That would be my first question of Henry "Hank" Paulson as he tries to railroad this country into a bad deal.  Those would be quickly followed by a few others:  Who's getting fired?  Who's going to jail?  What regulations will be put in place to ensure that Wall Street won't do this again in 10 years?

Where's the beef, Henry?

I watched Paulson over the weekend and he reminded me of Martin Short as a big oil spokesman in Saturday Night Live.  The original one of him speaking for the cigarette companies is closer to the mark for Hank, but you get the idea.  He never answered a single question Snuffleupagus asked him on Sunday morning.  Just mumbled stuff that didn't really mean anything, as if the type of people watching that program aren't savvy enough to see through his bullshit. 

It was insulting, really.  At least send someone out to pull the wool over our eyes that knows how to really sell it.  It took Colin Powell to sell the Iraq War.  We should have at least gotten Greenspan to sell this shit.  At least he is coherent and doesn't inspire more uncertainty with ever word he utters.  I am even more worried now that I know the caliber of the clowns in charge of these things. 

Hank used to be CEO of Golman Sachs for fuck's sake and that is the best he can do?

Looks like the October surprise came a few weeks early this year and should help Obama more than hurt him.  So far, he is the only one I can find who has talked about applying a rigid structure to this bailout plan.  Barack has addressed four key points that must be part of any plan he supports.

Not like Dodd and Schumer who are trying to ram this shit through Congress based on chimeras.

So I ask again to anyone out there who can explain it better than Barack has already done, linking bailouts to specific plans, and instead give me a reason why a total, no-strings-attached bailout is the right thing for American tax payers?  I also want to know why we shouldn't socialize the profits of these companies we save if we are being forced to absorb their losses?  Why should millionaires and billionaires walk away with barely a scratch while We The People get screwed? 

When are we going to envision, enable and enforce standards of conduct that are in line with the long-term interests of our country?

There is a lot of movement among voters this year.  Republicans spitting one last time in disgust before tearing up their card and becoming democrats.  Independents who needed to register democrat to vote for their candidate in the primary.  New voters entering the fray because a candidate came along who asked them to do so.

I would hazard a guess that not too many people are joining the republican party, though. 

I registered republican for the first time in my life in August, despite the criminals currently in charge of the party and their culpability in our country's horribly weak and vulnerable position.  I registered republican because of people in my life who I respected immensely and didn't really come to understand until I stopped debating them over methodology and started listening to their actual long-term goals for the country.

Most of them believe in conservation and education and some sort of socialized medical system to make American businesses more competitive on a global market.  These are smart and accomplished people with good hearts and high morals standards who are registered republicans nonetheless. 

I registered republican because of my sister and brother-in-law who first supported Ron Paul and then switched to Obama for the general because of their belief in taking this country to a more state-centric union.  That is what the Constitution was supposed to be, not an unaccountable and imperialsistic federal government.  At least if you are a follower of the first republican president - Thomas Jefferson.

I joined because of people like stillidealistic and witty1 and the few others around TPM who claimed republican roots yet displayed uncommon wisdom and insight into the issues.  They were dismayed by the same things as I am.  They were passionate about many of the same things.  They didn't offer anger and derission the same measure as those on the left-side of the spectrum did.  There is something about your party going down in flames that makes a person humble and for those republicans in flux, there was a humility and willingness to forget the past that was refreshing. 

Humility combined with confidence is something I respect.

I registered republican because Barack Obama seems to recognize that we need both liberal and conservative methods to institute sustainable changes.  This country has been pretty evenly divided between conservative and liberals for much of its history.  Sometimes those two halves come together and do something great, like in 1932.  Sometimes it isn't so great, like 1980.  But when it really works, America can do great things with both sides of our nature represented in our politics.

