Ten Magical Things You Have to Believe to be A Republican
Being a Republican today is like being a character in a Disney animated film--it means believing in magical things.
Being a Republican means believing that Pat Toomey and the teabaggers represent the mainstream of American opinion, the stormfront of a new wave of political awareness that will soon sweep your party back into power.
Being a Republican means believing that cutting taxes increases revenue, even after thirty years of doing it.
Being a Republican means believing that science is a big liberal plot to corrupt the youth of our great nation and steal money from the pockets of honest, hardworking rich people.
Being a Republican means believing that you lost the last two elections to more liberal candidates because your candidates weren't conservative enough.
Being a Republican means believing that teenagers today will have less sex than they did when you were a teenager if you just spend enough money telling them abstinenance is good.
Being a Republican means being an indefatagible and ceaseless fighter for less government intrusion into the day to day lives of ordinary citizens. Unless you're a terrorist. Or you talk to terrorists. Or you talk to people who might talk to people overseas. Or you want to marry someone of your own sex. Or you want to use recreational drugs other than alcohol or tobacco. Or you want to watch pornography or buy a sex toy. Or you you want to gamble online instead of hitting a casino or a track. Or you want to have the option to have an abortion, or avoid the necessity to have to consider having an abortion by using morning after contraception. Or, any contraception, any, because if you're not married, we've already taught you not to do it. Or you want to be allowed to die if you fall into a persistant vegatative state. Or you want to be secure in you persons, house, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Being a Republican means believing that television shows and war movies are valid bases for policy making.
Being a Republican means believing that the the entire collapse of the global financial system in 2008 was caused by a law banning redlining that was passed when Jimmy Carter was president.
Beiing a Republican means believing that all those people who got trapped in the King Dome during Katrina would have been fine if they'd just had the presence of mind to grab a couple of thousand in cash, toss some bottled water into their SUVs, and drive to their summer homes in the mountains.
Being a Republican means believing that the only problems that can't be solved by military force are the ones that can be solved by tax cuts.
Being a Republican means my facts are just as good as your facts, buster and if I believe that the world was created in seven days six thousand years ago, there was no big bang, fossils are God's little jokes, Saddam was behind 9/11 and had WMDs, we'd be better off if the Social Security funds were invested in the stock market, and carbon dioxide is as transparent to infrared radiation as it is to visible light, that's just as valid as whatever it is that you think.
Its a wonderful magical world they live in.
Being a Republican means that tax cuts actually fund the military?
April 28, 2009 9:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
Being a Republican means Bush never told a lie, he just had bad intelligence.
Being a Republican means talk of seceding from the United States is the highest form of patriotism.
Being a Republican means your ideological opponents hate America.
Being a Republican means never altering or changing course.
Being a Republican means loving wars but refusing to pay more taxes for them, or enlisting to fight them.
April 28, 2009 9:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Excellent!
April 28, 2009 9:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Being a Republican means never having to say you're sorry.
April 28, 2009 10:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
Being a Republican means its better to be ignorant than educated...
Being a Republican means you get to talk like God is important to you, but you don't have to live like it...
Being a Republican means that its okay to think poor people deserve what they get, after all, if they were real Americans, they wouldn't be poor...
Being a Republican means you get to elevate hypocrisy to an art form...
Being a Republican means that you don't have to feel guilty when someone loses their home because they can't pay their medical bills...
April 28, 2009 10:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
That rawks
April 28, 2009 10:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Serious ditto on that.
April 29, 2009 12:58 AM | Reply | Permalink
"Being a Republican means you get to talk like God is important to you, but you don't have to live like it..."
Here's the one that I just don't understand. The inconsistency of being a Republican. Which is covered in your other points too.
April 29, 2009 6:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
Being a Republican means believing that the legal system is not the solution to our problems; the legal system is the problem.
April 28, 2009 10:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
I noticed that
=D
April 28, 2009 10:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Unless it's helping to keep Al Franken out of office.
April 29, 2009 9:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
Nice.
April 29, 2009 1:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
Let me amend this:
Being a Republican means never having to say you're sorry, but expecting everyone else to.
=D
April 28, 2009 10:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
Corollary:
Being a Republican means suffering from partisan attacks but never, ever, having made one yourself.
April 28, 2009 10:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Heh. I can't be a Republican, then. Can I?
=D
April 28, 2009 11:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
You could still be a Republican if you underwent Limbaughtomy.
April 28, 2009 11:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Being a Republican means you only have to say you're sorry to Rush Baby!
April 29, 2009 4:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey Steve, you are probably above such things but I hereby give you the Knightly Blog Award for the Day for this here TPM site given to all of you from all of me.
