Holy Shit I vote like a Republican!

I had another epiphanette a couple of days ago … I’m a liberal … but I’ve voted like a Republican for almost 30 years. When it comes to Presidential Elections … I vote Out of Fear. Just like the Republican Base.

I’m afraid the Republican candidate will get elected … and the Republican base is terrified the Democratic candidate will win.  We all vote out of fear because we’re convinced that “The Other Guy” will ruin the country.

The Corporate Powers That Be yank everybody’s chain, scare both sides silly, and laugh all the way to the bank. Y’know … the bank we just bailed out … again.

The Republican Sneer n’ Smear machine cranks out lies about the Democratic candidate. Millions were spent making sure the Republican base was aware of the non-existent “facts” about the world-wide drug smuggling ring headquartered in Mena, Arkansas and the ominous “Clinton Body Count.” The Swift Boat Veterans for Truth trashed John Kerry because they were given bags of money from Republican deep pockets to lie about … and destroy Kerry’s military service.

And this year the Right Wing Noise Machine will have spent millions more convincing the craziest Republicans that Obama will begin his Inaugural address by shouting allegiance to Allah, and conclude by quoting Cleavon Little from Blazing Saddles, “Where the White Women at?”

That’s all the Right Wing has: Money and Lies. Tons of money to spread the lies to reverberate throughout the media. Corporate Media love to move the Sneers n’ Smears down the food chain. It doesn’t make any difference whether on not it’s true. It’s great copy … and better television.

But what about fear-mongering by the Democrats?

44 years ago Lyndon Johnson’s campaign produced an anti-Barry Goldwater spot showing a little girl picking and counting the petals of a daisy. When she reached “nine” an ominous male voice began counting down and when he reached zero … a flash …. then a mushroom cloud filled the screen.

Vote for Johnson or the little girl, and everybody else, dies in a nuclear blast.

Pretty Spooky Stuff but Goldwater once said, “I could have ended the war in a month. I could have made North Vietnam look like a mud puddle.”

The difference between Democratic fear mongering and Republican fear mongering is that the Democrats don’t have to lie. The Truth about Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole, and George W. Bush is far scarier than any of the lies cooked up by the Right Wing Noise Machine. They just never get any media coverage.

Barack Obama can talk about Hope and Change from now until the election but he’s going to get millions of votes not because of his message … but because there are a lot of people out there scared witless that John McCain will be a third term for The Bush Regime.

I’ve put this question to friends and family:

Why are you going to vote for Barack Obama? And the answer cannot be fear based.

As in: If I don’t vote for Obama, McCain Will Do Something Bad. Like put more conservatives on the Supreme Court, Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace … yadda yadda yadda …

They don’t have an answer because their primary reason, for voting for Obama, is out of fear of McCain.

Now I told you all that because I have another but similar question that took me completely out of fear-based Presidential Politics:

Can anyone tell me why a liberal should vote for Barack Obama?

I’m a liberal … and I really want to know.

And why should I, as a liberal, have voted for any Democratic nominee for president since 1980?

Don’t regale me with the history of the Democratic Party. Don’t bother telling me about how the Democrats saved the country from the Great Depression, won World War II, gave us the G.I Bill and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Save your breath because that Democratic Party was buried with George McGovern’s anti-war candidacy in a landslide in 1972.

The political hacks that crawled out from underneath the wreckage left the principles of the Democratic Party behind under the rubble and re-invented themselves as the New Corporate Democratic Party.

And the New Corporate Democratic Party makes the same audacious assumption every 4 years: liberals must vote Democratic because where else are they gonna go? The Democratic Leadership blatantly uses liberal voters and discards them like used Kleenex if it looks like any of their liberal ideas might taint the campaign.

Barack Obama was carried on the backs of liberals over the finish line during the primaries and then he pulled a 180 on them. Screw the Fourth Amendment. Let’s have more nuclear power plants. Call offshore drilling “Responsible” Domestic Production of Oil and Natural Gas. Using the word “Responsible” makes it all sound Greener’n hell doesn’t it? Exxon’s banking on it.

I’m tired of listening to people praise a party that doesn’t exist anymore and then try to explain away what the Party’s Leaders are presently doing.

I’m tired of hearing Let’s just have a Huge Democratic Win and then fix everything later. Everything on the liberal Agenda can be on hold until after the election. Like in 2006? When Democrats won and Nancy Pelosi, John Conyers, and Harry Reid sat on their goddamned hands and refused to stop War Crimes?

The Democrats over the last 30 years, The Neo-Dems, Vichy-Dems, Craven Spineless Dems, whatever you want to call them, have helped turn a Conservative Supreme Court into an Ultra-Conservative Supreme Court and I’m supposed to believe they wouldn’t stand in the way of the Super-Duper Conservative Supreme Court?

All I know is that liberal square pegs don’t fit in round Democratic holes.

Liberals keep asking, pleading, begging, and wishing the Democratic Party would be something that it’s not.

I do the same thing just about every day. I wish my cat were a dog. To date … the cat has refused to cooperate.

Somehow the stranglehold of fear-based partisan politics has got to be broken. It divides the country and keeps us fighting the wrong enemy. Ourselves

Starting this election cycle, I’m going to kiss off spending any time, energy, or concern about participating in the insane presidential version of the Academy Awards. It’s a rigged game guys.

Heads the Right wins …

Tails the liberals lose.

Every single time.

Who am I to hand out advice about Presidential Politics?

Just another liberal sucker who’s been played for a chump by Republicans and Democrats for most of my life. As Sam Goldwyn said, “Include me out.”

I ain’t gonna work on Maggie’s Farm no more.

Holy Shit I vote like a Republican! August 13, 2008