I Believe

I consider myself a Progressive. I have long felt myself in a place with one foot in the realm of the Liberal, and one in the Conservative, but I also know change is a good an healthy thing. I personally believe that there are others like me out there. I hope there are, because the events of the last few days have left me feeling very depressed about the future of our nation.

I believe in total equality for all, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and the pursuit of happiness for every, single citizen of this country. I believe that we must reach out and provide help to those who need it to reach those goals. I believe everyone deserves quality healthcare. I believe in an intelligently regulated market, and I believe that achievement, however you want to measure that, is not something that should be demonized or scorned.

I believe that blanket Federal laws covering things like guns and minimum wadge are foolish, because the people pushing for them can't seem to rationalize that there are huge swaths of this country that simply don't operate in the way their own lives operate. A $15 minimum wadge in New York City is probably rational. A $15 minimum wadge in Broken Bow, NE is probably overkill, and would likely harm small business. That the vast majority of gun owners are skilled and have safety as a primary concern. These things should be decided on a state level, because local lawmakers SHOULD have a much better sense of what is needed in their regions.

Conversely, "States Rights" are not a license to perpetuate hatred and bigotry. That achieving a level of financial success should not be a license to bully those who have not. That a woman's body is her own. That your religion is yours, not mine, not your neighbors'. You are welcome to use your religion to inform your voting choices, but the law is the law. Your religious convictions are not a valid reason to break the law.

I believe that businesses will pay their workers as little as they have to. I believe that unions are vastly important to protecting the interests of the worker in the face of big business thinking. I also believe, in a number of cases, unions have become big business. That they have been complicit in financial disaster by strong-arm tactics to force benefits that could not be sustained.

I believe that solutions to this country's problems can come from anywhere, and will never be found if we continue to invalidate, ignore, or attempt to silence, voices that are not in line with our own. I believe that, while there are many downtrodden and marginalized people in our country in need of our help, there are very few true victims. There is very little to actually fear. That the perpetualization of the victim and fear mentality is engineered by those who profit by keeping us apart. Those who profit from discord and strife.

I believe that "internet activism" has virtually nothing to do with changing anything, and everything to do with enjoying our own voices. It's sole purpose is to create an echo chamber of unchallenged, often incorrect or outright fabricated, opinion back at a mob that already agrees with it. Solidifying groupthink and hardening hearts and minds to any possible solutions that may not fit the pre-conceived narrative they have been indoctrinated into.

When I hear a phrase like "the devil never needs an advocate," I know that the person speaking is deathly afraid of being wrong. Of being confronted with a question that their narrative cannot answer. I believe we should all welcome the moments when we can say "I don't know."

I believe we are all the same. I believe a joke is a joke, and art is art, and that both of those things are intensely personal. That artists must speak truths, and teachers must teach truths, no matter how uncomfortable.That you have every right to not patronize that which you are offended or injured by, but you have no right, at all, to silence anyone's voice, or to impede others from enjoying, or learning from, said voice if they wish to.

It's become depressingly clear to me that there are very few "Progressives" of my stripe, willing to speak out, left in this country. But, my oh my, are there so many Fundamentalists of both a liberal and conservative bent, who will bend your ear for hours. Who's goal is not to improve our society, except in the most narrow, self-centered, of visions, but to win the game.

It's Not Pretty, But It's Human

I started out this week with a long blog about the Orson Scott Card/Ender's Game controversy.

I deleted it.

I frankly just decided that I couldn't take the aggravation.

I've been confronted a lot this week with groupthink. A pervasive, insidious push toward "you're with us, or your against us." Left, right, no fucking difference. God forbid anybody asks questions, or offers considered alternatives. The opinion of the masses has been set. Speaking out with any sort of critical thinking has become verboten in our rapidly brainwashed culture.

Yes, I said brainwashed.

We are inundated with messages that position the world as black and white. There's "us," the right thinkers, and "them," the unwashed, insidious evil. Again, left, right, no difference. Social media has made this portion of the American political spectrum, which has always been there, the mainstream.

