E Pluribus Chao

Today's column for the Daily Banter takes a look at our increasing dedication to party and political ideology over solidarity with our fellow Americans.

Here's a quick excerpt:

"I sometimes wonder what the response would be like were another 9/11 to happen -- say, tomorrow morning. I'd like to believe that we'd once again put aside the trivial concerns that divide us and the inane distractions that only casually connect us, the ridiculous tribal allegiances and eliminationist rhetoric we seem to thrive on in the age of hive mind hyper-connectivity. I'd like to believe it, but I think that doing so would be astonishingly naive. We've simply gone too far -- pushed things well past the breaking point. There isn't an event that we can't now politicize. There isn't a tragedy that we can't find a way to blame someone from the opposite side of the political aisle for or an act of heroism or nobility for which we can't withhold credit from our ideological adversaries. And thanks to the overwhelming number of media outlets willing to fracture us and feed us only information that confirms our already firmly held biases, I doubt very seriously that this deplorable situation will end anytime soon. If anything, it will likely only get worse."

Read the Rest Here

Quote of the Day

"A Gingrich presidency, if such a thing can even be imagined, would be a chaotic catastrophe. A Gingrich nomination would yield an Obama landslide."

-- David Frum

This is a pretty succinct assessment of Newt Gingrich's entire ego-trip of a candidacy, to say nothing of that candidacy's laughable recent elevation by a Republican party desperate to vote for anybody but Mitt Romney. From the same source that linked to the above quote -- a post in the Daily Beast -- Andrew Sullivan points out the most important element to Newt's sudden rise in the polls, and it speaks volumes about what's truly important these days: timing.

"His timing is pretty good: better to be on the rise a month before the voting begins rather than two months before. And the hardcore base doesn't have many other places to seek refuge."

It's true that if the GOP had a singularly fantastic candidate to get behind, it'd be less likely to play the field as if it were one of the Sex and the City girls, eventually awakening to the cold light of day and being forced to take a Sisyphean walk of shame, over and over again. But there might be a bigger point to be made about Republican indecision and what it says about us as a media-shaped culture. I've mentioned this before, but we now live in a world where our attention spans are shrinking rapidly, largely due to the rapid-fire nature of our media. News cycles are dwindling down to hours instead of days. Zeitgeists come and go seemingly in an instant. You can go from nobody, to viral sensation, to the target of a harsh backlash in the span of a couple of days. We no longer have the will to stick with a message that's longer than 140-characters.

We're constantly looking for the next thing, particularly if we're not 100% satisfied with the thing we already have.

I think what this means for politics is that it's no longer important to be steadfast as a candidate or in message; the most vital thing is to be constantly evolving and staying one step ahead of media obsolescence, and that's much easier said than done. The reality is that everything -- everything -- becomes old news after a very short time these days and even the most media-savvy can trip up and lose momentum or find that no matter what they do, it's not enough to hold the interest of a public suffering, en masse, from ADD. The end result then becomes that politics is a game of musical chairs: whoever happens to be on top of the media cycle when the music stops wins.

How do we know our attention spans are shrinking, that vast swaths of our culture have turned into Lenny from Memento? Newt Gingrich -- a guy who just a few months ago was declared DOA because of a series of monumental screw-ups, a guy with a long history of personal and professional baggage that should doom any political aspirations he might have from the very start -- is now the frontrunner for the GOP presidential nomination.

Stupid Is As Stupid Votes

Choose Wisely

You know, what with the latest addition to Sarah Palin's impressive pantheon of really fucking stupid comments -- namely her defense of just making up words as she goes -- I thought I'd dip into the archive and find something I wrote way back in September of '08, during the closing days of the presidential campaign.

With midterms approaching and the talk of the 2012 White House race already ramping up -- I think this sentiment bears repeating:

"And this is what it's come down to. They've drawn the battle lines and all that's left now is for the rest of us to choose which side we're on -- because they've seen to it that there is no middle-ground.

You're with us or you're with the idiots.

You're smart or stupid.

You either want your leaders to use their brains or you align yourself with the ones who would play the role of the dumb jocks mocking those who dare to think as being a bunch of effete wimps who can't be trusted.

You vote for great minds or for people who don't just devalue great minds but demonize them.

Sarah Palin was right about one thing last night: This is a battle for survival, but defeat doesn't mean death -- it means dumb.

I don't know about you, but I don't want the two most powerful people in the free world to be a couple of folks I'd just like to sit down and have a beer with; I want them to be fucking super heroes -- sharper, stronger and wiser than I could ever hope to be. They have the weight of the world on their shoulders; I want to never have to worry that they won't be able to carry it.

But that's my choice.

Now it's your turn.

Where do you stand?"

Well?

Bonus Quote of the Day

“I have a message. A message from the Tea Party. A message that is loud and clear and does not mince words: We have come to take our government back.”

-- Rand Paul, political neophyte and son of Ron Paul, crescendoing his victory speech after winning yesterday's Kentucky primary

First, Paul's win should shock absolutely no one; if ever there was a place where unfocused and largely incoherent white resentment grows up out of the ground like weeds right now, it's Kentucky. The important thing to keep in mind here is this: He won the Republican Senate primary because he's a Republican -- and for some strange reason, I suppose in an effort to be taken more seriously and to deflect accusations of racism, the tea baggers often like to pretend that they eschew political affiliation, which is horseshit. The reality has always been that the "Tea Party" is nothing more than the militant wing of the GOP -- it's what Hamas is to the PLO (minus all the acts of terrorism -- for now). The tea baggers feel like the Republican party just isn't crazy and scary enough on its own these days, so they're pulling a Vince McMahon and creating an XFL to "compete."

Second, I don't want to hear one more supposedly high-minded asshole trying to convince me or anyone else that Ron Paul is someone who should be taken seriously -- at least as far as his ideas are concerned. Anyone who names his child after Ayn Rand -- and does it ostensibly as an adult and not some pissy, arrogant teenager who stalks the halls of his high school trying to convince himself that the world is beneath him and he's secretly more evolved than the kids who are regularly flushing his pack of cloves down the toilet and stuffing him into lockers -- doesn't deserve even an ounce of credibility.

Finally, how chilling is it getting to hear this "take our government back" crap?

Political Donation

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Carlos Sanchez -- the only man in history to actually owe his life to the fact that it's an election year.

AP: Connecticut Mayor Donates Kidney To Facebook Friend/4.22.10

Middle Schooled

Decent commentary here on trying to stay at least somewhat fair in the age of partisan journalistic hackery.

Mediaite: Attacking the Middle/2.24.10

Adventures in Hypocrisy

Stop me if you've heard this one before, but within the past 24 hours there have been at least two spectacular takedowns of the seemingly shameless hypocrisy of the current Republican power structure and its fervent supporters.

First, Rachel Maddow laid out, piece by inarguable piece, proof of how GOP lawmakers are attempting to block even good policy -- policy they've at times offered vocal support for and which they've gleefully reaped the benefits of -- simply because the White House backs it. In other words, and once again stop me if you've heard this before, the only reason they're uniformly turning against legislation that they've agreed would benefit the country is because their political adversaries agree that it would benefit the country.



Then in Salon, Glenn Greenwald, as much as he irritates the hell out of me sometimes, slam dunks National Review editor and Sarah Palin masturbation fantasist Rich Lowry. Little Richie took aim at Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas's new book -- titled, in obligatory over-the-top fashion, American Taliban. The book compares aspects of the American right to radical Islamists, leading Lowry to decry, "Only an extremist says, the other side in the American political discussion shares the same agenda as radical jihadidsts."

