The purity patrol thinks that they have all the answers. The purity patrol thinks that if only we would elect Cindy Sheehan to Congress, then all our problems would be solved and our elected officials would bow down before the trumpets of Jericho. Never mind that in order to oppose rulebreaking by our elected officials, they break the rules of this site themselves. Never mind that Cindy Sheehan would abolish the IRS and the Federal Reserve, which makes all of her positions on the issues little more than pipe dreams.
First of all, the purity patrol thinks that rules don't apply to them. They apply to everyone else -- elected officials, for instance. But the rules of this site that state that we are not to promote non-Democrats here somehow don't apply to them. Now, how is that supposed to be any different than the Republicans whom they claim not to like? Some of the most vile homophobic people around are secretly gay themselves. So, if you are really so concerned about our elected officials following the rules, then follow the rules yourself. Don't break the rules of this site, promote non-Democratic candidates, and expect to get people to listen to you.
We are all disappointed about how Nancy Pelosi handled the opposition to the war. But Cindy Sheehan simply brings a destructive ideology of another kind -- the same sort of destructive ideology that led to the failed policies of the Hoover administration. She would abolish the IRS and the Federal Reserve -- two inconvenient facts that somehow seem to escape the purity police.
The problem with the whole line of reasoning of the purity police is that their cultic devotion to a backstabber and an anti-tax extremist is just as destructive as the cultic devotion of the George Bush Right or Wrong crowd. They can't be reasoned with -- nothing Cindy Sheehan ever does can't be explained away. Or, they say that it's irrelevant because she is against the war and Pelosi is not. Big fucking deal -- there are Nazi hate groups who oppose Bush's war as well. Would the purity police say the same thing about a Neonazi who is running against her?
And on top of that, Cindy Sheehan, by their own admission, can't relate to the people of the district whom she is trying to represent. How will she try to make the lives of the people in her district better? How will she help the people she would represent pay the bills, get good jobs, and make ends meet? How will she address the problems with the schools? Running for office is not a purity contest -- I know it is not as glamorous, but you need to understand roads and bridges before you go running for office.
Cindy Sheehan backstabbed us -- she used us to catapult herself into fame, and then she stabbed us in the back when she had no more use for us. And what's more, she conveniently omits her support for the abolition of the IRS and the Federal Reserve on her website. That raises another question -- why should we believe her when she says she is against the war, when she has already stabbed us in the back?
There is a right way and a wrong way to get rid of Nancy Pelosi. The right way is to find someone who lives and works in the district who would do a better job than she would, and recruit that individual to primary her in 2010. The wrong way is to trade off one sort of enabling for another form. And if you think that Grover Norquist, Mike Huckabee, Ron Paul, and Pat Buchanan won't try and capitalize on Cindy Sheehan's anti-tax extremism, you are kidding yourself. This is the sort of thing they do all the time.
And anti-tax extremism kills. Cindy Sheehan's anti-tax extremism led to the misery and suffering of millions of people in this country, broke families and communities, destroyed relationships, and nearly brought this country down to its knees. That is why we got the New Deal in the first place. Cindy Sheehan's anti-tax extremism directly led to Katrina and I-35. So, for the purity police to be claiming that Pelosi is all about death, suck on that.
The purity police can claim that this is all about trying to elect better Democrats -- that is not what the administration would say in this case. The administrators would not allow Sheehan to advocate against a Democrat on this site. So, it's already been settled. If you want to support Cindy Sheehan, do it somewhere else. This is not the place to go promoting non-Democratic alternatives. People may complain to me about "free speech," but what about Kos' free speech? What about his free speech right to control the content of this site? If you run a business for long enough, you will learn that there are certain people who you simply don't want to represent your company. And since this is a site to elect Democrats, there are certain viewpoints that Kos does not want to be associated with because they detract from the purposes of this site. And it is not his job to enforce the rules because there are too many diaries and comments to monitor; that is the job of the users of this site; so spare me your whines about "hall monitors."