We live in a world where we have chosen, systematically, to opt out of critical thinking in favor of a collective groupthink that aligns with the opinions we already hold. We choose "news sources" who will present information in ways that singularly support our own worldview, or at least fail to challenge it.

The simple fact is, there are no "news sources" anymore, simply propaganda machines that we either hold up as unimpeachable, or slander as outright fabrication. I don't give a shit if it's thinkprogress.com, Fox News, Salon, or The New Republic. None of it is designed to facilitate thought, it's designed to reinforce and justify the opinion you've already decided upon.

It's comfort food. An intellectual Twinkie. It's sweet and comforting, and provides zero nutrition.

Then, the really destructive part kicks in. We share this propaganda on Facebook, or Twitter, and convince ourselves this is the same as political "action"...

Bullshit. Utter bullshit.

It's not action, at all. What possible positive change in society can come out of sharing something you already agreed with? That challenged your overall perceptions not in the slightest. Sharing it with a group of peers who, at a guess, are 99% (or more) likely to absolutely agree with you? That's not action, it's masturbation.

It's sharing propaganda with a like-minded peer group, in order so that you may all share in the glow of being "right" and "more enlightened" together. It perpetuates a continual divisive political climate, and a close-mindedness to ideas that do not hew, utterly and completely, to your already established bias. You've created a closed cycle of superiority, and outright hatred (which is ABSOLUTELY NOT the sole purview of the right, let me tell you), that will never resolve positively.

Let me say that again; it will NEVER resolve positively.

Animosity will continue. Hatred and resentment will grow, and we'll continue to look around at our own peer group, read our preferred propaganda, and assure ourselves, "hey, WE'RE not the problem."

Then the shooting will start.

I have walked many different paths in this world, with many different kinds of people. I've worked on ranches with very conservative peers. I have worked in the very liberal world of theatre for most of my adult life. I grew up in a town dominated by the military, and now the center of the "megachurch" phenomenon. I've been to the lowest points a human can tolerate, and the highest. I have seen love and hate in all of these places.

No one is a saint, and no one is a devil.

The thing I learned, and I often don't see around me, and rarely see considered, at all, anymore, is that we're all the same. We're all human, we make the best decisions we can, based on the situation at hand. We fail, sometimes catastrophically, we succeed, sometimes far beyond our wildest dreams, but we cannot transcend our basic humanity.

...And sometimes humans are very, very petty. Sometimes they are very, very weak. Sometimes they are very, very cruel.

The thing to remember is that we are ALL those things. That's what "human" is. We are all biased, all fearful, all stereotypes, all prejudiced. Flaws are an inescapable part of the fabric of humanity, and hating the "right people" doesn't absolve your hatred. It just means you've managed to justify your ugliness to yourself.

No one gets a pass, and anybody who accuses another of any of those things, is...without fail...a hypocrite. Which is not to say that we should not be held accountable for our failings, but we should all remember....those failings are often universal.

And to answer what you may be thinking, I don't pretend to have any moral superiority in any facet of life. I have done awful things. I have hurt people and myself. I absolutely do not excuse myself from this criticism. However, I do believe that refusing to excuse myself is the first step to understanding myself and others.

Yes, I Am Sad...

...and I have nothing but love and prayers for those children, and their families. Nothing in the world I can say will make it better, or changed what happened.

That said, something else needs to be said:

I say this not to be callous, although I'm sure the accusation will come. Bad things happen. Bad things have always happened, and will always happen. We just happen to live in a world where bad things get splattered on our computer and TV screens in 10 seconds, rather than hours later. It gives us a false sense of personal connection, and personal stakes, in something that really isn't about us, at all.

I am not "outraged." I am saddened. I am not taking this horrible act as a personal affront. It's simply because it really has nothing to do with me. It has to do with those people, those children, those parents, and if I were to try to make it about my feelings, or my issues, would be, frankly, disgusting.

This is a moment when I know how utterly and completely stupid social media is. How useless it really is at "communication." How happy some people are to jump up on their soapboxes and pontificate in the most useless and self-aggrandizing ways. Especially when it's a Facebook post, for example, almost literally defines the idea of preaching to the choir.