Greenwald points out that the National Review's own Jonah Goldberg recently wrote a book called Liberal Fascism -- which asserted, absurdly, that Adolf Hitler and the Nazis could be classified as liberals -- and that Review editor Ramesh Ponnuru wrote one called The Party of Death which claimed the Democrats were for euthanasia and infanticide.

Greenwald writes:

"I know it's not news that Rich Lowry is an intellectually dishonest hack. And I also know it's not news that the brain of right-wing authoritarians allows its host to blithely accuse others of exactly that which they do. Still, as common as it is, there are times when I'm amazed at how compartmentalized and self-blinding the human brain can be.

Shouldn't a normally functioning brain send a signal to Lowry along the lines of: You can't complain that it makes someone an 'extremist' to compare 'the other side in the American political discussion' to Islamic radicals because one of your magazine's Senior Editors just recently wrote a book comparing liberals to Nazis, and another one of them wrote a book calling them the Party of Death? Forget intellectual honesty; just as a strategic matter, in order not to expose yourself as a wildly dishonest and hypocritical polemicist, shouldn't the brain intervene and at least tell the person that they should alter their criticisms so it's not blatantly attacking exactly what their closest comrades do? Yet somehow, the brain never sends that signal -- or it never gets received -- and people like Rich Lowry can sit there with a straight face and attack someone for doing exactly that which his own writers do, without any apparent recognition of that fact at all. If nothing else, it's a wonder to behold as a biological and psychological phenomenon."

Once again, though, as I've been saying 'til I'm blue in the face lately, I'm just not sure logic even has an impact anymore. Ideologues at the extreme of either side of the political argument appear to be bulletproof to it; the only difference being that the Republicans seem to be at the mercy of those extremist ideologues these days. They've allowed their party to be hijacked by them and they've gladly fallen in lockstep behind.

The folly of this is what led me to write the following piece in November of last year. Maybe this is where I first began to sort of "give up."


"Partisan Crashers" (Originally Published, 11.10.09)

If you've read this site long enough, you probably know that it hasn't always been this way.

I used to put a very high value on my ability to evaluate each issue on its own merits. Although I often tend to be center-left in my politics -- rarely if ever going the extreme liberal route -- I spent many years frequently siding with the right on a whole host of topics. I'm all for being strong on defense; I could care less about the political correctness that was a ridiculous liberal cause celebre for quite some time; I don't believe capitalism to be inherently evil; I want to see the poor and helpless in this country treated with dignity and everyone afforded good health care, but I think it requires a more efficient and vigilant government -- not a big one willing to just throw money around; I think that paying extra attention to certain ethnicities at airports is a natural concession to reality in this day and age and amounts to basic police work; I hate hippies; I can occasionally be as jingoistic as your average Toby Keith fan and freely admit that right after 9/11, I too had the knee-jerk reaction that wanted to see us annihilate a random city in the Middle East, just as an object lesson; I pretty much laughed out loud when those Navy snipers took out the Somali pirates who held an American captain hostage back in April.

Yes, sometimes I'm the first one to get all "America, fuck yeah."

For months and months on this site, I skewered Democrats in much the same way I skewered Republicans, believing that working backward in any argument to make the "facts" fit a predetermined point-of-view -- no matter that point-of-view -- was the most intellectually dishonest thing imaginable. I still think that I'm capable of sticking to that ideal, because if I don't, then my already somewhat inconsequential opinions are rendered utterly worthless since they're the product of nothing more than partisan prejudices.

But lately it's no secret that I have actually been more outraged by the actions of the right as a whole than those of the left. And I think the reason for that can be summed up in one simple question that may seem trite but which kind of needs to be asked: When did the primary voices of the American right become so shockingly dumb -- so shamelessly willing to jettison every last vestige of rational thought? True, during the Bush years stupid seemed to reign -- but the reality was always that those at the top were very smart people using very gullible people as stage props to further their agenda. I also get that this still happens regularly -- on both ends of the political spectrum.

But something has changed recently; maybe it started with the introduction of Sarah Palin to an already toxic mixture of paranoia and ignorance coming to a boil within certain segments of the population. Either way, over the last year it seems as if all logic and reason within the Republican party and its champions on talk radio and Fox News has gone completely out the window. It's like these people have lost their fucking minds. I'm not simply talking about their tendency to embrace and perpetuate half-baked conspiracy theories of the most mind-bogglingly outlandish variety; I mean their lack of shame at making arguments that not only don't hold up within the context of an extended timeline -- the kind of bewildering shit that can easily be proven hypocritical by comparing it to their comments of just one year ago -- but make no sense at face value.

Last night on Fox News, Sean "I Can Put You Into a Car Regardless of Your Credit History" Hannity made a comment and an implication so inflammatory and absurd that it's shocking his brain didn't rip the top of his head open to get some air. He pondered, "What does (it) say about Barack Obama and our government," that apparently the U.S. military knew that Major Nidal Nasan had contacted al Qaeda and was a growing threat yet did nothing to stop him? In other words, Hannity tried to link the fact that the military may have dropped the ball in devastating fashion on the Fort Hood shooting to the fact that Barack Obama is in the White House.

Do I need to remind you -- since reminding an obviously thick-headed ideologue like Hannity wouldn't do a damn bit of good -- that in the months leading up to 9/11, there were intelligence failures left and right within the CIA, the FBI and the Bush administration, including one in which Bush himself seemed to flat-out ignore the warnings of an intelligence report that all but spelled out the coming attack? I'm not saying that governmental agencies shouldn't be held responsible for their failures when a national tragedy happens that could have been prevented by them; I'm saying that you can't keep a straight face and castigate one president of the United States for an avoidable catastrophe that happened on his watch after singing the praises of another who was much closer to the fuck-ups that led to the avoidable catastrophe that happened on his. Well, you can't keep a straight face unless you're either a modern right-wing pundit or the lead character from Memento.

This is just another example of the kind of bald-faced, completely-detached-from-reality hypocrisy that the people who've hijacked the Republican party have trafficked in now for months into years -- the same people who spent almost eight years ranting and raving about how criticizing the president during a time of war amounted to treason, but who now conveniently add the caveat "Unless that President is Barack Obama -- That's Alright."

Crackpot conspiracy theories, circular reasoning, selective memory, insane arguments that go nowhere, the complete abandonment of logic and reason, the canonization of the craziest and most farcical among its lunatic fringe -- this is why it's become impossible to defend the GOP these days. It's gotten so bad that even taking an occasional stand for the ideals of conservatism, some of which I happen to agree with, makes me feel like I need a shower -- because those who are supposed to be advancing these ideals have instead allowed their party to meltdown from the inside out.

It's almost impossible to imagine that conservatism was once the domain of unapologetic intellectuals like William F. Buckley.

Now look at it -- it's the soapbox from which Michele Bachmann shouts gibberish.

Who with a brain wants to in any way be associated with that?

Ballot Proof

I'll make this quick.

The Democrats got their clocks cleaned last night -- got them cleaned by an airheaded former nude model who seems to have an unnaturally intimate relationship with his pick-up and who immediately upon winning tried to pimp his two hot daughters out on national television. In other words, they got their asses kicked by a punchline -- the male version of Sarah Palin.

And you know something? They 100% deserved to.

