I'm sorry I missed out on the big atheist diary of late. Personal demons are gnashing their teeth in my life. I tried to write two diaries that came out very confusing, but the basic parallel to our country right now is this:
Some people believe what they want to believe, and that's how they find peace. Religion is built on believing what you want even in the face of any evidence, and that is why it causes so much damage when Religion finds a home in politics.
Of course if what they believe is not the truth, but they still cling to it so they can find peace, you've got a choice to make. Do you stand for the truth, the facts, and the principle, or do you make peace with someone even if it takes capitulation about what is the real answer.
I think we're watching the end of this country, because we've finally met a group of people who don't care what the truth is, they are sinking their anchor on their own beliefs, and the truth will be beat to fit, paint to match and they don't care about the consequences.
Can we fight that?
(be warned, I ramble. If you're in a hurry, move on already and save me the bitching about all the time you might waste)
Glenn Beck actually came out and said it not long ago - something like "Say what you believe! Stand up for it! Even if it's wrong!"
Where the hell do you go from there?
My problem with religion is that it starts with a proposition, "All Christians are good people", and sets out to make all the evidence fit that claim. And if the evidence doesn't match, well then see Rule #1, and either excuse it away by saying "that's not one of us", or by saying "there was a reason."
I spend a lot of time contemplating the word "United". Our founders put enough importance on that word that they put it at the front of the very name of our country: "The United States of America".
And yet when I try to absorb what is being said by my family, my neighbors, the RW media, they've declared that "their" country is being ruined, and they're going to take it "back".
Think about that. There is a political party right now who feels that they not only have the right, not only have the capacity, but have the obligation to take the country "back" from Democrats.
When Republicans were in control, they insisted that it was the patriotic duty of every American to put aside their political leanings and get behind their president. We were at war, remember?
Now that they have lost the election, they feel that the only patriotic thing to do is stand up against the Democratic party which won the election.
Am I the only one who sees that Republicans are not Democrats because they clearly only believe in democracy as means to an end?
Democracy only works when it's citizens not only cherish their "freedom" and their "liberty", but when all citizens honor the system that provides that freedom and liberty even when it does not deliver the outcome they personally may have wanted.
Republicans have a different set of rules for themselves, that always renders them both victims and patriots.
Republicans cry that judges "legislate from the bench"; failing to acknowledge that the way the system is supposed to work is that if the Supreme Court (or any lower court) sets a precedent, overturns a law, or declares it unconstitutional, then the path to a resolution is for congress to pass a law that is capable of sustaining judicial review.
If Congress cannot gather the votes to pass a law that will survive judicial review, it still means the system worked. It does not mean that there is some fault.
But not if you're a Republican. If the decisions don't go the way they would hope, then they claim the system isn't working, and they set out to prove the machine is broken.
Clearly, Republicans do not respect the Constitution of the United States or the democratic system as they stand, but only when both work in their favor.
Our system of government, with it's "checks and balances" is like a great big game of "Rock, Paper, Scissors": the Judicial, Executive, and Legislative branches are never alone capable at any time of being bigger than the other two; and any time that happens, those other two can exercise their power to bring the balance back to level again.
But the Republican party actually promoted ideas such as a "Unitary Executive Theory" and their talking heads dreamt of a "permanent Republican majority". Well, if the Executive is unitary, it comes at the expense of balance of powers; and if there is ever a permanent majority of any party, is the country still a democracy? If one party always wins, and re-writes all the laws and policies to the exclusion of the rest, have we then become a totalitarian dictatorship, presumably achieved by less offensive means than a coup or a revolution? Democracy yes, but only as means to an end.
If President Chenebush felt that torture or domestic surveillance or renditions were required to defeat our enemies, the American Way does not mean that a presidential fiat is the way to get it done; the president could have cajoled Congress to change our laws - even amend the Constitution if need be - to accomplish any end that could be agreed upon was needed. But if he could not get the votes, it does not mean that there is something wrong with the country, it means that democracy, and the Constitution, was upheld.
Roe v. Wade is NOT an example of "legislating from the bench", Roe v. Wade is evidence of the LACK of congressional willpower (and by extension of the people they represent) to change the law. That's exactly how the system is supposed to work. To prove that, one only need to think of the illegitimacy of FDR trying to pack the supreme court with Liberal minds, and ask if packing the Supreme court through opportunism of the process over as many years as it takes doesn't accomplish the same thing? We need a balanced court to keep a balanced country.
