When I was 17, I was a socialist.
Seriously. When I was 17 years old and a senior in high school, I announced to everybody who would listen that I was a card-carrying member of the Democratic Socialists of America. And I was fervent about it. I was a true believer.
I turned 18 in November of 1990, three and a half months after Saddam Hussein rolled his tanks into Kuwait. George Bush was in the White House, and we all saw him on CNN declaring that the Iraqi invasion would not stand. War seemed inevitable. And war, as every college freshman knows, is something that must be opposed with protests and signs and chants. Mostly because that’s where all the girls are, the pink-cheeked teenage girls in their cut-off jeans and their tank tops with peace signs on them.
Between the endless succession of vainglorious anti-war extracurriculars and the sudden post-U.S.S.R.-era tackiness of that old-time proletarianism, 18-year-old me came into the 1992 election cycle as about as rasa a tabula as you could ever hope to see. I knew that war was bad because the hippie chick with the bandana and the jeans with the hole you-know-where told me so in between attempts to teach me how to French kiss. But on the other hand, I knew that the Gulf War had been about as bloody as a Pearl Jam concert and had lasted only slightly longer. Democratic candidate Bill Clinton delivered a few stump-speech platitudes and a Ray-Banned sax solo, and it was a done deal.
That November I went into a booth and I pulled a lever and I was proud to be an American and a Democrat.
Throughout the 1990s, I was an unapologetic, though not always proud, member of the Democratic Party. I had lost none of the fervency of my high-school days; I really believed. I was twenty years old. Of course I believed. Believing is what unreconstructed idealists do best.
But in 1998, the whole world came crashing down. That summer, news broke that the President — my President — had had a protracted and wildly inappropriate sexual relationship with a 22-year-old White House intern named Monica Lewinsky. And not only did he have an affair, but he lied about it defiantly and forcefully. “I did not have sexual relations with that woman,” he said. He said it to the press, he said it to the whole country. He said it to me. And it was a lie.
“Oh, everybody lies about sex,” they said. You know: they. The faceless voice of the conventional wisdom. “It’s no big deal,” they said. But to me, it was a big deal. I don’t expect my President to be without sin. But I do expect that when he looks me in the eye and pounds his extended finger on that podium and says it like he means it, that he’s not lying to me.
I didn’t say anything about it to anybody. Not to my friends, not to my co-workers, not to anybody. But it was then, in the fall of 1998, that I began to feel, for the first time, like I didn’t fit in with the Democratic Party any more.
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During the late 1990s, little by little, my convictions began to evolve. Things that had seemed self-evident to me five years before were suddenly up for grabs, or worse, now seemed equally self-evident to me only in the opposite direction. But I was still a Democrat — I’ve never been one to jump ship over a few differences of opinion — and I dutifully voted for Al Gore in November 2000.
The aftermath of the 2000 election was an embarrassment to the nation. Gore’s retracted concession was an act of political classlessness unequalled in recent memory, and the turmoil that resulted damaged this country in ways from which we still haven’t recovered.
But what really shocked me was the vitriol that gripped my party during and after the election. People were throwing around the word “stolen,” and they meant it. They really believed that some dark cabal had conspired to overturn a fair election and award the Presidency to a candidate who hadn’t earned the office.
In the winter of 2000, it seemed like dissatisfaction with a failed campaign boiled over into outright hatred, not just among the fringe lunatics but in the minds of mainstream Democrats around the country. Once again, I was starting to wonder whether I really fit in.
Then came a Tuesday morning in September.
I was on a business trip, visiting a client in Los Angeles. My phone woke me up. “Turn on your television,” said the co-worker on the other end. I asked which channel. “All of them,” he said.
One of the towers had just fallen and the other one was burning; smoke was rising from the Pentagon. There were rumors of planes still unaccounted for. It wasn’t over. One of our co-workers had been on a flight from Dallas to Chicago that was in the air during the hijackings; was he okay? They were clearly trying to hit “soft” targets, and the woman I loved worked in one of the largest buildings in the Southwest. And the phones were jammed and I couldn’t get through to anyone. I looked out the window of my high-rise hotel over the L.A. basin and saw, on the horizon, the blue-grey smudges of a pair of F-15s. A flash of reflected California sunshine and they were gone.