Blame Martha Coakley's inept campaign, non-existent personality or generally smug sense of entitlement -- blame it all you want -- the loss of a Senate seat in the bluest of blue states, one held by Ted Kennedy for nearly half-a-century, is something the Democrats have had coming for quite awhile. It's a shot across the bow of epic proportions.

A couple of years ago, the Democrats managed to even things out in Congress after years of being trampled under the boot of the GOP; then last year, after enduring eight years of an entirely or largely Republican government that ran this country head-first into the ground, the American electorate made a decision to hand the reins over to the Dems completely -- and what have they done with it since? Sure, there have been legislative victories, necessary reversals of God-awful GOP policy and baby-steps in the right direction, but considering the amount of power the Dems have had over the past year, it's shocking how little has gotten done. This is mostly because the Democrats have behaved, by and large, as if our ostensible two-party system is really just a couple of slight variations on one-party. They've bitched and moaned and obfuscated and delayed and generally allowed an opposition party that hasn't simply been in the minority, it's been a deranged and disorganized pack of chimps hurling shit at anything and every little thing that scares the hell out of it, to stand in the way of progress. The Democrats have had the numbers to advance their agenda by faster-than-light jumps -- this in spite of the eight years of damage that's needed to be undone -- and yet they've behaved as if they have time to dawdle.

Well, good going, guys. The people just let you know in no uncertain terms that they won't wait -- they'll even put a Birther-backed male bimbo in office as long as what he offers is different than the crap they're seeing right now. What's worse, those people just made your lives that much more difficult: You couldn't quickly push your legislation through before, when you had all the pieces in place -- you think it's gonna be easier now?

Look, I'm still a fan of Barack Obama, mostly because I believe in what he hopes to accomplish, but even I understand that a one-man political movement will never hold. During the Bush years, there were plenty of Republicans who couldn't name a damn thing W's administration had done that benefited them -- but it didn't matter because they believed that he was somehow generally "a good man." He shared their beliefs. This is a ridiculous way of thinking, and that's true no matter what side of the political fence you're on. A person is only as good as his or her policies. It's not who he or she is -- it's what he or she does. Obama's taken a couple of bold steps forward while in office, to be sure, but if he and the Democrats don't take this upset in Massachusetts for the wake-up call that it is, they're gonna be out on their asses in no time.

The Democrats rode in on a wave of populist rage, and if they don't start recognizing the ramifications of that, they're gonna ride out on exactly the same wave. The people are still pissed, and in the absence of effective leadership they'll turn to anyone. Even clowns like Scott Brown.

Tuesday Is Recycling Day

I've been really happy to shy away from politics lately, mostly because the intensely polarizing mindlessness that political debate in general has devolved into in this country just wears me out. It's the kind of thing that's barely possible to even be funny about anymore because things are just so fucking insane out there. I certainly don't want to bury my head in the sand and simply hope for the best, but dwelling on it makes me long to find a doctor willing to dole out Vicodin like a human Pez dispenser.

That said, what's happening today in Massachusetts is something all of us have no choice but to pay at least a little attention to, mostly because it has the potential to be a game-changer in Washington. For those who've chosen to remain blissfully ignorant, a special election is being held today that will determine who fills Ted Kennedy's former seat in the Senate -- and it looks as if it's entirely possible that a one-time Republican nobody named Scott Brown could thwart the entirely lackluster campaign of Democrat Martha Coakley. Scott's an empty suit and an empty head of the highest order; Coakley's a smug dumb-ass whose own sense of entitlement has put her in the position she's now in, basically neck and neck with a guy who never should've been a threat but whom she always should've considered one. What makes this election a big deal is that if Scott wins, the balance of power tips slightly in the Senate, at least enough for the GOP to successfully filibuster any Democratic initiative, like, say, the massive health care reform package that lawmakers have been debating, according to my calculations, since 1833.

Like everything involving partisan politics these days, this race is an amalgam of toxic components that seem all too familiar by now: There's been the Tea Bagger crowd at Scott rallies shouting that Coakley needs somebody to "shove a curling iron up her butt"; obnoxious and pompous posturing from both sides; a lot of invoking and revoking of the memory of Kennedy; the Schadenfreude of far left progressives, who seem to now delight in the prospect of President Obama failing outright as some sort of object lesson to those who "sell out" the supposed base; you get the picture. If you've been reading this site regularly over the past year or so, you know that it's this last curiosity -- the confounding narrative that has some on the left suicidally reveling in their erstwhile candidate's political setbacks -- that's entertained and infuriated me in equal parts. The all-or-nothing mindset that pervades left-wing politics is so laughably self-defeating that I've actually reached the point where I'd almost like to see Obama's agenda go down in flames, not as a rebuke of his occasional willingness to compromise but as a rebuke of the hardliners' vow never to. Call it "meta-failure."

I obviously don't want to see anyone sacrifice his or her ideals or throw campaign promises on the fires of absolute appeasement, particularly not to an opposition party made up of howler monkeys that have made it perfectly clear they'll never be appeased. But the tendency of liberals to instantly and impetuously turn on anybody who doesn't conform to whatever pie-in-the-sky image they've created in their own grad school-educated brains -- that's earned them a serious whack on the nose with a rolled up newspaper. And if the Republicans were to retake Congress and eventually the White House, it might finally wake them the fuck up to the reality that the Naderization of progressive politics may look wonderfully Utopian on paper, but sorry, it ain't gonna win elections.

Of course it's a nation's responsibility to hold its elected officials' feet to the fire when it comes to promises they've made and positions they've espoused. But pitching a hissy-fit and pushing for the failure of a president and a party just because they're not giving you everything you want usually leads to a president and party taking over who will give you nothing you want.


"With Friends Like These..." (Originally Published, 8.21.09)

"So progressives are now in revolt. Mr. Obama took their trust for granted, and in the process lost it. And now he needs to win it back."

-- Paul Krugman in an editorial in today's New York Times

I'm not one of those people who listens to right-wing radio, even occasionally, looking for something to piss him off. If I wanted to make myself angry for no good reason, I'd call my estranged wife -- or maybe put on a Phish record.

That said, I was flipping through Sirius XM radio a couple of days ago when I stumbled across the America Right or "Patriot Radio" channel. The show that happened to be on at the time was something called The Wilkow Majority (I'll give you a minute to shake your head at the right's ongoing and obligatory need to cast itself in the most muscular terms possible) hosted by a guy named Andrew Wilkow. What separates Wilkow from the rest of the crazy-come-latlies out there in conservative radioland is his belief that he's, well, a punk.

I'm not kidding.

Both Wilkow and his producer, an at one time faux-hawk-sporting kid named Nick Rizzuto, have gotten it through their heads that they're the personification of the right's new school -- and that the new school they represent also happens to be the logical next step in the evolution of punk. They've even started a website called "Conservative Punk." If this sounds fucking laughable, believe me -- it is. Do yourself a favor and don't think too hard about trying to fit the square peg of punk rock culture into the round hole of unabashed capitalism and conservatism; I tried for awhile and it only made my head hurt. Jello Biafra and Henry Rollins are turning over in their graves at this ridiculous conceit and they're not even dead yet. You almost have to give credit to the right's lack of shame when it comes to attempting to co-opt some of the better trends of the left while forcibly trading off its own misdeeds, clumsily trying to shove them under the banner of its enemy and hoping that no one notices how full of shit the whole notion is (Hitler was a leftist, racism is a liberal ideal, etc.).

