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You’ll All Pay #34

© Joe Conat 2004

I sometimes despair. I sometimes talk to other “liberals” or “progressives” and, quite frankly, grind my teeth in frustration and despair.

It’s no damn wonder we lost.

Look, election fraud or no, we pussied out in 2004, okay? Just face it. We didn’t fight, we whined. We didn’t argue, we “discussed”. We weren’t strong.

John Kerry would have made a fine president, I’m sure. Maybe even a great one. But we don’t know, and we likely never will. Why? Because he lost. Why did he lose? Because he was so busy being “electable” he didn’t stand up and tell America precisely and firmly just why the hell he should be elected.

And now…now I’m coming back to my previous stance of “I’m a liberal and I can’t stand liberals.”

Check out this article in Salon. MoveOn.org, which organization’s e-mails I constantly receive and skim, held a series of “house parties” across the nation linked by speaker phone and the Internet. Thousands of MoveOn.org’s members attended to get together and, I don’t know…drink friggin’ wine and eat some stinky cheese and whine about how we lost. “Let’s strategize!” they say and get together and…decide that…election reform is their top priority.

*sigh*

I’m all for election reform kids. I still think we must strenuously investigate all these allegations of misconduct and irregularities in the ’04 election. I will cop to a deep, secret hope that they find enough to truly legally challenge the results and oust President Bush. And throw him in jail while they’re at it.

But somehow I get the sinking feeling that groups like MoveOn.org just aren’t the folks who are gonna get it done. Or get anything truly done.

This is not a gloomy “we lost, forget it, I’ma move to Canada and live in a cave” thing. It’s just…

They sing songs. Screw songs! They may be clever, but ultimately it’s no more than political filking. It’s self-congratulatory claptrap. It’s bogus and a waste of time.

From the previously linked article:

“Here’s the short list of ‘top’ issues the group of 15 named: election integrity; dismantling the electoral college; the war in Iraq; foreign policy; developing allies; the environment; education; separation of church and state; the economic crisis/coming stagflation; corporate takeover of the media; the rising theocracy ruling the country; building relationships with our very own ‘red’ family members; and picking a few issues that ‘we can easily sell to voters in the Midwest.’”

“Building relationships with our very own ‘red’ family members”? Why? Look, if your Uncle Bud voted Republican in this election you are not going to change his mind.

Right after the election there was much hoo-haw about how a statistically significant portion of Bush supporters voted that way because they “agreed with Bush’s moral values”.

But look at this article in the New York Times. A recent Times/CBS News poll shows that many Americans, including those that voted for Bush, have deep concerns about some central tenets of his proposed agenda for the next term.

“Among the disputed results of the Election Day survey of voters was the finding that moral issues were critical in determining the outcome.

That survey found that 22 percent of respondents called it the most critical issue in making their decision. Some pollsters criticized the way the question was asked because it was presented as a general category, without any kind of explanation, along with a list of six other specific issues, including Iraq and health care.

In this poll, when allowed freely to name the issue that was most important in their vote, 6 percent chose moral values, although smaller numbers named issues like abortion and same-sex marriage. On a separate question in which voters were given a choice of nine issues, 5 percent chose abortion, 4 percent chose stem cell research and 2 percent chose same-sex marriage.
The top issue was the economy and jobs, which was cited by 29 percent of respondents.”

What, then, was the main reason so many people seemed to go for Bush over Kerry?

“Across the board, the poll suggested that the outcome of the election reflected a determination by Americans that they trusted Mr. Bush more to protect them against future terrorist attacks - and that they liked him more than Mr. Kerry - rather than any kind of broad affirmation of his policies.”

They were scared.

“Build relationships”? Forget it. The problem isn’t that they don’t understand us; the problem isn’t that they have a significantly different moral view, or that they are dumber or less educated or “driven by hate and homophobia and vitriol” as one MoveOn.org party-goer seems to believe. The problem is that John Kerry did not convince them that he would make them safer.

He talked about the economy and he was right. He talked about health-care and he was right. He talked about the war in Iraq and he was right. But none of that mattered to people who are consumed by visions of airplanes flying into their office buildings, who are filled with nightmare scenarios of bio-terrorism, chemical attacks and dirty bombs in our cities.

MoveOn.org and other organizations have the wrong priority, in my opinion. Stop talking nice and making sure everyone gets along and all the kids who show up to play get a trophy. Use the system.

I just get the feeling that these people will get together and agree to fight the system and organize and all that…and the result will be a letter writing campaign. Or worse, an e-mail petition.

None of that crap works, okay? You know why? It’s too easy.

It is! It’s too easy! Nobody in power cares that 100,000 people out of 250,000,000 bothered to type their name on an e-mail petition and annoy ten of their friends by forwarding the damn thing. Nobody in power cares that 100,000 people out of 250,000,000 wrote their name on a form letter they got from a liberal PAC site and slapped a stamp on it. You are statistically insignificant. Nobody. Cares.