The blood is in the water, and the sharks can smell it, they're gonna keep tearing at the body until it's ripped to shreds, and pat themselves on the back for it. Take a tragic moment and make it about them. They can't even give it a day to let it just be about the victims.

To all the parents I know who tweeted or posted that they were going to hug their kids extra hard tonight. Bless you, and know that you focused on what was important in a moment like this. You are the best of us. I hope the whole world would read your posts, and skip over the lectures, speeches and sermons.

Now, Why is He Cool and Metallica Sucks?

Dave Mustaine, frontman of Megadeth....

 

Just endorsed Rick Santorum for President.

People should forgive Lulu on this factor alone. That's just an ill-considered artistic move.

Bruce Norris - You May Not Want To Hear This....

I love this:

(Bruce) Norris does not believe that theatre is a particularly good catalyst for change. "There is no political value in having sensitive feelings about the world. I don't think it generates political action. You go, you watch, you say, 'That's sad,' and then you go for a steak. The best you can hope for is to make people slightly uncomfortable. At least if you take the piss out of the audience, they feel they are being addressed," he argues.

SOURCE

This man is so right. Theatre is not an agent for change. I do believe it can be an agent for understanding, and maybe Norris poo-poos that too easily. Understanding can lead to change, in the right context. I also, strongly, believe it can impart moral lessons, as all storytelling can, but moral lessons are not political statements.

Oh, I know, everyone thinks their own, personal, politics always carry the moral high ground. Here's the difference, morals are personal, politics are institutional. Morals are emotional, politics are intellectual.

Lectures are intellectual, stories are emotional. Please, people, stop writing plays that are political manifestos first, and storytelling second...because nobody gives a shit.

Seriously, nobody gives a shit. Oh sure, the people who agree with you will rally around you, slap you on the back and tell you how brave you are. Here's the secret...you're not brave, you're just another part of the problem.

And what is the problem?

We've worked ourselves into a corner because we've allowed ourselves to become awash in trying to give our work "meaning." We've got tons of kids coming out of theatre school, all pumped up with their desire to re-make the world into a liberal utopia, having been fed that they can do this by doing what they love. How happy and easy it all sounds! I don't have to protest, or run for office, or collect signatures, or do any of that icky work. Yes, you can CHANGE THE WORLD with theatre!!!

No you can't. Sorry to break it to you.

Just a joke...OK, Picard fans?

One of the biggest reasons you can't is because in the last century we have all but given up our place as actual, honest-to-god entertainers in favor of trying to be educators. No one cares about theatre except the people making it. Year after year, production after production, we've receded further and further from making emotional connections in favor of trotting out facts, figures and heavy-handed, blindingly obvious arguments. We've lost our way as storytellers so completely that theatre of a serious bent, as opposed to the cotton-candy bullshit of the Broadway musical, is reduced to lecture.

Research is important, facts are important, but, ultimately, useless for storytelling.

"There are 213,000 victims of sexual assault each year! A sexual assault occurs every 2 minutes!!! DOESN'T THAT MAKE YOU ANGRY!!?!!?"

Well, if you want me to be honest, no. It doesn't. The reason is simple, too. It's just a number. Why don't you, instead of waving numbers in my face, tell me story about a rape victim? Someone who's just living, and trying to deal with the results of what's happened. Why don't you eject the "concerned rape councilor" character, who's a crutch for you to inject facts and figures, which, ultimately, are a billion times less interesting and important than just writing a damaged character honestly, and letting an actor play it honestly.

People, also, do not talk like that.

Well, some people do, but NOBODY WANTS TO HAVE A CONVERSATION WITH THEM. Let alone watch them on stage. They may have to, and there's some drama to be mined in that. The drama however would be in the fact that THESE PEOPLE ARE INSUFFERABLE.

