Where to start? Well, I suppose with the name change. I'm just feeling more snarky and smarmy than angry these days.
Getting rid of Rumsfeld was a mistake as was the way in which it was done.
That said, let's talk about the election. We lost. The morning after was rainy here in Maryland, some might say appropriately. I confess, I broke my promise to myself about avoiding exit polls. I watched them all night- well, most of the night. Additionally I am embarrassed to admit that when I woke up on Wednesday morning and saw the results I had a "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" moment. You know that scene towards the end where Jimmy Stewart is on the steps of the Lincoln memorial, bags packed, ready to hop the first bus back home? Well that was me, but minus the "bus back home" bit. I was ready to toss in the towel, "If my fellow Americans lack the courage and resolve to do what's necessary then we deserve the dark world we're sure to get." In fact, embarrassed doesn't cover it. I'm deeply ashamed of my initial response.
It lasted for about a minute and a half. Then I pulled myself together, re-embraced democracy, rolled up my sleeves and committed myself to the long haul. Democracy means sometimes you're on the losing side. And the Republicans deserved to lose congress this election. The Democrats didn't really deserve to win it, but...well- as with all things it's a mixed bag.
Bill Whittle (who has a new essay out) graced us with a blog post after the election which sums up how I feel about things (post first minute and a half) quite nicely. The short of it is that a Democrat controlled congress is going to make things more difficult for us, but we still have a job to do. The fact that the mission just got harder doesn't absolve us of the responsibility to complete it. It will probably require more of us, and the price of victory probably just got higher. It's still a price worth paying, because the price of defeat is too great to fathom.
It's time to roll our sleeves up even further and dig in even deeper. It's going to take hard work, but hard work is something that Americans practically have the market cornered on. This is a nation of hard workers the likes of which the world has never seen before.
The bums got tossed on the second. There are positives that could come of that. The Republicans will (hopefully) take a second to analyze exactly why they lost. This was a wake up call that just may have helped us avoid a real disaster in '08. Additionally having gained power, I hope that the accompanying responsibility will serve to wizen the Democrats.
Don't mistake the positive tone of this post to mean that I'm not concerned. I am. However, I'm determined not to fall into the hole that caught the Democrats up. I will not be shrill or hysterical. I will not compare Nancy Pelosi to Osama Bin Laden or the Democratic Party to Al Qaida. I will keep my conversation civil and my discourse will continue to be based in fact and logic. The Democrats aren't the enemy the terrorists are and if the Democrats could see that about the Republicans we'd have an easier time of things. Hopefully control of congress will allow them to see that.
For the good of the Republican Party I'm not going to pull any punches when it comes to calling out shrill crazed members from my side of the aisle. To demonstrate this I'm going to coin a new term: Moongopher.
Moongophers are the rightwing equivalent of moonbats. They're shrill, irrational, and hysterical. Let's hope I don't have cause to use it often.
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