Needless to say, neither Andrew Wilkow nor his remora, Nick Rizzuto, is a punk. To twist a somewhat legendary phrase: Boys, I grew up with punks. I was good friends with punks. I was a punk (and according to some, still am). You're no fucking punks.

The reality is that, after taking a quick glance at his website, Wilkow looks like he could be just about any other right-wing talking head. This is especially amusing when you consider the fact that he is actually quite a bit younger than the usual suspects and yet still looks like your basic perpetually middle-aged white guy who hasn't been blown since college. I guess that's what being Sean Hannity's hand-picked protege does to you. (Now's a good time to once again remind you that a guy who counts his introduction to Hannity among the greatest moments in his life also considers himself an up-the-establishment standard bearer of punk rock's new blood. You've gotta be fucking kidding me.)

All very easy shots at Wilkow and his show aside, though, I have to admit that while listening to him for a few minutes the other day, he made a surprisingly good point -- one that I sort of made here earlier in the week. I guess we're both on the same "Punk Rock Manifesto Weekly" mailing list.

The Wilkow rant in question had to do with the tendency of liberals to seemingly revel in martyrdom and self-sabotage -- their propensity to almost embrace their roles as losers and to be able to snatch defeat from the jaws of even the most assured victory. The crux of his argument was this: The Democrats have near-complete control of the government right now -- from the White House to the Hill. Legislation-wise, they can accomplish practically anything they set out to, and yet they're somehow content to bitch, moan and blame Republicans for standing in the way of progress when in reality no one's completely blocking their path. Worse than all of that, and this is something Wilkow didn't broach but I will: Liberals can't help fighting amongst themselves. It's as if it's ingrained in their DNA to never completely agree on anything. And we've all seen how well that strategy works when it comes to pushing through an agenda or, you know, winning elections.

A couple of days ago I published a piece decrying the Democrats for not being willing to take off the gloves and get their hands a little dirty when it comes to battling the Republican noise machine trying to thwart them at every turn. My point was that there won't be much solace in being able to say, "Well, at least we stuck to the ideals that make us better than the GOP automatons," four years from now if nothing got done and a Republican president is back in office. I'm not saying that there can't and won't be disagreement and dissent; I'm saying that in order to get the job done and give Barack Obama the clout he needs to move his agenda forward by leaps and bounds, there has to be, to a large extent, a united front to face the consistently united front staring you down from the other side of the aisle. To paraphrase The Godfather, as far as outsiders are concerned, you never take sides against the family.

Sure this is slightly robotic and seems to stand against everything left-wing America stands for, but guess what? It fucking wins.

Sometimes you've gotta look at the big picture -- and if there's anyone who can't seem to do that because they're too busy picking every little thing apart just to prove how intellectual, analytical and multi-faceted they are, it's liberals.


Case in point: today's New York Times editorial by Paul Krugman.

First of all, let me state unequivocally that Krugman's a genius; he's one of the smartest people around, and his views are always worth listening to. Let me also make it clear that I'm not suggesting that any side of the political spectrum let its leaders get away with anything and everything. The good of the nation should, for all intents and purposes, trump the good of the party. My argument is that the battle lines are so clearly drawn these days, the alternative for either party is so far removed from its own desired reality for the country, that each side has to be willing to accept that a big picture victory, even a partial one, is infinitely better than a complete loss. The Republicans realize this; the Democrats seem not to. Krugman's editorial, which takes President Obama to task for supposedly betraying the progressive base that helped put him in office, is a perfect example of the self-defeating splinter cell tendency of left-wing politics. Yes, Barack Obama seems to have slipped comfortably into a more middle-of-the-road stance than much of the left-leaning electorate would've liked, but make no mistake: a New York Times editorial from one of the leading liberal voices in America declaring that Obama has lost the support of progressives and now has to earn it back accomplishes nothing aside from doing the job of Republican strategists for them.

An editorial like Krugman's is every conservative's wet dream -- because those on the right know that any well-publicized dissension within the Democratic ranks makes Obama look weak and proves their point to those on the fence: that even when the Democrats have what they need to run the government their way, they can't make it happen. They can't seal the deal, despite having everything on their side.

As Wilkow said, they're born losers.

Right about now, the Democrats need to take a hint from a recent song by Green Day: Know Your Enemy. At the very least, know who he is.

Of course, Green Day actually have something in common with Andrew Wilkow: They're not real punks either.

Fools on the Hill

Once upon a time, the United States Senate was a shining beacon of at least semi-intelligent discourse -- living, breathing, debating proof of the success of America's experiment in democracy. It was Rome, when Rome was in its heyday.

These days it's more like Rome right before the fall of the empire -- brimming with arrogance, stupidity, influence-peddling and near-constant partisan hackery, and overrun by self-serving clowns drunk on their own grandiose sense of importance and always on the lookout for the next illicit sexual encounter.

Salon runs down the worst of the worst among what's supposed to be the best America has to offer.

Salon: Meet the Knuckleheads of the U.S. Senate/9.8.09

With Friends Like These...

"So progressives are now in revolt. Mr. Obama took their trust for granted, and in the process lost it. And now he needs to win it back."

-- Paul Krugman in an editorial in today's New York Times

I'm not one of those people who listens to right-wing radio, even occasionally, looking for something to piss him off. If I wanted to make myself angry for no good reason, I'd call my estranged wife -- or maybe put on a Phish record.

That said, I was flipping through Sirius XM radio a couple of days ago when I stumbled across the America Right or "Patriot Radio" channel. The show that happened to be on at the time was something called The Wilkow Majority (I'll give you a minute to shake your head at the right's ongoing and obligatory need to cast itself in the most muscular terms possible) hosted by a guy named Andrew Wilkow. What separates Wilkow from the rest of the crazy-come-latlies out there in conservative radioland is his belief that he's, well, a punk.

I'm not kidding.

Both Wilkow and his producer, an at one time faux-hawk-sporting kid named Nick Rizzuto, have gotten it through their heads that they're the personification of the right's new school -- and that the new school they represent also happens to be the logical next step in the evolution of punk. They've even started a website called "Conservative Punk." If this sounds fucking laughable, believe me -- it is. Do yourself a favor and don't think too hard about trying to fit the square peg of punk rock culture into the round hole of unabashed capitalism and conservatism; I tried for awhile and it only made my head hurt. Jello Biafra and Henry Rollins are turning over in their graves at this ridiculous conceit and they're not even dead yet. You almost have to give credit to the right's lack of shame when it comes to attempting to co-opt some of the better trends of the left while forcibly trading off its own misdeeds, clumsily trying to shove them under the banner of its enemy and hoping that no one notices how full of shit the whole notion is (Hitler was a leftist, racism is a liberal ideal, etc.).

Needless to say, neither Andrew Wilkow nor his remora, Nick Rizzuto, is a punk. To twist a somewhat legendary phrase: Boys, I grew up with punks. I was good friends with punks. I was a punk (and according to some, still am). You're no fucking punks.

The reality is that, after taking a quick glance at his website, Wilkow looks like he could be just about any other right-wing talking head. This is especially amusing when you consider the fact that he is actually quite a bit younger than the usual suspects and yet still looks like your basic perpetually middle-aged white guy who hasn't been blown since college. I guess that's what being Sean Hannity's hand-picked protege does to you. (Now's a good time to once again remind you that a guy who counts his introduction to Hannity among the greatest moments in his life also considers himself an up-the-establishment standard bearer of punk rock's new blood. You've gotta be fucking kidding me.)