For four days I sat in that hotel and watched the news unfold on CNN. By the time the airports reopened, I knew exactly what I wanted from the government and the President. I didn’t want mere retaliation or a military quid pro quo. I wanted absolute certainty that nothing like the events of that horrific Tuesday morning could ever happen again. I wanted the smoke from the burning towers to herald the flames of a reformation that would sweep across Central Asia, the Middle East and parts beyond. I wanted the President — who at some point during that unforgettable week had become my President — to change the world.
Not all Democrats saw it that way. While American troops were fighting in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere, Howard Dean announced that Osama bin Laden should be considered innocent until proven guilty. Prominent Democratic donor George Soros declared that “crime requires police work, not military action.” John Kerry, who would eventually secure the Democratic nomination, said that the President “rushed into battle.”
What the hell had happened to the Democrats? Why was a party that had been so willing to use American military force during the 1990s when the commitments were small and the sacrifice slight suddenly so reluctant to do what was right?
I came into the 2004 President election season disenchanted with my own party but ready to be won back. All the Democrats had to do was show even a token willingness to win the war. They didn’t do that. Instead they nominated an undistinguished legislator who saluted with one hand and pandered to the squeamishness of the anti-war bloc with the other.
In November 2004, I walked into a booth and pulled a lever. And I was proud to be an American and, for the first time in my life, a Republican.
I have friends who’ve been Republicans all their lives. I think we all know people like that, people who inherited their political opinions from their parents and never wavered. I had to strike out on my own and experience a sort of philosophical Wanderjahr before I was ready to come back to the values I learned from my parents.
Does that make my political opinions any more valid than anyone else’s? Of course not. But it does make them complicated. I believe that personal responsibility is a cardinal virtue, but I believe that society must sometimes protect us from ourselves. I believe that free markets solve problems better than governments, but I believe that public education is too important to leave to the invisible hand. I believe that sometimes war is the inevitable extension of a strong foreign policy, but I believe that the state has no business executing prisoners. I’m a swarming, teeming mass of political contradictions, and as such I fit in perfectly with no political party.
But I think that’s how American politics is supposed to work. I think American political parties are supposed to be made up of smart, dedicated people who disagree about practically everything but who find enough common ground to work together. I think that American politics is the politics of persuasion, and that people with strong convictions have a responsibility to get out there and start persuading others to see things their way.
And I believe that strong-willed people who disagree with each other can change the world for the better. Because I think that those are the only people who ever have.
Jeff Harrell blogs at The Shape of Days.
Welcome Jeff,
It’s been said that “a Republican is a Democrat who’s been mugged once”. Your mugging was everyone’s on 9/11/01.
I sometimes wonder just how many of us are out here. Those of us who are a,
swarming, teeming mass of political contradictions, and as such fit in perfectly with no political party.
9/11 did have a huge impact on a number of us.
the hippie chick
LMFAO! Perhaps you meant 1965 instead of 1990?
Howard Dean announced that Osama bin Laden should be considered innocent until proven guilty.
Damn! Did you forget all the whining from the GOP impeachment shills about the Rule of Law?
Welcome to the fold, Jeff!
I, too, was a Democrat during my misguided youth. I’m from a blue-collar Hispanic family, and had always been taught that Democrats were the party that represented the interests of poor downtrodden people like us.
My epiphany came a couple of years after I entered the work force as a medical technician. It just about killed me to work my butt off six days a week and get a sizeable chunk taken out of my check in taxes, while my patients were on various federal and state government programs and enjoyed a better standard of living than I did. Here I was, eating oatmeal morning, noon and night so that I could afford to pay my light bill, and these people got to eat steak. Not cheap hamburger meat like I bought when I wanted to splurge, but real steak. To make matters even worse, my patients took great delight in bragging about how they scammed the system.
When I’d complain about the whole mess to my family, I pretty much got raked over the coals and was tersely informed that it was the government’s job to do stuff for people. I waved my pay stub and asked them, “Where in the hell do you think the government gets its money?” They honestly thought somebody in Washington, D.C. just sat around printing money all day long.