I registered republican because Barack Obama gave me the confidence and the awareness to realize I am much more conservative than I had originally thought.  I don't want a revolution.  I don't think we have time for that shit.  40 years ago?  Perhaps, but a different generation of young people dropped the ball.  Today we need evolution.  We need to pursue many paths toward progressive changes, driven by smart and pragmatic thinkers on the left and right.  We need to use all of our tools - public and private - in a way to maximise our effectiveness a nation.  We need to quit using political parties as a way to bludgeon each other.

I became a republican because I think there is a movement in the GOP to be grand again.  There is a movement to take Ike and Teddy and Abe as our examples instead of Nixon and Reagan and Bush.  That movement should be encouraged.  I also encourage moderate democrats to become republicans if they think the far left of their party is a little too eratic and not as results oriented as it should be.  Together with the existing progressive movement in the GOP can allow us to craft more conservative methodology to attain our larger goals as a nation. 

Perhaps the democrats could use more pragmatism when deciding how we are going to do all these huge and seemingly impossible tasks over the next ten years.  Perhaps the fact that many republicans are also ones with access resources can help aid in that effort.  They have a vested interest in America being great again and a case can be made that they need to step up to the palte and do the right thing. 

It makes sense that the more people we have focused on the same goal, the more liekly our chances of success are.

The only way "they" win is we keep working at cross-purposes as a voting public.  The only way that atmosphere continues is if we leave the republican party in the hands of neoconservatives.  Progressive moderates of good will and common sense must register regpublican and get better candidates through the primaries.  There is only about 18% turnout nationally for primaries, so the numbers aren't huge to make drastic change.  This project is worthwhile and doable, so there is an obligation to try to change the GOP into something more productive than an obstructionist roadblock to political success.

That is why I joined the republican party, even though I hate everything that the brand currently stands for.  All things change.  Millions of republicans just like me can be the catalysts of that change.  I am patient and can look out over the next five to ten election cycles.  I am also tied of the anger and hate coming from the left-side of the country.  They have preached tolerance and love and peace for all these eyars and a little blood in the water is allit takes for them to start stringing up "repugnicans" from teh nearst tree.  No thanks.  I want no part of such mindless vindictiveness.

I do ask that all the good republicans consider staying in the party.  Without every progressive republican a really, really hard task becomes next to impossible.  The democrats don't need you.  They have started tossing the DLC stooges who kept them from making the progressive changes we needed.  Right now the GOP is ripe for takeover, but only if all progressive republicans stay and the ones who left come back.  Your country needs you to not leave the only other major political party in this country int he hands of zealots.  It will make the changes Barack wants much harder to manage.  He must have committed republicans pushing their representatives to support progressive reforms.

Barack cannot do this with democrats and independents alone. 

That is why I registered republican.

A front-page article on TPM "explains" how Obama seems to be running from "who he is" by playing to small crowds in small town libraries and gymnasiums.  That Barack needs to embrace his true identity as a "celebrity" as being the thing that made him who is and brought him to these staggering heights.

I disagree.

The thing that made him a "celebrity" was the guy who traveled to every small town in Illinois in a bid to be their senator.  The man the spoke at the 2004 democratic convention wasn't a celebrity.  The guy who won the Iowa caucus wasn't "selling out" huge stadiums.  The "naive novice" who beat one of the most experienced politicians in Washington for his chance to compete for the presidency on the democratic ticket didn't start the race with a silver spoon shoved in his nether regions.

The people who care about big stadium events besides the media and pundits are already voting for Barack.  He doesn't need to shore up that group of voters.  He needs to speak to small town folks who are little turned off by all the fuss.  He does best in small intimate settings where his personality and humor aren't blocked by a teleprompter.  I am quite sure "his people" aren't afraid to get him in front of "real crowds" when it is appropriate. 

If this is what passes for advice on the left, I am glad Barack follows his own script on this election. 

Conventional "wisdom" for democratic presidential candidates has led to 7 losses in the last 10 elections.  This is why Barack will win despite the hue and cry from the choir.  His supporters on the left don't seem to understand his strategy and are baffled by his tactics, which leads me to believe he is on the right path. 