All very easy shots at Wilkow and his show aside, though, I have to admit that while listening to him for a few minutes the other day, he made a surprisingly good point -- one that I sort of made here earlier in the week. I guess we're both on the same "Punk Rock Manifesto Weekly" mailing list.

The Wilkow rant in question had to do with the tendency of liberals to seemingly revel in martyrdom and self-sabotage -- their propensity to almost embrace their roles as losers and to be able to snatch defeat from the jaws of even the most assured victory. The crux of his argument was this: The Democrats have near-complete control of the government right now -- from the White House to the Hill. Legislation-wise, they can accomplish practically anything they set out to, and yet they're somehow content to bitch, moan and blame Republicans for standing in the way of progress when in reality no one's completely blocking their path. Worse than all of that, and this is something Wilkow didn't broach but I will: Liberals can't help fighting amongst themselves. It's as if it's ingrained in their DNA to never completely agree on anything. And we've all seen how well that strategy works when it comes to pushing through an agenda or, you know, winning elections.

A couple of days ago I published a piece decrying the Democrats for not being willing to take off the gloves and get their hands a little dirty when it comes to battling the Republican noise machine trying to thwart them at every turn. My point was that there won't be much solace in being able to say, "Well, at least we stuck to the ideals that make us better than the GOP automatons," four years from now if nothing got done and a Republican president is back in office. I'm not saying that there can't and won't be disagreement and dissent; I'm saying that in order to get the job done and give Barack Obama the clout he needs to move his agenda forward by leaps and bounds, there has to be, to a large extent, a united front to face the consistently united front staring you down from the other side of the aisle. To paraphrase The Godfather, as far as outsiders are concerned, you never take sides against the family.

Sure this is slightly robotic and seems to stand against everything left-wing America stands for, but guess what? It fucking wins.

Sometimes you've gotta look at the big picture -- and if there's anyone who can't seem to do that because they're too busy picking every little thing apart just to prove how intellectual, analytical and multi-faceted they are, it's liberals.


Case in point: today's New York Times editorial by Paul Krugman.

First of all, let me state unequivocally that Krugman's a genius; he's one of the smartest people around, and his views are always worth listening to. Let me also make it clear that I'm not suggesting that any side of the political spectrum let its leaders get away with anything and everything. The good of the nation should, for all intents and purposes, trump the good of the party. My argument is that the battle lines are so clearly drawn these days, the alternative for either party is so far removed from its own desired reality for the country, that each side has to be willing to accept that a big picture victory, even a partial one, is infinitely better than a complete loss. The Republicans realize this; the Democrats seem not to. Krugman's editorial, which takes President Obama to task for supposedly betraying the progressive base that helped put him in office, is a perfect example of the self-defeating splinter cell tendency of left-wing politics. Yes, Barack Obama seems to have slipped comfortably into a more middle-of-the-road stance than much of the left-leaning electorate would've liked, but make no mistake: a New York Times editorial from one of the leading liberal voices in America declaring that Obama has lost the support of progressives and now has to earn it back accomplishes nothing aside from doing the job of Republican strategists for them.

An editorial like Krugman's is every conservative's wet dream -- because those on the right know that any well-publicized dissension within the Democratic ranks makes Obama look weak and proves their point to those on the fence: that even when the Democrats have what they need to run the government their way, they can't make it happen. They can't seal the deal, despite having everything on their side.

As Wilkow said, they're born losers.

Right about now, the Democrats need to take a hint from a recent song by Green Day: Know Your Enemy. At the very least, know who he is.

Of course, Green Day actually have something in common with Andrew Wilkow: They're not real punks either.

Fighting Words

There's been quite a bit of controversy throughout the liberal blogosphere pegged off a couple of comments made recently by Rolling Stone columnist and avowed prick Matt Taibbi. As a writer Taibbi's always had strong opinions, and despite being regularly left-leaning, he's never shied away from taking those who typically embrace him to task when he thinks their adherence to stereotypical dogma amounts to shooting themselves in the foot. This is one of the qualities I've always admired in him: He's an honest-to-God individual and doesn't really give a crap what either side of the aisle thinks of him; he seems to revel in pissing down the back of everyone.

The comments that have some of the usual suspects on the left in such a tizzy come from Taibbi's blog (which as far as I'm concerned is required reading) and have to do with the current battle over health care reform. At first glance, they seem to defend the tactics of the Bush Administration.

The most recent:

"I’ll say this for George Bush: you’d never have caught him frantically negotiating against himself to take the meat out of a signature legislative initiative just because his approval ratings had a bad summer. Can you imagine Bush and Karl Rove allowing themselves to be paraded through Washington on a leash by some dimwit Republican Senator of a state with six people in it the way the Obama White House this summer is allowing Max Baucus (favorite son of the mighty state of Montana) to frog-march them to a one-term presidency?"

Then there's this one (posted here last week):

"Make no mistake, this has nothing to do with Max Baucus, Ben Nelson, or anyone else. If the Obama administration wanted to pass a real health care bill, they would do what George Bush and Tom DeLay did in the first six-odd years of this decade whenever they wanted to pass some nightmare piece of legislation (ie the Prescription Drug Bill or CAFTA): they would take the recalcitrant legislators blocking their path into a back room at the Capitol, and beat them with rubber hoses until they changed their minds."

It goes without saying that to think Taibbi is suggesting that the Bush White House had its merits is to miss the point completely. What he's expressing, rightfully and angrily, is frustration.

For eight years we watched George W. Bush and his band of corrupt cronies get away, almost literally, with murder. When the GOP held absolute control over every arm of the government, it abused that authority thoroughly -- not only cutting out but publicly belittling the political minority that it knew didn't have the numbers to make a successful stand against it. The Republicans truly were the Evil Empire in Washington, DC; they treated the Democrats as a non-entity, annoying gnats to be swatted away with the wave of a fat, sweaty hand. Here's the thing, though: Like it or not, agree with their sickening platform or disagree, the Republicans got things done. They got things done because they did what they always do: get behind a person or simply a set of obscene and ridiculous talking points and stay there. True, if you were on the other side during this dark period in our nation's history, you likely shouted to the heavens about how unfair the whole thing was -- how unconscionable repugnant turds like, say, Jim Sensenbrenner were for literally standing up and shutting off the lights and walking out of the room while their Democratic counterparts were trying to speak on the Hill. You no doubt despised the special brand of GOP thuggery.

Once again, though -- these tactics, as deplorable and antithetical to the spirit of the American political system as they were, pushed the Republican agenda through with unsurprising ease.

It's not right, but it worked -- in the sense that it accomplished what it set out to.

And to this day, there have been no negative, lasting repercussions for those who chose to undertake this course. Bitch all you want, these assholes are still walking around free -- and they will be from now until they die fat and happy on a set of 1,000 thread count sheets somewhere. George W. Bush is already preparing his memoirs; Dick Cheney isn't up against a wall behind the Hague; Tom DeLay's on Dancing with the Stars for fuck's sake. They got away with it.

And now that the tables are turned and the other side has near-complete control of the White House and the Hill, what do we get?

We get spineless waffling, pathetic half-measures, a supposed push for bipartisanship in deference to a group that giddily trampled its political opponents underfoot for nearly a decade and have no compunction about continuing to, despite the fact that it's in no position whatsoever to exert such force -- not anymore.