The doctor that oversaw our department heard me ranting in the break room one day, and took me under his wing. After he dispelled many of the myths about the Republican party that I had always harbored, I changed my political affiliation. My family was horrified. You would have thought that I just murdered thirty-seven people with a weed-whacker or something. “How could you?!” they screamed. “Republicans are the party of the rich!”
Maybe I’m just weird, but I kind of liked that idea. I wanted to be rich, too. I’m not there yet, but I’m still working on it…
Your right wingers really do make me laugh here you are complaining about how the state is wasting money on people in most cases what your really saying is non white people,,,,and then when is comes to Iraq your party is suddenly the most caring party out there and willing to spend billions to help some brown people get democracy,,,hypocrites the truth is you dont give a dam about no one in the USA who aint got no money and you only support the war because your all war mongering bloody thirsty cowARDS
Wow, I could have written this, except that I came to my realization between 1997 and 1999. By 2000 I was convinced that the lesser of two evils was on the right and not the left. By 2004 I will admit, I enjoyed watching them flounder in defeat. I’m STILL unhappy with a lot of what the right does, but I’m also not an idiot. In a de facto 2 party system, you pick the one that does the least amount of damage.
When one side wants to risk my very life and the other only wants to run it…the choice is clear for me. I’ll take the political mother-in-law; at least she doesn’t want to invite terrorists over for dinner and serve them on the good china.
Clinton lying, Gore’s participation in the 2000 election debacle and advocacy for a military solution for terror.
Those are like mating calls to moonbats. Let me get some popcorn, this could be fun.
When I turned 18, my mother told me that if I ever wanted to vote in primaries, I’d have to register Dem; when someone did run on the Republican side, he was unopposed and generally had little chance of winning whereas you at least got a chance to weed out the idiots on the Dem side. I grew up around people who would NEVER vote ‘R’ just because… you know the litany.
The ‘D’ party pretty much ran the state, and I heard all the crap; I heard the people who would vote for someone they KNEW was an idiot/drunk/thief/incompetent because “he’s the party candidate!” and that was all that mattered. And it came to really piss me off.
What I tell people now is that saying “He’s the party candidate and that’s all I need to know” is the equivalent of hanging out a sign saying “I don’t have to think, the Party does it for me”. That may be a fine attitude for the PRC or Cuba or the old Soviet Union, but it’s not how this republic was supposed to work.
I make no apologies for the ‘R’ party when they do something stupid, and I will vote for a ‘D’ when I know this one is both the best for the job and will NOT fold up for the national party’s wishes. Problem has been, the ‘D’ party nationally I cannot trust AT ALL, and the ‘R’, if I watch the clowns hard and yell enough, I can trust somewhat.
I have to mention one more thing; when I found that the Democrat party trusted our enemies to be ‘reasonable’ with nukes and chem/bio weapons, but didn’t trust me to own a firearm, BIG splitting point there.
Great article, and welcome to the crew. I’m looking forward to reading more.
Yeah, I was a socialist for a little while in high school, then a Randian for a little while after that (that was an amusing switch), and then I voted for Clinton in 1992 (I was 18). Then I joined the Libertarian party sometime before 1996, the year I moved to NYC.
Then I stopped playing games in 2001.
So yeah, I hear ya Jeff. 2001 really woke me up. I was bemused by Clinton’s “diplomacy” when it came to North Korea, Iran, Iraq, Israel, etc. Then it all became deadly serious, and the UN’s perpetual finger-wagging was no longer so funny.
Things don’t change much as the decades pass. Quaker hippie chick (who later converted to Judaism after a summer dig in Israel and dumped me), Earth Day, anti-war protests, all in the background for my first Presidential Vote. However I was never a “Party Man.” I voted for Shirley Chisholm. (Not just the Primary, but for the final election too. No way I was gonna vote for McGovern.) However, then a righteous man appeared on the scene. Carter. Oops. Yep, after I helped elect the guy who led us into double digit inflation, one foreign relations blunder after another culmunating in the disaster OPERATION EAGLE CLAW, I was done with idealism. The final straw was when he essentially paid ransom to the Iranians by releasing their frozen assets (who as a final snub to Carter refused to release the hostages until after Reagan’s inauguration). If the Dem’s could find someone practical AND with some integrity, I would have voted for their candidate, but they haven’t found one yet.