How can anyone have a discussion or a decent debate with someone who believes the world is 6000 years old even though they really do not believe such nonsense but wish to make it look like they do to get votes from idiots who do?
WHAT?????
GREAT BLOG
April 28, 2009 11:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks. To be honest, I kind of feel like this one was "too easy," in the sense that it's not like anyone here will take serious issue with it. I do think it makes a point, which is a favorite of mine, that's important enough to risk being accused (whether by myself or others) of engaging in cheap "unity thread" crowd-pleasing pandering. That point is that the Republican Party growing embrace of an essentially totalitarian mindset over the last ten years has naturally led its elites into the classic trap of totalitarian parties: they have come to fervantly believe their party's own propaganda.
Their decent into delusion has become a serious danger to their own party's survival. I truly wish them well in struggling back to some kind of sanity. If they wither away, our governmental system almost impels the Democrats to fission into two parties, neither of which is likely to be a place where I'll be particularly comfortable. If some series of catastrophes brings them back to power in their present delusional state, they represent a danger to liberty and, at the risk of being melodramatic, possibly to the entire world.
April 29, 2009 10:04 AM | Reply | Permalink
Agreed. And, it would probably a split of the Blue Dog/Mod Dem Caucus from the rest.
OT: A pitch about this (kick my ass, but this is my first real researched TPM blog)--see my cafe post about the Blue Dogs and Specter.
April 29, 2009 11:52 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks. To be honest, I kind of feel like this one was "too easy," in the sense that it's not like anyone here will take serious issue with it. I do think it makes a point, which is a favorite of mine, that's important enough to risk being accused (whether by myself or others) of engaging in cheap "unity thread" crowd-pleasing pandering. That point is that the Republican Party growing embrace of an essentially totalitarian mindset over the last ten years has naturally led its elites into the classic trap of totalitarian parties: they have come to fervantly believe their party's own propaganda.
Their decent into delusion has become a serious danger to their own party's survival. I truly wish them well in struggling back to some kind of sanity. If they wither away, our governmental system almost impels the Democrats to fission into two parties, neither of which is likely to be a place where I'll be particularly comfortable. If some series of catastrophes brings them back to power in their present delusional state, they represent a danger to liberty and, at the risk of being melodramatic, possibly to the entire world.
April 29, 2009 10:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
speaking of "what the hell."
April 29, 2009 10:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
Being a Republican means that the illegal Mexicans streaming across our borders are infecting us with Swine Flu. However, our teenagers returning from Spring Break in Cosumel are not.
And, don't forget...being Republican means that you get to re-name the other party. The Democratic Party is now called the 'Democrat Socialist' Party. By Repbulican Decree.....
April 28, 2009 11:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
Small note. The King Dome was in Seattle (we blew it up.) The Super Dome is in New Orleans (and probably should have been blown up.)
Very funny post.
April 29, 2009 12:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
See? Now that's a perfect example of what I'm talking about here. You Democrats talk a good game about intellectual freedom, but your arrogant insistance that your facts are better than anyone else's just goes to show what fascists you all really are at heart.
April 29, 2009 8:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
God I love the look on DeMint's face when Sanchez goes at him. Like he is confused that a member of the village would actually question his ridiculous sound bite.
And I'm not sure what has sparked the outbreak of vulgarity among cable news anchors, but after Rachel's double entendre, Shep Smith's f-bomb, and Sanchez's incredulous "What the hell does that even mean" (to a sitting senator, no less), I'm fully expecting Campbell Brown to change the name of her show just to fit in.
April 29, 2009 1:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
As already noted, it is the Superdome, not the King Dome, in New Orleans. The King Dome in Seattle imploded in 2000 (watch it on YouTube). The GOP right now is undergoing a similar implosion, just a bit more slowly.
April 29, 2009 1:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
Operative word, 'believe'. As in not necessarily supported by facts.
I find it ironic that republicans are often critical of Hollywood or LA. I guess that's because they have their own private mental picture of la la land. What might that place be like? It creeps me out to consider the possibilities. I won't go there.
April 29, 2009 3:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
Being a republican means an honorable discharge is what other people get for doing something you are too chicken shit to do yourself. And then making believe you respect and honor their sacrifice.
April 29, 2009 3:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
And being a Republican means that you demand more of that sacrifice because the troops want to be sacrificed and because it makes good entertainment.
April 29, 2009 3:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
Being a republican means that you always win every election, no matter how many people voted for you (or didn't).
April 29, 2009 7:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
ooooohhhh.....like that one!
April 29, 2009 5:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good post. Highly recommend.
April 29, 2009 7:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
Being a repug means you make the rules for everyone below your income level and suck up to the ones who make more than you.
