Right Thinking From The Left Coast
It's the blog Duffman would read

Election 2006


Wednesday, December 13, 2006

Speaking Truth To Power

I am often asked why, given my disillusionment with the Republican Party and the conservative movement in this country, I am still such a fan of John Hawkins and his blog Right Wing News.  The answer is simple:  he’s very, very good at stating his positions, and he’s not afraid to speak his mind.  I respect that to no end, even if I fundamentally disagree with him a lot of the time.  As an example of that, I give you this post, which is John guest blogging at Tom Delay’s website.

How could it be that we had a Republican President, 55 Republican Senators, and a 15 seat lead in the House, yet we still had a massive deficit, a Republican led amnesty for illegal aliens push, and someone like Harriet Miers being nominated to the Supreme Court? Just when did the Republican Party become the sort of party that supported projects like the “Bridge to Nowhere,” and expensive big government programs like the Medicare Prescription drug plan? When did we stop being the party of Reagan and become the Party of compassionate conservatism? “Compassion” is all well and good, but in the real world, all it seems to mean is wasting a lot of taxpayer money and the President standing there and taking it when he’s called a liar who misled the American people into going to war by Democrats who voted for the war themselves because they believed that Saddam had an active WMD program.

Face it: the GOP lost in 2006 because they became complacent, arrogant, and decided that they were too good to, “dance with the conservatives that brung them,” into power in the first place. Moreover, let me add that the distance between the Republicans in Washington and the people who should be their biggest supporters has yet to be bridged by the sting of defeat. The base may not like the Democrats or be happy that they’re in power, but they’re still frustrated and angry with the GOP.

Who makes more sense, John or the excuse-makers in the GOP?  Read the whole thing.

Posted by Lee on 12/13/06 at 07:45 PM in Election 2006 • (10) Comments • (1) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

He Be Strokin’

NOTE:  If you’re coming here via a link from another blog full of righteous indignation, make sure you read this first.

Maybe I’m wrong.  Maybe God does want a Republican majority in the Senate.

MSNBC is currently reporting that Senator Tim Johnson (D-SD) has suffered a stroke.

There is no word, currently, on the Senator’s condition.

A call from RAW STORY to Johnson’s office has not yet been returned.

If Johnson were to pass away, or be forced to retire, the US Constitution delegates the task of appointing a replacement to South Dakota lawmakers, who in turn, often turn that task over to the Governor. The Governor of that state, Mike Rounds, is a Republican, and both houses of the state legislature are dominated by Republicans.

In the case of South Dakota, the decision would fall to Rounds, whose appointment would serve as senator until 2008 at which point Johnson’s seat would have been up for election anyhow.

While anyone suffering a stroke is a tragic event, how fucking hilarious would it be if the Democrats lost control of the Senate right before they were to assume power?  I’d laugh and laugh and laugh and laugh…

Update: His staff is now saying no stroke.  Stay tuned to see if this is really nothing or if the Democrat politburo is pulling a Fidel Castro.

Posted by Lee on 12/13/06 at 04:24 PM in Election 2006 • (21) Comments • (2) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

Drunks With Scalpels

There’s been (ahem) a few people lately who have essentially blamed me for the loss of Congress because I didn’t vote for the GOP.  Their argument is that no matter how bad the GOP is, the Democrats are worse.  In many respects this is true, but I’d like to illustrate this concept with an analogy.

Say you need surgery and you have to choose between two doctors.  Both of them are drunk.  One is more drunk than the other.  Since a drunk doctor is in no shape to perform surgery, does it really make any difference which one you end up with?  Is it really that significant that one doctor is slightly less drunk than the other?  No matter which one you select, you’ll end up maimed or dead.

So, rather than choose the less of two evils, I punted.  I’m hoping that by a loss this time around it will cause the slightly less drunk doctor to go to rehab and get his act together.  In 2008, I’ll evaluate the two doctors once more.  And if they’re still both drunk, I’ll be once again visiting Dr. Libertarian.

Remember, the lesser of two evils is still evil.

