Why not just call McCain the new Jesus?
Published by punkass marc February 9th, 2008 in HUH!?, McCainery, FUCKING IDIOTSUn-be-fucking-lieeeeeeevable. I’m really sorry it’s all gloom and doom from me when I find the time to post these days, but I am fed up with the defeatist language of the Democrats. It alternately depresses me to the point of inaction and sends me into a frothing tizzy accompanied by incoherent thoughts.
Allow me to do my best to sum up my feelings: THE DEMOCRATS ARE FUCKING IDIOTS. Every day, I become a tiny bit more convinced that the game is rigged and they’re trying to lose, because nothing else explains the astronomical levels of incompetency that pervade every campaign and every candidate and every organization.
The most recent example: Hillary Clinton, in an attempt to beat a fellow Democrat, basically showered her sum-bitch Republican opponent with gold, frankincense, and mer. [I had to include the frankincense and mer or that would’ve been a golden shower. And what she said was the opposite of peeing on him. Unfortunately. /digress.]
“If our nominee is running against someone with the legendary background of John McCain — Democrats need to think about this,” Clinton said. “Because we’re picking a nominee we expect to win. We cannot take four more years of more of the same.”
The LEGENDARY BACKGROUND? I realize the man was a PoW and all that, but come the fuck on. Why not just call him bulletproof? Why not just cut off any attempts to assail his character now and forever? If Hillary runs against McCain, this quote will be thrown in our faces the entire time. “Even tax and spend liberal demon Hillary Clinton thinks John McCain is ‘legendary.’ Vote McCain! Paid for by the Committee of Shitbirds to Elect John McCain.”
It gets worse. Well, maybe not worse, but it stays pretty damn bad.
“When I think about running against Senator McCain, if I’m so fortunate to be the Democratic nominee — you’ll never have to worry about being knocked out of the ring,” Clinton said to cheers. “I think I can go toe to toe with John McCain every single day.”
Oooooh boy! We MIGHT have someone who THINKS they can maaaaaybe go toe-to-toe with the Republican! Aren’t we full of bravado! Gosh, what a novel idea, expressing that perhaps you’re the equal of the person you’ll need to defeat to become President and just maybe shove the country back on the train tracks.
I can’t believe the Democrats are fighting amongst themselves to point out who best measures up to the awesomeness of the Republican candidate. This is political suicide. And worst of all, it’s a goddamn lie. John McCain’s a tough guy who went through some rough shit. He also sold his soul to get this nomination. And his voting record is disgusting.
Until someone in the party calls these hypocritical bastards by the names they deserve to be called, Democrats will never win. You’d think someone would’ve figured that out by now.
It’s worth remembering that Bill Clinton’s supposed campaign genius couldn’t get him 51% of the vote in either election.
Absolutely true. It’s been a long time since a Democrat won without a whole slew of extenuating circumstances (massively disruptive 3rd party candidates, watergate hangover, etc.). Maybe it’s because they really, truly suck at speaking truth to power, so the power wins.
To be fair, Gore won fair and square, even with a Green spoiler. He wasn’t allowed to keep his win, but he ran a clean campaign against a dirty opponent who had billions of dollars worth of free campaigning from the media, and he got the majority of both popular and electoral votes. I hate to sound like a bore about it, but the word for what happened was “coup”. It even had the requisite hoards of would-be fascists.
McCain only has a fighting chance for the same reason Bush had a fighting chance—because the media is campaigning for him, misrepresenting him as a moderate when he’s a conservative. What Democrats need to get is that We. Are. Winning. Conservatives can’t win a fair fight. This is the time, to fully agree with you, to start saying so from the podium. Not McCain is some legendary guy. But the truth—McCain is a hard right conservative who can only have a fighting chance by misrepresenting himself.
The irony is that last line is precisely what Republicans say about Clinton, that she’s a secret liberal. The sad thing is in her case, it’s not true.
True, Hillary Clinton’s about as liberal as … Barack Obama.
