22 Ways To Be A Good Democrat (2 Viewers)

[KenHigg]

1. You have to be against capital punishment, but support abortion on demand.

2. You have to believe that businesses create oppression and governments create prosperity.

3. You have to believe that guns in the hands of law-abiding Americans are more of a threat than U.S. nuclear weapons technology in the hands of Chinese and North Korean communists.

4. You have to believe that there was no art before Federal funding.

5. You have to believe that global temperatures are less affected by documented cyclical changes in the earth's climate and more affected by soccer moms driving SUV's.

6. You have to believe that gender roles are artificial but being homosexual is natural.

7. You have to believe that the AIDS virus is spread by a lack of federal funding.

8. You have to believe that the same teacher who can't teach fourth graders how to read is somehow qualified to teach those same kids about sex.

9. You have to believe that hunters don't care about nature, but loony activists who have never been outside of San Francisco do.

10. You have to believe that self-esteem is more important than actually doing something to earn it.

11. You have to believe that Mel Gibson spent $25 million of his own money to make "The Passion of the Christ" for financial gain only.

12. You have to believe the NRA is bad because it supports certain parts of the Constitution, while the ACLU is good because it supports certain parts of the Constitution.

13. You have to believe that taxes are too low, but ATM fees are too high.

14. You have to believe that Margaret Sanger and Gloria Steinem are more important to American history than Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Edison, and Alexander Graham Bell.

15. You have to believe that standardized tests are racist, but racial quotas and set-asides are not.

16. You have to believe that Hillary Clinton is normal and is a very nice person.

17. You have to believe that the only reason socialism hasn't worked anywhere it's been tried is because the right people haven't been in charge.

18. You have to believe conservatives telling the truth belong in jail, but a liar and a sex offender belonged in the White House.

19. You have to believe that homosexual parades displaying drag, transvestites, nudity and bestiality should be constitutionally protected, and manger scenes at Christmas should be illegal.

20. You have to believe that illegal Democrat Party funding by the Chinese Government is somehow in the best interest to the United States.

21. You have to believe that this message is a part of a vast, right wing conspiracy.

22. You have to believe that it's okay to give Federal workers the day off on Christmas Day but it's not okay to say "Merry Christmas."

 

[Pauldohert]

On most of these - they seem to be half right!?

Thats a pass mark.

 

[dan-cat]

On most of these - they seem to be half right!?

Thats a pass mark.

No wonder you can't pay your bills

 

[Pauldohert]

11. You have to believe that Mel Gibson spent $25 million of his own money to make "The Passion of the Christ" for financial gain only.

I'm intrigues by this - what is this getting at? -

Artistic reasons?

 

[KenHigg]

I was wondering about that one as well...

 

[Pauldohert]

You posted it Ken? Is it not your own work. Please include sources!

 

[KenHigg]

You posted it Ken? Is it not your own work. Please include sources!

I could forward you the email I plagiarize..., er, I mean recieved it in but I looked and there were no ref's...

 

[Pauldohert]

Its not a red source anyway!

 

[statsman]

22. You can't live in Maine.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

19. You have to believe that homosexual parades displaying drag, transvestites, nudity and bestiality should be constitutionally protected, and manger scenes at Christmas should be illegal.

As long as the parade's participants aren't depicting scenes from the Bible, of course. Like Sodom and Gomorrah? But the moment religion creeps in, it is time to kick the creeps out!

Actually, linving in N'Awlins as I do, I've seen a couple of the Southern Decadence parades. They are mostly harmless unless you want to stick your nose someplace it doesn't belong. I.e. religious extremists who STILL don't have the message of tolerance that their own central iconic figure tried to teach with the lesson about turning the other cheek.

These parades, done well, offer parody and wry social commentary. The people who come for the festival buy food and drink. They don't trash hotel rooms. They bathe a lot more than many folks I've met. And the REALLY devoted ones don't take part in the parade. They are in the crowd in a way that makes it hard (sometimes) to realize that the "babe" ahead of you has a mustache bigger than your own, but you don't see it until "she" turns around.

It is very hard to be afraid of someone wearing six inch heels and eight inches of tu-tu. It is even harder to not laugh out loud. But hey, whatever floats your boat. Sadly, on this, as in many other topics, the Religious Right crowd just doesn't get it. I've actually heard someone from that crowd (in excited conversation with a religious nut) use the line, "Oh, yeah? Well just try walking a mile in MY shoes, honey."