Posted by Lee on 12/13/06 at 02:46 PM in Election 2006 • (10) Comments • (0) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

Suck It, Fundies

You know the old saying “Don’t put your eggs in one basket?” Well, if you want to know why the GOP lost in November, it’s because they put all their eggs in the fundamentalist Christian basket.

In our study, “The Libertarian Vote,” we analyzed 16 years of polling data and found that libertarians constituted 13 percent of the electorate in 2004. Because libertarians are better educated and more likely to vote, they were 15 percent of actual voters.

That’s a pretty decent sized chunk of voters, enough to swing an election.

Libertarian Party candidates may have cost Sens. Jim Talent and Conrad Burns their seats, tipping the Senate to Democratic control. In Montana, the Libertarian candidate got more than 10,000 votes, or 3 percent, while Democrat Jon Tester edged Burns by fewer than 3,000 votes. In Missouri, Claire McCaskill defeated Talent by 41,000 votes, a bit less than the 47,000 Libertarian votes.

Ooooh, that’s gotta hurt!  But why were libertarians turned off from a party that they traditionally vote for?

President Bush and the congressional Republicans left no libertarian button unpushed in the past six years: soaring spending, expansion of entitlements, federalization of education, cracking down on state medical marijuana initiatives, Sarbanes-Oxley, gay marriage bans, stem cell research restrictions, wiretapping, incarcerating U.S. citizens without a lawyer, unprecedented executive powers, and of course an unnecessary and apparently futile war.

Yep, pretty much.  They GOP isn’t conservative or small government any more, it’s Christian socialism and authoritarianism.  And it’s not a party I have any interest in supporting.  But here’s the kicker.

The striking thing may be that after all that, Democrats still looked worse to a majority of libertarians.

Absolutely true, which is why I voted Libertarian.  I couldn’t lower myself to voting for the Democrats, but there was absolutely no way I could in good conscience vote for the GOP.  Now, here’s the clincher, the elephant in the drawing room, the inescapable, undeniable truth of life that the Republican Party has clearly forgotten.  If you are a Republican who’s all butt hurt over the ass-whipping you just took, READ THIS PARAGRAPH OVER AND OVER AND OVER UNTIL IT SINKS IN.

If Republicans can’t win New Hampshire and the Mountain West, they can’t win a national majority. And they can’t win those states without libertarian votes. They’re going to need to stop scaring libertarian, centrist, and independent voters with their social-conservative obsessions and become once again the party of fiscal responsibility. In a Newsweek poll just before the election, 47 percent of respondents said they trusted the Democrats more on “federal spending and the deficit,” compared to just 31 percent who trusted the Republicans. That’s not Ronald Reagan’s Republican Party.

No it isn’t.

Posted by Lee on 12/13/06 at 02:35 PM in Election 2006 • (32) Comments • (0) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

Friday, November 10, 2006

The Right of the Left

I just got an email message from the head of the California GOP.

While Republican Governors and Senators were falling throughout the country in the worst year for Republicans since 1974, you played a vital role in insuring the re-election of Governor Schwarzenegger.  And although the media is rightfully pointing out the broad support the Governor received, exit polls show 91% of Republicans voted for the Governor, an amazing number.  You also were critical in the election of our newest star, Steve Poizner, as Insurance Commissioner.

Just four years ago pundits, both Democrat and Republicans, said it was almost impossible for a Republican to win a statewide race. Now, even columnists like George Skelton believe Tuesday’s results were not an anomaly and that quality Republicans can and will win statewide races in California.  That is a dramatic change.

At the legislative level, even with gerrymandered districts, we not only held the three assembly and one senate seat that were under attack by the Democrats; but you were the difference in the election of Lynn “Landslide” Daucher to a seat formerly held by the Democrats (by a 138 vote margin as of this writing).  And finally, your clear call for “no new taxes” was heard throughout the state with defeat of all measures that sought to increase our taxes.

Wow.  Standard small-government conservatism with a libertarian social policy seemed to work, even in a liberal state like California.  How’s that Christian socialism working out for the rest of you?

Posted by Lee on 11/10/06 at 05:25 PM in Election 2006 • (9) Comments • (0) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

Sizing Up the Liars

This morning Sullivan makes exactly the same point I did two days ago about Rush Limbagh and Hugh Hewitt, though he managed to be a lot more diplomatic and used far fewer “fucks” than I.