April 29, 2009 8:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
Magical things that Democrats believe:
(1) While evolution explains how humans got here, but it has absolutely no bearing on human behavior. Human behavior is determined completely by society, which arose completely independently of biological factors. Therefore, human behavior is infinitely malleable.
(2) The fact that Asians and whites consistently score higher than non-Asian minorities on all tests based on intellectual aptitude means that every single one of those tests is racist in some way.
(3) When, after years and years of spending beyond our means, the economy begins to collapse, the problem is obviously that we are consuming too little and the solution is to have the government increase consumption in order to stimulate the economy.
April 29, 2009 8:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
No, sorry. Actually all of those things are just more Republican delusions phrased in the so they can be falsely attributed to liberals.
April 29, 2009 10:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
Actually:
Point 1 couldn't possibly be true because society is an evolutionary adaptation. It didn't just spring up magically from human thought.
Point 2 is just silly. Aptitude tests are all inherently flawed. The designers know it, which is why they are always being updated or removed. The fact that you have reduced aptitude scores into a statement about race demographics is absurd. The real demographic measurement for aptitude is community and class. Compating aptitude and race is as arbitrary as the aptitude test measurements themselves.
Point 3: consumption does stimulate a capitalist economy. Start with Adam Smith and work your way forward. I guarantee you will be rewarded with knowledge.
April 29, 2009 3:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually:
Point 1 couldn't possibly be true because society is an evolutionary adaptation. It didn't just spring up magically from human thought.
That is exactly what I am saying. However, there is a very prominent thread in Democratic thought (in all liberal thought really) that all human tendencies are learned and that society can be reshaped in the way that liberals want if only society teaches people the correct behavior.
Point 2 is just silly. Aptitude tests are all inherently flawed. The designers know it, which is why they are always being updated or removed.
How are they flawed, other than the fact that every, or almost every, test gives results that are not politically correct?
The fact that you have reduced aptitude scores into a statement about race demographics is absurd. The real demographic measurement for aptitude is community and class.
Actually, black scores are, on average, lower than white scores even after controlling for socioeconomic status, or parental educational achievement.
Comparing aptitude and race is as arbitrary as the aptitude test measurements themselves.
Aptitude tests actually have fairly good predictive power; they are not perfect, but they are pretty much better than any other single factor we have found.
Point 3: consumption does stimulate a capitalist economy. Start with Adam Smith and work your way forward. I guarantee you will be rewarded with knowledge.
Read some Ludwig von Mises or Murray Rothbard. I guarantee that you will be rewarded with knowledge. The source of economic growth is savings, and from that savings, investment. The idea that our problem is lack of consumption is absurd.
April 29, 2009 10:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Point 3: consumption does stimulate a capitalist economy.
I want to point out again how wrong, wrong, wrong, this is.
Economies are stimulated through production, which is increased through investment, which requires savings. The reason why recessions and depressions happen is because we do not have the savings to cover our investments, so many of the projects we invest in cannot be completed due to the lack of resources. What we need right now is increased savings, not increased borrowing.
April 29, 2009 11:03 PM | Reply | Permalink
Awesome post Steve :). Being a Republican means thinking the reasons minorities don't like you is because you have a bad marketing campaign, not your anti-immigrant attitudes, not your screw the poor people attitudes, not the "southern strategy," not the fact that a serious contender for the chairmanship of your party was distributing racial slurs about our current President.
Being a Republican means thinking your issues with minority voters can be solved by electing a black guy to use outdated hip hop lingo to get the word out that Democrats are wicky-wicky WHACK, YA HEARD???.
April 29, 2009 8:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
And, apparently, it means believing that believing intellectual capacity is a racially determined characteristic is honest empiricism rather than racism.
April 29, 2009 10:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
And, apparently, it means believing that believing intellectual capacity is a racially determined characteristic is honest empiricism rather than racism.
As opposed to Democrats, who believe that the idea that there may be any differences in the average intellectual capacity of different ethnic groups cannot possibly be true and that anything that could possibly be evidence of such must be ignored.
April 29, 2009 10:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Being a Republican means believing that we should torture those who don't agree with our high principles.
April 29, 2009 10:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
As the Guinness boys say: Brilliant, just brilliant!
April 29, 2009 10:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
The following is a complete list of all the ways your post is wrong.
April 29, 2009 11:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
NC baby, I don't know how old you are, but when I was a kid, the drooling right-wingers were known by names, such as the "John Birch Society", and they espoused not merely extreme ideologies, but warped patterns of thought and deductive reasoning, not at all unlike your scenario about what it means to be an R today.
At best, they were entertainment. Tom Lehrer wrote songs about them.
What happened was: along the way, these fringe loonies were legitimized
You know the old cliche, "In MY day..!!"? Well, in my day, we knew who the batshit crazies were. We didn't elect them to office and put them on TV.
