Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

Some Republicans That I Admire

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NBA Star Charles Barkley.  OK now technically, we can no longer call Mr. Barkley a Republican.  He used to identify as such, but recently felt compelled to leave the GOP because

What do the Republicans run on? Against gay marriage and for a war that makes no sense. A war that was based on faulty intelligence. That’s all they ever talk about. That and immigration. Another discriminatory argument for political gain.

Or, as he said more succinctly elsewhere, “I was a Republican until they lost their minds”.  I include Mr. Barkley here because, as an enormously popular national figure with political aspirations of his own, he is a huge loss to the GOP.  Imagine if he were campaigning now for McCain, not Obama.  Take away lesson:  not all Republicans of conscience will wait for the party to regain its senses.

Last week, Mr. Barkley had this to say to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer.

BARKLEY: Hey, I live in Arizona. I have got great respect for Senator McCain. Great respect. But I don’t like the way the Republicans are taking this country. Every time I hear the word “conservative,” it makes me sick to my stomach, because they’re really just fake Christians, as I call them. That’s all they are. But I just — I’m going to vote Democratic no matter what.

[…]

BLITZER: All right. One quick point before I let you go. You used the phrase “fake Christians” for conservatives. Explain what you’re talking about.

BARKLEY: Well, I think they — they want to be judge and jury. Like, I’m for gay marriage. It’s none of my business if gay people want to get married. I’m pro-choice. And I think these Christians — first of all, they’re supposed to be — they’re not supposed to judge other people. But they’re the most hypocritical judge of people we have in this country. And it bugs the hell out of me. They act like their Christians. And they’re not forgiving at all.

BLITZER: So you’re going to get a lot of feedback on this one, Charles.

BARKLEY: They can’t do anything to me. I don’t work for them.

BLITZER: You feel comfortable saying all that?

BARKLEY: I feel very comfortable saying I’m pro-choice, and I’m for gay marriage. Very comfortable.

BLITZER: But you can’t lump all these conservatives as being fake. A lot of them obviously — most of them are very, very sincere in their religious beliefs.

BARKLEY: Well, they should read the part about they’re not supposed to judge other people. They forget that one when it doesn’t fit what they want it to say.

U.S. Senator Susan Collins (R-Maine).  Senator Collins has served in the US Senate for over a decade.  She co-sponsored the Matthew Shepard Act, the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and the Early Treatment for HIV Act.

Sen Collins supports, among others, the Uniting American Families Act, Tax Equity for Domestic Partner Health Plan Beneficiaries Act, and the Healthy Families Act.

In a recent Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, the Senator questioned the wisdom of turning away LGBT Americans from the armed forces, and stated that the “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy needs to be reconsidered.  

Finally, Senator Collins has twice voted against the Federal Marriage Amendment.  

Senator Collins’s personal web page can be found here.

Mayor Jerry Sanders, San Diego, CA.  Mayor Sanders used to oppose marriage equality.  Then, in September, 2007, the San Diego City Council passed a resolution to declare support of marriage equality as the CA Supreme Court considers the constitutionality of marriage discrimination.

One day before his reelection campaign was to begin, Mayor Sanders decided to “lead with my heart” and support the resolution.

[Sanders] said he realized he could not accept “the concept of a separate-but-equal institution.” Because of that, he continued, he was unwilling to send the message to anyone that “they were less important, less worthy or less deserving of the rights and responsibilities of marriage.”

The mayor, now crying openly, noted that he has close family members and friends in the gay and lesbian community, including staff members and “my daughter Lisa.”

“In the end, I couldn’t look any of them in the face and tell them that their relationships, their very lives, were any less meaningful than the marriage I share with my wife, Rana,” said Sanders, who quickly thanked reporters and dashed from the room.

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  1. well two people, anyway – in the GOP.  Regrettably, your list of admired Republicans is a lot shorter than your recent list of Republicans involved in sex scandals.

  2. Just a slight addition. Earlier in that Charles Barkley interview he said:

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    But what I really said was, I’m rich like a Republican. I never voted for a Republican. I’m actually an Independent.

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    p>Given the statement Laurel quoted where he said “I was a Republican until they lost their minds”, it looks like Sir Charles was never a “Real Republican” (TM), he must have been one of those fake Republicans we hear about, like what “Real Republicans” say about John McCain.  

