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Politics : Stockman Scott's Political Debate Porch -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: sylvester80 who wrote (66842)11/10/2004 3:59:14 PM
From: Kip518  Respond to of 89467
 
Published on Wednesday, November 10, 2004 by Ted Rall
Confessions of a Cultural Elitist
Win or Lose, Kerry Voters Are Smarter Than Bush Voters
by Ted Rall

Democratic hand wringing is surrealy out of hand. No one is criticizing the morally incongruous Kerry for running against a war he voted for while insisting that he would have voted for it again. Party leaders have yet to consider that NAFTA, signed into law under Clinton, may have cost them high-unemployment Ohio. No, Indiana Senator Evan Bayh, darling of the "centrist" Democratic Leadership Council, blames something else: the perception "in the heartland" that Democrats are a "bicoastal cultural elite that is condescending at best and contemptuous at worst to the values that Americans hold in their daily lives."

Firstly, living in the sticks doesn't make you more American. Rural, urban or suburban--they're irrelevant. San Francisco's predominantly gay Castro district is every bit as red, white and blue as the Texas panhandle. But if militant Christianist Republicans from inland backwaters believe that secular liberal Democrats from the big coastal cities look upon them with disdain, there's a reason. We do, and all the more so after this election.

I spent my childhood in fly-over country, in a decidedly Republican town in southwest Ohio. It was a decent place to grow up, with well-funded public schools and only the occasional marauding serial killer to worry about. The only ethnic restaurant sold something called "Mandarin Chinese," Midwestese for cold noodles slathered with sugary sauce. The county had three major employers: the Air Force, Mead Paper, and National Cash Register--and NCR was constantly laying people off. Folks were nice, but depressingly closed-minded. "Well," they'd grimace when confronted with a new musical genre or fashion trend, "that's different." My suburb was racially insular, culturally bland and intellectually unstimulating. Its people were knee-jerk conformists. Faced with the prospect of spending my life underemployed, bored and soused, I did what anyone with a bit of ambition would do. I went to college in a big city and stayed there.

Mine is a common story. Every day in America, hundreds of our most talented young men and women flee the suburbs and rural communities for big cities, especially those on the West and East Coasts. Their youthful vigor fuels these metropolises--the cultural capitals of the blue states. These oases of liberal thinking--New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Portland, Boston--are homes to our best-educated people, most vibrant popular culture and most innovative and productive businesses. There are exceptions--some smart people move from cities to the countryside--but the best and brightest gravitate to places where liberalism rules.

Maps showing Kerry's blue states appended to the "United States of Canada" separated from Bush's red "Jesusland" are circulating by email. Though there is a religious component to the election results, the biggest red-blue divide is intellectual. "How can 59,054,087 people be so DUMB?" asked the headline of the Daily Mirror in Great Britain, and the underlying assumption is undeniable. By any objective standard, you had to be spectacularly stupid to support Bush.

72 percent who cast votes for George W. Bush, according to a University of Maryland's Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) and Knowledge Networks poll, believe that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or active WMD programs. 75 percent think that a Saddam-Al Qaeda link has been proven, and 20 percent say Saddam ordered 9/11. Of course, none of this was true.

Kerry voters were less than half as idiotic: 26 percent of Democrats bought into Bush-Cheney's WMD lies, and 30 percent into Saddam-Al Qaeda.

Would Bush's supporters have voted for him even if they had known he was a serial liar? Perhaps their hatred of homosexuals and slutty abortion vixens would have prompted them to make the same choice--an idiotic perversion of priorities. As things stand, they cast their ballots relying on assumptions that were demonstrably false.

Educational achievement doesn't necessarily equal intelligence. After all, Bush holds a Harvard MBA. Still, it bears noting that Democrats are better educated than Republicans. You are 25 percent more likely to hold a college degree if you live in the Democratic northeast than in the red state south. Blue state voters are 25 percent more likely, therefore, to understand the historical and cultural ramifications of Bush's brand of bull-in-a-china-shop foreign policy.

Inland Americans face a bigger challenge than coastal "cultural elitists" when it comes to finding high-quality news coverage. The best newspapers, which routinely win prizes for their in-depth local and national reporting and staffers overseas, line the coasts. So do the cable TV networks with the broadest offerings and most independent radio stations. Bush Country makes do with Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity syndicated on one cookie-cutter AM outlet after another. Citizens of the blue states read lackluster dailies stuffed with generic stories cut and pasted from wire services. Given their dismal access to high-quality media, it's a minor miracle that 40 percent of Mississippians turned out for Kerry.