April 29, 2009 11:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, I'm certainly old enough to remember the Birchers, certainly. There's always been a seed of lunacy in the GOP, but I don't know of a time in U.S. history when one of the two major parties has been so thoroughly crazy. I honestly wonder if they didn't take it in like a dormant infection when they absorbed the Know-Nothings in the 1860s. Throughout most of that time, the party tolorated their nutter faction but kept it contained and controlled. I think the turning point may have been 1968, when the evil and crazy factions of both parties got loose and combined under the Wallace/Lamay banner. It's like the crazyness grew in the American Party's incubator and then was eagerly absorbed in toto by Nixon's GOP in 1972.
April 29, 2009 12:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
That is an extremely astute observation and, since I was a functioning adult at the time, I agree wholeheartedly. Well done.
April 29, 2009 7:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ah, that's not exactly true at all.
Not to plug myself, but, my web site at
http://www.treatyist.com shows that we RINOs have horns.
a) the only political site that actually tracks President Obama by good numbers. I've got energy, trade, the budget, his quotes, plan vs goal, co2, and more. all with links to backup the actuals and even the plans. A Republican blog that links to both Mauna Loa and RSS... oh do tell!
b) the best co2 calculator on the internet. I dove in and used real numbers and let you calculate any way you want to reduce your carbon footprint, how much it will cost, and how much the net carbon reduction will be, AND, how much the energy savings costs will be. I've got user entered factors in their to consider the increasing price and complexity of technology as things get more fuel efficient, scenarios to swap out coal for nuclear or wind, or any mix thereof.
c) we're going protectionist. You can't win elections in the northeast on free trade and we're going to refute the oft stated case that free trade actually is the magic bullet. To woo our southern free traders over, I have a great peace as to how protectionism helped the north win the civil war. We're going to make Democrats choose between being popular around the world versus winning the votes at the union hall. Remember - Republicans actually carried the working man vote in the last election. It was the wealthier classes - middle and up, that went for Obama. If we come out in favor of the unions, Democrats are done.. because, the only reason Teamsters and the UAW support Democrats on social issues is because they are somewhat nice on trade. But oh look, Obama is going to let GM go belly up....
We'll be taking those votes, in 2010, thank you very much.
April 29, 2009 11:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thank you very much for the laugh (especially on c). That was AWESOME. If this isn't satire, it should be.
April 29, 2009 1:32 PM | Reply | Permalink
My favorite part of c: If we come out in favor of the unions, Democrats are done..
April 29, 2009 1:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
That was my favorite line too. I thought it akin to, "if monkeys fly out of my butt..."
April 29, 2009 4:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
It is a pretty awesome site. I encourage every one to visit it. I'm still not sure if it's satire, but if it is, it's brilliant. It's one of those that even after you look at it a little bit, and click on some of the links, you're still not sure if it's satire (seriously).
Whether or not it's satire, it's an excellent commentary on the state of a certain segment of the population.
April 29, 2009 2:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good luck with getting the Repubs to do any of this, without it snapping their necks, with or without bubble wrap.
April 30, 2009 7:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
Sweet!
Being a Republican means that you believe everyone else must follow the rules, but you yourself are always a member of the Exception Family.
April 29, 2009 1:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Spending millions to promote sexual abstinence is far better than preparing for the next flu pandemic, yay.
April 29, 2009 1:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Man, did I nail the first one, or what?
April 29, 2009 3:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
You actually nailed ALL of them; you just happened to have one of those amazing events where the brilliant senator proved you right within hours of your posting.
It reminds me of a Woody Allen movie where he was arguing in a line to get into a movie about what a particular author (or director) meant, and someone else said he was wrong. The very same author then walked up and told the Allen character that he was completely right.
Savour this moment, TCFK... they are truly rare.
I suggest you go out and get some lottery tickets before the sun goes down.
April 29, 2009 4:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
Being a Republican means believing that the Constitution is a Ouija board.
April 29, 2009 4:51 PM | Reply | Permalink
Great blog TCFKNCS. Do I laugh because it is funny or cry because it is true?
April 29, 2009 5:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
I've rec'd this blog because it made me laugh, but I should qualify that I don't think that these magical concepts are symptoms of being simply a Republican, but rather a special firebrand version of Republican: The Limbaugh/Hannity/Bachmann/Palin kind of Republican. There are Republicans out there who can actually think and write and speak rationally about their policy disagreements with us progressives, but it's sad how they're too often drowned out by the wingnuts and teabaggers, who of course are relentlessly enabled by the mainstream media.
April 29, 2009 8:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
I laughed to keep from crying.
April 29, 2009 8:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
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September 12, 2010 11:59 PM | Reply | Permalink