Those of us more firmly in the center have been enthusiastically impressed every step of the way.

I can't believe how much you people take stock in polls around here.  
The polls have been consistently off this year.  Almost twenty points off in New Hampshire.  Yet liberals shit golden twinkies everytime a poll comes out that shows McCain ahead with this tiny group of voters or Obama is leading with this group but not with that and could never get a third.  All based on polls with unknown bias and dubious methods.  
November is still long enough away that you could seriously damage yourselfs if you get this worked up over every poll.
Let me slow it down - polls are bullshit, but if you must get all worked up, at least look at comparisons from year to year from this point in the campaign rather than going off the d4eep end with each Gallup daily.
I thought you guys were a little smarter than that.

There seems to be a lot of emphasis on party lines this year from the democratic side of the house.  I hear a lot of words used interchangably that are perhaps an oversimplification of the voting public this year.  Liberal is equal to Progressive.  Neoconservative is equal to Conservative.  With barriers  falling all over the place, everyone is tagged and labeled and stuck in a box.  Yet somehow noone talks about how Reagan Democrats and Obama Republicans are basically the same group of moderates who lead to landslide victories in American presidential politics.
The quality of political analysis on the left and right is just plain sad with a few notable exceptions such as Keith Olbermann and Bill Moyers.
I guess that brings me to the area of Assumptions and how I see them being as damaging on the left as they have been on the right.  The democratic party rises in popularity across the political spectrum.  It is incubment upon those long-time party members to mind their manners and recognize that some of their guests might be a little shell-shicked from the ass kicking the neoconservatives have given the republican party faithful for 40 years.  
It is helpful to remember that "liberals" are supposed to be the empathetic ones in our system. 
There is a huge shift in American politics right now.  It is happening on the left and the right.  The vast silent majority in the middle, asleep for too long, is starting to look for solutions to the problems we can no longer ignore.  They have all had different labels during their lives.  Some may have even been registered as a democrat, an independent and a republican at times in his life.  
Hell, some may have even joined the republican party as recently as a month ago, because it is the party on its way out of power that is easiest to change.  The hysterical mob mentality among some democrats for the taking of republican heads didn't help make the democrat's case either.   I was done being an independent and identify with a more measured approach to crafting solutions.  O believe in stronger state governments as originally called for in our Constitution.  The smaller the budget, the less the corruption.   Evolution, not Revolution.
Republicans come in all shapes and sizes.
As do democrats, making their job even harder.  They must continue to push for a very progressive agenda in a dividedcountry and from within a party not too long off the corporate teat.  The democratic party isn't nearly as innocent in our decline as their marketing might suggest.  
For independents, I would say pick a party and drive it toward instant run-off voting mand progressive change.  That is the only way we get a new political system - change it from within.  The time to sit on the fence is long past.  we only win with numbers.  
The GOP is more in need of moderates than the democrats.  Independents seem to be a little more open minded as well and more solution focused, which is what we need to convince mainstream republicans that a progressive party is possible.  Not only possible, but invevitable given the republican party's rich past and roots in our very founding.
Both democrats and republicans must continue to change their parties to refelct the enormous challenges we face.  Both parties must be well managed and forward thinking if we are to succeed.  It isn't enough for just the democrats to succeed.  One pary rule still leaves half the country on the sidelines.  We can still work toward common goals, though with different methods or from a different point of view.