We have a political party right now - the Republicans - who clearly do not appreciate what President Bush was so arrogantly proud of declaring he had at his back in 2004 - "Political capital". Barack Obama earned 16 times the political capital that Bush did in 2004 (and how do we even measure 2000?), and the Republicans think somehow that the country suffered some kind of setback. (think Bernie Goldberg's 'slobbering love affair', where he argues the media threw the election to Obama)
Republican's clearly only believe in democracy as means to an end - their ends - and if that is not achieved, they feel the country has been betrayed.
Are you really willing to admit what that means?
Take a look at this graphic from the marquis of "Right Wing News", taken from sometime after the Election (obviously)
"Kneecapping Barack Obama at Every Opportunity".
Ya gotta love it when the political opposition is using the language of the Mob to describe their platform goals.
Meanwhile, they crying towels were out for eight years from the same clowns who thought the Left was just making fun of GWB because we were mean-spirited, not because Bush was a genuine moron and a corrupt liar with no conscience and a messiah complex.
When Republicans like Richard Mellon Scaife bankrolled the Arkansas Project to bring down Bill Clinton, and after two years finally got a lie told under oath, Republicans said (as if to spit in Richard Nixon's eye) that the country must know the truth, and a man who lied cannot be leader of the country.
But how many times did George W. Bush or Dick Cheney or anyone in the administration of 2001-2009 lie? Well, as long as it wasn't under oath, then in the mind of a Republican, it's all good. They even got Gonzalez to skirt that little problem when Arlen Specter indignantly objected to requiring Gonzo be sworn in when he testified failed to remember anything he did while AG. And when Scooter Libby got caught in a lie, the cries went up for a pardon (even though he only got a commuted sentence) because Libby's lie was not a conviction of any of the original charges that were presented against him. Well, hey - by that measure, Bill Clinton's lie was also not relevant to any of the things Ken Starr set out to investigate, so does that mean Clinton's impeachment can be overturned?
See? They don't play by the same rules, and we seem to let them.
Democrats now have a real conundrum on our hands: We're trying to claim the higher ground by actually standing on it, which means not taking all the cheap shots that Republicans do.
Meanwhile, the Republicans are taking all the shots they can get away with because they can't stand to lose. By whatever means necessary, the ends justify the means.
Personal story:
When I was in elementary school, they taught the boys greco-roman wrestling in gym class - the kind of wrestling that is legitimate in college and the Olympics, not WWF. And there are indeed "holds" that are barred: headlocks for one. We were told by our gym teacher that anyone caught using a headlock would be forbidden to ever participate again, and we all knew that in a sanctioned tournament it was grounds for forfeit of the whole match.
During the same period of my life, there was this kid who used to beat me up on the way home from school. He was a year older and a grade behind me; so he was both bigger and dumber. For five years this kid beat me up, and I always kept thinking "no headlocks". I was the goodie-two-shoes who even took notes from my teacher home to my mom so the teacher could tell my mom all the bad things I had done. For five years I got beat up by this lug.
And then one day when this bully was staring me down, blocking my way home like he had for years, I finally realized there was no referee to throw me out of the tournament - because this was no tournament. This was my bruised and aching body deciding whether it was going to put up with another round of pummeling for no good reason than this cretin's ego. So when he lunged at me and got me on the ground, I scrambled for all I was worth and got my left arm around his neck. I folded my right forearm over my left wrist and locked down on that bastard's throat for everything I was worth. He was punching me in the head with his free arms, he was kicking and trying to roll over on me, but I was clamped down on his airway. I was going to get hit in the head and kicked anyway, but this time, in thirty seconds he went limp.
So had I been in a tournament, I would have been thrown out and disqualified. But after five years of this bullshit, despite my begging her not to when my mom had called the school, and called his mom (which you all know just made it all so much worse), I learned a life lesson on this day. Once the bastard turned blue and went limp, he didn't come after me ever again.
I went way off the scale, I broke the "rules" - but it was the only thing that worked.
And so.
What is my lesson here?
We - Democrats - are trying to prove we are the better party here by taking the high road. And unlike Republicans, we understand that if one party wants to claim the higher ground, then we actually have to wind up standing on it at some time. That means we can't jump down on the low road with our enemies, even just for a little while. There is no "five second" rule. Republicans claim the high ground (and get away with it in the minds of their followers) simply by bragging about it, and how their belief in Jesus gives them claim to it no matter what they do, and they always reserve the right to sink to the level of their enemies in order to get the job done.
That's what they did with wiretapping, and torture, and renditions. The United States was once demonstrably better than our enemies, and we could point to our history and make a plausible claim our reputation was well deserved because it was well earned. Republicans threw away the United States claim to the higher moral ground by claiming that unless the USA sank to the level of our enemies then we could not defeat them.
Dick Cheney is still digging holes for us on that score as I write this.