My bleeding heart wife bought me Carter’s new book for Christmas. It sits next to the toilet in the basement. Just in case I run out of toilet paper.
Good job on the Wizbang Gig, Jeff.
See, life ain’t all hell. 😉
Jeff
Just when I trhought it was impossible to find another naive, gullible impressionable young man, you produce this codswollop!! Your President! Your president! Who are you? What are you?!! You change your enrire political outlook because of a sex scandal?!! Jesus Christ, I’ve heard it all. With the due-est of respect, how do you say, oh yes get a life!
Please excuse any typing errors. Am trying to trade at the same time!!!
I too was once a liberal. I am embarrassed to say I voted for Dukakis and Clinton the first time.
Although I had switched parties long before the whold Lewinski thing broke. Even when I pulled the lever for Clinton in 1992, I was already changing, and had I realized then what an accomplished liar Clinton was, I probably wouldn’t have voted for him that year, but I didn’t know that then.
Chuck Robb has the dinstinction of being the last democrat I ever voted for-it was somewhere around the mid 90’s that I figured out the democratic party just wasn’t what I thought it was, its values weren’t the ones I believed in, and the GOP was a better fit.
“I have to mention one more thing; when I found that the Democrat party trusted our enemies to be ‘reasonable’ with nukes and chem/bio weapons, but didn’t trust me to own a firearm, BIG splitting point there.”
Oh, Mark, you NAILED the very thing that turned my head toward the right. I was appalled that a group would, as a platform plank, endorse a stance that encouraged people who wanted Americans dead to gain access to weaponry that can kill, indiscriminately and by the tens or hundreds of thousands, but they refused to see what the Founding Fathers recognized as my personal, individual and inherent right: to be armed for the purpose of protecting myself. It was that very notion that created the schism between my former liberalism and my current trend toward libertarian-esque conservatism.
Hmmmm–me thinks poor little “David” must be a LLL–reckon?
Well, I’m not surprised you could change your entire political affiliation over a sex scandal. Believe it or not, a lot of college students are liberals because of what they think about the issues, not because some girl tells them to be. The fact that you’re so intellectually shallow is belied by the fact that you changed your entire philosophy over a sex scandal. Oh well, I guess we’ll be welcoming you back to the Democratic party after the Abramoff scandal is fully exposed. I mean, I’m assuming you’re not so much of a hypcrite that you could stay with a party whose leaders would look into the camera and lie about their involvement?
Great article and comments. I too had a moment of weakness in the early 90’s when I was working as an attorney at the time & considered myself well-read but I bought that line that Republicans were ruining the courts by stacking them with conservatives. Thankfully, my insanity was short-lived and I haven’t voted for a democrat in a major election since 1992. Now even most of the Republicans aren’t conservative enough for me.
Chris
If you think Jeff changed his whole philosophy over a sex scandal, need to go back and have your keeper read it to your again, without skipping over the 3+ syllable words.
You and David are in the say dayroom, right?
Convenient how David and Chris read only what they want to read. It was the “let’s roll over and piss ourselves like wimpy dogs” attitude the liberals adopted after 9/11 that had him see the light you pompous, ignorant pseudo-intellectual pansy boys.
You think the enemy *respects* for your willingness to self immolate? Hardly. Like any bully they see you as the patheitic excuses for intelligent beings you think you are.
I just love the “reality based community” that doesn’t live in the real world–“progressives” who whine about everything but never, you know, progress–and “enlightened” people who show about as much enlightenment you would expect out of a mentally handicapped amoeba.
I have ZERO respect for a party who ignores their real problems and the only position they can muster is an anti-platform. It’s easy to just be anti-establishment. It’s easier to manipulate you because you are more controlled by the establishment that way.