There is no reason why the fight between democrats and republicans can't be over tactics and not long-term strategic goals.  We can craft a future that has republicans and democrats arguing over who is most progressive and has the most sustainable policies.  That means progressive on both sides of the political spectrum need to focus on changing both parties from within and give each other enough space to make the transformation possible.  
NEWS FLASH:  Please note that most republicans who support Obama don't buy into the same silly Limbaugh talking points and will be happy to debate policy details all day long if you lay off the personal attacks that "all republicans" are this way or that.Most Americans don't vote, so no party has a majority of anything except people who are hurting and haven't really paid attention before this year.  
We have a huge influx of new voters on the left and right which will reshape the electoral map this year.  It also can't be seen by polls because the "likely voter" card is played over and over, missing a huge swath of this year's likely voters.  Right now, good manners and a gracious welcome from the democratic party will go a long way toward making the current trends in the republican party continue in the right direction.  
Please be understanding if the republicans you stumble across are still shaking off the programming and need to be convinced despite their wounds.  Human psychology is always messy.  It may take some genuine success on the part of an Obama administration to really get the changes to take root.  It will certainly take patience on everyone's part if we are going to fix this country and not drive it deeper into dustbin of history.
It is essential that we get this right to ensure our survival as a species, let alone as a nation.

Anyone who has been in the US Navy knows the term Hold Fast.  It's when you are in a desperate situation and don't want to lose the last remaining grasp forward progress that you can muster.  It's a cry of resolve and of acknowledgment.

"We're in a  tight spot."

It's exactly where the neoconservative movement that begun under Richard Nixon and  has dominated our politics, both left and right, for the last forty years finds itself.  Hold Fast to our base - Wall Street and the Rapture Right.  That is why they picked Sarah Palin.  That was a pick to shore up the lackluster Social Issues crowd.  Palin's "record" and "resume" as a "reformer" is well documented.  No need to delve into her personal life when her professional one is the gift that keeps on giving for Barack.

Until she "withdraws" for "family" reasons in October in the noecon's last ditch gamble to avoid a 50-State blowout in November.  McCain-Whomever (my bet is Leiberman) still loses by 15 points, but they Hold Fast.

So what does that mean for the democratic party?  It means they have an opportunity to live up their marketing and be the Party of the People for the first time in a long time.  This is an FDR moment when the country is ready for (and desperately needs) drastic change and will embrace a leader who can deliver on it.  We are Holding Fast too. 

This is the moment when a democratic Ronald Reagan can caputer a huge slice of the republican vote and point us a new, more progressive direction. 

Barack embodies the best of both parties.  He understands that the best way to achieve our common goals is evolution instead of revolution.  We don't have enough time to build this again from the gorund up.  We have to work within the existing system.  Lockheed Martin make solar panels and develop technology for a more responsive health care system under a Barack Obama administration. 

Common sense solutions for a country on the brink of catastrophe.

The neoconservatives understand that they have pushed this country as far as it will go.  They  will keep the 23% Rapture Right vote and the 12% Rich Motherfucker vote, but the rest is going to Barack Obama and Joe Biden.  Every republican I know is voting for him.  My buddy from the Navy.  My MBA best friend.  My middle class sister and brother in law.  Barack will govern with a majority of democrats, republicans and independents.   

They 50-State victory arrives in 2012 after we actually turn this country into the America every real American knows it can be.

Hold Fast.

My wife's cousin stayed with us last night on a layover to Uganda that left this morning.  He's going back for a year or so on his mission to record and help market native music.  This trips comes after only a couple days home from fighting fires in northern California.  He considers himself an "evangelical" and is voting for Barack Obama.

To say I was impressed with his commitment to doing good in the world would be an understatement.  It made me think about a lot of the things over the last week or so around here as democrats continue to push the notion "Jesus Freaks" and other assorted myths about Christians.  The deomcrats far left wing is totally clueless about the faith-based community beyond the caracitures they saee on TV or in films.

I asked him on the way to the airport this morning what his definition of an evangelical was because so far he goes against every stereotype I had heard.  He looked surprised at the question, as if no one had ever asked, and replied, "We consider ourselves the progressive Christians."