A few years ago, I directed a production of Stop Kiss by Diana Son. I love that play, and I think it's genius. It's wonderfully aggressive about not being profound. It's not about gay bashing, or homosexual awakening, it's about two people falling in love, who happen to be women, and something terrible happens to them. The fact is, that story makes more of an impact because Son just refuses to write a "gay play," but creates characters who act and feel real. Normal people in extraordinary circumstances, who are too busy dealing with their situation to even think about what it means to other people, let alone speaking it out loud.

Stop writing about ideas. Write about people.

A Truly Poor Showing...

For myself this week. Really awful. I managed TWO whole blog entries this week.

Normally this blog is enjoyable to write, and I have a good time with it. Sometimes, however, the pressure to actually produce something starts to get to me. I've also, by trying to keep up a five days a week schedule, put myself in a position where I have to generate a lot of material. I make no bones about the fact that a lot of what I put up here is just random crap that falls out of my head. Sometimes it coalesces into an actual point, and sometimes it doesn't.

But that's what a blog is for, isn't it? A public diary for folks who are just egotistical enough to believe that things they find interesting, other people will find interesting. There was a quote from Eddie Van Halen, years ago (probably around 1997 when the last full Van Halen album came out - before the turn to full-on loony-bird status), where he said, essentially, that. It always struck me that statement encompassed pretty much everything "art" is about.

Anyway....

Sitting here looking at my Facebook account, and I'm struck by all the political posts. I strive, in most cases, to be a pretty apolitical person. I just don't care to get so angry about things. I tend to the left, but at the same time, I can see the logic of some conservative viewpoints. I say this only to position myself in you, my reader's eyes.

What the hell is the point of political posts on Facebook? I mean, generally speaking, I see the same links and blogs re-posted ad nauseum. Most of my Facebook friends are friends with each other, the circle is not that big. So, basically you're just re-posting the same point over and over and over again. I was asked to write my congressmen about funding for public broadcasting (link to the exact same page, with the exact same phrasing) no less than, and yes, I kept track, 46 times.

I sent the e-mail after the 2nd.

I also LOVE the "if you don't agree with this, you can just unfriend me" line.

I mean, really?

I have conservative friends on Facebook, but I'm near-completely certain that they're not violent homophobes or out-and-out fascists. If you are so invested in this blog/video/article/youtube clip (whatever it might be) that you are instructing your assembled friends that, unless they agree with you, they need not be your friends, WHY THE HELL ARE YOU FRIENDS WITH THEM IN THE FIRST PLACE?!?!?

Are you just accepting every, single friend request you get?

...Because, folks, that's dangerous.

I also love the "shotgun blast" advocacy. I have a friend, and I do consider him a friend, who will start posting links to various blogs, and just not stop. It just turns into link, after link, after link. I'm talking about 10 blogs linked in 15 minutes.

Do you have ANY IDEA how annoying that is? Do you realize that, no matter if the blog sounds interesting, I'm just blocking it out now? I mean, did you confirm, or even read, all this shit?

Magic 8-Ball says....Response Hazy, Try Again Later.

Then the Magic 8-Ball exploded.

You killed Magic 8-Ball, you BASTARD!!

The point of all this, because I guess I should get to it, is that too many of you fine folks out there have boiled being "involved" and "socially active" down to sitting on your ass in front of a computer and regurgitating the crap you've read somebody else say on the internet.

Y'know the garbage about Obama not being born in the US? That started just like this.

When I found that picture above, I just jumped at it. It's the perfect metaphor for what the internet, and our human society has become. A little tube you crawl into that reflects and reinforces your own views as you ride through it. We're not learning anything on the internet, we're just finding fuel for what we already believe.

Then we turn around and spew it out as "evidence" and feel good about the "good" we've done. Being a socially conscious advocate for change is so easy when all we have to do is click a link, isn't it?

Now Is The Time For All Great Men To Come To The Aid Of Their Country...

And shut the hell up.

With all sincerity in my soul, please, please shut the hell up.

When I see a tweet that says:

PSA: Heeding Obama's call for a more civil discourse does not mean I stop calling you out on your own hateful bullshit.

Actually, sir...it does. At least in the sense that "hateful bullshit" is not really a way of phrasing your feelings as to...y'know, foster productive conversation. I understand your feelings, your anger, but, and this is very, very important for you to realize...YOU ARE PART OF THE PROBLEM.