  3. He will never, ever run for national office. Constitutional amendments take decades to get past so he can never run for President. He might one day run for Senator of California but as far as I know him supporting gay marriage should not cost him votes. He is already too moderate-liberal on the environment, education, health care, and gay rights as it is to win over social conservatives in a statewide election. The majority of his supporters are Democrats.

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    p>I see no reason why signing that bill which most Californians approve of would at all be detrimental to his career so I do not see why he would not just support marriage equality. No politician genuinely morally believes in civil unions it is just a way to have it both ways, oppose gay marriage while supporting gay civil rights. This should be a no brainer for him and I am surprised this maverick has not bucked that trend.

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    p>Shout out to Sanders San Diego is fairly conservative for California and that took real political courage to support.

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    p>I would also add Lincoln Chaffee to this list one of three Senators who support gay marriage and the only Republican one to ever support it.

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    p>David Brooks has a lot of good reasons why real conservative Republicans, not just libertarian or moderate ones, should support gay marriage. It encourages nuclear families albeit with sam sex couples. It decreases promiscuity, increases adoption thus decreasing abortion, and creates more families which they believe are the bedrock of our civilization. Also on the flipside if Elvis can marry Britney Spears and SHE can raise kids I see no reason why gays can’t.

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    p>Obviously Christians can oppose gay marriage in their churches and I see nothing wrong with that, but their is no reason the secular state should not allow them.  

    • Does anyone read Esquire? I think Esquire is home to some fantastic journalism. Underrated coverage of Iraq, too.

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      p>In March’s Edition, Tom Junod profiles Arnold. At the least, the article made me re-think the Governator, and I could see some parellels with Obama. Also, this jumped out at me:

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      It feels sort of royal, but it’s also a symbol of his determined inclusiveness, because [Schwarzenegger’s smoking] tent has become the place where legislators, lobbyists, businessmen, and activists of all stripes get a chance to meet with Arnold and his Democratic, lesbian, cigar-smoking chief of staff.

      I’m not trying to court or create controversy here, by the way. I’ve just never heard Susan Kennedy referred to as anything but Arnold’s Democratic, lesbian, cigar-smoking chief of staff. Indeed, that he has a Democratic, lesbian, cigar-smoking chief of staff is part of the story — the story of how he responded to the special election of 2005 and the first failure of his life. His Republican staff was part of his failure, so here’s what he did: He authorized his wife to find a more Democratic one, or at least a more heterodox one. Maria Shriver found, among others, Susan Kennedy (no relation), who had worked for Gray Davis and had watched, in her words, “a Democratic governor torn limb from limb by the Democratic majority.” She was out of politics and as disillusioned with the prospect of winning as she was with the reality of losing. She was the better way because she believed — because she needed to believe — that Arnold was the better way. She was the better way because she believed that California needed Arnold as much as she did and that America needed Arnold as much as California did. She was the better way because she believed that she saw in Arnold what the previous staff had missed — “his limitlessness” — and set about rooting his politics in that.

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      p>And not to hijack this thread, but the most outstanding piece of journalism I’ve ever read was another Tom Junod Esquire piece called The Falling Man, which examines the social taboos of suicide during the author’s jorney to place a name with a famous photo of a 9/11 jumper. It’s a gripping visceral read – don’t miss it.

      • to put it mildly.   If you like Obama, be careful making comparisons between him and Schwarzenegger.  Although come to think of it, sometimes those comparisons might be apt.  I’m talking about both of them contriving ridiculous reasons not to support marriage.  In the case of Arnold, he and Kennedy said that he couldn’t sign the marriage bill because it would conflict with a state prop that prevents CA from recognizing ssm’s solumnized in other states.  Total rubbish.  I won’t bother to repeat Obama’s double-speak and constitutional obfuscations on this subject.  They just fall on deaf eyes, and I’m not in the mood for the slap-back (not by you necessarily of course).

        • My comparison between Arnold and Barack had nothing to do with policy and all on optimism, positiveness, and trying to build a broad, working coalition, in other words, the style with which they propose to accomplish goals.

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          p>But with you pointing out there dodging the marriage issue, it makes me wonder if closer scrutiny might not produce some useful insights.  

        • he and Kennedy said that he couldn’t sign the marriage bill because it would conflict with a state prop that prevents CA from recognizing ssm’s solumnized in other states.  Total rubbish.

