Dumb Americans

David Bowie had it all wrong: All night, they were the dumb Americans.

Too be an equal opportunity asshole, here's a few reasons I could never be a fucking Republican, based on some things in the news the last few days:

Kansas syndrome. The whole damn place. Idiots. Home of the anti-evolution movement. Where else but in the heart of America would people vote to not teach their kids science? As a good friend once said, "My faith is not so weak as to hinge on whether or not the theory of evolution is true." But, if that isn't enough, they are home base of some of the most intolerant of Christian wackos on the anti-gay fringe. A handful of them came to my home town recently so they could parade around with big signs that said things to the affect that God hates gays and sent AIDS to try and wipe gays out. You know, nice Christian sentiments like that. They also, apparently, have a list of "Sodomite Whorehouses Masquerading as Churches." (We were quite bummed not to have made the list.) The Republicans have been playing to these two groups like crazy recently in what can only be a clear attempt to win people over based on stupidity, ignorance and fear. So far, it seems to be working. I feel sorry for the smart people in Kansas... All two of them.

The Tom and Duke show. I don't know what's sadder, that Duke Cunningham, a decorated Vietnam vet and former fighter ace, has plead guilty to a variety of bribery related charges, or that one of the first and loudest voices to defend him was Tom DeLay. At least Cunningham has the decency to cry, apologize, and admit what he's done. DeLay has shamelessly pretended he's a victim as a legal noose tightens around him.

Mrs. Dick Cheney. I caught some of an interview on NPR with her today, and she may be the new standard in Republican harpies. After a great soliloquy on the morals and values of the United States, on our role as world-wide teachers of decency, she was asked why it was that her husband and the president wouldn't agree to John McCain's anti-torture legislation. She said that was a mis-characterization of the issue and extolled her husband's moral virtues. She then, very sweetly, asked, "If the choice was getting information that might save millions by using a little shot of sodium pentathol, wouldn't you take that choice? That doesn't sound so bad to me. A little shot of sodium pentathol." There are warmer things in the reptile house at the zoo. A few minutes later, she said she was insulted that anyone implied that the torture "buck" stopped with her husband or the president.

I feel a level of disgust for my country that I can't even describe, and it's all thanks to the Republican Party. The Liberals I know are often soft-headed and lack backbone, and almost always feel that it's ok to slow the part of the economic gravy train that doesn't affect them, but, being an ineffectual boob isn't all that dangerous most of the time. No, the Republicans and their allies (big business, fundamentalist religious nuts, a handful of Catholic Bishops, foreign policy loonies) are slowly changing what it means to be an American, and their changing it into something a lot of us don't want to be.

Maybe I need to go be a die-hard independent in Canada?