Relieves you from actually thinking of solutions as you only have to wait for the other side to actually do something then you can oppose it. It’s the ulimate in laziness…don’t think just be lead around by the nose by either your opponent or your sycophants.
I’ve heard the term Cognitive Desonance is a good explanation for the reactions of the left. I disagree since it implies there was an ability to apply cognition in that first place.
Darleen, perhaps it is you, whom should have your keeper re-read it to you. The seeds of doubt were sewn when heavens forbid a politician, the er-hem, president had an affair with an intern. Now lets not be coy. Politicians are human beings. They are not infallable and are subject to the same moral frailties as the rest of us, probably more so given the money and kudos at stake.
The post 9/11 diatribe….. is nothing more than a diatribe. There was not a single trace of an original thought . Rehashed, hackneyed and put together with the expectation of a clap on the back, a howdy partner, a welcome on board mate, as it were. In other words, it was more of the same old, same old, well this was my turning point, I’m one of you, therefore I am great! Who cares? Who gives a flying fart? It’s not quite the road to Damascus, but Christ does it go on?
Caveat: I am not a democrat and my leanings would be more Republican but the current administration is in my humble opinion, an abomination. Spin and nationalistic rhetoric have overtaken the real values. Bush et al have hijacked 9/11 for their own twisted purposes and made America look weak. I am not anti war, when it is for the right reasons. Lets be honest here, there are few on this website, well not many in the country whom could have picked out the Middle East on a map of the world never mind any of its individual components such as Iran, Iraq Saudi etc,nor would they have been au fait with the history/culture of said region. Now we have pundits appearing right left and centre boring a lot of us to tears with their insights and impressions. A quick google search on the Middle East and suddenly everyone is an expert!! Experts who live in the smallest one horse or cow towns, whom have probably never ventured further than their state line!!!
We are probably the most powerful nation in the world. I hope it never comes to a show of strengh with China or our old foes such as a re-formation of the SOviet bloc. The world used to look to us for leadership. Now we are ridiculed by by our old allies, and even by some of our closest neighbours. No, it is not the rest of the world whom is out of step, it is us!
My helmut is on so fire away!!!!!!!!!!!
The world used to look to us for leadership. Now we are ridiculed by by our old allies,
OMIGOD, the old “They used to LOVE US” canard. For crissakes, why is that tune by Urban Myth still being banged out?
am not a democrat and my leanings would be more Republican but the current administration is in my humble opinion, an abomination.
Yeah, right, sure. I believe you. Really. Uh-huh. I’ve never heard that one before …
BTW clr… the sentence you missed
If you are bored reading “hackneyed insights” let me give you the same advice I’d give to Mrs. Grundy on the ladder peering over the 8 ft backyard fence to be scandalized by her nude sunbathing neighbor — GET DOWN OFF THE LADDER and stop reading.
Putz.
I swear, Chris and clr need to learn to read: It wasn’t the sex. It was the lies. He said as much. I love how when someone is angry that Clinton lied… moonbats go on the “IT WAS JUST SEX!”
No. It was a president who looked into the camera and lied. Something that moonbats want to have Bush tried for treason over. He lied under oath about a sexual relationship during a rape investigation. But everyone overlooks that. I guess:
“IT WAS JUST RAPE!”
Darleen, perhaps it is you, whom should have your keeper re-read it to you. The seeds of doubt were sewn when heavens forbid a politician, the er-hem, president had an affair with an intern. Now lets not be coy. Politicians are human beings. They are not infallable and are subject to the same moral frailties as the rest of us, probably more so given the money and kudos at stake.
Actually if you had read the post, it wasn’t just the affair, but the fact Clinton looked the nation in the face and lied to us all. But I doubt it was a uniquely pivotal factor. It was just one of several steps on the road to enlightenment. If not this, then something else would have taken its place.
Although people don’t care much for Monica, that lie wasn’t a just an “I didn’t do it!” lie of a child. It was an attempt to paste Lewinski as a scheming liar or mental case.
That lie wasn’t just CYA, it tried to harm someone else as well.
