Art Lawler
The Athens Review
Athens — My fellow Americans, liberals and conservatives, tea partyers and party poopers — such as Republicans and Democrats.
Lend me your eyes.
We have filled the halls of Congress and the Senate with children who do not play well together. Maybe you’ve noticed.
They are dysfunctional. They do not share the football. They do not drink together. They don’t party together. They just preach together — all at the same time, and with vastly differing theologies and ideologies.
We hired them in this land of one-for-all and all-for-one – remember?
Everyone who has ever registered to vote, and who has then gone out and actually done it, is responsible. The non-voters are not responsible.
They are irresponsible, which makes this their fault, too. Maybe we should take ourselves out behind the barn, and give ourselves a good blistering, then take our belts and razor straps to D.C.
Too many church politicians want to close the borders, spank the unemployed and starve their children by first starving their parents.
Too many liberals want to soak the corporations which provide the jobs, partly because some of them infuriate us when we discover they are “too big to fail.”
So we let the government — both parties here — bail them out.
Our job is to pay for it, or let our grandchildren pay for it. The bank’s job is to keep it and not loan it to us, even if we beg to get our money back before we lose our homes, cars, families, etc.
Instead, they wrap themselves around our money, and settle into the fetal position, seeming to say, “Let them eat cake.”
They’ll loan money when the economy improves, which won’t happen, because the banks won’t give us any of our money back. So we can go out and spend it, thereby reigniting the economy.
Now let’s discuss the replacements we’ll need after we fire D.C.
Anybody will do as long as they’ve never told a lie, never cheated on their wives or husbands, never cheated the IRS, never spit on the sidewalk and have never taken a stance on anything beyond harmless platitudes such as “I am pro-God.”
They must be free from all neuroses, all radical ideas and devoid of interesting personalities.
If we can’t find enough of those boringly-safe people to send back, we can look in the mirror, and shoot the image looking back at us. We’d still miss the intended target, but that’s about as close to the truth as we’re ever going to get.
Ninety percent of us can’t remember anything longer than a sound bite. We’re more interested in our politician’s sex lives than their legislative efforts. If they do what’s right – you know – feed the poor and clothe the naked, we’ll fire ‘em on the spot.
Most of them are getting naked themselves, and with all the wrong people, bless their exposed hides.
Obama reminds me of Fess Parker swinging ol’ Betsy at the Walt Disney Alamo of the fifties. So far, the consensus builder has convinced himself, his wife and not enough legislators, to pass a bill.
If Republicans and conservative Democrats go along with Obama on health reform, they will probably be sent to the guillotine by their respective electorates.
The Republicans, starting to collect moss on their backs from inactivity, have achieved party solidarity by saying no to everything related to Obama. I’ve seen more action in a nursing home. We ought to spread wet plaster over them and make statues out of them when it hardens.
Obama could propose a bill calling for world peace, and he still couldn’t get 60 votes out of the Senate.
Obama keeps saying, “We won.” But Republicans keep saying, “No, we won, 41-59. What is it about tyranny of the minority you don’t understand?”
Democrats, weary of losing, are threatening “reconciliation.” A more inappropriate word has never been devised for something this divisive.
How divisive will a one-vote victory in the Senate be? Look for a march on Washington.
How divisive will non-legislation be for Obama and the Democrats if they don’t “reconcile?”
Look for a Democratic bloodbath in D.C.
If healthcare does goes through, look for a bloodbath for Democrats in November, with Republicans applying the sword.
Therein lies the silver lining. The Republican set-in of the last year may have been a little too effective. Cut off an opponent’s options, he gets desperate, and that desperation might defeat you.
Nothing could be more liberating for Democrats. They’re going to the guillotine, no matter what they do. So do the right thing, as they see it.
At the very worst, Washington politicians will have done something.
Besides, 40 million Americans really do need health insurance of some kind.
I can hear Hannity screaming without even turning on my television.
Moderates, once known as well-grounded, sensible people, have become our frightened little chickens with no real values.
Compromise? Not us. We’d rather kill the nation, first. This is James Dean and Marlon Brando playing chicken in a black-and-white B movie with their ‘49 Mercurys.
Government, part of we radicals, say, should die and go to political hell.
Could maybe we all come and reason tog....”
“Shut up. Shut the dirty word up.!!!”
If these “children” were back in elementary school where they should be, they’d be called back in from recess and made to write “ifs.”
You know; “If all this country were just like me, what kind of a country would this country be?”
I hereby sentence all registered voters to write 3,000 “ifs” apiece. In addition, I am sentencing all non-registered voters who have the ability to write, to print the same “ifs,” and ask themselves the same question.
And don’t you dare point your finger at the other side when answering this question. This one’s for you, and you alone.
If you want to point your finger, look back in your mirror, and have at it.
Class dismissed.
