THE BIG YAWN

[NanceGreggs]

THE BIG YAWN
By Nancy Greggs

I don’t think anyone could argue the fact that the GOP is directly responsible for the loss of thousands of lives. One need only look to the numbers of casualties since the beginning of the War in Iraq, military and civilian, to understand what your unfailing support of this fiasco has led to. Well, as you say, they ARE only numbers.

But recent events lead me to believe that you have now launched your most insidious plan to cause fatalities among we poor US citizens: You are obviously intent on boring us all to death.

The lack of creativity in your current tirades is apparently meant to lull us all gently into that final good night where, with numbed minds and eyes rolled to the back of our heads, we succumb to a slow but inescapable death.

Ann Coulter, unofficial spokes-skeleton for the Conservatives, is out there flogging yet another tome on the talk-show circuit, spewing the same old tripe: All Liberals are traitors, all Democrats are insane, anyone who questions the wisdom of G.W. Bush et al should be taken out in the public square and shot.

To phrase it in the popular vernacular, “Oh, pulleeze!” Surely you have another blonde skank in a Size .004 miniskirt who can be dragged out into the limelight, someone who has something different to say? You could easily make HER into your new best-selling author – after all, bulk sales are bulk sales. I’m sure someone new (and hopefully different) could write an equally vitriolic, fact-less piece of crap that winds up in the bargain cut-out bin at the local book stores just as easily as Coulter does. Maybe a redhead, or a brunette, just to keep it vaguely interesting for we yawning TV audiences?

And then there’s Amanda Doss & Crew who are threatening a Swiftboat-style attack on John Murtha. Can you people not grasp the simple concept of “been there, done that”, and the fact that the only idiots who are interested in things like murthalied.com are the same idiots who don’t know how to find a website in the first place? One would also think that Murtha’s current record on supporting the troops (by way of funding for equipment in combat, decent food, potable drinking water, and sufficient pensions and benefits, as opposed to magnetic yellow ribbons on the back of an SUV) would lead you to conclude that the baseless dissin’ of an honored military man is going to end in a well-deserved ass-whuppin’ for the lot of you.

In addition, there’s always that persisting problem of people being prompted to ask more of those embarrassing questions about Bush’s military service. It’s not like that hasn’t happened BEFORE when you used the same tired tactics on John Kerry. Do we REALLY have to sit through this tired old post-war movie AGAIN? Ho-hum ad naseum. Roll the credits and let me sleep in everlasting peace.

The big news this week was the resignation of Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson, who Karl Rove described as ‘irreplaceable’. Okay, you’ve got to be kiddin’ me. Irreplaceable? Just get a homeless guy off the street (and thanks to you, there are PLENTY to choose from) to re-arrange the words “terror, fighting ‘em over there, spreading democracy in the Middle East”, yaddah, yaddah, yaddah, into Bush’s NEW speeches. Second verse, same as the first – as is the third, fourth, and umpteenth verse, in case you haven’t noticed.

Maybe you could get David Frum back to pen Bushie’s future misunderstimations – or maybe not. Being as you are now attributing Gerson as the originator of that scruffed-up little gem “Axis of Evil”, a phrase which Frum has taken credit for time and again, lil’ Davy might not be as cooperative as he once was. Oh, well. Stupid is as stupid does, and it's still boring as hell -- even when the "stupid" part is sung as a duet on the same tired soundtrack.

That brings us to Rick Santorum, whose big announcement this week was that WMDs had FINALLY been found in Iraq. No offence, but I knew you were scraping the bottom of the same-old/same-old barrel when I heard that one trotted out. Word to the wise (if there are any wise left among you): No matter how many times you say it, WMDS are NOT going to magically show up, despite Rumsfeld's specific directions: “To the north, east, west, and somewhat to the south.”

Give it up – I’m begging you. If I can be free for one moment to mix my metaphors, no matter how much lipstick you put on that tired old WMD story, that pig (as pretty as you might make her) will fly at around the same time hell freezes over. Might I suggest a little mascara, or perhaps some blush? Mega-yawn, and points deducted for using a shade of lip gloss that is literally eons old.