The one thing you learn from this: Hewitt and Limbaugh are party animals. They put loyalty to party above intellectual honesty. They have admitted that they knowingly misled their readers and listeners. They can and will do it again.

Of course they will, because their listeners want (need!) to feel that they’re a truth detector, a beacon of accuracy in a world warped by the evil grasp of the liberals.  As I asked their fans the other day, “Since both of them admitted today that they didn’t really believe the things they’ve been saying for the past few years, how can any of you possibly believe anything they tell you in the future?”

Posted by Lee on 11/10/06 at 11:06 AM in Election 2006 • (6) Comments • (0) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

Thursday, November 09, 2006

The Perils of Reality

Following up on a point I have made countless times in the past is Jake Tapper.

There are legitimate conservative arguments to make about the media. But not every time someone reports something that doesn’t bode well for Republicans is it bias. Sometimes it’s called: reality.

Exactly.  Just because you believe that the Democrats are the sum total of all evil doesn’t mean that the Republicans are any better.  Just because you happen to rightly point out that Rumsfeld is astonishingly unqualified for his job does not make you a liberal, and the fact that Cindy Sheehan and Michael Moore might hold the same opinion (but for totally different reasons) does not make you a liberal.

The Bush administration has done a lot of bad, bad things.  Pointing out this undeniable fact does not make you a liberal, it makes you a believer in objective reality.  Dismissing everything as a plot by them durn libriuls?  That makes you delusional.

Update: Allow me to elaborate here.  The MSM all leans left, that’s indisputable.  However, “that durn librul media” has become such a convenient catchword.  NY Times reports good news about Bush?  Shout it to the world!  NY Times reports bad Bush news?  It’s media bias, because they hate America.  Polling data shows Bush in the lead?  Woo hoo, suck it liberals!  Polling data shows Bush in the toilet?  Well, those polls are biased by the liberal media.

The point of this post isn’t to claim there is no liberal media bias, of course there is.  I blog on it all the time.  The point is that, for way too many people, bad news for Republicans instantly equals “liberal media.” As Tapper said, sometimes it’s not liberal, sometimes its accurate.  “Liberal media bias” has become all-too convenient an excuse for the right to blithely dismiss any reportage it doesn’t like, and that’s a serious problem.

Posted by Lee on 11/09/06 at 10:08 PM in Election 2006 • (29) Comments • (0) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

Headline of the Day

From the AP:

Bush, Pelosi to bury the hatchet

“President Bush today announced he was going to bury a hatchet in Nancy Pelosi’s skull.”

Posted by Lee on 11/09/06 at 08:15 PM in Election 2006 • (8) Comments • (1) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

Recheck Your Position

I’m going to post on this because it’s been irking me all morning.  This was left in a comment earlier today.

Whenever you find yourself standing shoulder to shoulder with the likes of Michael Moore and Cindy Sheehen on a particular issue, you might want to check your position.

Let’s explore this for a moment.  What is the point behind making this statement?  Simple, it’s to discredit the other party.  If you can’t provide a logical basis for an argument, you can always win by trying to turn your opponent into sum durn librul.  Allow me to flip this around a little.

Whenever you find yourself supporting a president with a long record of approval ratings in the toilet, you might want to check your position.

Whenever you find yourself supporting a party which just lost control of Congress in a fit of voter dissatisfaction, you might want to check your position.

Whenever you find yourself as a staunch backer of one of the most incompetent defense secretaries in the history of this country, you might want to check your position.

Whenever you find yourself as a gung-ho flag waver for an administration which is more concerned with the manner in which a war is fought rather than in actually winning it, you might want to check your position.

Whenever you find yourself defending the astonishing corruption of the Bush-era GOP, you might want to check your position.

Get the point?  It’s not me that has anything to apologize for.  What remarks like the one above are intended to do is throw up some kind of evil boogeyman, against which all “normal” people will rebel.  It’s exactly the same logic that we’ve seen in this election cycle.  “If the Democrats win, then those gay homosexuals will be in the elementary schools converting your children to their sick lifestyle!” Rather than defend the policies of the Bush GOP (which is virtually impossible to do), they throw up a red herring like the impending homosexual invasion to muddy the waters.  It’s the politics of fear and intimidation, Karl Rove’s masterstroke, and it just didn’t work any more.

