Wednesday, November 15, 2006

Thanks for your concern

Well, Michael Moore posted a letter to try and make those who were rooting for the other horse in the recent elections feel a bit better. Granted, the last time I paid attention to anything Mr. Moore wrote was when said the insurgents in Iraq and the Minutemen of the American Revolution were the same, and that the insurgency was going to defeat the US. Prior to that I'd considered Mr. Moore a charlatan who made his fortune through slick editing and magician-like misdirection. After that letter he became a useful idiot who was going to be a tool for those who were opposing the US. I don't know exactly what he's done since then. Hell, I thought he died when he blew up a secret government facility hidden inside Mt. Rushmore. Turns out I was wrong.

To My Conservative Brothers and Sisters,


I doubt he actually wanted to direct this to me. I'm not exactly conservative in the way I think he means. But I'm reading the letter so it might as well be addressed to SFC B.

I know you are dismayed and disheartened at the results of last week's election.
Not really. It was an election. The party I wanted to win didn't, but it's not like the American Communist Party of National Socialists was swept into office. Hell, Lieberman won in CT and Webb in VA is probably more conservative than the Republican he defeated. Besides, it's not like those who were voted out were really doing anything all that great to begin with.
You're worried that the country is heading toward a very bad place you don't want it to go. Your 12-year Republican Revolution has ended with so much yet to do, so many promises left unfulfilled. You are in a funk, and I understand.
Has it really been 12 years since the guy who was my best man was so very thrilled with the election? Wow, how time flies when you're not paying attention. As for what direction the country may or may not go, I'll wait until someone new actually takes office before I worry about the direction it's headed. Right now it's all a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing.
Well, cheer up, my friends! Do not despair. I have good news for you. I, and the millions of others who are now in charge with our Democratic Congress, have a pledge we would like to make to you, a list of promises that we offer you because we value you as our fellow Americans.
I get a small degree of pleasure from the thought of Mr. Moore choking on his own spittle when he realizes that many politicians are not willing to put their careers on the line by supporting the policies of a person who openly called for the defeat of his own country.
You deserve to know what we plan to do with our newfound power -- and, to be specific, what we will do to you and for you.(emphasis included)
Newfound power? I can imagine him chortling like a bowl full of jelly when he wrote that. As if a radioactive spider just granted his party of choice the strength to move mountains. I have an instinctive dislike of the government trying to do anything to me or for me. I dislike it when it's done by either side of the aisle.
Thus, here is our Liberal's Pledge to Disheartened Conservatives:
Dear Conservatives and Republicans,
I, and my fellow signatories, hereby make these promises to you:
This should be good.
1. We will always respect you for your conservative beliefs. We will never, ever, call you "unpatriotic" simply because you disagree with us. In fact, we encourage you to dissent and disagree with us.
I don't know if I call you unpatriotic. I'd call you a useful idiot at best, a defeatist at worst. I'm glad to know that "unpatriotic" is off the table. Now we just have to worry about being called a torturer, a murderer, or an lazy and uneducated. And that's just how the small segment of society that serves in the military is treated. But at least patriotism wouldn't be questioned.
2. We will let you marry whomever you want, even when some of us consider your behavior to be "different" or "immoral." Who you marry is none of our business. Love and be in love -- it's a wonderful gift.
Actually, if enough of you consider a behavior to be "different" or "immoral" then you won't allow people to amrry who you want to marry. Does Mr. Moore not understand how this voting thing works? Did a gay marriage amendment pass when I wasn't looking? Was there a rider to some legislation which allowed gay marriage that I didn't read when I went over my ballot? Did the election of a Democratic majority actually make the majority of the people in the US decide to change their minds regarding marriage? Cart before the horse here.
3. We will not spend your grandchildren's money on our personal whims or to enrich our friends. It's your checkbook, too, and we will balance it for you.
So, what will you spend it on? As for my checkbook, Mrs. SFC B handles that very well thankyouverymuch. However I'm glad to see he recognizes that my checkbook belongs to me "too". I know I'm mixing metaphors, but this "pledge" really is flying in the face of several decades of prescedent. While I'm less than thrilled that my taxes were not cut to the bare minimum required for basic government services by the Republican majority, I'm not too stupid to realize that the only way for the government to have a surplus in the budget is if they took too much money from me. I'd much rather have the government a little overdrawn than in the black. But I'm not an economist.
4. When we soon bring our sons and daughters home from Iraq, we will bring your sons and daughters home, too. They deserve to live. We promise never to send your kids off to war based on either a mistake or a lie.
Cut. and. run. Depressing. Moore is straight-up channeling John Kerry back in the 70's with the "mistake", and there are so many things wrong with "lie" that I can't think of where to start. I'm just not in the mood to argue a strawman while I'm making a pathetic attempt to fisk.
5. When we make America the last Western democracy to have universal health coverage, and all Americans are able to get help when they fall ill, we promise that you, too, will be able to see a doctor, regardless of your ability to pay. And when stem cell research delivers treatments and cures for diseases that affect you and your loved ones, we'll make sure those advances are available to you and your family, too.
Universal health coverage does not bode well for the future of my income taxes. It will also make America the last Western democracy where cutting edge medical research and treatment is done. You'd think someone as rich as Mr. Moore would better understand how profit can be a more motivating factor than altruism. Canada is another Western democracy with universal health care, and they were the only Western nation to suffer a SARS outbreak a couple years ago because the delays in their health care system prevented those ill from being identified, isolated, and treated in a timely manner. I can't go shopping for groceries without having someone offer me a flu shot. People in the country illegally don't get turned away from urgent care. That everyone in the nation can't afford bleeding edge medical treatment for everything that ails them strikes me as a "too bad, I'm sorry" moment. That universal health care probably wouldn't cover stem cell treatment because it's too expensive and unproven strikes me as ironic. With the profit motive diminished by universal health care wouldn't it delay the research, development, treatment, and acceptance of stem cell research? I'm glad Mr. Moore doesn't have a problem with letting those who disagree with him access to the same treatments he'll be able to receive. However his hope for equal care for all would likely ruin the chance for those advancements to happen.
6. Even though you have opposed environmental regulation, when we clean up our air and water, we, the Democratic majority, will let you, too, breathe the cleaner air and drink the purer water.