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          p>Actually, it’s not total rubbish. You (and I) may not like it, but it’s a fact. The proposition in question says, in totality:

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          Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California. (Proposition 22, passed in 2000)

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          p>The original intent of this prop was to prevent CA from recognizing other states’ SSMs, but it clearly also bans CA from instituting it’s own SSMs. And under California law, a proposition may only be overturned by the courts or by another proposition. The normal legislative process (getting passed by the legislature and signed by the governor) won’t do.

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          p>Ahnuld was right.

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          p>Now, if you ask me, he still should’ve signed the damn thing anyway, even knowing full well that it would be held invalid…

    • My guess about Arnold is that he either a) personally really opposes marriage equality, or b) he has held back because he wants a high-level appointment in the administration – something no voter can give him, but his anti-gay republican masters can.  Just his bum luck that there will be no repub after Jan ’08 who can grant him that wish!  What do you bet that once a democrat is in the white house, arnold magically decides it’s time to sign pro-equality legislation?

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      p>As for Lincoln, it is true that he opposed the federal marriage amendment.  you are right that he deserves recognition for that.  however, i’ve never seen an outright statement in support of marriage equality from him.  rather, he takes the chickenshit dodge that clinton and obama use – that marriage is up to the states.  if you can find a link to a clear endorsement of marriage equality by him, please drop the link here and i’ll all a Chafee entry to the diary above.

  4. Have the nasty tendency to bow down to the party when the pressures really on, especially on things like Iraq and wiretapping. I’m sure she’s a great person, but I’m looking forward to her potential loss in the upcoming election. I haven’t heard any recent news, but I’m pretty sure a popular US Rep from Maine was at least seriously considering a campaign against her… and, if he is running, I hope he wins.

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    p>The good news is the gay issue is quickly becoming a non issue, as it should be. We’ve seen in Massachusetts, where marriage equality is the norm, very few Republicans willing to either still stand up against it or run against it in new campaigns. I’m confident that will be repeated throughout the country as our movement gains steam. The Republican Party, in the long run, will be better off for it.

    • The UC College Republicans who are quite conservative for a college campus but have a libertarian contingency on social issues debated the UC Dems on gay marriage.

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      p>The College Republicans did not want to debate gay marriage since they knew they would lose, but unfortunately a bunch of vocal social conservatives in their annual meeting demanded they not cede ground to the UC Dems on social issues and debate gay marriage. In previous years the College Republicans have done quite well debating the Dems on economics since most College Republicans are econ majors and most UC Dems are not. In any case my friend was moping about their inevitable loss.

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      p>I suggested they debate ending government marriage altogether to satisfy both the social conservatives and the libertarian wing and debate that. The UC Dems were shocked and the GOP won.

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      p>But NONE of them really wanted to debate banning gay marriage entirely since they have all realized the tides are shifting especially amongst youth. The generation brought up in front of Will and Grace and Queer Eye has moved faster on this issue.

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      p>By the 2020s it should be a dead issue.  

      • On American Idol there is a contestant that has some very stereotypical gay mannerisms. I don’t know that flamboyant is the word and I don’t know for sure what his orientation is.

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        p>But my wife and I had just had a conversation about the Michelle Obama comments and I remarked that when I was in high school, the way this kid was acting would NEVER have been tolerated. One kid might have tried to act that way and been outcast.

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        p>And so I am proud that in less than twenty years our country has become so much more accepting of people of different sexual orientations. We still have a ways to go, but I’m proud of the progress we’ve made.

      • On the other hand, youth were overwhelmingly open to mind-altering drugs in the late 60’s and early 70’s, and then we got the war on drugs, mandatory sentencing guidelines and an appalling percentage of our population incarcerated for minor drug offenses.  

        • good point, Bean.  also, i would hate for anyone to stop pushing hard for civil rights now because they think it will just come naturally and so much more easily when the current youth cohort “grows up”.  such promises of heaven are best left to religion, where any failure to materialize results in nothing worse than loss of faith.  

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          p>as i see it, the (very pleasant) danger with more lgbt-positive young people is that because they are accepting, they don’t even realize how badly we’re being discriminated against, because it would never cross their minds to discriminate against us.  i frequently participate in lgbt panel discussions at schools and community colleges, and i still find buckets of anti-lgbt bias out there, and almost blanket ignorance as to our civil rights issues.  unfortunately, the education and campaigning must continue apace.  hope for the best but prepare for the worst, and all that.