And McCain does have a “legendary” background. You know — maverick, fighter, POW — remember that “legend” doesn’t mean “truth about a person.”
Why do we even fucking care about Democrats? They are largely pro war, pro capitalism, pro-open ended funding for Israel, pro torture. Democrats signed the Patriot Act. Democrats helped legalize torture. Democrats let Palestine burn. Do the democrats talk about taking down any of our 175 (in 132 countries) military bases (read: outposts of empire)? Do democrats support the missile defense base in Poland?
Give me a fucking break. What do Democrats do to improve our access to abortion, or basic medical care. If they’re our only option, if we can only vote for rich folk with ruling class consensus agendas–Fuck this system, tear it down.
I’m not a third party fan or anything, but I think it’s disgusting the way we consider third parties–like, say, Greens, who actually attempt to ’speak truth to power’ (boy is the above post a mis-usage of this oft repeated phrase–when the fuck do ‘electable’ democrats EVER speak truth to power??); who are actually anti-war, to an extent; like Kucinich or Gravel–who I still wouldn’t have ‘voted’ for…these people are shut out of the media and even debate…by Democrats!
Sorry, my mindbrain can’t take anymore of these pretend ass elections pulling potential rabble rousers into the main stream. Plus, NPR and AIR America have been turned into elections central, and this makes me cranky.
How about “McCain has a mythical background”? Objectively the same, but very different in its implications.
On Amanda’s Gore point, let’s not forget that Gore was a much heavier favorite than the eventual slim margin he [sort of] won by. While the media did a massive and unfair hatchet job on him, he also ran a very soft campaign that gave Bush much more credit than he deserved. He essentially ran the ‘try not to lose” campaign instead of going out and fighting for the win. And while the election was stolen from him, he still lost a tremendous amount of ground by running a weak campaign. That election should’ve been a blowout, but the dude didn’t even win his HOME STATE. The media fucked him, but he also fucked himself, and that got the game close enough for Bush to steal it.
I feel you on the Dems, Iris, but at this point the single advantage to the Dems is stopping the bleeding. Will they advance our rights and social justice? Not much if at all. But they won’t continue to erode it, either. The lesser of two evils counts for a tiny bit in this day and age.
All I know is it’s just bad politics to call your opponent any word that sounds like a glorification of her/him, and “legendary” definitely freakin’ qualifies.
What the hell is “mer”?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myrrh
The thing that is incredibly depressing is, like I said above, Democrats have been eroding our rights! They signed the patriot act, the military commissions act of 2006, Clinton doubled the prison population, rolled back welfare access and abortion access, and pushed through ultra-expanded free trade. Of course there is a lesser of two evils, so to speak, and the Bush admin. is particularly fascist, but this is life and death for a lot of the planet–not just ho hum election year buzz. Democrats don’t even stick up for us: they would never ever push for impeaching these war criminals because they know investigations would hold their complicity in torture and war crimes to the same scrutiny. Like I said, in terms of stopping the bleeding, elections aren’t the place to turn. Capitalists bleed you dry. That’s the point.
I agree that candidates shouldn’t receive the Legend makeover.
kevin,
whoops! I just got lazy.
good catch, and thanks.
I don’t get why legendary was a compliment. It seemed value neutral to me.
The media acted like Colin Powell was the next jesus so lets see them run together how about that! http://dirtyelection.com/2008/02/07/colin-powell-as-john-mccains-running-mate/
Go McCain
hey Elizabeth,
It may be that hillary meant it as neutral, but I think it’s pretty easy for that comment to be read as effusive praise. it certainly can be exploited by McCain’s camp as such.
When using the word legendary in conversation it’s usually done with reverence, right? People talk about legendary football coach Vince Lombardi, or the Legend of King Arthur, or what have you. You dont’ discuss the legend of something bland, and you don’t discuss the “legend” of someone evil like Hitler. it’s usually used admiringly, and that’s not a wise way to describe your adversary, no?