And what magic wand will be waved to do this? I assume this means that the Democratic majority will pursue a policy of supporting and encouraging clean, safe nuclear power plants. Maybe they'll offer tax breaks and research grants to industries that lower their emissions and cut down on pollution. One can hope.
7. Should a mass murderer ever kill 3,000 people on our soil, we will devote every single resource to tracking him down and bringing him to justice. Immediately. We will protect you.
Unless the methods to used to track him down involve monitoring of financial transactions or phones calls from know terrorists to people in the US. I'm going to call straight bullshit on this one. The Democratic minority showed no interest at all in actually supporting methods to help capture terrorists.
8. We will never stick our nose in your bedroom or your womb. What you do there as consenting adults is your business. We will continue to count your age from the moment you were born, not the moment you were conceived.
And the women of Earth heave a sigh of relief that Michael Moore's nose will never go near their womb. Cheap shot. I know. I'm sorry. I should be a better person than that.

I'm all about there not being laws restricting what consenting adults do in the privacy of their own home. I have a very personal dislike of the thought of it being legal to kill a person when they're able to survive outside the womb. And because of that I don't like the thought of abortions being legal after a certain point. Where that point is will probably be debated until Rapture, but I'd much rather err on the side of caution than not. If forced to choose between barring all abortion, and allowing all abortions I'll choose the former. That Mr. Moore by this statement prefers the latter is his own call. I think he's wrong, but I think that about a lot of his opinions.
9. We will not take away your hunting guns. If you need an automatic weapon or a handgun to kill a bird or a deer, then you really aren't much of a hunter and you should, perhaps, pick up another sport. We will make our streets and schools as free as we can from these weapons and we will protect your children just as we would protect ours.
I'd prefer to hunt with a rifle rather than a gun, but that's just my personal choice and I don't like hunting anyway so it's probably a moot point. I'd feel a lot better about gun control if the people advocating it had any idea what they were talking about. I agree with Mr. Moore that there is very little need for a civilian to own a M2. But I doubt that Mr. Moore appreciates the difference between an automatic, semi-automatic, and single shot weapon. In his Bowling for Columbine he displayed a willingness to outright lie about gun ownership procedures and I don't consider him an honest broker when it comes to gun ownership. The best way I can think of to protect my own children, when I have some, is through the proper application of force against threats to their well-being. To me that includes the use of deadly force should the situation require. Mr. Moore can afford to hire professionals for the protection of his family and property. I'm limited to what caliber the state will allow me to own. If that's my limit I want the biggest caliber, capacity, and rate of fire I can find
10. When we raise the minimum wage, we will pay you -- and your employees -- that new wage, too. When women are finally paid what men make, we will pay conservative women that wage, too.
I'll ignore that he said that conservatives will only be able to make minimum wage because I know he didn't mean that. However I wonder what new social programs will be implemented to help those who are now unemployed because their employers can't afford as many employees at the new minimum wage. Sure, it's great for those who survive the firings, but it sucks for the poor bastards now unemployed. The "pay women less" amendment must have been one the same referendum where gay marriage was allowed. I looked at Mrs. SFC B's pay stub and it turns out she earns the same as a male who works the same hours and has the same seniority. I looked for the different male and female pay charts for the government and I didn't find one. That women as a whole make less than men as a whole isn't a function of gender discrimination. Maybe this is Mr. Moore's way of letting the WNBA know that soon laws will be passed that require them to be to signed to $100,000,000 contracts? Who knows.