          • Most of my LGBT friends understand quite well that they still live in a world where they are not viewed as normal. I went to Chicagos aquarium with a bunch of my friends last year including a gay couple and when the held hands in public I thought it was quite touching and endearing but the stares they got from passerby were not so approving.

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            p>So while I would say most people my age are accepting, a lot of them aren’t, I knew kids in Cambridge that got beat up for “acting gay”, and most adults are not, especially outside the progressive bubble of New England.

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            p>Much like the civil rights movement we cannot wait for people to “get around to it” we must actively fight to make people at the very least accept that some people will lead different lifestyles and even if comfort with that cannot be enforced toleration at least should end the violence, the discrimination, and hopefully tone down the bigotry.  

    • Herb Hoffman of Ogunquit (formerly of Cambridge, where I first met him) is announcing today in three press conferences (Portland, Augusta and Bangor) that he is entering the Senate race as an independent. If you want a strong anti-war candidate, he’s about as strong as they come.  

    • … the GOP is smart about such independent thinkers.  What they tend to do is count the votes and then if there are any left over, they look around for those that would benefit in their local electorates by breaking with the party.  This often times means these same independent thinkers.  They are allowed to voice whatever they want all the way up-to and until it gets in their way.  As long as they are ineffectual the GOP is glad to have them… unless a better aligned primary challenger comes along and then the activists in the party may make a challenge of the seat.  

    • Maine’s 1st CD Democratic Congressman announced months ago against Collins.

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      p>I agree that Collins has taken moderate votes in anticipation of a strong challenge but if re-elected she will still vote to put some right-wing, anti-equal marriage, anti-LGBT, anti-worker, anti-environmental, pro-war advocate in as Senate Majority Leader.

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      p>Until Collins votes against a right-wing Republican leader of the Senate she can’t claim to be a moderate on scoial issues.

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      p>Better to elect a Democrat and keep the Dems setting the agenda – if only to ensure that legislation we all know is hateful will be kept bottled up  

      • Since choosing a majority…minority…leader is done in the Cloakroom, you, me and everybody except 49 Senators have no idea who she supported for leader.

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        p>And Susan Collins has taken moderate votes when she was unopposed, too.  She has been a member of The WISH List (look it up) since its inception.

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        p>Striker – is your solution to have nobody but Progressives and NeoCons hold elective office, and have them battle it out in a perverse celebrity death match?

          • ….for the actual business of government.  Not horseracing, government.

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            p>I have long thought that there is a Bell Curve of politics.  (Damn, I wish I could DRAW on this cocktail napkin!)  At either side are the extremes – where the bases live.  There is a gradual upward slope on both sides, culminating in a rounded peak – which is where most people in America are.  I live about a third of the way up the hill on the right hand side, and suspect you have a corresponding address on the left.

            • Possibly there are a lot of folks congregated atop the mode of the normal distribution in happy confidence of their  majority status. However, there is no evidence that they agree about very much. Moderates include anti-choice economic liberals and socially tolerant jingoists. If there really were so many of them and they really agreed, they’d form a party, write a platform, run candidates, and dominate the government.

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              p>They don’t.

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              p>One might also expect that there would be a significant number of Republicans more liberal than some Democrats and a significant number of Democrats more conservative than some Republicans. That certainly cannot be observed in Congress.

              • …are so appalled by the actions and rhetoric of the numerically tiny extremes on both sides, which are portrayed as the ‘base’ and true distillation of politics by MSM types who are really just looking for a cheap and controversial quote, that they do not write a platform and form a party because they are horrified by the people involved in the activity.

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                p>Agreed about trans-political politicians – RINOs and DINOs.

                • What the People of the Napkinville don’t like is disagreement, especially disagreeable disagreement like, say, everything Rep. Boehner says or MoveOn’s ad against Petreaus.

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                  p>However, the Iraqi invasion, costing billions of dollars, displacing millions of Iraqis, inflicting terrible head injuries and psychological stress, as well as killing people is a very real thing. The Republican Party has not, er, exactly distinguished itself in its fealty to truth on the whole thing, or bipartisanship. Possibly, too, your party is being punished precisely for its politicizing this whole thing.  Until the Administration and its ever loyal supporters in the Congress face realty on Iraq, the conflict-adverse will have lots of conflict about which to feel adverse.