So our guy lost the election. Why shouldn't those of us on the coasts feel superior? We eat better, travel more, dress better, watch cooler movies, earn better salaries, meet more interesting people, listen to better music and know more about what's going on in the world. If you voted for Bush, we accept that we have to share the country with you. We're adjusting to the possibility that there may be more of you than there are of us. But don't demand our respect. You lost it on November 2.

commondreams.org



To: sylvester80 who wrote (66842)11/10/2004 4:34:30 PM
From: jlallen  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 89467
 
Try a coherent post next time.....



To: sylvester80 who wrote (66842)11/10/2004 4:43:56 PM
From: one_less  Read Replies (2) | Respond to of 89467
 
Is yourself out of control again? These raving self hate lectures are rather odd you know

<<<It takes a blithering idiot like yourself to know the blithering idiots .... You see, blithering idiots like yourself are attracted to those threads. You are clearly the king of blithering idiots. LMAO!>>>

<To: sylvester80 who wrote (66750) 11/9/2004 9:40:55 PM
From: sylvester80


"Personal attacks will get you nowhere other than show your 2 year old brain. So answer the questions pinhead?"



To: sylvester80 who wrote (66842)11/10/2004 4:57:56 PM
From: SiouxPal  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 89467
 
Hey Sly! The following is a repost from Suma.....
The London Daily Mirror
Subject: Fwd: Cover Story in London's Daily Mirror
GOD HELP AMERICA
THE PEOPLE HAVE SPOKEN
The Daily Mirror, UK
THEY say that in life you get what you deserve. Well, today America has
deservedly got a lawless cowboy to lead them further into carnage and
isolation and the unreserved contempt of most of the rest of the world.
This once-great country has pulled up its drawbridge for another four
years
and stuck a finger up to the billions of us forced to share the same
air.
And in doing so, it has shown itself to be a fearful,
backward-looking and
very small nation.
This should have been the day when Americans finally answered their
critics
by raising their eyes from their own sidewalks and looking outward
towards
the rest of humanity.
And for a few hours early yesterday, when the exit polls predicted a
John
Kerry victory, it seemed they had.
But then the horrible, inevitable truth hit home. They had somehow
managed
to re-elect the most devious, blinkered and reckless leader ever put
before
them. The Yellow Rogue of Texas.
A self-serving, dim-witted, draft-dodging, gung-ho little rich boy,
whose
idea of courage is to yell: "I feel good," as he unleashes an awesome
fury
which slaughters 100,000 innocents for no other reason than greed and
vanity.
A dangerous chameleon, his charming exterior provides cover for a
power-crazed clique of Doctor Strangeloves whose goal is to increase
America's grip on the world's economies and natural resources.
And in foolishly backing him, Americans have given the go-ahead for more
unilateral pre-emptive strikes, more world instability and most probably
another 9/11.
Why else do you think bin Laden was so happy to scare them to the polls,
then made no attempt to scupper the outcome?
There's only one headline in town today, folks: "It Was Osama Wot Won
It."
And soon he'll expect pay-back. Well, he can't allow Bush to have his
folks
whoopin' and a-hollerin' without his own getting a share of the fun, can
he?
Heck, guys, I hope you're feeling proud today.
To the tens of millions who voted for John Kerry, my commiserations.
To the overwhelming majority of you who didn't, I simply ask: Have you
learnt nothing? Do you despise your own image that much?
Do you care so little about the world beyond your shores? How could
you do
this to yourselves?
How appalling must one man's record at home and abroad be for you to
reject
him?
Kerry wasn't the best presidential candidate the Democrats have ever
fielded (and he did deserve a kicking for that "reporting for doo-dee"
moment), but at least he understood the complexity of the world outside
America, and domestic disgraces like the 45 million of his fellow
citizens
without health cover.
He would have done something to make that country fairer and
re-connected
it with the wider world.
Instead America chose a man without morals or vision. An economic
incompetent who inherited a $2billion surplus from Clinton, gave it
in tax
cuts to the rich and turned the US into the world's largest debtor
nation.
A man who sneers at the rights of other nations. Who has withdrawn from
international treaties on the environment and chemical weapons.
A man who flattens sovereign states then hands the rebuilding