Disagree with my views?  Refute them all you like.  But remember this, it wasn’t my party or my ideology that just got kicked in the nuts yesterday. 

Posted by Lee on 11/09/06 at 01:41 PM in Election 2006 • (27) Comments • (0) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

It’s A Split

I have to admit that I’m quite happy that Jim Webb won.  Allen was a moron, and Webb is exactly the type of guy I wish we had more of in Congress.  Good for him.

A while back I wrote a post about gridlock, and how divided government is always something we should strive for.  In this post I asked whether you would prefer a Democrat president and a Republican Congress or vice versa.  If I had to pick one, it would be a Democrat president.  Now we’ve got the opposite.  Let’s see how well this works, too.

Posted by Lee on 11/09/06 at 10:51 AM in Election 2006 • (6) Comments • (0) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

On the Simpsons

I have another comment here which I think deserves a response on the main page.

Andrew Sullivan would know about dick in his mouth. Lee you said “I haven’t spent the last four years with George W. Bush’s dick in my mouth, telling everyone how wonderful it tasted” well if my memory serves me, you voted for him 2 years ago. And I remember nothing but good talk about him from you.

That’s partially true, but not entirely right.  Yes, two years ago I voted for Bush.  I wasn’t thrilled about it, but I thought that at the time he was, even with all his faults, the best man for the job.  If the election were held today, and I had to make the same choice between the two candidates, I’d probably choose Bush again for the same reasons I did before.  If I remember correctly, at the last minute I went back on one of my pledges, and donated $20 to the GOP, simply because I thought Kerry was singularly unfit to prosecute a war of any description, let alone a non-conventional war like this one.  So in that sense I was pro-Bush.

However, I was also anti-Bush at the time, but not as overtly so.  I was very critical of the president’s spending policies, and some other general stuff like that, but the Iraq War was still new enough to where it had not yet turned into a goatfuck, and this it was all-too easy for us to write off the bad news as nothing but reports by the durn librul media trying to sabotage the war.  Where I failed in this regard is that, yes, the media were trying to sabotage the war, but this didn’t make their reports any less accurate.  So when they reported on , say, Abu Ghraib, I was all too willing to dismiss it as agitprop by the anti-war contingent of the American left.

Since his reelection in 2004 we’ve been treated to Teri Schiavo, then the hurricanes and the incompetent rescue, not to mention the aftermath.  Then the video of Bush surtfaced receiving his final briefing prior to the hurricanes making landfall, where he just sat without asking a single question.  It was mindblowing seeing this transpire, and it really showed a level of monumental self-delusion.  This was really the beginning of the end with me.  When I started reading the resumes and pedigrees of some of the people Bush put into key cabinet posts I was just floored.

As things started going south in Iraq I got to thinking if the media stories we were hearing might, y’know, be true after all.  And they were.  We learned about the people sent to Iraq to fulfill jobs for which they had no experience of qualifications other than being campaign donors for the GOP, or interns at the national party apparatus.  So they’d send someone to Iraq, for example, to set up the Treasury or some other vitally important institution, and this guy would have zero experience at everything except raising GOP money.  I also read about how there was, literally, no counterinsurgency plan in place because the fundamentalists had convinced Bush/Rummy that they would ever become established.

In 2002 I was gungh-ho Bush.
In 2004 I was “Man, is this guy an asshole!  But, he’s better than Kerry.”
In 2006 I am “This guy has lost touch with reality, and the only thing which can solve the problem is politically.”

I wanted the GOP to lose and lose big because they absolutely deserved it.  If there was a way to do so without helping the enemy I would do so, but there isn’t, so I didn’t.  The Bush/Cheney/Rummy cabal needed to be stopped, and they showed no inclination themselves towards self-restraint and self-policing.

At any rate, 2004 saw me as lukewarm at best when it came to Bush.  By 2006 I had learned so much new information I was just disgusted.  And I voted accordingly.

