And if you don't know

Well, now you know.

Moore to Come, Part 2

(This post continues sentiments uttered in previous posts - or reiterates. Or something. Probably not.)

Again, I draw your attention to the Urban Dictionary.

suggested definitons for:

Liberal
a: A word used to describe someone who tells you how they "feel" instead of what they think.

b: Someone who wants to help the poor and downtrodden WITH YOUR MONEY. They never volunteer THEIR time or money, they leave that to the churches they so detest. They also want to see the wealthy and powerful to be unseated because they are jealous. An American communist. If a liberal ever does have money, he is a politician that could not cut muster with the Republican party and is only an opportunist who is lying to the hordes of ignorant poverty stricken who believe he will save them from the bed which they themselves pissed in.

Many liberals are just baby boom hippies who are too self-righteous to rethink their dated teenage rebellions. They have made many songs and movies glorifying an anti-war position, and this media deluge of philosophical masturbation has won over much of the younger generation.

c: Jealous, whiny, and loudmouthed (on the internet).

Loves to talk about opinions, but gets all upset when other people's opinions differ from their own. Owns a tinfoil hat.

Though I found the most telling to be this one:

1) One who espouses a political philosophy based on belief in progress, the essential goodness of the human race, and the autonomy of the individual and standing for the protection of political and civil liberties.

2) Somebody for whom the Democratic Party no longer speaks.

(I hope I haven't found my way into a "What exactly is a liberal, anyway?" essay. Damn.)

It strikes me as amazing how those who promote broad change scare people. Moveon.org describes itself as:

MoveOn is a catalyst for a new kind of grassroots involvement, supporting busy but concerned citizens in finding their political voice. Our nationwide network of more than 2,000,000 online activists is one of the most effective and responsive outlets for democratic participation available today.

Now that's democrat - small d. Which is a tough sell when the main page invites you to:

A) Investigate the Vote - that being the Ohio vote which gave Bush the 2004 election
B) Take on Fox - because "24 hours a day, Fox News Channel turns Republican talking points into news headlines."
C) A link to the Daily Misleader - an article showing you Bush "gaffes"

That's democrat. Small d.

I emphasize this sentiment because those claiming to offer opportunities of information and activism on this side of the spectrum tend to alienate as opposed to incorporate. Which is why Jack Matthews of the NY Daily News claims Farenheit: 9-11 won Bush the election. Get a mob mad enough, and you'll motivate them to do everything possible to beat you down.

A professor from my freshman Political Science course introduced the term politics as "a conversation about how we should live." If that's the case, we liberals do as much damage to the conversation with our collective whining and search to sound smarter as conservatives with their war cries and silence of opposition. I thought David Brooks nailed it on the head the other day in the Times:

You have to remember that Republicans have a different relationship to ideas than Democrats. When Democrats open their mouths, they try to say something interesting. If the true thing is obvious and boring, the liberal person will go off and say something original, even if it is completely idiotic. This is how deconstructionism got started.

Republicans are less concerned with displaying their own cleverness. When they actually stumble upon an idea, they are so delighted they regurgitate it over and over again. Where others might favor elaboration, Republicans favor repetition.

If that's the case, I'm gonna go think things through some more. Moore to Come.

Moore to Come

This morning, I came across a post on Michael Moore's web site, known to the masses as MichaelMoore.com. It lead with a post that starts with good intentions, that despite referring to Republicans as "sore winners" and such, he offers stats to show optimism in the Democratic party:

*Total members of Move On: More than 2,000,000
*Total Attendance at Vote for Change Concerts: An estimated 280,000
*Total Union Members in U.S.: Around 16,000,000
*Total Number of People Who Have Seen “Fahrenheit 9/11”: Over 50 million
*Total number of you reading this: Perhaps 10 million or more

(Well, no one ever questions Moore's ego.)

Then, it goes in a very strange place.

