Watercooler Conversation today and my reaction (not good)

[texpatriot2004]

So, this morning I go to work. I walk into the breakroom and I hear one co-worker talking to another about politics and the "election." Actually, it was about campaigning but the gist of it was (negative tone) "the Democrats are putting out these commercials all over linking Republicans to * " as if to say, those Democrats are so bad and wrong for doing this. There was also something said about the Wilson vs. Madrid race (New Mexico).

Here's me, I am so sick of Heather Wilson and her negative ads about Madrid that I invited myself into the conversation briefly. I made a comment about the Republicans doing plenty of negative ads, especially Heather Wilson. My co-worker repeats to me how bad the Democrats are for making this association between all Republicans and *. She's talking about a "strategy" on the part of the Democrats.

I have rarely talked politics at work...almost never. Today, I see why and it had nothing to do with my co-workers. This very brief moment of conversation caused a reaction so severe in me that I was shaking I was so appalled.

Afterward, I thought about it (couldn't shake it) and decided I was very glad that people who have supported * are being called on it...accountablity, I thought. What's so bad about accountability in a "Democracy"?

I am in a Rethug area. I have no beef with any of my co-workers. I get along with them. I tolerate their difference of opinion regarding politics. However, I noticed that my reaction was so charged, and I think this is true for many people today. I read recently that there was a study indicating that we (Americans) have stopped talking to the "other side" about politics, religion, current events, etc and that we are surrounding ourselves with like minded people.

I can't even have the tiniest conversation without being poised for a fight and it's been that way since 2004 or before. Go figure.

[kurth]

1. Yep. Live and learn

Thanks to The Great Uniter Not A Divider™ and his conservative compassionatism, you can't discuss politics like football at work anymore.

[coco77]

2. The problem is that..

when you try to talk they want to kill you for having an opinion. These are the same people who talked about Clinton for years and dems would not make excuses for him if they thought he was wrong. These people take it personally and act as though he is there lover,child or some close family member and would kill for him and that is why this country is going to hell and when they finally realize how bad it really is it will probably be too late for a lot of the problems he has caused.

[apnu]

3. Nothing to figure out there, you (and your co-workers) are victims of Rove's politics

While he (and Melman) is still around, politics in the US will be bitter, noxious and divisive. Because of them, there can't be a meaningful dialog of any kind because the GOP (under Rove's instruction) doesn't want it. We can talk all we want, the other side isn't listening, and if Limbaugh and O'Riely are indicators of anything, they think we're just bleating partisans.

Black is white, up is down.

[maxsolomon]

15. rove & melman could die tomorrow

and i will live the rest of my life (40 more years, or so, hopefully) never voting for a republican. they are the party of american puritanism & fascism. i felt this way before bush 2, before bush 1, before i could vote against reagan. nixon resigned when i was 11. that's my image of the GOP.

never have, never will. i have sequestered myself in a liberal bubble of intelligence & reason, the WA 7th, home of UW & Jim McDermott.

[karmaqueen]

4. I know exactly what you mean.

There are days I don't go out of the house because I'm afraid I will run into a * supporter and blow up. I had a real bad time right after my nephew left for Iraq, I did not leave the house for a week. I want to go out and scream at everyone who voted for that a hole.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

5. I say if the * shoe fits, wear it.

Those Republican politicians weren't ashamed to be associated with him a few years ago when his approval ratings were soaring, were they? If you vote with him 90+% of the time, guess what? You're linked with him. Their inability to think and legislate independently is not our problem.

[lyonn]

9. All those great thinkers in 2004 that voted for bush again

now complain if Dems. use bush against their opponents (rubber stampers).

[texpatriot2004]

27. Exactly nm

[kstewart33]

6. You are deeply frustrated and so are we.

It's difficult to keep your annoyance and frustration in check. Your emotions aren't unusual at all. Anyone who has kept informed over the 6 years should be outraged.

[rep the dems]

7. Yeah, some people who were kind of my friends were real

far right conservatives, and talking to them for more than a minute about politics made me want to kill them. Then people start asking me why I care so much about it, since it's "just politics." Sigh.