                • [new]  I think, by and large, that the high number of moderates….  (0.00 / 0)

                  …are so appalled by the actions and rhetoric of the numerically tiny extremes on both sides, which are portrayed as the ‘base’ and true distillation of politics by MSM types who are really just looking for a cheap and controversial quote, that they do not write a platform and form a party because they are horrified by the people involved in the activity.

                  Agreed about trans-political politicians – RINOs and DINOs.

                  Yr. Obedient Servant, Peter Porcupine, Republican

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                  p>What you believe and how you go about implementing and/or achieving what you believe are orthogonal: that is, statistically unrelated.   Reckless is not an ideology (not matter how much Cheney and Bush try to act as if it were so…)and liberal is not a verb.

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                  p>It suits one side of the ideological divide to conflate ideology and the momentum, (if only to confuse the issues. And, btw, guess which side…?) and so define themselves as inherently better.  But this is BMG, reality based and all…

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                  p>  

            • But I keep a vacation house just over the ridge…

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              p>I think your model is accurate, though I think the curve is pitched slightly to the right.

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              p>The problem is that the distribution of elected officials in government is more like a ski bowl:  A peak on the left, a peak on the right, and a valley in the middle.  In my view, the disconnect between governed and the governors is directly attributable to the proliferation of gerrymandered “safe” seats, and began with the creation of “seats of color” some decades ago.  Safe seats favor candidates that best motivate those who live at the foot of the hill.

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              p>The governator had a solution to the problem in California, which was to remove, to a degree, the didtricting issue from overtly political actors.  Like tax reform 30 years ago, this was an issue for which California could have led the country.  Democrats killed it though, demonstrating that party politicians will ALWAYS put the good of the party ahead of the good of the people.

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              p>Hence my decision to remain independent.

            • I used to think that is how the political spectrum worked in the country.  Lately I have been thinking of it more as a horse shoe.  I say this for two reasons.  In some instances the far extremes are getting closure to each other then the majority of the people and they also appear to be moving further away from the majority of the people.  

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              p>The other problem I have been having with the whole right/left political spectrum is that it just doesn’t seem to be accurate enough.  By reducing things to either right or left many important issues and positions are marginalized.  

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              p>For instance where do you put Nazis on the political spectrum? They came from a socialist party but you wouldn’t group them in with say the green-rainbow party would you?  Same with Marxism.  

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              p>I’ve been using the political compass lately instead of the left/right.  On that I find myself in the south east, repubs in the northeast and dems in the northwest with some in the southwest.  I try and put candidates I would vote for on this compass and usually find myself having to choose between weather I economically or socially agree with a candidate.  I have yet to find a mainstream candidate that falls in the same quadrant as me.

              • The Nazis do not come from a socialist party. They were never, say, members of the first internationale, they didn’t trace their ideology to Marx or any other known socialist.

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                p>And yes, I know what NSDAP stands for.

                • … the socialist ties of the Nazis in his book.

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                  p>Neiwert takes it apart here:

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                  Indeed, it was probably as dangerous to be a socialist in Nazi Germany as it was to be a Jew. Certainly, the liquidation of the Left in Germany served as an important predecessor to the Holocaust.

                • The idea that a far right party could be socialist is just dizzingly weird. I think the burden of proof is on JK.

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                  p>Anything Jonah Goldberg writes does not count as proof.

                • Your and Neiwert’s position only discusses what the Nazi’s had turned into and fails to acknowledge where it began.  Which is what I had posted.

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                  p>The evil that came to become the Nazis can’t be put on political spectrum.  I had this discussion with many on this site before that tried to say that Nazis were conservatives.  They were not.  Nor were they on the political left either.  They did how ever have their start in socialist worker party.

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                  p>Nazis were authoritarians, which can have both left and right economic beliefs.  Nazis did believe in many socialist economic policies, such as capping profits on private corporations, nationalizing certain means of product,  increasing social benefits, etc.  The exception is that they wanted these things for only Germans to benefit.

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                  p>All of this just adds to my original point, the left/right political spectrum is an oversimplification of complex ideas and is misleading and inaccurate.