Update: I have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA why I named this post what I did.  I was really tired last night, and this was the last thing I did before I went to bed, so I guess in my mind this was some great witticism, but I’ll be damned if I can remember what it was.  Apologies.

Posted by Lee on 11/09/06 at 01:38 AM in Election 2006 • (45) Comments • (1) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

Wednesday, November 08, 2006

And I’m Sticking To It

With Limbaugh and Hewitt now saying that they were just kidding about that whole supporting the GOP thing, is there anyone on the right who has the integrity to stick by their guns?  I give you John Hawkins.

When Donald Rumsfeld became Secretary of Defense, he made an effort to change the military into a faster, sleeker force more capable of dealing with the sort of post Cold-War battles that we’re likely to fight today. Combine the sort of bureaucratic infighting that effort surely prompted with the fact that Rumsfeld is an extremely pushy, demanding sort of boss and it was inevitable that Rumsfeld would make a lot of enemies at the Pentagon.

Then, of course, there was the war. As the war in Iraq has grown steadily less popular, Rumsfeld made a whole new set of foes and the temptation to get rid of him for political reasons must have increased significantly over time for Bush.

Now, after a crushing defeat in the election, with old Republican allies like Richard Perle calling Rumsfeld incompetent, with the Military Times calling for Rumsfeld’s dismissal, and with even some Republicans in Congress calling for Rummy to go, the pressure on Bush to get rid of him must have been enormous. Add to that the fact that by getting rid of Rumsfeld, it makes it much easier for Bush to credibly say to the American people, “Hey, we’re changing strategies in Iraq and we think that we’re going to make progress.”

Personally, I like Rumsfeld a lot, think he was good for the military, and think he did a better job in Iraq than he has gotten credit for. However, Bush has allowed himself to become so politically weakened, that he probably felt he had no choice but to toss Rumsfeld over the side. I’m not thrilled with that development, but I’m not going to criticize Bush for it either. He did what he felt like he had to do and Rumsfeld’s replacement, Robert Gates, seems like a competent enough fellow.

The truth is that Donald Rumsfeld probably deserved better, but that could be said of a lot of people who end up out of jobs in Washington. It’s just the nature of the beast in politics.

I think Rumsfeld was one of the most incompetent political appointees of my lifetime, and given the astonishing levels of incompetence in virtually every aspect of the Bush administration, that’s saying something.  However, I can absolutely respect John’s opinion here.  I’ve been a faithful reader of his blog for years, and while he and I definitely have our disagreements of opinion, I’ve always found him to be one of the most eloquent, honest, and passionate defenders of the Republican Party.  This post shows why.  In the face of yesterday’s humiliating (but well-deserved) defeat at the hands of the Democrats, it would be oh-so easy for him to do what Hewitt and Limbaugh have done and turn his back on his previous beliefs, but to his eternal credit he has not done so.  Good for him.

Posted by Lee on 11/08/06 at 11:49 PM in Election 2006 • (24) Comments • (1) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

I’m a Meanie Poopiehead Again

A comment from Karen.

Wow- if there was ever a time to take a break from the blogs I think this is it.

Lee-I think you’re a smart guy, seriously.  But you just sound like a fucking bitter piece of shit right now.  Christ you got what you wanted and the people who came here faithfully are getting called names and ridiculed.

You know, I thought I would be upset if the dems won.  Thought the fucking world was gonna end.  I’m willing to wait and see what happens before I slit my wrists, but I sure didn’t need to hear this crap tonight.

I wish you well.

Hey, I’m sorry, but for all this shit I’ve taken over the past two years—going from 5,000 visitors a day to 1,500, being called a liberal and a leftist and a socialist and a Bush-hater, having my integrity smeared with snarky little jabs about how the left-wing California air has been rotting my brain, and so on—you’ll have to give me a little time to gloat.  For all the sucking up to Bush that the right-wing punditocracy has done, for them to turn around now and say, “Well, I didn’t believe what I said,” I mean, give me a fucking break.  Hugh Hewitt and Limbaugh have done more than just about any two conservative commentators to defend EVERYTHING that Bush has done, and the first damn thing they both say was, “Well, I didn’t actually mean it.”