This statement was a blinding flash of the obvious to me considering all the stuff I have concluded from blogs and the primary results and the feeling at large in America.  Just like "liberals" are ready to take out the "conservatives" without really understanding what those terms mean at the grassroots level, a Witch Hunt is occurring with evangelicals in America.  As if they are all ready and waiting and willing to bring on the Apocalypse.  As if every single one of the millions of evangelicals are like 40 or 50 thousand that can be seen in a televised megachurch service.

Liberals have taken a minority voice with the biggest pulpit and prejudged the entire evangelical community, most of whom are just like my wife's cousin - humble and charitable and willing to work on what we have in common despite what we might not agree on right now.  He also watched the Rick Warren Saddleback Church broadcast and came away even more committed to getting Barack elected.  Many of his fellow faith-based Americans came away with the same impression.  Most are actually following Jesus' lead and won't be the ones screaming from the highest mountain about crazy shit.

The problem with applying a definition to a group of people from the outside is that it might not match the actual definition they have for themselves.  If most "evangelicals" consider themselves to be the Progressive Christians, how is it that the democratic party, before Barack ran, was unable to get their votes?

Think on that Obamadems.  Perhaps it is time for a little of that good ole liberal empathy that we keep hearing so much about.

It's official.  I have joined the republican party and will be voting under that banner in November. 

No, I am not voting for McCain, I am just sick and tired of the self-righteous anger the democrats have lathered themselves into this year and being an independent  seemed so wishy-washy.  I cannot get behind any effort designed to paint millions of Americans with the crimes of a few simply because they call themselves conservatives. 

Would you give an abused woman one last ass kicking as she stumbled in
the door of the shelter for not being wise enough or strong enough to
leave earlier?

I am proud to bring announce the return of the Bull Moose faction of the GOP and the thinking that truly inspired FDR to craft his New Deal legislation some 20 years later.

Since I musing on the end of labels last month, I realized that little traction exists for giving them up altogether.  Perhaps they are too comforting to people?  At least two thirds of Americans identify as republican or democrat, so there is something in our make-up that looks to our fellow citizens for further refining of our political identities.  So, if labels are clearly not out, I figure why not offer a new one that is a little more precise.

I will leave you with a link to the inspiration behind the title of this post. 

I love Rage - both literal and figurative - but we aren't focused on the right targets.  Rage against the machine, not you fellow Americans.  Rage against injustice and intolerance and backward thinking not against moving forward together as a nation of reconciliation.  Rejoice in the idea that millions of republicans are already articulating a new way of thinking inside our party - don't waste your anger on impotent and illogical bursts of self destruction. 

Revolution (or in this case evolution) takes a little bit of time to get it right.

Frank Rich is on point this week for sure.

Has anyone else had a conversation with another Obama supporter that includes the above sentence ?  This conversation occurred with my best friend over the weekend as we discussed our mutual candidate.  He has been supporting the man for longer than I, being too practical to support a firebrand like Kucinich.

Yet, based on "the moves" Barack has "been making" over the past few weeks, talking to him is like talking to a bottle of Prozac, a decided downer.  Anyone who may have read what I write here would know what my predictable response was to such doom and gloom pronouncements based on an incomplete understanding of the candidate.  I started to pick apart what it was that was worrying him about Obama's recent statement and it came down to an incomplete understanding of the man and his positions, one fueled by a reliance on the corporate media for the underlying narrative. 

My friend had read his book and looked at the website and had apparently watched speeches, yet he was unable to wrap his head around Barack's recent policy positions.  I asked which ones.  He  said, "All of them, but especially Iraq."  I asked which position he has changed, because as far back as I can find he has been advocating a slow, yet immediate, withdrawal of combat troops from Iraq at a pace of one to two brigades a month depending on actual conditions. 

We were both in the military, so he knows as well as I do how big a pain in the ass it will be to get out of Iraq.  If Obama can accomplish it and not leave a smoking ruin in the wake of our departure it will be a huge feat.  If we leave a fully-functioning democracy, it will be a miracle of epic proportions.

