Brushfire of Freedom
The Irritable Pundit
Hello all,
A couple of irritating things and a movie to discuss.
1) A piece of advice for the Republican party leaders. Learn how to personalize. With Obamacare we have generational strife enshrined in law and the Democrats completely and utterly own it. The young will hurt the old via restricting healthcare, and the old will hurt the young via bills our children and grandchildren will choke on. We are hearing the senior side of the equation, but what about the young? Stop talking right vs wrong in general terms and make it specific to the impact on the young as well.
"Dear Young people,
Your lives are going to be less and will contain less than your parents, and your children's will have even less than your own. Simply because we today do not have the strength or honor to pay our own bills and will stick you with them instead. It is easier and takes no work on our part. You are our credit card, and we are maxing you out.
Love,
The Democrats."
2) I am truly amazed at the backbiting going on in otherwise sane conservative circles in the wake of the recent Obamacare efforts. Yes, it is bad. Yes, we need to fight this every step of the way. No, it is not time for "It's FILL-IN-THE-BLANK's fault!"
Republican commenter : You conservatives didn't back McCain with all your heart! See what happens?!?!!
Conservative commenter: You Republican insiders forced McCain on us! It's your own fault!
You could easily make at least a semi-coherent argument for both sides, and I do have a preference between the two of them, but it simply does not matter anymore. It is over. That election is done.
Truth #1: Conservatives need to back our next candidate with great energy, as opposed to holding our nose and voting at best, or staying home to "teach the Republicans a lesson". The stakes are too high.
Truth #2: The Republican party has to nominate someone the base will enthusiastically follow. No one deserves a nomination to anything because of time served, hero or not. Bob Dole should have been lesson enough. Never do that again.
3) I want to point out one more thing that is irritating me. We are currently seeing buyers remorse from Obama voters pick up steam as Obamacare looms, and exactly the wrong thing is occurring. We are screaming "I told ya so you IDIOTS!". Stop that. Stop that right now. I am not saying that you can't partake of a bit of schadenfreude, but keep it civil people. We need them coming around, not hardening their positions out of spite because we are being boors.
In fact, every one of you who is currently wild-eyed and shouting that "Obama Lied! He hid his grades! Where is his birth certificate?!?!" needs to stop and take a breath. Beyond the fact that it is far too late for those issues, your anger keeps focusing on the point that Obama somehow "tricked us" on his way to power. Is he a liar? Sure he is. His duplicity is bald-faced and easy to see. But that is exactly the point (and it is one you are missing).
Obama was no mastermind, no Svengali. His lies were not rock-solid and told with impenetrable cunning. He simply gave us a blank slate on camera, added a bit of misdirection and let the American people fool themselves. Think about it. And yes, this is somewhat rehashed from an old piece (Obama is as Honest as Reagan) that the sarcasm-impaired are still unable to grasp.
When speaking to leftist groups (meetings with Acorn/SEIU) Obama was completely honest. He knew the wizards of smart would trot out the "oh that's just to fire up his base!" line. "He didn't really mean that!", they said. Usually adding a bit of eye-rolling at all the rubes they knew would work themselves into a tizzy. "After all, they always come back to the center near the end and Obama is a centrist at heart." We were assured by our betters that it would all work out and Obama smiled all the way to the Whitehouse. All he really did was palm one card and let us fool ourselves from there. He isn't that smart, the American people were simply that complacent.
We as a nation fooled ourselves. It is up to conservatives to wake and educate them with compassion. To ensure they see what is happening without us giving in to our lesser instincts "to get a couple of good shots in" out of anger (deserved or not). Do not win the battle and lose the war. That way lies many more years of Democrat dominance.
And on a lighter note...
4) James Cameron lifted the lid off his latest theatrical wonder and proved that some guys just do not know when to quit. I haven't felt this violated since George Lucas reached out to touch my inner child with Jar Jar Binks. Frankly I want to call Dateline NBC to report the abuse. Maybe NBC should make a new version of their hit TV show and call it "To catch a Film-Editor".
What we have here is a beautiful (seriously) stunning (Oh yes) incredible effort involving genuine CGI wizardry. Which would be all well and good if it wasn't weighed down with a hackneyed plot line lifted from a half-dozen better movies. That alone does not make it bad, but frankly the key points are handled with a comic book sensibility at best. The hero is Lt. John Dunbar from Dances with Wolves, the heroine is Pocahontas with a touch of Smurfette and a staggering amount of HGH (Smurfahontas goes wild!). And the bad guys? Well, it is on an alien planet far in the future and yet the blame is still assigned somehow to Bush, Haliburton, and anyone not green enough to rate an invitation to Copenhagen last week.
You gotta love Hollywierd, you just gotta.
To summarize: Beautiful, lots of frenzied action that never changes anything, preachy, over-budget, and makes promises it can't keep. It is the perfect mindless entertainment movie and the perfect liberal analogy at the same time. See you at the theatre!
And we will see you next week here as well, Happy Holidays!
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