See, because disagreement? That's not the problem. The fact that probably about 50% of the people in this country think you are wrong (no matter what your views are), and about 50% think you are right. That's not going to change unless we stop screaming at each other, and start listening to each other. When we listen, we might just find common ground with half, or more, of that 50%, and maybe, just maybe we can find a way to pull this country back from the clutches of the extremists who are defining, and obliterating, the tenor of political conversation in this country.

I'll quote from that lovely statement by Jon Stewart again, which is still the most clear and rational  that's been made so far about this shooting;

It's true that others are working feverishly -- feverishly to find blame and exonerate the other.

Watching that is as predicable as it is dispiriting.

Let me ask you a simple question...Do you want to make things better, or do you want to be right?

Because, let me tell you, it's quite likely that those things are not going to always be the same. It's quite likely that the best course of action for our country, moving forward into the great unknown of the future, is going to take a little from the left, a little from the right, and forge them into something that is rational, fair, economically feasible, and humane. See, because Democracy, well...here's the (in my estimation) most relevant definition:

a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections

 That doesn't say, "you get what you want, all the time." It doesn't say, "you by virtue of your political affiliations, have a corner on rationality and morality."  Do you know why?

C'mon, GUESS!

Because we're all human, and we're all fallible, and we're all WRONG, far more often than we would like to admit. Our problem, right now, is that we've lived so long in a self-aggrandizing, ego-stroking society, that we cannot fathom how we could ever be wrong. Them, THOSE PEOPLE, over there! THEY are the WRONG ones!

Democracy works best when divergent ideas come together and form a stronger, compromise whole. That doesn't mean that we have to give up the fight, for anything, but it does mean we can, and should, be open to solutions that don't fall within our own, personal comfort zone.

I hear a lot of my friends talking about the influence of big business, and how it's ruining the country. All I can think is this....

You know what the absolute best thing you can do to continue that kind of garbage? Keep being more concerned with turning politics into a Goddamn football game than a forum for the exchange of ideas and the offering of solutions. Turn off that idiot Beck, or that smug putz Olbermann, because they're just in the back pocket of a corporation, too. Wheeling and dancing to keep you pissed off at one side or the other, instead of looking for solutions and ideas. 

And stop fucking thinking that some brilliant solution is going to drop out of the sky, fully formed and fulfilling every dream of a Utopian society you've ever had. It takes work, it takes new ideas, it takes compromise, and it takes sacrifice. Yep, sacrifice...YOU MAY HURT TO ACHIEVE SOMETHING BETTER. You may have to pay more in taxes, or you might have to pay for your own health care, or maybe you won't get a cost of living increase on your pension...Stop acting like you're the only person in the world to ever, ever shoulder these horrible burdens. 

Trust me, a hell of a lot of people have had it a hell of a lot worse.

Grow up, and stop blaming others. All Christians are not bigots, all Muslims are not terrorists, gays aren't trying to undermine the morality of America, and you're not an asshole just because you're rich. Stop trying to remake everyone but yourself into a vast, faceless, inhuman and easily defined group. We're all PEOPLE, good and bad, weak and strong, petty and noble, and that doesn't have a damn thing to do with where you want to stick your penis, where you want to pray, or how much money you have in the bank.

I am not a political person. I detest it, I hate talking about it, I hate being lectured about it. Still, these last few days, I have almost come to the point where I wanted to swear off ever voting, ever again. Because so many people out there are so busy trying to take ground, cover their ass, assign blame and generally behave like assholes, I have no faith in the world, let alone America. If, and frankly, I'm starting to think it's WHEN, the whole thing comes down around your ears, oh, you'll blame somebody else, Obama or Palin or Bush or Ebaneezer Scrooge, but you'll have brought it on yourself.

Chalk Another One Up For Jon Stewart

I struggled with a couple of blog entries about what happened to Congresswoman Gifford in Arizona. I found myself really laying into everyone, on the Left and the Right, who allowed the environment that nurtured this act.

