Cabaret

[Onlooker]

I just saw a superb production of Cabaret in Cambridge, MA. It was a very dark production, and supposedly much truer to the book, Goodbye to Berlin by Christopher Isherwood. It's the story of a liberated and happy time that's interrupted by a right-wing movement. No one takes the movement too seriously, believing they won't win elections and even if they do that they will soon be voted out. Even many of those who enjoyed the liberated spirit of the cabaret (The Kit Kat Klub) did not seem worried about the rise of the right wingers. They felt that the Nazi's simply represented another point of view, among socialists, communists, and others, and would never achieve their aims.

When I look at the rise of the Tea Party, and the fact that they can win primaries even though they want to allow private businesses to discriminate based on race, want the government to decide how women handle their pregnancies, want to deny gays equal rights, support torture, want to discriminate against Muslims, and want to deny American born children citizenship, I think we must be vigilant. If people stay home and the Tea Party gets a foothold, we may really see a white rights party that is a modern form of Nazi-ism. It's as much b.s. that the Tea Party is integrated as it is that the Nazi Party was gay friendly. Maybe I'm being paranoid, but Cabaret really speaks to these dangerous times. In my opinion, this election is in some ways even more important than the election of 2008.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

1. The Tea Party shoud be hung up to dry

little teabags hung on the line.