Debi, you're not the first Republican to spread lies and insults at a progressive Web site. Nor, sadly, will you be the last. But when you visited my site recently, you
said some things to which I would like to respond. Because, you see, lies left unchecked only lead to more lies. Insults left unchecked only lead to more insults. And every time we as Americans ignore the increasingly heated rhetoric coming from the extreme right, we cede more ground to those who have already led our once-great nation down a dangerous path. You wanted to make me angry, to provoke a response that only reinforced your misguided notions. You failed miserably, Debi. You've only made me more determined. Consider this my response.
Debi, you come to my site to lecture everyone about perceived negativism, yet in your own responses you refer to people as "anti-Christians" and "homos". So right there, and despite claiming repeatedly to be a Christian Republican conservative, you lose any and all moral justification for calling
anyone negative. Then, you jump to the next false premise, that all Democrats do when on television is scream and rant about how terrible the current administration is, yet I'd like for you to characterize the media appearances of, say,
Ann Coulter,
Michelle Malkin,
Bill O'Reilly or
Rush Limbaugh. When your response to anything a Democrat says is that the particular Democrat is negative, or mean, or angry, or offers no solutions, you reveal to everyone the true nature of
your arguments. Because you and others like you simply cannot debate someone on the merits of his or her arguments, you resort to calling us negative. Why? Because it distracts everyone from the nature of your original argument, which is far more often an angry rant than a well-thought, measured stance. And also because, when we respond with vigor - and with facts - you can accuse us of doing what you just did. But we won't do what you want us to do, which is shut up anytime you pollute the debate with lies, half-truths and an obvious agenda.
We will respond. And why will we respond? Because I can't think of a single, meaningful change that has ever come about in our society - freeing the slaves, giving women the vote, ending segregation - because people kept their mouths shut and let people like you stifle dissent and debate.
I find your continued reliance on asking myself and my fellow progressives what we do to help the poor rather insulting. My life and the lives of my "regular cheerleaders", no matter what you might think, don't begin and end with a Web site. I can't, and won't, speak for them, but you know nothing of the time and money and energy I've devoted to helping leave this world a better place than I found it. This isn't about a contest to see who has helped the most people. And it shouldn't be. It's about two differing philosophies. One, mine, believes that we're all in this together and it is our society's obligation - the government's obligation - to help those who need it and to instill in everyone a sense of shared responsibility. The other, yours, believes that those who have are somehow better than those who don't have, that those less fortunate than yourself are that way because they're unwilling to work to improve their lives. Your continued insistence that the vast majority of the less fortunate are that way because they refuse to work is terribly flawed. You, and others like you, may believe in the image of the "welfare queen", but have you stopped to think how many Americans are an economic downturn or medical crisis away from facing some terrible realities? I'm sure you would also find, Debi, that my girlfriend Casey shares the same views as I do and, in your misguided opinion, is therefore negative. How, then, would you characterize the fact that she works more than 40 hours a week for a nonprofit that performs community outreach in the poorest parts of the poorest big city in this country, offering healthcare to those who, in your eyes, "chose this lifestyle"? Oh, and by the way, she, like me, is
an atheist. You see, helping the less fortunate isn't solely the province of your faith-based friends. We don't do it, either, because we harbor the patronizing attitude that the less fortunate don't know any better and we're there to help. We do it because we're
human beings, and human beings don't look down on those they help. They just help. I'm not belittling your service. I consider it your penance for supporting a party who considers the less fortunate less than human.
You've asked a lot of questions, Debi. Specifically, you've asked what the Democratic plan is to end the war in Iraq. Well, allow me to answer your question with one of my own:
What is the Republican plan for ending this war? Staying the course? Making sure freedom remains on the march? Accomplishing the mission? So far, the Republican leadership has nothing to show for their actions in Iraq other than nearly 3,000 dead American soldiers and countless thousands of dead Iraqis, many of them civilians. So, by asking the Democrats you would rather keep silent about what
we would do, why don't you look in the mirror and realize that your party has lost this war. Not the Democrats. Not the media. Not Michael Moore. Not Cindy Sheehan.