So, I deleted it.

I'm kinda sick of being angry. It's really exhausting, because I really am sick of all of it. I'm sick of the horrible things the Right says about, say, homosexuals and anyone that supports social programs. I'm equally sick of the horrible things the Left says about, say, Christians and anyone who's "rich." It's the lonely road of the moderate in this day and age, where you fell stupid talking about compromise, because the voices of the ends of the political spectrum have decided there is none.

I'd like to thank Jon Stewart for saying something rational and calming.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Arizona Shootings Reaction
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor & Satire Blog</a> The Daily Show on Facebook

Here's the transcript:

So here we are again stunned by a tragedy.

We've been visited by this demon before.

Our hearts go out to those injured or killed and their loved ones.

How do you make sense of these types of senseless situations is really the question that seems to be on everybody's mind. I don't know that there's a way to make sense of this sort of thing. As I watched the political pundit world, many are reflecting and grieving and trying to figure things out.

It's true that others are working feverishly -- feverishly to find blame and exonerate the other.

Watching that is as predicable as it is dispiriting.

Did the toxic political environment cause this? A graphic image here, an ill-timed comment, violent rhetoric, those types of things.

I HAVE NO (bleep) IDEA.

You know, we live in a complex ecosystem of influences and motivations and I wouldn't blame our political rhetoric any more than I would blame heavy metal music for columbine and that is coming from somebody who truly hates our political environment.

It is toxic. It is unproductive but to say that that is what has caused this or that the people in that are responsible for this I don't think you could do it.

Boy, would that be nice. Boy, it would be nice -- boy, would it be nice to be able to draw a straight line of causation from this horror to something tangible because then we could convince ourselves, is that if we just stopped this the horrors would end.

To have the feeling, however fleeting, that this type of event could be prevented forever.

It's hard not to feel like it can.

You know, you cannot outsmart crazy. You don't know what a troubled mind will get caught on. Crazy always seems to find a way. It always has.

That is not to suggest that resistance is futile.

It sounds futile.

That sounded dark.

Crazy people rule us all.

I don't think it's true. I do think it's important to watch our rhetoric. I think it's a worthwhile goal not to conflate our political opponents with enemies if for no other reason than to draw a better distinction between the manifestos of paranoid madmen and what passes for acceptable political and pundit speak. It would be really nice if the rambles of -- ramblings of crazy people didn't in any way resemble how we actually talk to each other on TV. Let's at least -- let's -- let's at least make troubled individuals easier to spot.

And, you know, again -- to see good people like this hurt, it is so grievous and it causes me such sadness but I refuse to give in to that feeling of despair.

There's light in this situation.

I urge everyone read up about those who were hurt and or killed in this shooting. You will be comforted by just how much anonymous goodness there really is in the world. You read about these people and you realize that people that you don't even know, that you have never met, are leading lives of real dignity and goodness.

And you hear about crazy but it's rarer than you think.

I think you'll find yourself even more impressed with congresswoman Giffords and amazed after how much living was packed in the lives cut way too short. And if there is real solace in this, I think it's that for all the hyperbole and have it -- vitriol when the reality of that rhetoric, when actions match the words we haven't lost our capacity to be horrified.

Please let us hope we never do. Let us hope we never become numb to what real horror, the real blood of patriots looks like when it's spilled. Hopefully it helps us match our rhetoric with reality more often.

The reality of dangerous rhetoric is, I think even those who speak hyperbolically all of that would recoil and say, wow, that's, you know -- that is not the picture of what we were discussing or talking about. I have to remember that there's a reality to that situation that we can't approach verbally. Because someone or something will shatter our world again.

And wouldn't it be a shame if we didn't take this opportunity and the loss of these incredible people and the pain that their loved ones are going through right now, wouldn't it be a shame if we didn't take that moment to make sure that the world that we are creating now that will ultimately be shattered again by a moment of lunacy, wouldn't it be a shame if that world wasn't better than the one we previously lost?

I wanna call your attention to one, specific line...

It's true that others are working feverishly -- feverishly to find blame and exonerate the other.