What horseshit.  They both absolutely meant it.  Rather than face the ire of the Bushbots™ and the fundamentalists they chose the easy way out, whereas it was people like me who stuck true to our principles and have been drug through the mud for at least two years.  So am I bitter?  Am I frustrated?  You bet your ass I am.  It wasn’t my brain which was rotted, it was the people who have spent years explaining away every incompetent thing this administration has done because, after all, Jesus spoke to Bush, and nothing Jesus ever says could be wrong, could it?

Bush is hobbled.  Rummy is gone.  And I couldn’t be happier about either.  Now that the Democrats are back in power, I look forward to slamming them for EXACTLY THE SAME REASONS I’ve been slamming our utterly incompetent president and his astonishingly corrupt Congress.

Update: A question for those of you who like Limbaugh and Hewitt.  Since both of them admitted today that they didn’t really believe the things they’ve been saying for the past few years, how can any of you possibly believe anything they tell you in the future?

Posted by Lee on 11/08/06 at 10:34 PM in Election 2006 • (17) Comments • (0) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

It’s Hugh’s Turn Now

Following up on Limbaugh’s “liberation” from this morning comes this whopper from Hugh “Shit Sandwich” Hewitt.

And it is a wonderful day for new media, especially talk radio.  For two years we have had to defend the Congressional gang that couldn’t shoot straight.  Now we get to play offense.

Oh, spare me your bloviating, Hugh.  You haven’t “had” to defend anyone.  You defended them because you’re an evangelical, you’re partisan, and you’re a Republican.  What you are NOT is a conservative.  You’re an authoritarian Christian statist, and you defended this party with your every breath because you were a true believer, a real eater of the Bush shit sandwich.

You know who doesn’t have anything to apologize for?  Me, and all the other real patriotic conservatives like me.  We’ve recognized for years the utter damage that Bush has been doing to the country.  We gave him every possible benefit of every doubt, and kept waiting for him to actually LEAD, which he of course never did.  He never really had to, because there were sycophants like you and Limbaugh to constantly excuse his every failure, to explain how Iraq was going perfectly, to elaborate on how everything was the fault of that durn librul media.  If Bush had won yesterday, both you and Limbaugh (and Medved and Hannity and O’Reilly and all the other schmucks) would be crowing about what a resounding victory it was for one of America’s greatest presidents ever.

Well, enjoy that shit sandwich, Hugh.  Unlike you, I don’t have any fucking aftertaste in my mouth.

Posted by Lee on 11/08/06 at 07:17 PM in Election 2006 • (75) Comments • (0) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums

Vindicated

What a fucking sell out.

Now, I mentioned to you at the conclusion of the previous hour that people having been asking me how I feel all night long. I got, “Boy, Rush, I wouldn’t want to be you tomorrow! Boy, I wouldn’t want to have to do your show! Oh-ho. I’m so glad I’m not you.” Well, folks, I love being me. (I can’t be anybody else, so I’m stuck with it.) The way I feel is this: I feel liberated, and I’m going to tell you as plainly as I can why. I no longer am going to have to carry the water for people who I don’t think deserve having their water carried. Now, you might say, “Well, why have you been doing it?” Because the stakes are high! Even though the Republican Party let us down, to me they represent a far better future for my beliefs and therefore the country’s than the Democrat Party and liberalism does.

You know what?  There are some of us out there who, unlike Limbaugh, are actual conservatives.  You know, people like me and Bill Quick and Andrew Sullivan and George Will and all the other folks who were more interested in telling the emperor he had no clothes than we were playing suck-boy to the GOP.  Unlike Limbaugh, I don’t feel liberated.  I feel vindicated.  I haven’t spent the last four years with George W. Bush’s dick in my mouth, telling everyone how wonderful it tasted.  I’ve stuck to my guns on every belief I’ve ever had, regardless of party affiliation.  And I have absolutely NOTHING to apologize for.

So all you Limbaugh fans out there, how does it feel to see just what a pathetic fucking sell-out your drug-addled hero is?

Posted by Lee on 11/08/06 at 04:34 PM in Election 2006 • (62) Comments • (0) TrackbacksPermalinkDiscuss this in the forums
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