                • Because fascism is more in the way of a pathology than an ideology — a pathology centered around the crude acquisition of power — it would adopt and discard ideologies and ideas with great alacrity, depending on its needs in forming alliances and gaining access to the levers of state power. As Franz Neumann put it:

                     

                  National Socialism ideology is constantly shifting. It has certain magical beliefs — leadership adoration, the supremacy of the master race — but it is not laid down in a series of categorical and dogmatic pronouncements.

                  Thus, to genuinely understand historical fascism, it’s far more important to look at their actions as well as their words.

                • … has much more to do with nationalism that socialism.

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                  p>Another Orcinus Post.

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                  Griffin’s treatment of Nazi Germany follows the same narrative arc as his discussion of Fascist Italy. Nazism has it roots in a tradition of völkish nationalism, which lacked the “ideological, structural, or tactical cohesion of a political grouping such as the Italian futurists.” Rather, these nationalist ideas “were a diverse current with many nuclei of assorted organizations and publications.” They tended to be centered on myth making about Germany’s past and future with the Volk at the center a “nebulous abstraction.” Sternhell illustrates the romantic and unpolitical nature of this culture in the Bayreuth Circle around Richard Wagner, and the Georgekreis, the “exclusively male” cluster of young “seer poets” that developed around the poet Stefan George. While the Bayreuth grouping was quite anti-Semitic, both groups were “esoteric” and passive. They were a “publicistic” group, along with anti-Semites such as Houston Chamberlain, and their writings had little impact on wider German society. Even völkish groups that had an associational purpose (such as the ‘Cartel of Productive Estates’) had little impact on the politics of the Second Reich. The Pan-Germanism inspired by the Boer War and World War One did not translate into revolutionary nationalism even as the Second Reich entered the third year of the latter conflict.

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                  p>More from the previously cited Neiwert post.

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                  The problem with doing so is twofold: not only were fascists prodigious liars and deceivers, they also were highly mutative and opportunistic. Because fascism is more in the way of a pathology than an ideology — a pathology centered around the crude acquisition of power — it would adopt and discard ideologies and ideas with great alacrity, depending on its needs in forming alliances and gaining access to the levers of state power. As Franz Neumann put it:

                  National Socialism ideology is constantly shifting. It has certain magical beliefs — leadership adoration, the supremacy of the master race — but it is not laid down in a series of categorical and dogmatic pronouncements.

                  Thus, to genuinely understand historical fascism, it’s far more important to look at their actions as well as their words.

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                  As for the “hatred of capitalism” that they actually practiced [quoting Paxton]:

                     

                  It turned out in practice that fascists’ anticapitalism was highly selective. Even at their most radical, the socialism that the fascists wanted was a “national socialism”: one that denied only foreign or enemy property rights (including that of internal enemies). They cherished national producers. Above all, it was by offering an effective remedy against socialist revolution that fascism turned out in practice to find a space. If Mussolini retained some lingering hopes in 1919 of founding an alternative socialism rather than an antisocialism, he was soon disabused of those notions by observing what worked and what didn’t work in Italian politics. His dismal electoral results with a Left-nationalist program in Milan in November 1919 surely hammered that lesson home.

                     The pragmatic choices of Mussolini and Hitler were driven by their urge for success and power. Not all fascist leaders had such ambitions. Some of them preferred to keep their movements “pure,” even at the cost of remaining marginal.

                • All parts of the Left in Germany can be traced to the SPD. Parties have split off from it temporarily (like the Independent Social Democrats) or permanently (like the communists). The German Workers’ Party, its predecessor, was hostile to the SPD.

                • … much of German nationalism can be traced back to the mid 1800’s.  Young Germans longed for a united Germany rather than the scattered kingdoms, duchies, and counties they had.  There used to be a popular drinking song that spoke of “What is the Fatherland?”.  Each chorus would supply a potential answer.  The one that ‘wins’ in the end is the lands that share the ‘Father-tongue”.  In fact, the reason you see a lot of paintings from the era showing women in empire-cut dresses is because the empire-cut itself was a political fashion statement.  It was a throw-back to the fashion during the Holy Roman Empire,… the last time Germany was united.

                • But if you can trace the NSDAP to Marx by telling us when they split from the social democrats, I’m all ears.

