As my friend Emily would say, dear baby Jesus is this a cluster-fuck of propaganda and disinformation. And by this I mean the Republican national convention, which I spent with Sam Seder and Janeane Garofalo on Air America's "The Majority Report."
My wife and I participated in the Great American Shoutout...I didn't hear anybody else yelling, but I saw some figures across the street that had to have heard us...
And when I say it's a clusterfuck of propaganda and disinformation, I say that because...
1. No mention of the one that got away--OBL.
2. Claims that economy is stronger because of his tax cuts. I was going to say "economic policy" instead of "tax cuts" but "economic policy" is not very descriptive of Bush's redistribution of wealth to the top.
3. And speaking of how well the economy is not doing, why, just today it was announced that second quarter productivity estimates were too high at 2.9% and had to revised downward to 2.5%.
And so on.
What The Matter With You?
If you haven't yet bought, downloaded, borrowed, checked out, stolen, photocopied, or just sat at the bookstore and read "What's The Matter With Kansas?" by Thomas Frank, you are really missing out. I have just begun to get to the really good part, and I don't want to spoil it for anyone, but if you've ever wondered why people who are hurt the most by Republican policies are the ones who seem to be the most dedicated and vocal Republican supporters, this is the book for you.
Basically, Franks' argument (from what I've read so far, anyway) is that the conservative movement, which he refers to as "the backlash" in the book, has drained economics from its critiques of politics and focused only on cultural issues. In other words, by focusing conservative true believers on opposition to say, abortion, gay marriage, etc. and averting their eyes from how tax cuts lead to cuts in social services and large deficits and so forth, backlash leaders allow the creeping corporate fascism in the door a little bit more every year.
Which, now that I read my understanding (again, I haven't finished the whole book) of the basic premise of the book, it doesn't seem that profound, but when you read it, you will experience its profundity.
For me, the money quote (so far) is on p. 121:
"While most of us think of politics as a Machiavellian drama in which actors make alliances and take practical steps to advance their material interests, the backlash is something very different: a crusade in which one's material interests are suspended in favor of vague cultural grievances that are all-important and yet incapable of ever being assuaged.
Which of course basically renders my appeal to self-interest in my epigram on every entry useless, but I shall soldier on.
Why I'm Voting For Kerry
I don't have time to write this right now, but I intend to go through the reasons I'm going to vote for Kerry and put them in writing in the best way I can. Not necessarily because anyone cares to read why I'll vote for Kerry, but it will help me when I have to defend my preference on an upcoming visit with my parents and when I go out and try to talk to people about why they should vote for Kerry. So hopefully something along those lines will appear here in the near future.
Although I could quickly sum it up right now--Kerry ain't Bush and Nader can't win. But that's oversimplified and the Limbaugh types would try to use that against me to say that I don't really even like Kerry, and that's just how fake and empty "the libs" are--they'll vote for someone they don't even like out of spite. And that's not true, there's plenty to like about Kerry.
And his rebuttal speech to Bush's hogwash was pretty damn hot...it looks he's getting ready to BRING...IT...ON...
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