Left and Jesus

I’m not religious, let’s just get that out of the way. But in the US religion and politics are intertwined very closely. It’s just one of the peculiarities of the the political process here – unless you are a believer or pretend to be – forget about  a career in politics. That is unfortunate, but it surely can be used to our advantage. Sorry, Bill Maher, we just gonna have to learn to swallow this bitter medicine if we are to live in this country. Watchya gonna do –  organize atheists? Have you ever tried herding cats? But to be honest, I do secretly hope that the majority on the Left is faking their religiosity.

Anyway, I find it strange that Democrats and the Left in general have allowed the Right to hijack Jesus and Christianity. Just think what kind of rhetorical skills the Right had to possess in order to justify the marriage of Christian principles and corporate capitalism. It’s like mixing oil and water but nonetheless they were quite successful in linking these two together. The message was simple: you work hard, play by the rules and then one day, maybe, you too will achieve the American dream. This way they kill two birds with one stone: First, if you fail you only have yourself to blame, probably because you didn’t work hard enough and second, this rat race keeps you occupied for the rest of your life. It’s an enviable arrangement for those in power and Republicans seized on it many years ago. But it is understood that this arrangement is applicable to the little guy, since  corporation have their own rules and privileges. But I digress, corporate welfare should be a subject of another post.

Religious people, and that’s about 85-90% of the population in this country claim that religion helps them in their everyday lives. They think of themselves as good people, good Christians, they believe they will most likely go to Heaven when they die, etc. But for some reason, the Right’s version of Christianity is very Old Testamenty – full of revenge, punishment, anger and all sorts of repression. Due to the subscription to that kind of values conservatives can’t really enjoy their lives and they hate to see others who can. That’s where Democrats come in! That’s where they start talking about the loving God, helping thy neighbor, feeding the hungry, caring about the environment – insert any liberal cause. You know, play on people’s positive traits. I mean Jesus was a hippie after all. No one thinks of himself as a vengeful or mean person. Deep down, even the worst criminal knows himself as kind, generous, just and humane person. That’s the kind of feelings that Democrats have to stir and capitalize on. Let Republicans own anger and resentment.

The Left also have to be mindful of the growing Hispanic population. I heard one Republican strategist saying that Hispanics are natural conservatives: they are religious and they have a strong work ethic. So they are already setting eyes on the new target, since relying on white southern men is no longer a viable strategy. Dems should not let this one slide.

Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize

Well, my first reaction was:  “Obama did WHAT?” I guess his first reaction when he heard the news was: “Fuck! That’s just what I need!”  Smartly, he did not make a big deal out of it and humbly said that he didn’t deserve it.  What else is he supposed to say, he has no control over it.

But I’m glad Republicans are going to have a field day today.  Enjoy,  guys!  Something to occupy your tortured minds for a week between the bites of a shit sandwich you have to eat these days. It entertains me to see how much you hate America.

In the beginning there were balls

That’s my answer to the perennial question of egg and chicken. There are too few people with balls these days. Especially on the left. The purpose of this blog is going to be the cultivation and encouragement of testicular fortitude among the liberals. So far the number of those can be counted on one hand.

What do we have? We have a bunch of well-educated, well-intentioned, reasonable, worldly, rational PUSSIES. We get represented by people who are not doing our bidding in Congress. All they want is to hold hands and sing kumbaya with bullies who can not be placated by anything. Our job is to knock the bullies out with a powerful punch or two and proceed to finish our business just by the time they are coming out of their coma. That’s what the political process involves: we won the election, people have spoken and spoken decisively against Republican policies. It is not our job to make friends with them – we have other more important things to do, like clean up the steaming pile of shit left by the 8 years of partying Republican frat boys. The job of the opposition is to, well, provide a meaningful opposition, and frankly, I would love to see some formidable opponents which would make politics an exciting process. I would love to hear pertinent ideas from the right on why unregulated free-market capitalism is a great idea and why fucking for pleasure is bad (for us, common folks). But of course the current opposition belongs to a mental hospital. I’m almost embarrassed for them. So democrats essentially is the only game in town and just as the time is perfect to strike the iron while it’s hot they let it slip through their hands. They do the classic Democratic maneuver called “snapping defeat from the jaws of victory”. They got dealt two aces for the first time since FDR, against the Republicans’ 2-7 offsuit and it is the Republicans who go all in, not Democrats. I don’t know, maybe they are planning some twisted, double secret strategy that involves conceding every legislative step to Republicans and then unraveling in some spectacular fashion annihilating the entire opposition. You know, to confuse the enemy. You see, that’s the problem – Democrats have misfortunes from too much overthinking and overanalyzing the situation, where Republicans just shoot from the hip and don’t give a damn about anything.

This fear – of making the wrong move – paralyzes many intelligent people. Not just in politics, but in everyday life. Conquering fear should be an ongoing quest in our personal and political lives. I noticed that that fear is positively correlated with IQ. No, I don’t have statistics – I have a gut feeling, ha-ha. The smarter you are, the more you know. The more you know the more you’re aware of possible outcomes of your actions, perhaps most of them negative. Your start playing too many what if scenarios in your head, each more elaborate than the other and in the end you do nothing, paralyzed with fear of failure. A stupid person is free from such analysis. A person with no brain but a lot of self-confidence will beat a person with intelligence but lack of courage. Just look at all the reality shows and Fox news.

Now, I do not advocate for Democrats to become less intelligent. I want them to recognize that different situation require different skills and right now it requires balls of steel. Democrats think that different conflicts can be resolved by mental gymnastics and fancy words, in which they, of course, excel, because, you see, they went to Harvard and Yale. Some conflicts, yes, for example if you were dealing with people who at the very least understand the meaning of words and of the way democratic process works. But you are not dealing with such people. Bullies understand force and not reason. That’s what we have to show them. All I’m asking of Democrats is to grow a pair of shiny ones. They will need them going forward.