Can I have a drum-roll for “Stay the course”, as tired and worn-out a phrase as was ever devised by man? Iraq is in chaos, the economy is plummeting, our global allies are jumping a sinking ship, our American way of life is disappearing, and our rights as citizens are currently on the endangered species list. Your answer to what ails us? “Stay the course.” If you think I’m bored with hearing THAT one, imagine how it sits with the unemployed, the uninsured, and the growing number of people who consistently answer the survey question, “Is the country on the wrong track”, with a resounding NO, IT’S NOT. (Second most popular response: “Are you out of your f&*king mind even ASKING?”)

Again, excuse me while I drop my lower jaw and yawn myself into a death-rattle. There isn't a corporation still in existence that doesn't recognize when an ad campaign has outlived its usefulness. Could you not even TRY to learn from their example, and fire whatever marketing genius insists on dragging THAT dead horse out on every occasion, just to beat it yet again?

Now, even I am willing to admit that some of your tattered not-quite-truisms have made it into the oldies-but-goodies category; i.e. stories that, while laughable in hindsight, have become as comfortable as a pair of moth-eaten, foul-smelling fuzzy slippers. And yet they seem to be missing of late. There’s the “newly painted schoolhouse in Baghdad” story, and the “purple thumb” footage – as timeless and as fictional as a showing of “It’s A Great Life” on Christmas Eve, they are stories I personally never tire of hearing. (I guess I can’t help myself; I’ve always been a sucker for the classics.)

All of that being said, I would implore you to abandon your latest campaign to bore us all into an unending sleep. I realize it’s rerun season, but honest-to-God, these incessant replays of your already proven-to-be-ineffective programming of days gone by (when a few people were still watching the GOP network) will be the death of us all.

But tomorrow will be another day, Scarlett O’Hara, and no doubt some talking head Republican will be all over the cable news networks, extolling the booming economy and the progress being made in Iraq. Just like they did three years ago, two years ago, last year, last month, last week – yesterday.

In a bitterly divided nation, if there is one thing Americans wholeheartedly agree on, it’s their hatred of reruns. So go ahead and persist in your diabolical plan to run your regularly scheduled programming, because you do so at your own peril.

Oh, that noise you hear? That’s the sound of an entire country grabbing the remote and switching to a DIFFERENT channel – before they slip into the brain-dead coma you are obviously intent on inducing.

[robbedvoter]

1. My vote was FIRST!!!!

:yourock:

[juajen]

2. Gadzooks, am I actually the first?

Congratulations Ms. Greggs on another "marvelous darlin'" rant!

My favorite GOP soundbite is "To the North, East, West and somewhat to the South". Honestly, Rummy is my favorite person to quote. I also love all the unknowns known to man and Rummy.

On edit: I see I'm not the first; but, I was when I posted.

[NanceGreggs]

3. Yeah, there's no one like Rummy when it comes to soundbytes ...

There are the things he knows, the things he doesn't know, the things that he wishes he knew, and the things that EVERYBODY else on the planet knows that somehow escaped his attention.

Next administration, no AMATEURS. (Now THAT'S a Constitutional amendment we can ALL get behind).

[ariellyn]

5. "No Amateurs"...that's a GREAT '06 slogan. n/t

[ariellyn]

4. I love your writing. n//t

[Mythsaje]

6. Very nice...

Obviously we're both in fine form today.

Check out my "Fired Up" on the Greatest Page...

[LuckyLib]

7. But NanceGreegs, why do you hate America?

;)

[Major Hogwash]

8. Ann Coulter, unofficial spokes-skeleton - that's not very nice.

Why don't you pick on rabies-infected Michelle Malkin?

Or the RR pinhead James Dobson?

Or that geek Tucker Carlson?

Or that racist Sean O'Hannity?

Or that drug addict Rush Limbaugh?

Or that smarmy Glenn Beck?

Or the homophobic Michael Wiener (Savage)?

You know, there are tons of them out there.


There's that guy from Human Events, Terry Somebody.