And that's what Taibbi's getting at. His comments pose an interesting question: Is it better to be able to say that you were completely "fair," or that you got things done? This becomes especially thorny when you consider that, despite all your attempts at being obliging and conciliatory, the other side isn't really interested in bipartisanship. The Republicans are only pretending to give a shit about fairness; the reality is that they'll never bend to the will of the Democrats -- they'll block Obama at every turn and by any means necessary. Try to appease them all you want, it'll get you nowhere.

By now, the Democrats should've realized this and should be rolling over the GOP obfuscation, misdirection and conspiracy machine with a tank. They have the power and the numbers, and yet they continue to behave as if the other side would show them the same courtesy were the roles reversed -- as if the last eight years never happened.

It's time to lay down the gauntlet and not fight back -- since the Democrats should in no way be on the defensive right now -- but fight.

This is what Taibbi's getting at, and he's 100% right.

Being able to say that at least you played fair will be little consolation four years from now when nothing's been accomplished and a Republican president is back in office.

Long Hard Road Out of Heaven

As you know, it's incredibly rare that I crib someone else's published piece wholesale and reprint it here. It has to be something I wish I'd written myself, something that makes a point I think needs to be heard far and wide, or both. Kathleen Parker -- the conservative columnist who may have provided the Cronkite-saying-Vietnam-can't-be-won moment during the election when she admitted that Sarah Palin was unqualified to be vice president -- is once again taking a ballsy stand against the conventional wisdom of her party for the sake of saving her party. Her assertion, and one that rings 100% true, is that "God" is killing the GOP.

"Giving Up on God" by Kathleen Parker (The Washington Post/11.19.08)

As Republicans sort out the reasons for their defeat, they likely will overlook or dismiss the gorilla in the pulpit.

Three little letters, great big problem: G-O-D.

I'm bathing in holy water as I type.

To be more specific, the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn't soon cometh.

Simply put: Armband religion is killing the Republican Party. And, the truth -- as long as we're setting ourselves free -- is that if one were to eavesdrop on private conversations among the party intelligentsia, one would hear precisely that.

The choir has become absurdly off-key, and many Republicans know it.

But they need those votes!

So it has been for the Grand Old Party since the 1980s or so, as it has become increasingly beholden to an element that used to be relegated to wooden crates on street corners.

Short break as writer ties blindfold and smokes her last cigarette.

Which is to say, the GOP has surrendered its high ground to its lowest brows. In the process, the party has alienated its non-base constituents, including other people of faith (those who prefer a more private approach to worship), as well as secularists and conservative-leaning Democrats who otherwise might be tempted to cross the aisle.

Here's the deal, 'pubbies: Howard Dean was right.

It isn't that culture doesn't matter. It does. But preaching to the choir produces no converts. And shifting demographics suggest that the Republican Party -- and conservatism with it -- eventually will die out unless religion is returned to the privacy of one's heart where it belongs.

Religious conservatives become defensive at any suggestion that they've had something to do with the GOP's erosion. And, though the recent Democratic sweep can be attributed in large part to a referendum on Bush and the failing economy, three long-term trends identified by Emory University's Alan Abramowitz have been devastating to the Republican Party: increasing racial diversity, declining marriage rates and changes in religious beliefs.

Suffice it to say, the Republican Party is largely comprised of white, married Christians. Anyone watching the two conventions last summer can't have missed the stark differences: One party was brimming with energy, youth and diversity; the other felt like an annual Depends sales meeting.

With the exception of Miss Alaska, of course.

Even Sarah Palin has blamed Bush policies for the GOP loss. She's not entirely wrong, but she's also part of the problem. Her recent conjecture about whether to run for president in 2012 (does anyone really doubt she will?) speaks for itself:

"I'm like, okay, God, if there is an open door for me somewhere, this is what I always pray, I'm like, don't let me miss the open door. Show me where the open door is.... And if there is an open door in (20)12 or four years later, and if it's something that is going to be good for my family, for my state, for my nation, an opportunity for me, then I'll plow through that door."

Let's do pray that God shows Alaska's governor the door.

Meanwhile, it isn't necessary to evict the Creator from the public square, surrender Judeo-Christian values or diminish the value of faith in America. Belief in something greater than oneself has much to recommend it, including most of the world's architectural treasures, our universities and even our founding documents.

But, like it or not, we are a diverse nation, no longer predominantly white and Christian. The change Barack Obama promised has already occurred, which is why he won.

Among Jewish voters, 78 percent went for Obama. Sixty-six percent of under-30 voters did likewise. Forty-five percent of voters ages 18-29 are Democrats compared to just 26 percent Republican; in 2000, party affiliation was split almost evenly.

The young will get older, of course. Most eventually will marry, and some will become their parents. But nonwhites won't get whiter. And the nonreligious won't get religion through external conversion. It doesn't work that way.

Given those facts, the future of the GOP looks dim and dimmer if it stays the present course. Either the Republican Party needs a new base -- or the nation may need a new party.

Related:

DXM: He Blinded Me Without Science/8.12.08

DXM: The Sectarian Candidate/12.6.07

DXM: WWJD? WTF?/11.29.07

DXM: Faith No More/6.8.07

The Worship of Jackals by Jackasses

This was never intended to be a political blog.

For almost two-and-a-half years, I took a great deal of pride in the misanthropic tone of the stuff I cranked out here, which, as far as politics was concerned, meant that I never really got behind much of anyone but instead assumed that one opportunistic crook was as good as another. This, despite the fact that I'd come to loathe the special brand of Bush-era evil and stupidity that had been allowed to bring not simply the country but the world to the brink of catastrophe.

But then along came Barack Obama: an inspirational leader in whom I truly had faith and who reminded me that some things are important enough to rise above trite ridicule for the sake of a cheap laugh or two. Some things matter.

And then came Sarah Palin: the most inexperienced and intellectually incurious candidate for a major office that I've seen in my lifetime -- an election year parlor trick who would reveal herself to be more of a punchline than a serious contender for the second highest position in the free world. She was an insult to America's intelligence and someone who stood for everything that I was against. Worst of all, she proved that John McCain, the oft-lauded war hero who claimed to put "country first," was willing to, instead, put the country in danger if it meant he could win the White House.

And so I got pissed, and I broke my rule about not sticking to one subject consistently -- to say nothing of my rule about not backing anyone in particular and treating just about everyone with the same level of snotty disdain.

I did it because believe in Barack Obama and Joe Biden.

And I'm terrified of -- and furious at -- John McCain and Sarah Palin.

So, on the day before Election Day, let me once again lay out the arguments that I and a lot of the readers here have made for why Obama should be our next president and McCain and Palin should be sent home.

It's a sort of "Best Of" from the past three months of whirlwind politics.

DXM: The Speed of Lies/8.28.08

DXM: Choose Wisely/9.4.08

DXM: Both Ends Against the Middle/9.11.08

DXM: Stupid Does as Stupid Is/9.12.08

DXM: It's the Thought that Counts/9.28.08

DXM: Six of Dumb, Half Dozen of Dumber/10.2.08

DXM: Vice Work If You Can Get It/10.3.08

DXM: His Own Worst Enemy/10.16.08

DXM: The Meta-Metamorphosis of Sarah Palin/10.24.08

Everything to Lose

David Frum is a former speechwriter for George W. Bush, an avowed neo-con, and an all-around Republican heavyweight (albeit a hugely wussified one) -- and he's just written the most daunting, defeatist article to come out yet on the GOP's hopes at the polls eight days from now.

"There are many ways to lose a presidential election. John McCain is losing in a way that threatens to take the entire Republican Party down with him.

