Those damn Hollywood types! [View All]

[Moderate Dem]

I watched Real Time with Bill Maher last night, and as a moderate Democrat, what got me was that neither Bill Maher (who I really think is funny a lot of the time) or any of the other Liberals "got it". When Andrew Sullivan talked about making fun of the Religious Right hurting the Democrats' chances, Bill argued about the intellectual defendability of what he was saying, but that's not the point!

Here, I think, is the crux of the matter:

We saw Michael Moore all over the place campaigning for the left, but why didn't we see Judge Roy Moore campaigning for the right?

Simply, we didn't see that because it would have severely damaged the right in the eyes of the people IN THE MIDDLE, and the Republicans managed their wackos a lot better than we did.

If the Democrats are to win in 2008, they have to field a candidate who is religious, unsullied by scandal, respectful of Social Conservatives and tough on defense. Michael Moore and his ilk need to be kicked to the curb, at least publicly. If the far left wants to migrate to the Green Party that would be great, then Democrats would more than replace them with millions of middle of the road voters.

I am not being a disloyal Democrat by saying this. There are millions of Americans who will gladly vote for a candidate who stands up for the working people, is in favor of protecting Civil Rights, and wants affordable Health Care. They are all mainstream Democratic principles, and they will win elections for us. We cannot allow ourselves to be marginalized into APPEARING to be a radical, angry mob, and that is exactly how we ended up looking, to millions of voters who otherwise would have voted for us.

Look, most voters are not very far away from the middle. Most voters who voted for Bush aren't even very Republican. They didn't vote for Bush because they want to prohibit Gay Marriage, they voted for Bush because he seemed more comfortable with them. You don't have to be a Social Conservative to feel uncomfortable with Garofalo making fun of Southernors. Incidentally, whether Southernors deserve to be made fun of is NOT THE POINT, and that's what Maher and others of his ilk do not understand.

Susan Sarandon and her ilk have got to realize that their very public presence is hurting their party. I will not argue that Hollywood liberals have nothing of consequence to say, but at this point they have been successfully caricaturized by the Right.

So, Susan Sarandon, Ben Affleck, and all the rest of you Hollywood types, if you want to work for the Democrats next time, do it behind the scenes! Stay out of the damn spotlight, you're killing us!