Then there's that other study in Freudian disclosure, that guy that looks like Terry Somebody, but his lips are always pursed and he's losing his hair on the top of his head so he combs it straight back so the camera will focus on his nose, he's on the radio, too, but nobody really listens to his rants either.

Then there's the old standby - Jeraldo Rivera. Did you know that he said he has been in more wars these past 35 years than Kerry has been in? Man, that freaked me out. I remember when he claimed he was standing on "hallowed ground" 2 years ago and was still 5 miles from the actual site of the firefight. Oh well, any dirt hilltop in Afghanistan looks pretty much like any other dirt hilltop in Afghanistan.

Then there's Pat Robertson.

Or Jerry Falwell.

I mean, if all these guys all went *poof* tomorrow in the press, do you think there would be more Jeff Gannons in the wings ready to fill their place?

Only in America.

[specimenfred1984]

9. Gov't Propaganda Never Changes

It's the same hideous crap over and over. Corporate propaganda changes, even if it directly contradicts itself, in order to sell stuff.

A great book on it is: "Taking the Risk Out of Democracy: Corporate Propaganda Versus Freedom and Liberty"

I'm sooooooooo sick of the lies I can't stand it for 5 seconds either. You articulate the frustration felt by all aware people very, very well. When I watch the TV or hear that crap on the radio or directly from a brainwashed zombie's mouth, I wonder just how long they think they can keep lying.

There are many people who are truly brainwashed now, completely deluded.

[rosesaylavee]

10. Very effective and oh, so very true...

This is the same old same old redressed for another day. I would like to see this refrain played on the DEMs part as I think it is very effective and may actually get them to talk less truthiness... or maybe just talk less is all I can hope for!

Great - I tried to recommend it twice it made me laugh so hard I forgot I had already done that!

[ejbr]

11. Typo??!

"...and the growing number of people who consistently answer the survey question, “Is the country on the wrong track”, with a resounding NO, IT’S NOT. (Second most popular response: “Are you out of your f&*king mind even ASKING?”)"

Should it be "decreasing" (least likely, given the emphasis on the response) or "right track" or "YES, IT IS"? Or is this supposed to be sarcastic? I included the second most popular response cuz it makes me laugh <tee hee>

If this was a typo, I can't blame you for it. Considering that you are fighting the drowsiness that the repugs are doling out. (Oh, once again you have amazed me with your words!)
:toast:

[NanceGreggs]

12. Yeah, a GLARING typo, to boot!

I posted pretty late last night, and by the time I went back and realized what I'd done, my 'edit' option had run out of time!

Just one of those things that happens when you are being BORED TO DEATH by the same old crapola. It was meant to read: "Is the country on the RIGHT TRACK?" "No, it's NOT."

[ejbr]

13. No worries

at least we can now avoid having some wingnut come to the sight and claim that you believe the polls are going in Bush's favor when it comes to the direction of the country. Heaven forbid!!

Also, it just goes to show you how we DUers value and decipher every syllable you share!

:loveya:

[WestMichRad]

14. Good essay, Nance!

You nailed it on one point - that they're intent (or perfectly happy) to bore us to death with inane blather.

I interpret "us" to mean the citizens, the electorate. And this leads me to contend that Dems are missing a big point here - that they don't mind at all dragging the discussion into the gutter, dumb it down below the interest level of many people, because if they can discourage a lot of people from going to the polls, all the better. Those voters that they don't mind discouraging are the middle third of voters who switch back and forth from election to election, and largely determine the outcome. The more of the "flexible" middle group who stay home, the more influence that their core supporters have on the outcome.

So they don't hesitate to dumb down the campaign to simplistic sound bites that say nothing but resonate with their core supporters. They don't hesitate to sling mud and take the issues to the gutter, because turning off the voters works for them. It's consistent with efforts to thwart general voter registration drives, because those efforts don't help them secure favorable proportions of core voters.

I'll keep holding my nose and voting, despite this. These bastards need to be impeached, convicted, sentenced, punished.

Thanks for the excellent essays, Nancy, keep up the great work!

Peace.