I asked my friend if perhaps he was setting the bar too high for the man.  That if we expect Barack to never change his mind or tactics based on new or evolving information that we are placing inhumane limits on him.  What rational person doesn't change their mind based on new or evolving facts?  What person can't even admit for the possibility?  This was the gist of our conversation and it sort of ended without really making any headway on why the corporate media continues to misrepresent and twist Obama's positions. 

I also never really got a chance to explain why I think it is damaging for his supporters to use sentences like the one this blog is named after.  It's not about my friend or any number of independents and democrats already voting for him.  It is about those would-be Obamicans.  They will  be the key players in our time with Barack at the helm of the nation.  We need a governing majority to make possible the changes we need.  We won't get one if even Barack's  earliest supporters let CNN and MSNBC and Fox continue to drive the narrative.

That's the next conversation I am looking forward to having with my friend.  He is a smart and savvy guy.  I am hoping I can make him see the benefit of overwhelming confidence in our candidate as the formula for winning over the vast majority of reasonable conservatives that exist in this country.  We need to quite treating the republican faithful like the entire group are Bush dead-enders. 

It is clear from the primary numbers that the game has changed.

I came across this comment and was compelled to share:

A haiku poet wrote the following and submitted it for approval to his teacher:

A dragonfly
Remove the wings
Bright red pepperpod!

The teacher disapproved strongly and suggested this:

Bright red pepperpod,
Add wings
A Dragonfly!

The student, reading that, burst into tears and came to enlightenment. We have been taking dragonflies and tearing their wings off now for years with our political opposition.

Our discourse is destructive and profoundly dis-integrative. We need to reverse the direction of the wheel. We need to start putting the wings back on----liberating all of our discourse back into the sky of enmity-free community.

Posted by Lux Umbra Dei
July 15, 2008 7:36 PM

I, for one, will be doing my best to put the wings back on the dragonflies I savaged over the previous months.  I can't promise perfection, but I will guarantee continued effort.

Namaste.

This was sent to my personal email address by what I can only guess is prepubescent teen with an inability to have adult discussions on a political blogging site:

Subj: You have been nominated for a Sore Spellar Award
From: Worst Spelling Ever [webguy@worstspellingever.com]
To: 'Jason Everett Miller'

Crybaby much?

http://worstspellingever.com/2008/07/14/douchebag-jason-everett-miller-gets-all/

Thank you, The Staff

Further evidence that some around here continue debating like children. 

We all have very high standard and ideals and are desperate to see this country great again.  That feeling is felt to the left and right of the spectrum.  We want a sense of safety and security back, yesterday. 

Problem is that safety and security are completely subjective views. 

Though the sense of desperation is shared, we each offer slightly different opinions on interpreting Obama's motives so far in this general election.   Until we see how he governs, we will never be able to truly judge if his decisions on foreign surveillance were strategic necessity or integrity about an issue the left disagrees with.  I prefer to use the totality of what I know to judge Obama on this and any other issue I disagree with him on.  I am not a single issue voter.  I never believed Barack to be a classically liberal democrat, so I have not felt "betrayed" by anything he has done.  I considered him an electable and pragmatic second choice to Dennis Kucinich.  Dennis dropped out before our primary or I would have voted for him instead of Barack.

The general election is about a nation, though, and not just a political party.  A general election requires all of us to expand our minds and see at three or four or five dimension.  Especially now, when the stakes have never been higher.  If somehow we can disagree with Barack's stand and yet increase our support instead of ditch him, we will all come across as grown-ups to the many folks who don't bother commenting on these threads but are probably reading them the same reasons as us. (If you think a couple hundred bloggers drives enough ads to keep the lights on at TPM, I have a great investment opportunity for you.)  Assuming there is a silent audience, imagine if we come across as pragmatic and willing to forgive the duped even as we punish the guilty?