I have a very simmilar story. I also voted for Clinton twice and Gore. It was not only not only the democrats reaction to 911, but the chorus of “its our fault and lets try to understand the terrorists” from the left made me wonder how I could be assosiated with such morons. It wasn’t long before every single one of my preconceived notions had to be scrutinized. I don’t consider myself a rebulblican, but I also can’t associate myself with a party whose left wing base are, for lack of a better word, idiotarians.
Typical liberal spin. Jeff wrote “And not only did he have an affair, but he lied about it defiantly and forcefully. “I did not have sexual relations with that woman,” he said. He said it to the press, he said it to the whole country. He said it to me. And it was a lie.”
Had Clinton courageously took responsibility for what he did, not only would the American people have forgave him, after all it was only about sex, but many soles wondering in the political landscape would have found a home in Clinton’s party. It was the lie itself that showed Clinton’s true character and it was that depraved character that started Jeff on the path to political enlightenment.
The lie was an attempt to obstruct justice in a sexual harassment case that was eventually plea-bargained rather than go to trial.
The moment for me was listening to Gore trying to answer the Juanita Broderick question when he got blind-sided that time, can’t remember the details. All I know is when I heard his non-denial double-speak bullshit, it was obvious Clinton was a rapist and Gore knew it.
If you think it was just about a blow-job you are an idiot beyond help.
Networking: Securing illegals’ records
Migrant farm workers flow into Salinas, Calif., during the lettuce-harvesting season, just as once portrayed, long ago, by novelist John Steinbeck. The difference is that now, the workers come to California’s Central Valley from central Mexico, not the Oklahoma dust bowl, as in “The Grapes of Wrath.”
And although they are in the United States illegally, have no money or health insurance and don’t speak English, they do have access to consistent medical and dental care, as a result of a new wireless networking initiative, experts tell United Press International’s Networking. By Gene Koprowski
Yes, the Dems left me and not verse visa. Many years of listening to how bad I was because I was an American took their toll. Sad, really, cause the Republicans could use honorable competition now more than ever.
Bonequark
cause the Republicans could use honorable competition now more than ever.
Guess what? I agree with you. No competition means getting complacent and lazy.
Of all the reasons that right-of-center ideas have gotten traction within the public at large, and why so much of the Left within the media, academia and blogsphere react with such spittle-spewing hysteria is that for too long such people have been the dominate view point and it’s allowed conservatives and libertarians sharpen their own argumentative styles against them. We know the Left’s lines of “argument” while they rarely know ours…or even give ours much credence.
I think a principled and non-Leftist liberalism needs to re-assert itself. A competition of ideas between people who can disagree in good faith is very much needed.
So i guess when reagan pulled the troops out of Lebanon after the Barracks bombing all you guys suddenly switched to the democrats, has it ever occured to you that each preseident takes millatary decisons after consulting the millatary and looking at the overall picture of whats happening around the world the full geo pollitical picture,
Clinton lied wow I aint no Clinton supporter to me the majority of them are liers, its just I aint brainwashed by party propaganda, Clinton lied that means every democrat is going to be a lier now…such an inteligent person is our Jeff…finally Bush lied cost us billions of dollers lost thousands of lifes and ruined the reputation of our millatary…and is taking us towards defeat in Iraq…but hang on dont worry its not his fault its the CIA’s…i mean how can Bush lie he goes to church
Chris,
The Abramoff scandal will hang as many demo moonbats as it will repubs (who should know better) – read this link – http://washingtontimes.com/national/20060115-115033-1547r.htm
You can hang the Republicans for the scandal but you can’t think the Democrats are clean – they still have to deal with the perception of “lying to the public” that Clinton endorsed and skated on. Very similar to the Kennedy debacle with Mary Jo. Lying always cuts deep to Republicans and honest Democrats – get over it. Until Demo’s quit hiding the truth (like kerry’s treason) Republicans will always take the high road.
clr,
Get a grip – this is Dave’s story and a lot of young people are finding likeness in it. I’m am an old fart – and I feel just like they do. It’s the continuing attachment to constant principles which drives Republicans. Democrats keep changing the roadmap – and people like Kerry aren’t helping (I voted for it before I voted against it?). And I don’t understand your point about finding the Middle East on a map – WTF? So? When has that been a requirement and what for? What we do know is that it’s where the terrorists are enshrined and perpetuated. It requires us to find them and if we have to use a map, so what? Just find them. Your “summary” – “Now we are ridiculed by by our old allies, and even by some of our closest neighbours. No, it is not the rest of the world whom is out of step, it is us!”