The Republicans. And, now that that's happened, now that your party has gotten drunk, stolen the family car, gone on a rampage around town and has driven the car off of a cliff,
now you're turning to us and asking, "Well, what would
you do? What will
you do to fix things?" Considering your views on the less fortunate, I find this position rather ironic. If you would have bothered to remove the partisan blinders that conveniently double as rose-colored glasses when looking at Iraq, you would have noticed that the Democrats
do have a plan to end this war. It involves a strategic redeployment. It involves telling the Iraqi people that the time is coming for them to stand on their own. It involves keeping our word and doing right by the Iraqi people, not treating them as the enemy and helping create the conditions that have led to a bloody civil war - with our troops stranded in the middle. It also involves doing the work that needs to be done to keep our homeland safe - like enacting, for instance, the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission. I've laid out
my thoughts in this issue before. I'm sure you read them before you spouted the party line, right?
Right?Funny, too, you should say "Enough on Katrina already." That's
exactly the sense I get from those in your party. While I appreciate the work you've done and the damage you've seen, in no way does it compare with what happened along the Gulf Coast, and New Orleans in particular.
In no way. Tell me, did your hometown's survival depend on a levee system whose improvements, whose floodgates and pumping stations, whose ability to withstand powerful hurricanes, were stifled by Bush administration
funding cuts? I doubt it. What did you expect those left stranded in New Orleans to do to help themselves? Go to the home improvement stores that were flooded and destroyed? When they scrambled to find food from local stores, the food they needed to survive, those in your party called them "looters" and "thugs". They did what they were told, which was to go to the Superdome and the convention center. Where was their government? They made their way to the bridge that crosses the Mississippi River and leads to Gretna. What happened on that bridge? They were turned away. Then you have the nerve to say that the president "can't be everywhere" because "he has a country to run". Do you remember what your president was doing as disaster approached and finally hit? He was
playing guitar. He was speaking about the
Iraqi constitution. He was using firefighters
as props. And while he surveyed the devastation from the air, do you remember what his 2000 opponent, Al Gore, was doing? He was in the midst of
chartering and accompanying two airplanes to New Orleans to rescue medical patients and fly them to Tennessee hospitals.
Leadership. Remember that? And since you asked what
I did, I donated money to the relief effort. A lot of money. I also donated my laptop to the Louisiana NAACP so that they could help connect evacuees scattered around the country with their families. My friends and family gave money and time, too. One of my friends just returned from there, where she was doing relief work. Tell me, what have
you done, Debi, other than what so many Republicans have done:
Blame the victims?You also question my assertion that you support a party that
supports torture. "Explain to me exactly what this torture is that you keep accusing me of supporting," you wrote. "If your
talking about interrogating the terrorists who want us all dead and using some force and making them uncomfortable, then say that is what it is, don't call it torture." You later add, "Please enlighten all of us Mr. Know It All Hughes, exactly what type of torture do we all support? Or do you think we should just give these guys a time out and have them go stand in the corner for awhile, maybe they will realize that their way of thinking is wrong and come out of the corner and apologize and promise to never try to kill us again. Oh but wait, we might hurt their feelings sending them to the corner, we better not do that either, it might humiliate them." If, Debi, you assume that the goal of an interrogation is to obtain information from a prisoner of war, then tell me what good forcing naked detainees into a pile does? Or what good forcing someone to stand, hooded, on a box with wires on his hands does? Or what good forcing someone to think they're drowning does? Those few examples aren't, to me, giving our captives - many of whom are petty criminals, if that, not terrorist masterminds - a time out. They're torture. You no doubt support this president. Do you support this immoral behavior, behavior which produces bad intelligence, puts our fighting men and women in danger and forever puts a stain on our society?
You didn't come to a progressive Web site for honest debate. You came for a fight. You carried a preconceived notion about the "angry left" and operated from a flatly false series of assumptions. Then, you inform everyone that you would "gladly vote Democrat if you can tell me what their plan is." This is neither the first, nor the last, falsehood you've spread. You didn't come to be persuaded; you came to lecture. To insult. To spread the politics of personal attacks. Calling people "anti-Christians" and "homos" isn't debate. Nor is it civil. You also said that "I can guarantee you that if a Democratic president is elected in 2008 I will stand behind him as will the Republican, conservative, Christians I know. We certainly won't be wasting our money on a web site to insult everything he does, says and chokes on. It's a thing called respect, which you guys obviously have none of." Again, another falsehood, one based upon the idea that the entire Clinton presidency - and the rabid Republican response to it - never existed. I hope, Debi, that you keep your promise come 2008. You'll have your chance. "... it's time to be American," you said. I agree. Tell us when you would like to start.
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