16. You have to believe that Hillary Clinton is normal and is a very nice person.

Now THAT is scary! Republican, Democrat, or anything else, Hil has skeletons in her closet including too many buried bodies. One case, her former co-worker and friend who committed suicide with a short-barrel pistol. Except for the startline discrepancies. Such as the suicide note - except it was written with the wrong handedness. The entry wound to the head - again, apparently made by holding the gun with the wrong hand with respect to the decedent's natural hand choice. The entry wound, no exit wound, AND NO BULLET by the time the body got to autopsy. The absence of powder burns in places that would be expected for snub-nosed revolvers. The powder residue on the hand - again, the wrong hand. Hil buried that body with help.

 

[CraigDolphin]

And conversely, to be a good republican you need to believe:

1. You have to be for capital punishment but believe in the sanctity of life.

2. You have to believe that unregulated businesses create prosperity for all, and that businesses behave ethically: just like they did in industrial revolution england, pre-civil war US cotton plantations, and modern-day sweatshops in cambodia. Like Microsoft did when it leveraged its monopoly on operating systems to prevent competitors in other areas. Wall street is your friend: never mind all that pesky Enron or Worldcom shenanigans.

3a. You have to believe that invading and occupying foreign countries will give other foreign countries LESS cause to develop nuclear weapons as a deterent to American aggression.

3b. Guns in the hands of law-abiding Americans are going to make those nuke-wielding Chinese and North Koreans tremble with fear.

4. What's Art?

5. You have to believe that global temperatures are ONLY affected by documented cyclical changes in the earth's climate and CAN NEVER BE affected by the sudden release into the atmosphere of hundreds of millions of years of biologically-sequestered carbon, and that the documented and unprecedented rate of change in global temperatures and associated sealevel change won't hurt the economy, cause poverty, instability, and wars in low-lying countries. (Stock tip: Invest in Smith and Wesson)

6. You have to believe that traditional gender roles are god-given, but being homosexual is of the devil.

7. You have to believe that the AIDS virus is a punishment from God for the gays. Pity his aim is so bad, for a supreme being, that it also effects straight folks too.

8. You have to believe that abortions are evil but teaching kids about contraception is worse.

9. You have to believe that loony hunters, who often mistake each other for deer, and other resource-extraction industry figures with vested financial interests, understand and look out for nature: but environmentalists with advanced degrees in biological sciences all live in San Francisco and exist only to stop economic progress.

10. You have to believe that sportsmanship is using a high powered rifle to shoot a purpose-grown animal that is released into a shooting preserve.

11. You have to believe that Dick Cheney's relationship with Haliburton and massively lucrative no-bid military contracts are entirely coincidental and result solely from deep humanitarian concern for the souls of ordinary Iraqis.

12. You have to believe the ACLU is bad because it supports certain parts of the Constitution, while the NRA is good because it supports certain parts of the Constitution.

13. You believe in personal-responsibility, but pass on your generation's debt to your grandkids to avoid paying taxes today. (There's some family values for you.)

14. You have to believe that history is something only found in those 'foreign' parts of the world that haven't been Americanized yet.

15. You have to believe that helping the poor is a waste of time and money. You can better that time spend going to church to hear about some pro-business guy called Jesus who preached in favor of expanding starbucks into the temple, avoiding paying taxes, and who used to go peasant-beating with his mates from the established religious hierarchy.

16. You have to believe that Dick Cheney is not DARTH VADER.

17a. You have to believe that public health care equals socialism, it hasn't worked anywhere it's been tried, and that the US health care system isn't actually costing more per capita, and delivering poorer outcomes, than in France or other countries with public health care like most of Europe, Canada, Australia, or New Zealand.

17b. You have to believe that communism equals financial ruin, and also that your belief is not absurd on its face considering that most of the US's foreign debt is being paid for by communist China.

18. You have to believe that a democratic president found guilty of obstructing justice (lying about a consensual sexual event) should be impeached, but a republican who lies while impeding an investigation into the leaking of a covert CIA operative's identity should not even go to jail. You also have to believe that Rebublicans in congress were legitimately asking about personal matters in the grand jury but that an investigation of a breach of national security measures was unwarranted.

19. You have to believe freedom of religion means exactly the opposite of what it says.

20. You have to believe that exclusively public financing of elections is against the interests of the citizens of the United States (taxes you know), while corporate campaign financing will be entirely selfless and benign.

21. You have to believe that 95% media ownership by right-wing nut jobs means there's a left-wing conspiracy in the media.

22. You have to believe that minimum holiday, conditions, benefits, and pay should be left to the discretion of Walmart. Merry Christmas.

23. Science is a conspiracy theory to attack Christianity and American economic might.

24. You have to believe the the Constitution is inviolable: but that the government enshrined in that same constitution is inhereantly bad.

25. Morality and Family values refers only to disciminating against gays, and making women undertake illegal abortions in back alleys like the good old days: because two deaths are better than one. Morality does not have anything to do with helping the poor or the sick.