What were you thinking? France threw up the white flag immediately, Germany has now let a terrorist killer out of jail, and Spain caved because, well, because they have no will – not to mention their government changed to left wing liberals. Did it do them any good? Not if you read the reports of what has happened there in the last year.
I’m with Dave. His education has been similar to many new Republicans. Glad to have them at least looking on things from right of center.
Psssst…. tbluebird
I don’t think you mean “Dave”
David
I realize that the Left runs on a fundie absolutism..that kind goes with emotion and unexamined faith.
Reagan’s moral bankaccount was hurt but not overdrawn with his ill-considered abandonment of Lebanon.
I left the Republican party when GHW Bush pulled out of Iraq before Saddam was over thrown. That overdrew his moral bankaccount. (I was a registered Libertarian until the end of Clinton’s 2nd term, and re-registered Republican so I could vote in the CA primaries).
Clinton lied that means every democrat is going to be a lier [sic] now…such an inteligent [sic] person is our Jeff…finally Bush lied cost us billions of dollers [sic] lost thousands of lifes [sic] and ruined the reputation of our millatary [sic]
I think you’re overdrawn at the coherency bank.
Winston Churchill once quipped, if you’re not a liberal when you’re 20 then you have no heart, if you’re not a conservative when you’re 40, then you have no brains.
Churchill also converted from very liberal member of parliament to very conservative prime minister. Also in his later days, the liberals were making excuses and allowances for Hitler as he rearmed Germany following WWI. Churchill was called an extremist for pointing out the danger. History repeats now in Iran.
But the following shows you swallowed the left’s propaganda hook line and sinker…
Being wrong about something is not a lie, it’s a mistake. If we are going to start calling every mistake politicians make a lie, then what are we going to call it when someone intentionally deceives us–a clinton?
Chris et al, I think you missed the point in there somewhere.
The facts are that most of us who were once liberal and saw the light didn’t actually have a road to Damascus type experience.
The reality is that for most of us, it was a gradual proccess-one day you realize that you don’t like A about what your party or its leaders stand for, the next day it is B, then C, then before you know it-you realize the party you once supported doesn’t believe in the things you believe in. Some people may not identify with the GOP, but they identify more with its positions than the democrats.
I can’t say there was any bright light moments-it just happened. I think for some, who were already seeing the signs that the party wasn’t for them, had a defining moment on 9-11, but I think it was more like the wife whose husband is cheating on her seeing all the little warning signs, and then one day catching him in bed with the other woman. While that was a defining moment, the reality is that she sensed there was something wrong long before that moment, that moment was just the last straw.
Usual crap its unbelievable how you guys in the states shit yourselfs so quickly and are only too willing eat the bullshit bush feeds you, I mean listening to some of you idiots sounds just like all the dangerous scare stories about communism, what happend when you got your asses kicked in vietnam did communism really take over the world no…now someone on here said Bush senior pulled out before over throwing saddam in the first gulf war which made him an idiot,,,well looking at whats happening over there now may be he was right…
Finally i’ve said this many times before you brainwashed ignorant moran dream on about Iran, your millatary is busy getting its ass kicked in Iraq by insurgents representing no more than 20% of a population of just over 20 million, now why do you think the Iranin presendent is egging you on becuase he knows his country is much larger than iraq with 3 times population of iraq and without the ethnic divisions to exploit so your millatary who has its handsfull in Iraq have not got the manpower to stage an invasion thats one reason and the other is that for one moment try to get it into your thick heads how would the US millatary cope if the Shia rebelled 60%+20% sunnis rebelling would the us millatary really be able to cope with that, I think not and in case you did’nt know the winners of the recent election is an islamic party whic was based in Iran during the times of saddam and has very close tiess to iran it is just one of several parties with very close ties and all of these parties have large millitias,,,,and Sisatani the religious leader of the shia well he is in fact Iranian born he is persian,,,so as you can see you really have Iran quaking in its boots
I guess Carter left office before most of you could walk, huh? 😉
Saf,
You seem to have forgotten the close US friend, located within short range of Iran. It’s name is Isreal….I realize it’s not on your map of the middle east, however it’s firepower is strong & I suspect Iran or Persia is expecting a delivery of that firepower soon.
