Quick, Henry. The Flit! (Google that, History of Advertising lovers)
The Right no longer has anything in common with angels and poets, heroes and saviors, if they ever did. They've instead found a more accessible kinship with the lower orders on nature's menu: decay, disinterest and destruction, stuff so basic it can be performed by a sleeping baby. Aiming high in all things low almost totally defines them and their sociopolitical aims; there's no tactic or concept too low for them, no resultant decay that's too putrid.
And such low hanging fruit and attracts a specific kind of patron.
Since they've clearly dispensed with classic conservative inspirations like Lincoln, Goldwater and even Reagan, the one they've most recently and triumphantly espoused is the apotheosis of low aiming, the epitome of pesteration.
It's the gnat.
That relentless, bothersome barely-something that dives and swarms mindlessly around anything which radiates the warmth of gently pulsing blood and causes even the most tolerant entomologist to throw his or her hands up in the bug-filled air and take a powder.
Leaving the newly conquered kingdom to the gnats.
And to the gnats, it's all about perception. Like a small, weedy guy who faces down a larger, more physically powerful opponent, a combination of supreme, almost unwarranted confidence and dirty, dirty, dirty fighting will inevitably unbalance and defeat the larger opponent.
So far has the modern conservative fallen from their well schooled predecessors that they would handily reject the just-this-side-sentient Ronald Reagan were he to reanimate and proffer some of "his" then-far right positions, which today's species would regard as being on a level with the evil machinations of a gay, Planned Parenthood physician.
They fly into your eyes, they natter you with nonsense, they tap-tap-tap their bastardized religions and bat-shit morality plays with the subtlety of a carpenter with St. Vitus' dance wielding a ball-peen hammer.
Facts and history mean nothing to the gnat. All that matters is eating, crapping and bugging the hell out of people -- life boiled down to the smallest of smalls. For the Republicans have offered the equivalent in the form of the base "No", the simplest of political platforms. Infinitely easier to support god, guns and gust; easier to decry science and education as elitist; easier to just plain bother and butt heads.
But really what choice do they have? They're just acting gnaturally.
Follow Steven Weber on Twitter: www.twitter.com/TheStevenWeber
My earlier post sleeps with the fishes, apparently. One must be careful when speaking of the gnat.
All I'll risk saying this time, is we liberals, each and everyone, must now man (and woman) our Flits! The gnat must not be allowed to reign as conqueror.
Splash yourselves with DEET (citronella for you naturalist), and it's into the swamps of ignorance and intolerance we go to do battle.
Ten-hut! Present Flits!
March!
Clark, B. (1998). Political economy: A comparative approach. Westport, CT: Praeger.
Contemporary American conservatism traces its heritage back to Anglo-Irish political philosopher Edmund Burke, who developed his views in response to the French Revolution.
Kirk, Russell, The Conservative Mind, p. 6.
US President Abraham Lincoln wrote that conservatism is "the adherence to the old and tried, against the new and untried."
Kirk, Russell, The Conservative Mind, p. 8.
Pesteration:
http://books.google.com/books?id=AnBXAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA743&lpg=PA743&dq=pesteration&source=bl&ots=zXGVnDvAr_&sig=snsixzWQIRzkVEsOfpdDXbrngOQ&hl=en&ei=0qBNTr_8CYrWiAKAkaSlAQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CBoQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=pesteration&f=false
Gust:
2. a sudden rush of smoke, sound, etc.
3. an outburst of emotion
Just trying to help.
Love your creativity, Steven, along with your wit, talent, good heart and liberal soul. Don't ever let the know-nothing critics getcha down.
Somehow that doesn't bring to mind the "Hollywood Left" so much as it does another group engaged in the current political discourse.
Did you know that 89% of the poor in this country own refrigerators??? And they have the gaul to ask the wealthy to pay more taxes, when they have "extravagances" like that.
Always enjoy your thoughts.
And agree.
So nice to hear from a friend today.
Boy, do I need it. grins. Maggie thanks you, too.
1, Always have an enemy (Govt, Obama, Muslims, gays etc)
2. Always be the Uber Patriot (see Tea Party)
3. Always have the means to saturate and repeat and repeat the message until it becomes the truth (SEE Talk radio and after 1996 Fox News)
Bill Clinton was the first Dem President after the repeal of the FD......I rest my case
Kudos to you.