I could pile up the poll numbers here, but frankly . . . it's too depressing. You have to go back to the Watergate era to see numbers quite so horrible for the GOP.

In these last days before the vote, Republicans need to face some strategic realities. Our resources are limited, and our message is failing. We cannot fight on all fronts. We are cannibalizing races that we must win and probably can win in order to help a national campaign that is almost certainly lost. In these final 10 days, our goal should be: senators first."

While this is shocking in its candor, what Frum has to say about the possibility of a Democrat-controlled executive and legislative branch is shocking for another reason: its hypocrisy.

"The political culture of the Democratic Party has changed over the past decade. There's a fierce new anger among many liberal Democrats, a more militant style and an angry intolerance of dissent and criticism. This is the culture of the left-wing blogosphere and MSNBC's evening line-up -- and soon, it will be the culture of important political institutions in Washington. Unchecked, this angry new wing of the Democratic Party will seek to stifle opposition by changing the rules of the political game. Some will want to silence conservative talk radio by tightening regulation of the airwaves via the misleadingly named "fairness doctrine"; others may seek to police the activities of right-leaning think tanks by a stricter interpretation of what is tax-deductible and what is not."

I would hope that Frum was forced to stifle a chuckle as he typed these words, since it's positively laughable that an apostle of the neo-con gospel could actually claim the high ground when it comes to the enforcement of petty grudges and the suppression of opposition. I have to assume he's hoping that everyone forgets that it was the GOP who, at various points over the past several years, attempted to disqualify the votes of many underprivileged, redistricted areas to create a Republican majority, invoked executive privilege to keep its own dirty secrets, and generally kept the Democratic minority securely underfoot -- laughing its ass off while doing it.

While waging an angry vendetta against those who gleefully oppressed them for so long would be a terrible idea for the Democrats should they take a good portion of the government on November 4th, their outrage would certainly be understandable given the behavior the Republicans exhibited when they had the unequivocal majority.

For the right to not realize this -- or worse, to play the victim -- is ridiculous.

The Washington Post: "Sorry, Senator. Let's Salvage What We Can." by David Frum/10.26.08

Part of the Problem

I continued to work in television news long after coming to the conclusion that the industry was badly broken -- I admit that. But I didn't enter into it believing that it was a colossal mess, otherwise, why would I have bothered? I eventually became frustrated with the direction TV news had taken, but I never thought the medium as a whole should be done away with.

The same can't be said for many of today's Republicans; for the life of me I'll never understand how they manage to sell the public on the idea that they have a starring role in a production they utterly despise as a matter of principle. Worse than Ivy League oligarchs like George Bush and Grover Norquist casting themselves as heroes of the common man are class-act bullshit artists like John Boehner and Roy Blunt, who play along and continue to invoke the supposedly hallowed legacy of Ronald Reagan by asserting that government in and of itself is a bad thing. These self-loathing lawmakers claim to despise our government -- not simply the way it operates but, really, its very existence -- and yet they strive to be elected and re-elected to positions within it.

A good rule of thumb: When you're trying to make a business work, you don't hire employees who hate what it is that you do and believe that the less of it there is, the better.

Is it any wonder why things are so screwed up?

Read on:

(The Huffington Post: "Does McCain Still Agree with Reagan that Government is the Problem?" by Arianna Huffington/9.29.08)

Money Changes Everything

(Reuters: Shifting Positions: Obama Takes Lead in National Poll/9.17.08)

Both Ends Against the Middle

“To read the papers and to listen to the news, one would think the country is in terrible trouble. You do not get that impression when you travel the back roads. The small towns do care about their country and wish it well.”

-- Charles Kuralt

"You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay. You know... morons."

-- Blazing Saddles

A few years ago, my wife and I, along with a close friend of ours, set out to do something we'd each dreamed about since we were in our late teens: We packed up a vehicle, grabbed a map, and hit the road with no clear plan in mind other than beginning at one ocean and ending at another. For almost a full month, we satisfied our Kerouacian wanderlust along the vast highways and off the beaten paths that run like veins and arteries through the heartland between Miami and Los Angeles. We spent obliterated nights crawling from one dive bar to another in New Orleans and Memphis; toured Graceland and marveled at every possible permutation of Elvis memorabilia available at every gas station a thousand miles in either direction; ate a steak the size of a regulation first base bag at the Big Texan Ranch in Amarillo; stood in awe at the edge of the Grand Canyon and stared silently across the seemingly endless void of White Sands; stumbled upon a group of Navajo children dancing at sunset just outside the Petrified Forest in Arizona; lost our asses in Vegas and partied like rock royalty at the Standard in L.A.; began the 4th of July at the annual UFO Festival in Roswell, New Mexico and ended it at something called the "Firecracker Fandango" in Odessa, Texas.

We bought a souvenir coconut head in Okahumpka, Florida.

To say that our little cross-country expedition changed me fundamentally would be the grossest of understatements; the fact is that the things we saw, the people we met, and the ground-level view of the country I'd lived in since birth but had never truly come to know opened my eyes and allowed me to better understand what it means to be an American -- the pride that should unequivocally go hand-in-hand with being able to call yourself one. To this day, I consider the entire adventure to be one of the most profound and cathartic experiences of my life.

I wouldn't trade it for anything.

And one of the main reasons why is that it allowed me -- a guy who'd been raised in Miami and had chosen to live in one big city after another as he grew into adulthood -- to fully appreciate the singular and simple beauty of the small town.

While the heavily populated areas along our route provided plenty of entertainment, it was the barely-there blips on the map that seemed to stay with me. The quiet pull of places like Erick, Oklahoma and Holbrook, Arizona was undeniable and somehow resonated inside my head long after we'd moved on; these little towns, most of them sleepy pockets of stunted civilization marked by not much more than a water tower, left me feeling as if I were missing out on something indescribable by living in a metropolis; something unspoiled; something that spoke directly to a secret desire of mine -- to exist in perpetual slow-motion -- in way that was, for lack of a better word, magical.


I ended our journey believing that there was wonder in small town life.

I realize that my romanticism of the rural milieu probably stems at least slightly from the grass always seeming greener on the other side of the cow pasture (or these days, the Wal Mart). Whether I could fully succumb to the charms of small town living and not feel stifled by the lack of unadulterated crazy in my day-to-day existence, who can tell. But I know better than to automatically assume that anyone who does choose to call the sprawling American outland home is an uneducated rube.

I'm not sure the same can be said for the people running the John McCain campaign right now.

On the contrary -- they must think that small town America is overflowing with idiots.

That's the only explanation I can come up with as to why they're lying to it, pretending to give a damn about it and, worst of all, exploiting it: its people; its preponderance of faith, not all of which demands to be brandished like a weapon; its sense of patriotism.

A long list of clever opportunists, both Republican and Democrat, seized on the idea of using the little guy as the main prop in a carefully stagecrafted piece of bullshit political theater long before McCain took up the mantle -- but I'm not sure anyone's narrowed the culture war down specifically to a battle between small town and big city with the kind of assurance that he and his people have this election. They've raised not simply pitting the classes against each other but actually undermining the infrastructure of this country to an art form.

And they've done it by trumpeting a single dubious claim over and over: "Our vice presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, is from a small town and can therefore speak for every American in every rural area across the country; her God, guns, and guts belief system, along with her folksy "hockey mom" style, is not just what this nation needs, it is this nation -- far more than any of those overeducated elitists in the big coastal cities."