You want to organize? Great. Organize. Organize and raise money and campaign for your state representative. You got a rep you don’t like? Campaign now to get him or her voted out in 2006. You got a Senator you don’t like? Campaign now, raise money now, spend that money on commercials and flyers and friggin’ skywriting. And we can take back Congress.

You got a candidate for President in mind? Same thing. Now now now, raise money, plan commercials, and get their face out there and their message out there now now now. Get your neighbors over to your side now. Promote their self-interest in future change now.

Work hard and work hard now. Put the effort in and put the sweat in…because then people will believe that maybe you got something to look at and think about. Nobody believes your conviction if you send an e-mail…or even write an annoying column, like me…they believe you if they see you spending money and, more importantly, time and effort.

But what I hear from so many liberals…and, again, I am one…is whinging and pissing and moaning and “let’s hold a show we can use my uncle’s barn and my Aunt Ginny can sew the costumes.” E-mail petitions and letter-writing campaigns.

This is the view that the other side…and, let’s face it, also the view a great many people who aren’t hardcore Republicans…have of “liberals”. We’re soft. We can’t take a punch. We can’t fight back. All we do is whine and engage in shrill histrionics.

(Or, you get the other extreme: the Shriekers. Excitable, over-caffeinated banshees who scream bloody murder and bloody revolt. Look, I don’t like the current administration either, and I think they’re making great strides in dismantling America’s power, greatness and prestige, but calling them “fascists” over and over again is not the way to go. If you’re going to scream epithets, and gods bless you if you are, scream accurate ones okay? In my opinion, shrieking “Nazi” at the Republicans is just as bad as a redneck shouting “faggot” at a well-dressed man. It paints you both as ignorant reactionaries without a shred of credibility. Shut up.)

Either perception is not entirely wrong.

Among some of the other ideas proposed by the MoveOn.org “house party” brainiacs: boycotting ATMs produced by the companies that also manufactured the touch-screen voting machines we’ve all heard so much about; holding a national strike (like the nation would be crippled by several hundred Starbucks java-slingers failing to show up for work); and forcing the economic emphasis from consumption into production by “not buying anything”.

What the…that is…GAH!

This is why the power-mongers and puppet-masters lurking behind the throne in the Oval Office are confident when they lean back, smirk and call us “chuckleheads”.

“Not buying anything”. That, my friends, is a liberal chucklehead idea.

Granted some ideas that came out of the MoveOn.org house parties were valid. Going out among the Red-staters, finding what issues truly matter to these people and convincing them that Democrats are better suited to addressing their concerns than Republicans. Okay.
But also among the brilliant strategies was holding a “Progress Party” on Inauguration Day to symbolically shed our widow’s weeds and face the future stoically or some such nonsense.

Yeah, that’ll get the GOP shakin’ in their L.L. Beans…holding a wine and cheese soiree and singing “We Shall Overcome” while dressed in your stylish-but-not-too­-stylish Old Navy pullovers and Birkenstocks.

Shut. Up.

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. –That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness…But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.” – Declaration of Independence. [emphasis mine]

And what does my emphasis mean? Stop focusing on lame-ass “protests” and “revolutionary actions” and use the system.

The Democratic campaign was weak sauce. While we may recognize that ambiguity is part and parcel of the day to day, in the post-9/11, terrorists-walk-among-us, war in the Middle East era people don’t want to hear you say “Well, that’s a complex issue”. Complexity is scary and baffling. People don’t want to be scared.

And, no, I’m not advocating the middle-of-the-road morally compromising “find a moderate who’s ‘electable’” stance. We did that. It was weak sauce.

But somewhere out there is somebody who has the conviction and passion necessary to clearly state a Democratic message and form a clear and effective Democratic agenda.

There is a system in place. There are rules and our government is not exempt. Play the game, use the rules. Take back the power. We are in charge.

The Political Left is not weak, nor is it powerless. Its voice can be just as loud and as valid as the political right’s. But their message was clear and ours was not. They, I hate to admit it, showed a calm resolve (or, as may be, “ignorant stubbornness”…the two are often indistinguishable from one another) and we showed flustered ambivalence and a confusing lack of focus.

Well that’s spilt milk, so stop your cryin’. Get focused and effective. Take deep breaths and clear your mind and be sure of your goals. Give us a real plan, give us a real and clear path and a real and clear understanding of where you stand, exactly.

Because I’ve set my spam filter to block y’all.

You’ll All Pay is written by bitter whiner and shrill hypocrite Joe Conat. You can tell him “Why don’t you be more effective, huh? Huh?” here.

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BONUS NEWS!

As of 2:20 p.m. on Tuesday, November the 30th yours truly is a daddy! Emeline Jayne McVay Conat was born at the above mentioned time, weighing 7 lbs. 5 oz. and was 20 1/2 inches long.

She is, I can say without bias or partisanship, the absolute bestest, most beautiful, smartest, strongest and most adorable baby ever conceived anywhere in the universe ever ever ever.

So I will take this opportunity to thank everyone for their well wishes and good thoughts, their love and support and gifts both material and emotional. Y’all…y’all just rock.

And, of course, I thank my beautiful wife Aimee for being the best part of my life.