Republicans want closure too, they just think we are conspiracy theorists.  Guilt will need to be proved in a court of law.  Does that make them evil?  I don't think so.  Just classically conservative. Most republicans aren't neocons, despite the brilliant takeover of the party by those PNAC/Nixon-era wack-jobs.  I think all Americans are idealists in one way or another.  I would have much rather debated the offending legislation as a policy issue vice a "Barack sold us out!" issue. 

My ideas on transparency would make this legislation immaterial.  I say let them have all the data.  Every transaction, every second.  Won't be long before it is way too much.  Of course, that would require many other safeguards and changes to work, but Barack is certainly not liberal enough for me on this and other issues.  I  also understand I am not the mainstream of America right now.  I can be patient and take a long view on this. 

The American center is heading back toward the left.  It is inevitable, but we can delay the process by being unreasonable during this time of reconciliation and transition.   Reagan won his landslides by convincing his "enemies" that all of his horrible ideas where in America's best interest.  You didn't have to agree, but by God we would fulfill the mission.

America is very mission oriented. 

Put the GOP on a Green Mission for God and Country if you want to see movement on progressive ideas.   Let's create an environment where the republicans and the democrats argue over who has the most sustainable policies, despite the methods they use to get the job done.  Let's use this opportunity to make labels immaterial with regards to our larger shared goals as a nation.  A president can create that kind of change, but only if we get him elected first with a governing majority. 

To win with a governing majority we must be willing to forgive our conservative brothers and sisters for being victimized by the neocons these past 40 years.  We must dispense with labels long enough to feel like Americans first if we are going to fix the many problems looming on the horizon, let alone those already under our feet.  We need to grow up a little and admit the possibility of gray areas.

We have reached the limit of labels to contribute to anything other than the continued desecration of our nearly-dead Republic.

It's amazing.  Everything Barack does now as a Senator brings out the Constitutional Lawyer Brigade (not a actual attorney among them) to SCREAM FROM EVERY THREAD - Obama is Destroying the Country I Love and Ending Democracy as We Know It. 

It's not that the CLB doesn't sounds credible at times.  They are good at pulling quotes from Appellate or Supreme Court decisions that kind of sorta have something to do with the topic they are discussing, but beyond that, all they have is illogical conclusions based on very unlawerly hyperbole.

I am not an attorney, and it drives me up a wall.  I I were an attorney, I would be much less constrained than the ones who frequent these pages have been.  I would expect all the lawyers by now to be like HusseinTenaX and libgirl and the precious few others who have gone out of their way to correct the CLB in their paranoid rantings about the Constitution and The End of Life as We Know It.

We've all seen them, so no need to call out the guilty on this one. 

I just have one questions for all the lawyers on TPM.  Are you as sick of seeing the law treated this way as I am?  I mean, if it were a bunch of fools talking about making or writing films who clearly had no idea what they were talking about, I would be busting that shit non-stop. 

If I get frustrated by how obviously uninformed they are about the American jurisprudence process, how fucking irritating is it to you guys?  My head would be exploding by now if I were an attorney.

When a Navy vessel is under attack or suffers a catastrophic emergency the ship's captain declares general quarters.  Without a second thought, thousands of individuals (conservatives and liberals) drop everything they are doing and come together as one cohesive unit to save the ship.

America is in General Quarters. 

We have an All Hands On Deck evolution that is being impeded by people telling half the ship to fuck off.  Our ship is taking on water at a rate that will sink us and half the damage control team is busy telling the other half to get away from the hole in the ship, they have it covered.

Is this metaphor to esoteric or am I getting through here?

If it isn't clear enough, let me slow it down:  The American Left is not enough to save the ship on their own.  We also need moderate republicans and right-leaning independents who understand the severity of our plight to jump in and help.  They may have different methods, but most are trying to save the ship, not sink it faster. 

So what if they think the emergency was an accident and not deliberate sabotage?