To say that this is presumptuous, if not flat-out ballsy-as-hell considering that it excludes and even demonizes a substantial portion of the country, would be like saying that John McCain isn't a kid anymore. What's worse, though, is just who the architects of this strategy are -- the campaign coordinators drawing up the battle plans centered around ingratiating their candidates to Little Town, USA.

They're basically K-Street lobbyists -- Washington neo-aristocracy.

They're Beltway-savvy future oligarchs using their Ivy League educations to cynically craft talking points written in faux-yokelese proclaiming the unassailable goodness of small town life.

They're the furthest fucking thing from the people they're pretending to give a crap about -- real elitists using the unwashed masses as pawns in a war against phantom elitists.


While no one would deny that the Democrats can be staggeringly adept at populist political manipulation, I've yet to see their own ability to divide and conquer through misdirection and outright bullshit come close to matching the GOP's. And this particular gambit -- claiming to hold the monopoly on "small town values" -- reaches new heights of lowness. It does it, first and foremost, by way of an underlying subtext with slyly racist implications. Even the densest of far-right acolytes understands that when he or she follows the talking points and parrots the virtues of rural tradition, there's another half of the equation that's left unsaid: that the opposite set of American values -- those of the country's "urban" areas, if you get my drift -- just don't measure up. Sure, when that white woman in the funny hat at the Republican National Convention last week spoke so highly of small town mores she meant "in comparison to those of the cosmopolitan 'elitists'"; but make no mistake, she was also subtly implying: "in comparison to those, you know, them -- Obama's people."

Back in 1992, the GOP attempted the same kind of crafty, nudge-nudge wink-wink sloganeering by appropriating the term "family values," blasting it as a suburban battle cry, and co-opting the meaning behind it as the exclusive property of the Republican party. George Bush and Dan Quayle couldn't make a public appearance without dropping the phrase at least three or four times, in tones ranging from scolding to triumphal. The problem, of course, is that even though the tactic worked as it was intended to -- as a means of energizing the conservative religious base -- it couldn't be recycled for the current Republican efforts; the unborn baby in Bristol Palin's belly pretty much shot that possibility all to hell. It's tough to claim that you're the party of old-fashioned family values when your vice presidential candidate's unmarried teenage daughter is pregnant by the local bad boy. That would require a level of hypocritical chutzpah even the Republicans don't possess.

So instead, they fashioned a similar call to arms around that vice presidential candidate's most notable characteristic (besides having a pregnant teen daughter): her small town background.

In the alternate universe that a phalanx of GOP operatives have conjured out of thin air in some Georgetown boardroom, Sarah Palin's small town charm and backwoods resourcefulness -- to say nothing of her "cute little filly" looks -- are all the qualifications she needs to succeed on the world stage and potentially take control of the most powerful nation to ever exist. She's been smartly packaged and sold to the common folk as one of their own -- a celebrity among those who claim to despise celebrities. What's more, it's not just Sarah Palin but what she supposedly represents that's cast as the cure for this country's ills. Like that laughably stupid grass roots push back in 1994 to "Elect Forrest Gump " -- only with a far more malevolent undertone -- voters are being asked to buy into the idea that provincial simpletonism, when thrust into the right situation by nothing more than circumstance, will not just prevail but will do so honorably. And the voters specifically being manipulated into swallowing this nonsense are those who supposedly share a special kinship with Palin that's based on nothing more than her having spent most of her life outside an urban center.

But as I've mentioned before, this election isn't about small town and big city; it never was -- regardless of what the GOP mouthpieces are encouraging you to believe. Not all who live in a small town are the same. They may have plenty of common social and cultural touchstones, just as those who call any particular place home do; however, to say that Sarah Palin and the Republican party is the one true voice of rural America is insulting -- especially when this claim is little more than a political parlor trick designed to get a guy elected. Besides, pitting one half of this country against the other based solely on where each happens to live isn't politics at all -- it's civil war. And it's wrong.

I live in the largest metropolis in America, and to assume that I know what every one of my eight-million neighbors is thinking would be ridiculous and presumptuous. I can't speak for them.

I've traveled to dozens of small towns across America, and I wouldn't dare try to speak for the residents of those places either.

And neither should John McCain.

And Now, an Open Letter to Barack Obama from Chez's Evil Twin, Garth

Look -- enough is enough.

It's time to take a stand.

It's time to get pissed.

I'm not talking about calling-McCain-and-Palin-out-on-just-being-more-of-the-same pissed; I'm talking "You two liars need to shut the fuck up before I put a boot in your ass," pissed. Trust me, a little steely-gazed righteous fury is what's needed right about now -- especially after that new ad the McCain camp just splashed all over TV that basically calls you a pedophile (and make no mistake, that's exactly what it's doing).

The ad, as you already know, bellows that you've done nothing for education other than pen legislation designed to provide "comprehensive sex education" to kindergartners (while showing an image of you appearing to leer lasciviously at children). The first part of that claim in and of itself is bullshit, but it's the second part that's insulting and disgusting in a way that's almost unfathomable -- even for the Republicans. We all know the truth: that the legislation they're talking about is actually an anti-sexual predator measure aimed at making sure kids can recognize when someone's trying to take advantage of them. Well, wait, I take that back. We don't all know this -- and that's the problem. You need to get in front of a fucking camera, or a hundred for that matter, and tell the nation what this is really all about -- then call McCain to the carpet for employing a tactic so low, so despicable that it actually pre-dates that reprehensible turd Karl Rove and is more a throwback to the Willie Horton "controversy" of 1988. You remember how that turned out for Michael Dukakis, right? Don't hear much about him anymore, do you?

What's worse, the Willie Horton ad was racist as hell and was meant to make it look like pussy-liberal Mikey was soft on crime and that some poor white woman had to pay for it by being raped at the hand of a big, dangerous black man. OOGA-BOOGA! SCARY BLACK PEOPLE! Meanwhile, you actually are a black man, so making you look like some beady-eyed Mandingo out to defile the little children of White Suburban America should be easy. In fact it was; the McCain camp just did it. And it's gonna stick too -- unless you get out there and throw down the gauntlet on this kind of crap.

For fuck's sake -- McCain and his retarded Snow Bunny lie about everything in their records -- seriously, just about everything -- and nobody says a word. Many in the press, particularly, stand there with their collective thumb up their collective ass. That's bad enough, but now they're lying about your record, and using soft racism to drive the point home with their lily-livered white base good and hard.

That cannot stand.

So it's time for you to fight back and take no goddamned prisoners. Don't worry that you may be perceived by some as being the "Angry Black Man." Those voters are going to think that anyway; you may have to write them off. But the vast majority of the country will watch, listen and be riveted by your strength and resolve if you point your finger at those responsible for this garbage and let them know that you won't let them get away with it. Period. Not with so much at stake. What you need to do now is fire back hard, stressing that you've got two daughters of your own and that you want to see them protected from criminals, and that you're willing to take whatever steps are necessary to keep them safe -- both through tough law enforcement and, yes, education. Remind everyone of what you are: an angry parent who was just accused of being some sort of pedophile by a gutless old man. If you don't make this clear to voters -- if you don't stand up to the bullshit and put McCain's shameful, dishonorable and unethical campaign in its place (and you know you've got both the balls and the oratory skills to do it oh-so-well) -- you will lose this election.

And God help us all if you do.

Please Mr. Obama, fight back.

Fight back hard and fight back now.

The future of our country depends on it.