26. You have to believe that the government should stay out of your personal business, but it should have stepped in to stop Terry Shiavo's wishes being honored by the courts.

27. You have to believe stem cell research to cure disease and save lives is immoral even though embyonic stem cells can be harvested from discarded unbilical cords.

28. You have to believe in trickle-down economics even though the gap between the wealthy elite and the rest of the citizenry grows markedly larger whenever republican economic theories get implemented.

 

[KenHigg]

Darn - That must have struck a cord... or did you plagiarize as well?

 

[CraigDolphin]

Actually, I write my own material.

Not to mention, I've lived under public health care and I live stateside now. When I had an achilles tendon rupture in New Zealand I had to pay just $20 for rental of moon-boot and some painkillers/antibiotics after the operation. When my wife cut her hand open the other week on a sunday night, we took her to the emergency room to get stitched up. Two stiches were required. If she hadn't had them straightaway, she would have had to take time off work because the wound would have been much slower to heal if delayed til the next day. The emergency room visit cost? $600! And the doctors bill has yet to arrive. Private insurance? Covered half the cost. So that's $300, or $150 per stitch, with the doctor's bill yet to arrive.

Republicans who insist on this farcical system make my blood boil. And as a (very imperfect, obviously) Christian myself, I do not find myself recognizing much from the bible that I read in the teachings of the evangelical church in America. The republican party would be a great choice for those 'christians' who find themselves reading the gospels and cheering for the pharisees.

So, yes. Cord struck.

 

[Rabbie]

And I always thought that the USA was split 50-50 between reactionaries and conservatives.

 

[Jakboi]

I am a registered Democrat but have gone to the right. The dems and their stances on many topics have lost my confidence. They flip flop a lot on subjects and never really seem to have any true convictions.

They more or less just tell you what you want to hear. The republicans may do the same but at least you know what they stand for and will follow through on what the say it seems.

The dems would run the whitehouse on opinion polls and not convictions.

Great list btw.

 

[CraigDolphin]

The dems would run the whitehouse on opinion polls and not convictions.

S'funny....almost like you're saying that a government who listens to the will of the people is a bad thing? Whatever happened to that whole 'government of the people, by the people, for the people' idea?

 

[KenHigg]

That's always been a curious area of debate. As a politician should you do what you think is right or what your constituents think is right?


???
ken

 

[CraigDolphin]

In representative democracies I think the answer is (or should be) the latter , and the former in other forms of government like dictatorships, monarchies, theocracies, military juntas etc the former would probably be acceptable. But that's kinda why those systems are generally unpopular IMO.

Personally, I think that the best answer is direct democracy where we skip politicians altogether and collectively vote regularly to determine laws and policy as a citizenry. That way, voters don't get the option of blaming anyone except themselves when the consequences of their own short-sighted, fickle, uneducated voting behavior come home to roost. After a good dose of that, I'm hopefull that voters will actually start to pay attention to good policy instead of catch-phrases and start voting intelligently.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

The USA is not a democracy precisely because it wants to avoid the tyranny of the majority. The majority COULD vote tomorrow to reinstate black slavery. Would that be right? Hell, no!

We are a representative-based democracy for which the tyranny of the majority is balanced by those who must consider ALL of their constituents, not just the majority of them. "Vox populi, vox Dei" - the Democrat's secret creed - translated loosely means, "Holy crap, how did we get ourselves in such a mess?" You know the best way to irreversibly spoil a child? Give him everything he wants. Know how to irreversibly spoil the poor? Give them every government program they want. Sounds like democrats in action to me.

The USA is based on balance. Which is why I'm so glad that now George doesn't have a republican majority in both houses. It probably won't happen in my lifetime, but the best thing for the USA would be to have a viable third party that is neither republican nor democrat. One big enough that NO party has 50% of the votes. One that means the powers-that-be would have to actually reach <gasp> compromises on legislation.

My country is tearing itself apart with the dichotomy it currently exhibits. Those of you in the UK who wonder what the Hell is wrong with the USA should try to imagine how your own country might suffer with only two parties, no others with any power. No need to compromise any time there is a majority in both houses. No need to worry about the voters. Throw out the whole concept of governing for all the people.

It is possible that with a three-party system, the USA would be out of Iraq already and our world image would be vastly improved, since it would stop us from making quite so many rash, impetuous decisions. Like prolonging the Iraqi war once Saddam was a gone pecan. But... George didn't ask me first so didn't get the benefit of my opinion.

 

[Rich]

Like prolonging the Iraqi war once Saddam was a gone pecan. .

I'm not surprised that the thought, you shouldn't have started the war in the first place, didn't enter your head