Dana Milbank listened to the Republicans on the Senate floor yesterday so you wouldn’t have to. Here’s our friend from Missouri:
“When a newly revitalized al-Qaeda carries out a 9/11-scale attack, you will own that one,” Sen. Kit Bond (R-Mo.) told his good friends across the aisle.
Here’s our friend from Minnesota:
Sen. Norman Coleman (R-Minn.) advised his Democratic colleagues that they were “handing al-Qaeda a victory that they will be able to use to strengthen their forces and then hurt and kill more Americans.”
And our good pal from Utah:
“This is the worst case of capitulation to appeasement since Neville Chamberlain spoke the words ‘Peace in our time,’ ” Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said during yesterday’s debate.
And the Gentle Lady from Texas:
Terrorists “will follow us home,” warned Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Tex.). “If we don’t stand for freedom against this enemy, we will see it again on our own shores.”
And the former Democrat from Alabama:
Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) advised his colleagues that they were sending “a message of surrender, a message of submission, a message of failure.”</blockquote
Not to be outdone by the former Democrat from Connecticut.
The lone member of the Democratic caucus to oppose the Iraq withdrawal, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), adopted the Republican language that Democrats were proposing a “deadline for defeat.” He warned that “if we follow the plan in this legislation,” Americans would lose their “security from terrorism here at home.”
Meanwhile, the Senators from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and New York were strangely calm and unafraid. Although one Senator from Virginia did chime in.
Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.), who won his Senate seat last year on an antiwar theme, suggested an end to the “defeatism and surrender” accusations. “I think we need to calm down a bit,” he proposed.
And I propose that the Republicans load up on duct tape, plastic sheeting, and bottled water. Cuz it’s hard out there for a bedwetter.
In a strange way, the Republicans are quite correct here.
Thet do not know how or why they are correct, but they are.
From the mouths of boobs.
Here it is.
Without a sea change in American culture…a change from a society based entirely on massive overconsumption, a change from the media propaganda (sometimes called “advertising”) that promotes this overconsumption, a change from the basic international tactic of economic imperialism that is used to fuel that society…the ultimately unwinnable war with the Third World will continue.
Always been outnumbered, soon to be outgunned.
The Third World War.
A palliative regime change that does NOT address these issues will change nothing as far as al Queda and the other nascent resistance movements are concerned. (Read South/Central/Caribbean America there, just for starters.)…and except for the more serious Greeners, I hear next to NOTHING on these subjects from Dem pols. No doubt because they are subjects that will lose rather than gain votes from the Hogmerican mainstream.
Given that continuing policy, the Ratpub approach is the ONLY way to sustain it. Not that this approach will work, long-term. There is no solution other than rejoining the rest of humanity and redistributing the wealth, a direction that is not, on the evidence of my own travels through all levels of this society, even remotely about to happen in Hogmerica. Still swilling down the pig juice, from the ghettoes right on through to the gated communities. “At least we’re better off than THEY are!!!” is the American mantra, intoned over messes of contaminated meat and through the fog of Big Pharma-hyped meds and lousy beer. Right.
There is no appeasing the hungry and/or the many-times bereaved.
Bet on it.
We either have to kill ’em all and let God (Insert your own appropriate god here…Mammon, Satan, Jehova…) sort ’em out or fess up to our 300+ years worth of sins and take real steps towards redemption.
Real, practical steps.
Like…pulling in our belts and slimming down.
RADICALLY.
Like…eliminating the Usurocracy that really runs this country.
We RUN on debt.
A bad tactic, as any hard-working person will tell you if he or she has a goddamned brain left in their head.
But…NOOOOOOOOO…
And why?
BECAUSE YOU CANNOT GET ELECTED WITHOUT THE SUPPORT OF THOSE WHO SIT AT THE TOP OF THIS ROTTED PYRAMID GAME.
Personally, I am thinking of writing in Donald Trump for every primary or election we have over the next year or so.
Why not?
May as well get real.
He is a fake billionaire.
A BULLionaire, when you get right down to it.
And we are a fake country.
The perfect face of Big Brother.
Reagan with a scowl.
TRUMP FOR PREZNIT!!! LET’S GET REAL!!!
Yup.
THAT’S the ticket!!!
Or…one of these weak-spirited DemRat motherfuckers has to find some backbone and stand up.
Strong.
So far?
Nope.
The only one with the rhetorical skill and talent to pull it off?
Obama.
But will he?
On his track record so far?
Nope.
Surprise me, Obama.
Surprise me.
Or…not.
We shall see…
Plan A Lite or a real Cultural Revolution.
Your choice now, brother.
Your choice.
Blink…and we are as good as dead.
Bet on it.
You are smart enough to know this, and you spent enough time skin color-dictated time beneath the underdog to be hip to what is really up. (The title of Charles Mingus’s largely fictional autobiography…Beneath The Underdog. Where the REAL shit happens.)
Surprise me.
You are better than what you have shown so far, sir.
Surprise me.
Surprise us ALL.
VAYA!!!
Or…pass the pork, Mama, ‘cuz we are in for a LONG winter.
Your choice.
Go for it.
Later…
S.
The only IMPORTANT motivational idea I would add is that many Americans in your Hogmerica scenario feel their God blesses them, and thus gives them this right to take more and more. They believe this so strongly that the phrase ordering the almighty to “bless America” has become part of their daily thought and language patterns, nevermind that the logic of telling any almighty being (can there be more than one??) anything is an oxymoron.
Anyway, Maslow has told us that People are motivated to stay alive at all costs so if we take too much from the world so that many folks cannot survive, they will not just die for us quietly, at least according to Maslow. However, if you say the mantra “God bless America” enough times in penance, maybe they will just starve by divine decree!
Now a stand-alone post.
DONALD TRUMP FOR PREZNIT!!! Why not just get real?
Comment there, please.
AG
first of all- re Bedwetting- don’t knock it until you try it so don’t slander bedwetting! – Ha!
Seriously though. What Mr milbank is doing is succintly pointing out who our focus should be on in 08! These folks are the spewers of the lies and misstatements and hate that have brought us to this point in history.
If the idiots would pause for one second and simply question the cost of financing the largest private army in history and who is paying this cost, there would not be a need for any supplementals!
billjpa
FEAR, fear fear fear! Be Afraid Be Afraid!!! Fear fear fear!
Okay Bond I got it, now it is my turn:
GROW UP!
Did you mean “plastic sheeting” or “plastic bedding”? For this Republican crowd, the latter would be far more useful.
Best closing line. Ever!