The Long Cold Winter

We're bundling up in South Florida today. With windchill, it's somewhere in the 30s this morning, which may be perfectly normal in other parts of the country, but down here, it causes mass panic. Moth-eaten scarves dragged out from trunks for the first time since the '70s. Weathermen swearing that there's a chance we'll see some rare weather-related phenomenon called "snow." No one is quite sure what it is, except that it's similar to rain, but colder. We fear it.

But the cold is an apt metaphor, so fuck the workaday realities. This is the winter of our discontent, like the Bard said. The long, dark teatime of the soul, to quote another great voice of British letters. To read it in the GD-Politics section of Democratic Underground, Clinton, Edwards and Obama are all cynical political hacks, light facades to shadow the evil reality of a cluster of conservative fifth columnists running for president on the Democratic ticket.

Not all in the same post, of course. Often just one, sometimes just two, and rarely all three. But in aggregate, we believe that our leaders are bent on the wholesale destruction of everyone stupid enough to vote for them. They are vile, vicious man-beasts -- the sort of human-animal hybrids only hinted at in State of the Union speeches of yore.

But I recall another too-often-quoted dead guy, who said, "Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you." That was Friedrich Nietzsche in Beyond Good and Evil, sounding suspiciously like H.P. Lovecraft. But more to the point, it reflects the level of discourse here over the past couple weeks, and let me tell you something, ace, it's about to get a lot worse.

Anyone who recalls the blood that shot from the eyes of Dean supporters following his loss in Iowa in 2004 knows what I'm talking about. Anyone who recalls the smug satisfaction of the Kerry crowd will recall the same. The situation will not improve here until one person climbs to the top of the bloodied heap after Feb. 5, holding aloft Excalibur and promising a fat chicken in every pot, love for all their friends, and doom and horror for all their enemies. We've seen it before, we'll see it again.

But in the meantime, I would point out that, far from any of our candidates being the sort of greedhead terrors one would assume them to be from reading Democratic Underground, it is instead the ones rolling in the mud day in and day out, both here and elsewhere, that are the real pigs. I would never ask for an end to discussion, an end to argument, or even an end to the visceral, meat-hook, bent-claw attacks. What I would ask is that everyone who reads Democratic Underground today and in the days to come do so with a heightened sense of critical thinking and reason, with an overdose of incredulity in their heads but a heart ready for forgiveness when the whole thing is over. I cannot wish that dark clouds will not pass over. I can only wish you have the sense to remember to bring your umbrella when they do.

As for the rest, it does worry me when this board starts sounding like the very people we claim to work against. It bothers me that there are sections of followers amid all the candidates that seem to treat their man/woman with the swirly eyed deference I would expect in a Huckabee supporter.

And what about that other side? It sure seems as if the Grand Old Party has finally split into its three representative factions: Fear, Greed and Fundamentalism -- a guy who says "9/11" like some sort of pull-string talking doll; a perfectly coiffed former corporate raider who believes strapping his dog to the roof of his car for a 15-hour road trip is a sign of a healthy, take-charge personality; and a Baptist preacher from Arkansas who preaches hate with a smile and makes his crowds weep and chant in perfect unison, "Yes, yes! The Messiah has come!"

This is what we are up against. Fear, Greed and Dark Ages Dumb. And after our candidate has that sword in hand, we'd be fools not to take up arms and join the attack. Until February, I'll see you in the trenches. Throw another log on the fire -- this will be a long, cold winter, but to a certain, weird type of person, Junkiatis Politicus, it's the most wonderful time of the year. Laissez les bons temps rouler. Let the good times roll.

:yourock:

:thumbsup:

Kudos! I love that - the Holy Trinity of the republi-CONS: Fear, Greed, and Fundamentalism.

I'd still like to find a bumper sticker that says "My dog won't let me vote for Romney."

Frankly, I think rudy's candidacy will be all but finished by then. If he's waiting to make a big impression til the end of January in Florida, I think he's kidding himself. I think the race will be pretty much decided by then. If not, it doesn't give him much time to regroup for Super-Duper Tuesday on Feb 5th. I wrote a rant about this myself - I think it'll be more voters than just Iowans who'll have noted that rudy blew off that whole state without even bothering to try. And it doesn't speak well for his character. Seems rather arrogant to me. But then again, Arrogance may be the Fourth element to the republi-CON belief structure. Perhaps it would be their version of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Fear, Greed, Fundamentalism, and Arrogance.

Sounds like the type of crowd I wanna join and to which I wanna have my good name attached. Yessirree.... :sarcasm: