happen to be in control of my party right now”) once the Gargoyles took over your Cathedral and became the majority. Now that they own and operate every damned lever and pulley and dead-man’s switch in the GOP, they’re not the “fringe” anymore: you are.

And, no, they don’t just “happen” to control your Party.

For thirty years the Children of the Southern Strategy have worked very, very hard taking over your Party committee-by-committee, fundraiser-by-fundraiser and library-board-by-library-board. Moderates such as the ones I know were so fucking desperate to win at any cost that they made a deal with the Devil and invited the absolute intellectual, moral, philosophical and theological dregs of the nation into your Party.

They hopped giddily into bed with the True Believers of exactly those same, vile beliefs the Original Republican Party went to war to defeat. And just so there is no misunderstanding here, the Falwells and Dobsons and Robersons of the worlds are not just tolerated within the GOP…for the sake of short-term electoral victory, the degenerate heirs of Jeff Davis and Elmer Gantry you were supposed be fighting against have been welcomed into the Party of Lincoln with flowers, candy, spread-legs, grabbed ankles and your very shiniest Fuck-Me shoes.

And while they have grown parasitically fatter and sleeker draining your Party of any remnants of its founding principles, you Party Elders have flattered and fawned over them, fluffed their pillows...and other things, refilled their coffee cups, roasted the corpse of Teddy Roosevelt to feed them a fine Sunday Dinner and generally catered to their every little need.

And Christ, David, Moderates were warned that this was how it would end!

Moderates were warned waaaaay back when Reagan killed off the Fairness Doctrine.

Moderates told us not to worry.

Moderates were warned when Rush Limbaugh was unleashed on America, the first of a plague of imitators who amped up the “Liberalman!” propaganda campaign to a thousand decibels on a thousand stations. The first to start pumping raw, hateful sewage -- undiluted and unrebutted -- into the air.

Moderates told us it was “just entertainment”, and if you’d just listen you’d hear that “sometimes he makes some good points.”

Moderates were warned when Tom DeLay was just a dark cloud on the Western horizon.

Moderates said, “Tom who?”

This didn’t just “happen”, David. They have been marching purposefully towards this day for years, and every Moderate I know has had warning -- ample warning -- and now they want to cop a plea of ignorance. Or diminished capacity. Or they just quite pretending they don't really think a nice, tidy Police State is just what America needs, turn Hannity up a little louder and join the consipracy of silence.

The Republican Party as you knew it – as my father knew it – is dead. Murdered by Moderates who voluntarily invited the Devil in their parlor. And the Devil now holds those same Moderates hostage and frozen into terrified inaction by filling their heads with even more lies.

These ghouls have destroyed your Party, beggared your country and lied us into a slaughterhouse in the deserts of Iraq from which thousand will never return, and tens of thousand will limp home, crippled for life.

So I ask you honestly, why are you still listening to anything they say?

And, again, my sincere thanks for being willing to ask hard questions of yourself and your Party out in the open.