11. We will respect your religious beliefs, even when you don't put those beliefs into practice. In fact, we will actively seek to promote your most radical religious beliefs ("Blessed are the poor," "Blessed are the peacemakers," "Love your enemies," "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God," and "Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me."). We will let people in other countries know that God doesn't just bless America, he blesses everyone. We will discourage religious intolerance and fanaticism -- starting with the fanaticism here at home, thus setting a good example for the rest of the world.
"Blessed are the peacemakers"? Maybe Mr. Moore is more pro-gun than I'd imagined? The irony of him quoting that camel-needle passage just smacked me in the head like a frozen fish. Mr. Moore is fricking loaded. He's written a couple of best selling books, and two mof his movies have been box-office hits, one of which won an Oscar. However I'm glad to see they're going to work to stop religious fanatascism here at home. Lord knows it's time for us to stop living in fear of religious extremists blowing up our buses, beheading kidnap victims, and acting like murderous savages in general.
12. We will not tolerate politicians who are corrupt and who are bought and paid for by the rich. We will go after any elected leader who puts him or herself ahead of the people. And we promise you we will go after the corrupt politicians on our side FIRST. If we fail to do this, we need you to call us on it. Simply because we are in power does not give us the right to turn our heads the other way when our party goes astray. Please perform this important duty as the loyal opposition.
Okay. If you say so. Good luck going after the few dozen Democrats who took money from Jack Abramoff. Oh, and Mr. Moore, while you're crusading to abolish corruption from government the presumptive Speaker of the House is touting a federal judge impeached for corruption as chairman for the Intelligence Committee. Oh, and the presumptive speaker is also backing for House Majority Leader the same person who unjustly called a squad of Marines murderers, and is one of the best practisioners of the black art of congressional earmarks. Appointing someone impeached for corruption and someone who has made a career out of getting a much money for his district by whatever means necessary is not a good start on reducing corruption. However, this is all theorhetical since no one has actually been appointed to a new position yet. Maybe the next month will see a turn-around of epic proportions and the newly elected class of 2006 will become a paragon of virtue ushering us into an era of greatness.
I promise all of the above to you because this is your country, too. You are every bit as American as we are. We are all in this together. We sink or swim as one. Thank you for your years of service to this country and for giving us the opportunity to see if we can make things a bit better for our 300 million fellow Americans -- and for the rest of the world.
I promise you a pony. It doesn't mean I'm able to make it happen. Mr. Moore, sou say we sink or swim as a country, yet you've spent the past six years acting as an anchor, publicly advocating the defeat of your nation's armed forces and policy just to score a point. When people thought your statement advocating the defeat of your own country to be "unpatriotic" you wrapped yourself in a flag of Nobility of Dissent like it was an aegis against just critisim of your words. Your career has been based on a bullet like dedication to presenting a one-sided view, even if you need to blatantly manipulate the truth to present your version. Your championing the working class while flying first class, and hording your millions reeks of rank hypocrisy. But that's my opinion and what do I know?

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