Too Much Heart, Not Enough Courage...
When I was in College we cast the Wizard of Oz using our professors. At the time we thought it was a riot. Mostly because we had a professor who looked like a flying monkey. He really looked like an aging leprechaun, but for us that was close to the flying primates in the movie.
Democrats suffer from casting themselves too often as a combination of the Tin Man and the Scarecrow. We want the hearts and the smarts. That is a good thing...a noble thing. We own the Scarecrow and the Tin Man. BooYah! The problem is we need to embrace the "King of the Forrest" ideal. The republicans have nooooo problem with this. They are the combination of the Wizard who hides behind the curtain and pulls all the levers and the Lion...after he gets his courage. They method act the hell out of these roles to the point that they are able to completly edit the Tin Man and Scarecrow out of the movie!
Now is the moment Democrats need to get in touch with their "inner" lion and claim their throne as king/queen of the forest. With a 'RRRRUUUFFF" and a "GRRRUUUUFFF". Debate and compromise are just not ever going to get Dorothy home. We cannot afford to miss this opportunity to get effective health care reform. The public option will force the private insurance companies to reign in the 300% increase in profit they have gained over the last couple of years. It will help lower premiums for everyone, which will mean higher wages for many Americans and give the option of healthcare to those who can't afford it under our current system. See?! If we embrace the Lion....we still get be the Scarecrow and Tin Man....only now we don't get cut from the movie. In our movie...Dorothy doesn't just get home...she gets affordable and effective healthcare to help her with the concussion she suffered during that whole twister scene!
Democrats suffer from casting themselves too often as a combination of the Tin Man and the Scarecrow. We want the hearts and the smarts. That is a good thing...a noble thing. We own the Scarecrow and the Tin Man. BooYah! The problem is we need to embrace the "King of the Forrest" ideal. The republicans have nooooo problem with this. They are the combination of the Wizard who hides behind the curtain and pulls all the levers and the Lion...after he gets his courage. They method act the hell out of these roles to the point that they are able to completly edit the Tin Man and Scarecrow out of the movie!
Now is the moment Democrats need to get in touch with their "inner" lion and claim their throne as king/queen of the forest. With a 'RRRRUUUFFF" and a "GRRRUUUUFFF". Debate and compromise are just not ever going to get Dorothy home. We cannot afford to miss this opportunity to get effective health care reform. The public option will force the private insurance companies to reign in the 300% increase in profit they have gained over the last couple of years. It will help lower premiums for everyone, which will mean higher wages for many Americans and give the option of healthcare to those who can't afford it under our current system. See?! If we embrace the Lion....we still get be the Scarecrow and Tin Man....only now we don't get cut from the movie. In our movie...Dorothy doesn't just get home...she gets affordable and effective healthcare to help her with the concussion she suffered during that whole twister scene!
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Now that's a Norse of a different color!!
Rec'd.
August 18, 2009 11:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thank you LB. Thanks for taking the time to check it out.
August 18, 2009 11:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
Gerat post - love the Wizard of Oz and you did a wonderful job with it..........
August 18, 2009 11:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks a million Maggie. I love it too. I left the witches alone in this one...I had to stop somewhere...lol
August 18, 2009 11:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
I think I accidentally just recommended my own blog. lol. That just can't look right.
August 18, 2009 11:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Heh, we all "accidentally" rec our own blogs sometimes. Nice to have you on board.
August 18, 2009 11:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
When are we gonna through water on the witch, and hear it say, I'm melting!
August 19, 2009 12:01 AM | Reply | Permalink
This is the real question. We keep trying to reach out to the witch. Some of the Democrats in congress keep thinking we can find some common ground and compromise with the witch. The witch wants to through fire on the Scarecrow, take Dorothy's ruby slipper and let her get home on her own.
Time to melt the witch.
August 19, 2009 7:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
..abd by "through"...I mean throw...yep...
...t-h-r-o-w...
August 19, 2009 8:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
Now I'll have Bert Lahr in my head for the morning. Hope he finds room among all the other folks hanging out there. We have to realize though that according to L. Frank Baum's book, the Wizard solved the problem of the lion not by giving him courage but by giving him a medal.
We also have to recognize that Dorothy melted her own witch--by accident. Hopefully we can melt ours on purpose.
There are considerable differences between the Oz of the Books and the Oz of the movies. Some have written that Baum was writing politics in the guise of children's books. Most of them are now on line, so if you want to read them you can. He wrote fourteen of them over twenty years. The list and the plots can be found at http://www.halcyon.com/piglet/books1.htm
And here's a pretty good short biography of Baum with links which may (or may not) be worth following (I haven't yet.) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/5949617/L-Frank-Baum-the-real-Wizard-of-Oz.html
August 19, 2009 10:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Indeed you are correct! Thanks for the links and info. On a side note I did a report on Burt Lahr in college. Pretty interesting career. I believe he was in the first run of "Waiting for Godot(sp?)"
August 19, 2009 11:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yep, though I'm not sure it was the first run. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bert_Lahr
In a way Wizard of Oz was a kind of cross he had to bear...ditto Ray Bolger the Scarecrow and Margaret Hamilton the Wicked Witch. No matter how good they were at everything else, and they were very good in about everything they ventured, the roles in Wizard were so striking and archetypal that they blotted everything else out of people's memories.
Hope you got an A on the report. This old professor has been compared to Santa by more than one of his students.
August 19, 2009 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Inventive:) Thanks for posting this.
Getting in touch with one's inner valor, especially in Washington DC is no small task. Mainly because inner valor is rarely invited to Washington DC.
I think President Obama has a lot of courage. More than any of us will ever know. I would love to see it translate more into this particular debate.
I would also like to see some real Democratic statesmen emerge from out of the progress-swallowing beltway sludge that oozes throughout our democracy.
August 19, 2009 6:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
I completely agree. I believe the President is a singular human being. I think the battles he is fighting are numerous and complicated. Some of the Democrats strengths are also their weaknesses. Democrats are a diverse group with passionate beliefs and strong streaks of independence. It seems to me that the Republicans are more about obtaining power and then maintaining that power. This is a sweeping generalization, but I think there is some truth to it. The conservative politicians are able to more easily subjugate their individual goals/beliefs and present a unified message designed to defeat their opponents.
It isn't right, but it is a difficult strategy to defeat. In this atmosphere thoughtfulness seems like indecision and catchy slogans seem like folksy confidence.
August 19, 2009 11:36 PM | Reply | Permalink