                • …Meaning there’s nothing upon which to elaborate…

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                  *[new]  Please elaborate  (0.00 / 0)

                  On how the National Socialist German Workers Party does not have it’s routes (sic) in socialism?

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                  p>The Nazis were socialists in the same way that the USS_R_ was a Republic… which is to say, in name only…   It’s a time honored tactic of dictators the world over to usurp the word and gut the meaning: which realization ought to leave you with a leaden, sinking feeling in your gut…   Not even the Nazis (or, indeed, the Soviets) thought they were fooling anybody. But they never met you, I guess…

                • “Patriot Acto”
                  “Moral Majority”
                  “compassionate conservative”
                  “Blue Skies Act”
                  “No Child Left Behind”
                  “Healthy Forest Initiative”

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                  p>I’m beginning to think that fella Orwell was onto somethin…

            • You know appealing to the Napkinville has been the Democratic strategy since, I don’t know, Jimmy Carter. Republicans have spent the time appealing to their base. Who has won the Presidency more?

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              p>You’re suggesting that we Democrats stick with an electoral strategy of proven failure.

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              p>Well, thank you so very much for your advice.

        • Peter – my solution is to elect people who share my views on issues facing the country, the state and my town. I’ll take a chance and assume you vote for candidates that reflect your values and ideals as well.

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          p>While holding the majority in the Senate,Senator Collins’ party placed far-right advocates in the Majority leader’s position (is Dr. Frist still offering medical opinions via videotape?). They worked hard to promote an agenda that hurts working men and women, the enviroment and helped get us stuck in Iraq. Had Senator Collins opposed the Republican leadership I am sure she would have made that public.

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          p>With her I’ll take the “if you aren’t part of the solution you are part of the problem” approach and drive to Maine to help Tom Allen.

          <

          p>P.S. I’ll leave the preverse celebrity death match to McCain and Huckabee’s good hands.  

    • Ryan, i can’t agree that gay stuff is becoming a non-issue.  if it were, the MA legis would have already 1) repealed the 1913 laws, 2) added gender expression to the non-discrimination laws, and 3) backed up the goodridge decision with a marriage equality law.

      <

      p>on the national scale, many states are still passing very anti-gay legislation.  tennessee and florida come to mind first.  and what gay-positive legislation has passed congress, let alone been signed into law?  how many state supreme courts have decided against equality using crap extra-constitutional reasoning like “it’s all about the children (that we will ignore you lgbt people have)”?

      <

      p>what major presidential candidate supports equal rights for lgbts unreservedly?  why could i offhand think of only 3 republicans for this diary?

      <

      p>perhaps we are moving in the right direction, but we’re not even close to lgbt issues being non-issues.

      • I agree with everything you say, which is why I said “quickly becoming.” We’re not their yet, but the younger generation (my  gen and younger) is a whole lot more tolerant, as society as a whole moves in our direction, especially in Massachusetts and the Northeast. Furthermore, I was talking as much about people’s perceptions as I was anything else, such as Beacon Hill legislation. Attitudes are shifting and that’s a good thing – many people just don’t care about who’s gay anymore, it’s just not a big deal to many, many more Massachusetts citizens now as it was 10-15 years ago (and heaven’s forbid any longer than that).  

  5. aside from the fact that its discriminatory, all these small-gov’t conservatives are trying to pass federal legislation in a case that is clearly the business of states rights in any event.  

    <

    p>Wall: meet head.  Rinse and repeat.

      • But since we can’t crash the boards our views probably are not prime time interviews.  

        <

        p>My view on GOP’s take on Federal marriage (and recall Clinton signed that bill)–ignore those issues that are States’ rights and dance with who brung you: fiscal conservativism, free markets and trade and smaller government.  The fringe right on the GOP is no worse than the fringe left/liberal of the Democratic Party–both must be placated but only to a degree.

    • based on what oprah or barkley think?  the point is that they are wildly popular performers/personalities that bring in a lot of money and eyes to any event they are involved with.  by losing barkley, the gop has lost some very fine fundraising potential and a fantastic gotv mechanism.

      • who said you should decide anything
        based on what oprah or barkley think?

        <

        p>I just said it.  Actually I just typed it, but it was me. Really, right here:

        <

        p>

        Oh my god, given that, I’d best check on Ophra, and maybe Jane Fonda, then decide my political affiliations.

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