contracts to
his own billionaire party backers.
A man who promotes trade protectionism and backs an Israeli government
which continually flouts UN resolutions.
America has chosen a menacingly immature buffoon who likened the
pursuit of
the 9/11 terrorists to a Wild West, Wanted Dead or Alive man-hunt and,
during the Afghanistan war, kept a baseball scorecard in his drawer,
notching up hits when news came through of enemy deaths.
A RADICAL Christian fanatic who decided the world was made up of the
forces
of good and evil, who invented a war on terror, and thus as author of
it,
believed he had the right to set the rules of engagement.
Which translates to telling his troops to do what the hell they want
to the
bad guys. As he has at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and countless towns across
Iraq.
You have to feel sorry for the millions of Yanks in the big cities
like New
York, Washington, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco who
voted
to kick him out.
These are the sophisticated side of the electorate who recognise a
gibbon
when they see one.
As for the ones who put him in, across the Bible Belt and the South, us
outsiders can only feel pity.
Were I a Kerry voter, though, I'd feel deep anger, not only at them
returning Bush to power, but for allowing the outside world to lump
us all
into the same category of moronic muppets.
The self-righteous, gun-totin', military lovin', sister marryin',
abortion-hatin', gay-loathin', foreigner-despisin', non-passport ownin'
red-necks, who believe God gave America the biggest dick in the world
so it
could urinate on the rest of us and make their land "free and strong".
You probably won't be surprised to learn of would-be Oklahoma Republican
Senator Tom Coburn who, on Tuesday, promised to ban abortion and execute
any doctors who carried them out.
He also told voters that lesbianism is so rampant in the state's schools
that girls were being sent to toilets on their own. Not that any
principal
could be found to back him up.
These are the people who hijack the word patriot and liken compassion to
child-molesting. And they are unknowingly bin Laden's chief recruiting
officers.
Al-Qaeda's existence is fuelled by the outpourings of America's
Christian
right. Bush is its commander-in-chief. And he and bin Laden need each
other
to survive.
Both need to play Lex Luther to each others' Superman with their own
fanatical people. Maybe that's why the mightiest military machine ever
assembled has failed to catch the world's most wanted man.
Or is the reason simply that America is incompetent? That behind the
bluff
they are frightened and clueless, which is why they've stayed with the
devil they know.
VISITORS from another planet watching this election would surely not
credit
the amateurism.
The queues for hours to register a tick; the 17,000 lawyers needed to
ensure there was no cheating; the $1.2bn wasted by parties trying to
discredit the enemy; the allegations of fraud, intimidation and dirty
tricks; the exit polls which were so wildly inaccurate; an Electoral
College voting system that makes the Eurovision Song Contest look like a
beacon of democracy and efficiency; and the delays and the legal
wrangles
in announcing the victor.
Yet America would have us believe theirs is the finest democracy in the
world. Well, that fine democracy has got the man it deserved. George W
Bush.
But is America safer today without Kerry in charge? A man who overnight
would have given back to the UN some credibility and authority. Who
would
have worked out the best way to undo the Iraq mess without fear of
losing
face.
Instead, the questions facing America today are - how many more
thousands
of their sons will die as Iraq descends into a new Vietnam? And how many
more Vietnams are on the horizon now they have given Bush the mandate
to go
after Iran, Syria, North Korea or Cuba...?
Today is a sad day for the world, but it's even sadder for the
millions of
intelligent Americans embarrassed by a gung-ho leader and backed by a
banal
electorate, half of whom still believe Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11.
Yanks had the chance to show the world a better way this week,
instead they
made a thuggish cowboy ride off into the sunset bathed in glory.
And in doing so it brought Armageddon that little bit closer and
re-christened their beloved nation The Home Of The Knave and the Land Of
The Freak.
God Help America

Sioux



To: sylvester80 who wrote (66842)11/10/2004 8:24:41 PM
From: Proud Deplorable  Read Replies (3) | Respond to of 89467
 
HE SHOULD BE BANNED....MY ADVICE IS WATCH FOR ABUSE AND SWEARING AND TURN HIM IN TO DAVE