Good luck
Saf,
I see you’re back with your usual charm. In past ages a conquering army suppressed uprisings among the conquered by barbaric brutality. That’s currently not an acceptable approach, so coalition forces are hampered in fighting the insurgents in Iraq. If not for the women and children to hid behind, the insurgents would be wiped out in a few weeks just as the U.S. destroyed Iraq’s army.
Iran is a different story. The U.S. should make it known that because Iran has violated the non-proliferation treaty that any nuclear device used against the U.S. or it’s allies will be assumed to come from Iran and the U.S. will retaliate in kind, but much larger in scope. Of course, the U.S. may not need to do a thing given Israel’s alleged advance nuclear program and anti-ballistic missile program. What will the world be like without an Iran?
“David” writes:
“Saf” writes:
Ladies and Gentlemen, the only question that remains is whether this troll is from dKos, Asstrios or DeludedUnderground.
Epador-while I wasn’t in diapers when Carter left office, I was still too young to give a hoot about politics. As a matter of fact I used to get very angry at Carter because he actually preempted a favorite TV show to give some boring speech (of course this was in the days before cable, and if the president spoke it was on all three channels, and I had no other options).
I do remember my mom voted for Carter, and my dad voted for Reagan. I don’t think my mom ever voted for a GOP candidate-but then she was very liberal.
Wow! Love the way he writes!!
Darleen
Thanks for the advice but if ever I find myself needing your advice, then I suspect It will be too late as my my marbles will have already been truly lost!
My dear, presuambly you are not well travelled but when you hear different people from different countries from both sides of the fence, the left and the right telling you how they percieve Bush et al, then you dont have to be a rocket scientist (I’m not far off!!!) to see that something is wrong with America today. Prior to 9/11 not many Americans would have known what was going on in the world. Post 9/11, everyone thinks they know what is going on. Bush has hijacked our fears and told us that “badmen” and “evil doers” are out to get America. Bin Laden bombs the World Trade Centre, we bomb a few mountains in Afghanistan but our ultimate goal is the removal of Saddam Hussein? Now, how bloody stupid do you have to be to buy that. Come on people!! This has to rank as the greatest con of a nation ever!
As for, it wasn’t the “sex” it was the “lies”, smarten up, dear, all politicians lie. It is up to us to choose which lies we believe and which ones we choose to let irritate us.
Similarly as for looking over the neighbours fence and then taking offence, you are quite wrong. On the whole I enjoy most of the articles on here, though not always agreeing with the sentiment. A privilege I am grateful for.
Darleen
Thanks for the advice but if ever I find myself needing your advice, then I suspect It will be too late as my my marbles will have already been truly lost!
My dear, presuambly you are not well travelled but when you hear different people from different countries from both sides of the fence, the left and the right telling you how they percieve Bush et al, then you dont have to be a rocket scientist (I’m not far off!!!) to see that something is wrong with America today. Prior to 9/11 not many Americans would have known what was going on in the world. Post 9/11, everyone thinks they know what is going on. Bush has hijacked our fears and told us that “badmen” and “evil doers” are out to get America. Bin Laden bombs the World Trade Centre, we bomb a few mountains in Afghanistan but our ultimate goal is the removal of Saddam Hussein? Now, how bloody stupid do you have to be to buy that. Come on people!! This has to rank as the greatest con of a nation ever!
As for, it wasn’t the “sex” it was the “lies”, smarten up, dear, all politicians lie. It is up to us to choose which lies we believe and which ones we choose to let irritate us.
Similarly as for looking over the neighbours fence and then taking offence, you are quite wrong. On the whole I enjoy most of the articles on here, though not always agreeing with the sentiment. A privilege I am grateful for.