simply perfectly correct -- JRD > We're Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore > > By Garrison Keillor > > Something has gone seriously haywire with the Republican Party. Once, > it was the party of pragmatic Main Street businessmen in steel-rimmed > spectacles who decried profligacy and waste, were devoted to their > communities and supported the sort of prosperity that raises all > ships. They were good-hearted people who vanquished the gnarlier > elements of their party, the paranoid Roosevelt-haters, the flat > Earthers and Prohibitionists, the antipapist antiforeigner element. > The genial Eisenhower was their man, a genuine American hero of D-Day, > who made it OK for reasonable people to vote Republican. He brought > the Korean War to a stalemate, produced the Interstate Highway System, > declined to rescue the French colonial army in Vietnam, and gave us a > period of peace and prosperity, in which (oddly) American arts and > letters flourished and higher education burgeoned and there was a > degree of plain decency in the country. Fifties Republicans were > giants compared to today's. Richard Nixon was the last Republican > leader to feel a Christian obligation toward the poor. > > In the years between Nixon and Newt Gingrich, the party migrated > southward down the Twisting Trail of Rhetoric and sneered at the idea > of public service and became the Scourge of Liberalism, the Great > Crusade Against the Sixties, the Death Star of Government, a gang of > pirates that diverted and fascinated the media by their sheer > chutzpah, such as the misty-eyed flag-waving of Ronald Reagan who, > while George McGovern flew bombers in World War II, took a pass and > made training films in Long Beach. The Nixon moderate vanished like > the passenger pigeon, purged by a legion of angry white men who rose > to power on pure punk politics. "Bipartisanship is another term of > date rape." says Grover Norquist, the Sid Vicious of the GOP. "I don't > want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size > where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub." > The boy has Oedipal problems and government is his daddy. > > The party of Lincoln and Liberty was transmogrified into the party of > hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based > economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of > convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking > midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brownshirts > in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, > Lamborghini libertarians, people who believe Neil Armstrong's moonwalk > was filmed in Roswell, New Mexico, little honkers out to diminish the > rest of us, Newt's evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a > dull and rigid man suspicious of the free flow of information and of > secular institutions, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured > body parts trying to walk. Republicans: The No.1 reason the rest of > the world thinks we're deaf, dumb and dangerous. > > Rich ironies abound! Lies pop up like toadstools in the forest! Wild > swine crowd round the public trough! Outrageous gerrymandering! Pocket > lining on a massive scale! Paid lobbyists sit in committee rooms and > write legislation to alleviate the suffering of billionaires! > Hypocrisies shine like cat turds in the moonlight! O Mark Twain, where > art thou at this hour? Arise and behold the Gilded Age reincarnated > gaudier than ever, upholding great wealth as the sure sign of Divine > Grace. > > Here in 2004, George W. Bush is running for reelection on a platform > of tragedy. The single greatest failure of national defense in our > history, the attacks of 9/11 in which 19 men with box cutters put this > nation into a tailspin, a failure the details of which the White House > fought to keep secret even as it ran the country into hock up to the > hubcaps, thanks to generous tax cuts for the well-fixed, hoping to > lead us into a box canyon of debt that will render government > impotent, even as we engage in a war against a small country that was > undertaken for the president's personal satisfaction but sold to the > American public on the basis of brazen misinformation, a war whose > purpose is to distract us from an enormous transfer of wealth taking > place in this country, flowing upward, and the deception is working > beautifully. > > The concentration of wealth and power in the hands of the few is the > death knell of democracy. No republic in the history of humanity has > survived this. The election of 2004 will say something about what > happens to ours. The omens are not good. > > Our beloved land has been fogged with fear, the greatest political > strategy ever. An ominous silence, distant sirens, a drumbeat of > whispered warnings and alarms to keep the public uneasy and silence > the opposition. And in a time of vague fear, you can appoint > bullet-brained judges, strip the bark off the Constitution, eviscerate > federal regulatory agencies, bring public education to a standstill, > stupefy the press, lavish gorgeous tax breaks on the rich. > > There is a stink drifting through this election year. It isn't the > Florida recount or the Supreme Court decision. No, it's 9/11 that we > keep coming back to. It wasn't the "end of innocence", or a turning > point in our history, or a cosmic occurrence, it was an event, a lapse > of security. And patriotism shouldn't prevent people from asking hard > questions of the man who was purportedly in charge of national > security at the time. > > Whenever I think of those New Yorkers hurrying along Park Place or > getting off the No.1 Broadway local, hustling toward their office on > the 90th floor, the morning paper under their arms, I think of that > non-reader George W. Bush and how he hopes to exploit those people > with a little economic uptick, maybe the capture of Osama, cruise to > victory in November and proceed to get some serious nation-changing > done in his second term. > > This year, as in the past, Republicans will portray us Democrats as > embittered academics, desiccated Unitarians, whacked-out hippies and > communards, people who talk to telephone poles, the party of the > Deadheads. They will wave enormous flags and wow over and over the > footage of firemen in the wreckage of the World Trade Center and > bodies being carried out and they will lie about their economic > policies with astonishing enthusiasm. > > The Union is what needs defending this year. Government of Enron and > by Halliburton and for the Southern Baptists is not the same as what > Lincoln spoke of. This gang of Pithecanthropus Republicanii has > humbugged us to death on terrorism and tax cuts for the comfy and > school prayer and flag burning and claimed the right to know what > books we read and to dump their sewage upstream from the town and > clear-cut the forests and gut the IRS and mark up the constitution on > behalf of intolerance and promote the corporate takeover of the public > airwaves and to hell with anybody who opposes them. > > This is a great country, and it wasn't made so by angry people. We > have a sacred duty to bequeath it to our grandchildren in better shape > than however we found it. We have a long way to go and we're not > getting any younger. > > Dante said that the hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who in > time of crisis remain neutral, so I have spoken my piece, and thank > you, dear reader. It's a beautiful world, rain or shine, and there is > more to life than winning. > > > > _______________________________________________ > Biofuel mailing list > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/biofuel > > Biofuel at Journey to Forever: > http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html > > Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): > http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/ > >
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