So now Democrats have a rotten choice to make - if we want to claim the higher moral ground, we have to make the effort to be standing on it. And that means we can't sink to the level of our enemies, or we're no better than they are.
But we're dealing with a wounded Republican party, and as a political party they may have made the same choice they made for the country in their war mentality: No Holds Barred. So we can play by the rules and still claim our integrity when the battle is over. But...
Well, you know the rest of that sentence. It's a shitty choice; your conscience or your chances - pick one.
To still see that this sick bastard who shot another doctor is being lauded as a just hero by many on the Right - the Christian right, no less - really chills my blood.
What would Jesus do? I'm pretty sure "act as a sniper" was not on the short list. I haven't read the Bible cover to cover, but I would think that after all the people I've met who have wanted me to find Jesus, one of them would have mentioned that one by now.
I'm just wondering if the other team is playing for keeps, and we play for the higher ground, where it ends? Because when there are calls to "kneecap" Obama, when there are still calls that President Obama is not a legitimate president (and those are the people who believed GW Bush was)), when the Republican party has members and voters actively talking of seccession and don't see the twisted irony, we have to realize the Republicans may have already forsaken the rules. Maybe the Party of Lincoln really does think those honored dead actually did die in vain.
I'm one for the high road. But I'm also one for putting an end to getting clobbered by the other kid if it's clear he never gave a shit about the rules in the first place.
I can't make this choice, but I thought I'd burden all of you with the pleasure of contemplating it with me. You see, I wrote this diary already, a few months ago. I was asking you then what we were going to do when the violence escalated; and then I wrote another diary that was largely misinterpreted to explain that Republicans are painting Democrats as Hitler painted Jews. (I'm obviously not arguing that they want to exterminate us; I'm trying to make you see that they want us all painted as people worthy of whatever damage they can exact on us, because we're just rotten to the core.)
I wrote a diary that failed to communicate accurately what I was trying to say; later in a comment I agreed there will be no organized "Tuesday at 3pm" Republican revolt or revolution or riot. But I do believe that we are seeing a wicked trend -
1.) lone wolf lunatics are coming out of the woodwork, and forcing law enforcement to respond. Recall how the RW reacted when Janet Napolitano warned of an increase in extremist violence - they cried it was a government effort to crush them without cause.
2.) as other lone-wolf attacks plague our country, law enforcement will be forced to take more drastic measures.
3.) then the far RW paranoia and bloodlust will use the increase in police/government action as evidence of 'fascist' government oppression, and feed the real calls for a real uprising because they feel the Government is oppressing them.
In the time since I wrote the "kristallnacht" diary, now that some of that lone-wolf violence has broken out and vindicated much of what was in that diary and the Homeland Security report that Napolitano was forced to apologize for, the RW is still decrying any attempt by the federal government to crack down on anything. During the BusCheney years, it was a patriot's duty to obey Bush, but there are now open calls that any action taken by Obama to quell a domestic uprising should/must be ignored. (they just know already which orders Obama would give, don't you?)
Sorry for the long meandering path, I don't do linear thinking very well.
It makes me fearful contemplating the duplicity of the Republican party: they had to know if Clinton was a liar, but they can claim their party has no liars because BusCheney were never called to testify. What was then a call to be a patriot and follow the President because he was your president and you must honor the legitimacy of our democracy, has now become a patriot's call to defy the President because somehow they feel democracy has been betrayed when Obama was elected.
Republicans have taken the gloves off, they make their own rules.
What are we going to do?
We shall not be so deluded as to be "pre-emptive", but we also have to establish that at some point we can agree the Republicans have already thrown the first punch.
I believe there will be a battle that will destroy most of mankind in an apocalyptic self-extermination; precisely because this type of "we know what our enemies are capable of, and we must defeat them at all costs" madness lives and flourishes in the minds of mortal men on both sides. But when an atheist tells you about the end of days, he does it with the knowledge that there will be nobody like Jesus to put it all back together when we burn it all down.
Will Rogers was quoted as saying, "Diplomacy is being able to say, 'nice doggy' until you can find a rock". I'm almost certain that Obama will be lauded for using diplomacy on the world stage to mend the damage caused by the Neocons under Bush; meanwhile on the domestic stage, I'm afraid that diplomacy in the American political arena may get us our asses handed to us.
And I see the self-righteousness of the Right that makes them so eager to fight, and I see the Left struggling to always be diplomatic instead - and at some point, the left may have to pick up a rock.
Ok, sorry. Everybody grab their iPod and cue up "Ramblin Man" by Bob Seger, and I'll do karaoke and accept the title. This is the best I can do in this state of mind.