[Sherman A1]

8. At work, we try to find areas in which we agree

when we don't and that is often and sometimes heated, we try to swing the conversation to the process as opposed to discussing topics or personalities until things calm down. You can probably find some areas of agreement with your co-workers and try to build thoughtful conversation from there, listening respectfully to others and insisting that they listen respectfully to you. In one case with a staunch Republican who delivers to where I work. We have a bet on the upcoming make-up of the Congress after next week. Winner gets a can of soda on the loser. I have found that I am better informed by having to be ready for my Republican Delivery Guy, who is a social & fiscal conservative and tuned into what is going on.

[Lexingtonian]

10. it's a long civil war with minimal violence

that we've been having, and everyone's exhausted but still adamant (in a fashion, at least).

We've used and eliminated all the 'reasonable', compromise-based, solutions and blocs of people and 'moderate' politicians, between us. Because the argument about citizenship and equality of it is that serious.

In 2002 we started the final confrontation, hardline R's and hardline (liberal) D's were the only viable political blocs left after that election. One or the other bloc/force had to crack and fail. The R's took/got given all the power; they thought it was an entitlement and final victory. The People considered it essentially a test, though- an ability for them to prove themselves and their claims since Nixon's days. (D's got given a different kind of test by The People, then, and something different to prove.)

But individual people suffer it all. It's a very large scale war of nerves, and people lose by losing control and sense, i.e. sanity. On our side there's breakdown into hysteria (Karl Rove is a genius and we'll never beat him, Howard Dean is a Deity Who Will Save Us, it was LIHOP, etc). On their side it's the manic-psychotic break into raving lunacy (shoot the liberals, nuke the Iraqis, black helicopters and the ZOG, Bush is God's Elect, etc), and then the plummet into depression. DU and FR are rather extreme illustrations of these breakdowns at times (and they are why a lot of posters get banned or leave them after a time, on both sites).

The People reached a quiet conclusion about the domestic conflict and the Parties this spring. One side is finished, and it's the Republicans. We're seeing the West, Upper Midwest, Midwest, and Northeast (plus some of Florida) vote half the verdict this year. But they don't want to make it too easy for Democrats- there must be proof rendered of ability and willingness and sense of measure. So it will be a decisive result on November 7, but Republicans will be given enough and Democrats held in suspicion until they demonstrate their ability to serve the common good comprehensively, in actions.

The second part of the verdict is going to be the elections in 2008. If Democrats fail themselves and their constituents, there will be backlash and Republican revival (how ever brief). If Democrats prove themselves in power, the Southeast and Southwest will (I predict) eliminate all their dead-ender hardline Republicans as useless and obsolete.

[gratuitous]

11. Those dirty dog Democrats!

Imagine, tying local Republicans to George W. Bush and his misadministration! Have they no shame? Have they no ethics? At long last, have they no decency at all? I ask you! Arrest my case!

I mean, how low do you have to sink to remind people that a Republican is in the same party as George W. Bush? If that isn't the dirtiest, lowest down, scummiest ploy out there. Like it's Heather Wilson's fault that she's a Republican.

Hang your heads in shame, Democrats.

[enough already]

12. I gave up not too long ago.

I had some Republican friends, but I just couldn't stand listening to their bushit any longer.

[EC]

13. How is that negative advertising to them,

since they still like **?

[texpatriot2004]

23. Good question nm

[Parche]

14. repubes

I feel your pain, while this office only has 2
I am not going to let them 'win' anymore, I am fighting mad
I am tired of constipated conservatives and will do anything I can to defeat them.........

[sandnsea]

16. They voted for the whistleass

Now they're mad because they're being reminded of what their own vote has done??

You SHOULD have been so mad you were shaking. There's a difference between outrage and assault.

[texpatriot2004]

29. Hey thanks for the validation. I did NOT assault anyone but I am

truly outraged!

[WCGreen]

17. of course they are gong to see anything that the dem's do

to win as "negative" because that is how they are conditioned...