Watching that is as predicable as it is dispiriting.

Oh, yes, it is.

I wonder if anyone ever catches themselves thinking first, not of the health of Gabrielle Gifford, but how this tragic turn of events will help them "get" Sarah Palin, or whoever. I wonder, because, a lot of the posts I read about this seem far more concerned with making a political point than really sending well wishes to those poor people. I wonder if they realize it first, and do it anyway.

Once again, we find a late-night comedian more up to the task of providing a calm voice of reason and truth, for which we used to turn to such giants as Walter Cronkite or Edward R. Murrow, a job that our newscasters and journalists have abandoned in order to curry ratings from the far extremes of the political spectrum.

I try to stay out of politics...

Rant mode on....

The whole process annoys me, and I find the most vocal members of either end of the political spectrum to be annoying, false, and ego-driven. O'Riley, Olbermann, Beck...These idiots don't give a damn what they say, if they contradict themselves in the same breath, or if it even makes any damn sense, as long as it attacks "those people.

Then I read this:

Is Obama Punking Us?

I'm sorry to say it, but Obama is a one term President. The main reason for this? His own supporters.

Our major problem, for every one of us, is the idea that's perpetuated in this country that we are all infallible. Our personal beliefs ought to be shared by everyone, and we get furious if they aren't. For God's sake, we get pissed off that anyone with any sort of pulpit for his views might speak something we don't agree with. Nobody wants to admit it, but our general attitude in this country, FROM ALL OF US, the left or the right, is that views in opposition to our own are best not heard.

The guy we vote for is nigh-on a saint, walking on water, and the other guy is two steps lower than Satan. Bush? A Nazi! Obama? A Commie! The parties are no longer about differing methods in order to provide the best for all citizens of this country.

If you think anybody starts a political party in order to screw a portion of the populace, you're on crack.

When your methods differ, but your goal is the same, compromise is possible, co-operation is possible. When your party exists simply to tear down the other party as far as possible, you have...the clusterfuck we have right now. The Republicans have no plan, so they just attack, attack, attack, and when Pelosi got the majority, it was all about payback. None of these people care one little bit about you or me or our lives, they just want to grab as much power for themselves as possible.

I voted for Obama mainly because he talked of ending this bickering. The unfortunate result of his win, however, was encouraging Pelosi and her crew on her quest to ram anything and everything she can down the Republican's throats.

The American public is also ridiculous. The woman in the article, "I got punked." Oh my God! He couldn't change the course of the nation in 8 months! What a liar! It's, yet again, the American attitude of "I want what I want RIGHT NOW! I don't have to compromise, I'm an American!!!"

Then, there was a laughable attitude among Obama supporters that somehow his election was going to change the entire system of government in this country. Someone I know actually said to me before the election, "Obama's talking about changing the whole way the Government operates." I didn't know if I should pity him, or laugh in his face.

Washington operates as it does, and it always will. No one will ever get elected and make sweeping changes to the system. You vote for people who share your values about what that system ought to be used for. All of the Obama supporters who perpetuated the "messiah" vibe around him are the reason his poll numbers are slipping. These people, who looked upon him as a miracle man, able to do anything, are now looking at a Health Care package that is the result of compromise over a difficult issue.

Y'know, the left used to attack Bush and his cronies as seeing the world too simplisticly. Everything was "black and white," and they never grasped the complications of these issues. Of course, when Obama takes office, those same people expect everything to happen RIGHT NOW. Iraq? We ought to be out last week, doesn't matter what kind of chaos that might leave in our wake. Chaos we caused, by the way.

Or, that allowing auto manufacturers to fail left and right might not be exactly the best course of action to restore financial confidence. Oh, I know most of you don't have friends or family who work for Ford or one of the other car makers, but...*pssst!* They do employ a lot of people.

It's a major financial turnaround we're going for here, and, lady, I don't care if you felt "punked" or not, it's not going to happen overnight.

So, y'know what? The guy's trying to do his best up there. Why don't you grow up, and stop whining like a 2 year old when you don't get things your way.