"We lost a very close election (a one-state difference) by running the #1 liberal in the Senate. Not bad. The country is shifting in our direction, not to the right. But the country was attacked and people were scared. They were manipulated with fear. And America has never thrown a sitting president out during wartime. That’s the facts."

Fact check time:

- Kerry: #1 Liberal in the Senate? Right.

- "The country is shifting in our direction, not to the right." Good. More red state v. blue state. Yeah, we need more of that.

- "And American has never thrown a sitting president out during wartime." Uhh... Lyndon B. Johnson, anybody? Granted, he didn't seek a second term, but a 30 percent approval rating in an election year, and competition from a Kennedy will scare you off... and out of office in a year we were engaged in Vietnam.

I'm not looking to take pot shots at Moore here. I actually admire his work (you can't do much better than Roger & Me as far as his work goes). And I do agree that if you can forgive the liberties he takes, Farenheit 9-11 is a must-see. But, this guy officially frightened me on this one. Why? This post goes here:

"In the meantime, while we reflect on what went wrong, I would like to pass on to you an essay that a friend who works with abuse victims sent to me. It was written by a woman who has spent years working as an advocate for victims of domestic abuse and she sees many parallels between her work and the reaction of many Democrats to last month’s election. Her name is Mel Giles and here is what she had to say…"

Those parallels?

"Watch them awkwardly quote the bible, trying to speak the ‘new’ language of America. Surf the blogs, and read the comments of dismayed, discombobulated, confused individuals trying to figure out what they did wrong. Hear the cacophony of voices, crying out, "Why did they beat me?"

And then ask anyone who has ever worked in a domestic violence shelter if they have heard this before.

They will tell you: Every single day.

The answer is quite simple. They beat us because they are abusers. We can call it hate. We can call it fear. We can say it is unfair. But we are looped into the cycle of violence, and we need to start calling the dominating side what they are: abusive. And we need to recognize that we are the victims of verbal, mental, and even, in the case of Iraq, physical violence."

(I'll give you a second to pick your jaw up off the ground.)

I mean, holy batshit. Democrats as victims of domestic abuse? I mean... I'm still flabbergasted, and I read this post almost 12 hours ago. Isn't the best advice to a victim of domestic abuse to just leave? Get up and go? Get out of the bad situation, as painful as it may be to leave? Should we all up and move to Canada?

I've got more to say on this, but I just wanted to put this out there first.

Honesty is Such a Lonely Word

London's Daily Mirror reports that one in four upgrade their internet to broadband for downloading pornography. The survey asked over 5,000 participants in face-to-face interviews. Meaning 1,250 said straight faced, "I like fast internet cause I download porn." No statistics available on heavy breathers, Joe Garnevicus.

Downloading porn ranks second behind downloading music. Masturbating to porn still ranks a strong first over masturbating to music, though.

Also making the list?
Music Videos (12%)
Listening to online radio (9%)
Downloading movie trailers (8%)
Share information with family and friends (5%)
Photos of Ian Ziering (2%)
That QVC Ladder Video (1%)
Culture (1%)
Mental Masturbation (-0.1%)

Yeah, Go Reach Out and Touch Yourself

Could Drunk Dialing be a thing of the past?

Perhaps, according to Virgin Mobile. The Australian-based Virgin Mobile designed a blacklist for cell phones, essentially to prevent you from drunk dialing. This came as a result of a study performed by the good folks at Virgin Mobile:

A survey of 409 people by Virgin Mobile, a joint venture of The Virgin Group and Optus, found 95 percent made drunk calls.

Of those calls, 30 percent were to ex-partners, 19 percent to current partners, and 36 percent to other people, including their bosses.

I'm taken aback by the 10 percent unaccounted for in that study. What could the Virgin population being up to with that remaining 10 percent? Maybe that drunken lot merely took advantage of good phone service? Perhaps those inebriated fellows engaged in acts so heinous, so insulting, so unbearable that we as citizens of humanity would request it cease to be immediately?