Wednesday, March 14, 2007

The Left Sucks Too

As a political blogger, I consider it my mission to trash the other side. But even I get bored of it after a while, and it's not like the left is a bunch 'o saints either. In fact, you know, basically my philosophy is this -- if they've gotten to the point that they're well-known enough to be electable, it's already too late. Big money has gotten them. And if a pundit is identified with the left or the right, they're lying about their true opinions about half the time, because staying on one side is good for talent bookers.

I have no such constraints, because there's no money in this. I'm not saying I can't be corrupted -- It's just that to date no one has bothered. So while I can still afford it, here's a list of things that tick me off about my own side of the spectrum.

  1. John Kerry. Humorless, inauthentic, looks like Herman Munster. I suppose it's not surprising that he was elected to the senate, and once there incumbency has taken care of him, but I can't imagine a less appealing candidate for anything, anywhere.
  2. The War Vote. This may be my biggest beef with the whole party. Iraq? And you really all BELIEVED that nonsense? It seemed pretty obvious to ME at the time that Iraq had nothing to do 9/11, nor had they attacked us. Y'all voted for it because you were afraid that we'd dislike you. Well, that's why we all like Obama now. Triangulation is the dark side of open-mindedness.
  3. "Poor people are poor because nuclear power plants are polluting the atmosphere!" Not a real quote, but a National Lampoon satire of Jane Fonda from the late seventies. There are good practical reasons to regulate business, help the poor and protect the environment, but much of the left pursues these things because of the warm fuzzies they get out of it. This quote is dangerously close to countless things I've read from various actors over the years. We have too many spokespeople, and a lot of them are just stupid. BTW, if anyone can confirm or deny that P. J. O'Roarke wrote this, I'd be grateful.
  4. Lecturing. We can be pretty insufferable some times. The right does it too, but I'm not writing about them now. Now sit down and don't interrupt.
  5. The Soft Bigotry of Low Expectations. Nobody can make the homeless feel even MORE disenfranchised then us. The left is always more willing to give a man a fish than to teach him how to fish. Not everybody can reel in the big one, but more people can than we think. There is a tremendous hubris among lefties, and we often believe that only we can save the world/the poor/the environment. We are mistaken. Except about the environment.
  6. The DNC. The Democratic National Committee has been leading us into the wilderness since the early 90's. The DNC made Ralph Nader look viable. The DNC turned Al Gore into a wooden cypher. The DNC said, "Howard Dean? Who could like him! Let's run Kerry instead." The DNC is an ocean that Karl Rove has been catching the big waves on for too long.
  7. Air America. It's great that there is such a thing... it's just bad radio. How difficult can it be to find left-leaning entertainers?

Hillary Clinton gets honorable mention (see 2, 4 and 5) as do any Fox News regulars - if you were good at articulating the position, they'd throw you off the guest list pal. And the list is by no means complete. The complete list, though, is about a tenth of the size of my list of things about the right that tick me off.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Apropos the NatLamp quote: I don't think it was P.J. O'Rourke. He wasn't too involved with the radio show, and didn't start writing for the magazine 'til the late 70s/early 80s. It was probably Doug Kinney or Michael O'Donoghue. Spelling optional on all of the above.

And as I said in another response, your willingness to question your own politics and worldview is a sign of being an evolved, intelligent blogger. It never ceases to amaze me how practically nobody else does-- even though some of the more established voices can damn well afford to occasionally call themselves wrong or declare a topic too complex to have an opinion on.

--S