Sun 1 Jun 2008
Drinking Liberally: the Legend
Posted by Frank under Personal Musings
[3] Comments
(snip)
Baratunde Thurston, 30, a stand-up comedian, performs around New York City with Laughing Liberally.
“After the 2004 election, Drinking Liberally meetings were like a support group,†said Mr. Thurston, who was a co-host of the Boston chapter at the time. “There were a lot of questions: ‘What happened? How could fellow Americans re-elect this man? How exactly do you move to Canada?’ In 2006, the mood started changing from pity party to newfound hope regarding the midterm elections. Local politicians would come by and make their pitches. We did joint events with human-rights groups and abortion-rights groups. It was like a swap meet of liberalism.â€
Be a part of the legend.
Tangier Restaurant, 18th and Lombard, Philadelphia, 6 p. m. to 9 p. m. Tuesday.
Link via Atrios.
There were a lot of questions: ‘How could fellow Americans re-elect this man?’
I have a question. Why can’t the Democratic Party nominate an electable candidate? Al Gore couldn’t carry his home state (I’m talking about Tennessee not Washington, DC) and John Kerry, the second most liberal Senator in the US Senate, was hardly a strong choice. Was Kerry the best Democrat available in 2004? I doubt it. Senators Bob Graham and Joe Lieberman , Rep. Dick Gephardt, Governors Mark Warner and Bill Richardson, and Wesley Clark were all potentially better choices than Kerry. Even Ed Rendell was probably a better choice than Kerry. So don’t blame us. Blame your own party. It cannot nominate an electable candidate.
The administration has made a mess out of most things during the last 7+ years. However, the Democrats have had control of Congress since the 2006 election. Their most notable accomplishment of late is overriding the veto of the latest Farm Bill – a bill that should have been vetoed. It’s full of pork (no pun intended) and pet projects, continues failed farm subsidy and support programs of the past, and continues to promote the ethanol hoax at the expense of food and other viable alternative fuels.
Physician, heal thyself.
I agree with you about Al Gore. I think he would have done a good job as President, but I can’t get too worked up over the scam in Florida, because Gore couldn’t carry his home state. Yeah, Florida was a scam, but, had he carried Tennessee, Florida would have been irrelevant.
I disagree about Kerry. He may not have been the best person in the field, but he was a man of integrity (that is, not a Republican). I think he made a fatal tactical error. He should have come down on the swiftboaters like a ton of bricks as soon as the first attack happened.Â
He did not realize that liars do not go away when you ignore them. He let the NeoCons sink their poison into the bloodstream of the electorate. Had he fought back immediately, I suspect we would have seen a different result three months later.
As for Congress, it’s high time the Democrats actually made the Republicans filibuster. There has developed this notion that, if 60 votes to break a filibuster are not on the table in the Senate, everything just stops. Let’s go back to the Olde Days, when the obstructionists were required to, you know, actually, like, obstruct.
As for the Farm Bill, that’s a sickness that goes back generations and really is not relevant to what’s going on right now. It’s a whole nother probem, and the problem is that, if you say "farm," everyone thinks of where we grew up; they don’t think of ConAgra and ADM and the fat cat corporations who actually benefit from the farm bill. It’s the classic misdirection play.
Jeez, I give anything to see the President of ADM in the seat of a John Deere.
Actually, Kerry was against integrity before he was for it.