After almost two decades of demonization by the Right Wing Echo chamber, what do you expect...

I heard the same thing about two weeks ago when the topic at a nearby table in the local diner turned to the race between Sherrod Brown and Mike DeWine...

Overheard.... Isn't it awful what that Sherrod Brown is saying about Mike...

I just chuckled at how ignorant they were, knowing Sherrod is going to win big...

[Arugula Latte]

18. One reason I live in a liberal left coast city ...

I can't STAND being around 'pukes. I've constructed my life so I really don't have to deal with them.

[texpatriot2004]

24. Oh how lucky you are. Or what a wonderful thing you did to

organize your life that way.

[Nay]

19. I'm in the same boat. I can't STAND to talk to any of these people

anymore. I consider them too stupid or too immoral to associate with. It's a sad thing, but that's the way it is. I could allow them their stupidities (as I have in the past) as long as the country was not going down the tube because of them. Now, I consider them the goddamn enemy.

[mrreowwr_kittty]

20. Same here. Especially after Katrina.

The war is bad enough, but anyone who supports the callous, heartless, morally bankrupt Bush admin after their deliberate negligence toward the people in the Louisiana gulf region, is an asshole. No questions asked.

[texpatriot2004]

21. Agreed! Absolutely Agreed nm

[Arugula Latte]

36. I know. I consider them the enemy too. How sad.

This is what this criminal administration has done to us. It basically created a "cold" civil war.

[Lindacooks]

22. Huh?

Wait a minute. Democrats are bad for pointing out that Republicans are ...

REPUBLICAN?

Do these people have more than one functioning brain cell?

[texpatriot2004]

25. Yeah, that's just it, in other matters they are quite sane...

it's just politics where they go brain dead.

[distantearlywarning]

26. I live in a very liberal area.

But every so often I see a W sticker on a car. It never fails to arouse anger and disbelief. I would truthfully have a hard time being civil to die-hard Republicans at this point, even if we didn't talk about politics. I suspect that at some point in the not-so-distant future eventually I will have a run-in with one of these people and perhaps it will get confrontational. I'm so pissed off I just simmer below the surface on a daily basis, and it wouldn't take much to get me going off on someone.

Also, I haven't called my grandmother in months and months, mostly because she's a total fundie type who watches O'Reilly and she always wants to talk about politics. I don't think I can be nice to her anymore if she brings up politics, and I really don't want to fight with her. She's almost 90 years old and blind and alone, and I really don't want to argue with her out of respect for her age and all. But I'm too mad to just let shit go without a fight anymore. So my solution is not to call at all. Pretty sad, huh?

[texpatriot2004]

28. Yes, it's sad but I can relate. I have let too much go for too long

and I too am angry on a daily basis (especially at those stupid * stickers).

I know what you mean. I can relate. Unfortunately, I have no answer.

[Blue Topaz]

30. I too live in a pretty liberal area, but when I see those occasional W stickers

I covertly flip them off below dashboard level. I have this immediate visceral almost-hatred for anyone who voted for that lying cretin. I am thankful I don't have to decide how to handle friends and family who support *. Not a single one of them does.

[judaspriestess]

31. these people are complete robots

whatever the talking point of the day is they just repeat it. either you're with * or you're with the terrorist. So all of a sudden these pukes are with the terrorist??? yeah right

[noamnety]

32. since the RNC put out the ad linking democrats to bin laden

That kind of begs the question, why does she think it's more unfair to link someone to Bush? Is he worse than bin laden?

[texpatriot2004]

35. Good question nm

[1932]

33. The problem is you're never going to change hearts and minds unless you

can have a dialogue with people who have a different opinion.

So, I really think people need to find a level on which they can talk about politics.

It might take a lot of experimenting with different tones and angles, but I think there are huge rewards in making the effort.

[Duer 157099]

34. Just turn it around -- "strategy" = "plan"

Use the opportunity to say: "See? And all you Republicans keep saying the Dems don't have a plan, or are not strategic" -- maybe they'll realize what idiots they are then.