October 15, 2002
A Challenge To The Opposition
A BUZZFLASH READER COMMENTARY
We are in trouble.
If the GOP were running the Democrats, they couldn’t be doing a better job of it. You know we are in trouble. The Democrats have become defensive and are afraid of offending anyone. This morphing attitude has made the Democratic opposition ineffective at best and irrelevant at worst. As an example, the so-called liberal media has become nothing more than a mouthpiece for the Republicans and the Right and all the Democrats can come up with are Paul Begala and James Carville. They are a fantastic team, but they are virtually alone in a heavily conservative dominated medium.
When an irreverent personage like Bill Mahr dismisses Michael Moore’s comments regarding the 2000 election debacle as old news, you know we are in trouble. Even though a very large majority, liberal and conservative, of legal scholars declared the decision of the Supreme Court misguided and legally indefensible, the mainstream press forgot about it. NPR doesn't even have the fortitude to air an unbiased documentary about the election. Now we’re talking about one of the worst decisions in the history of the Court; on a par with the Dred Scott decision. When the head of Democrats.com brought up the subject on The O’Reilly Factor, all O’Reilly could come up with was a non sequitur about getting on a bus to Mexico. The SCOTUS decision in Bush v. Gore is indefensible, I just wish its supporters would own up to the fact that their man won by unconstitutional means, so who cares.
When Ann Coulter’s vitriolic and vicious musings are actually taken seriously, you know we are in trouble. Ann Coulter's book has risen to the top of the best seller lists. A book that consists of nothing more than ad hominem attacks decrying ad hominem attacks. She has been able to get away with, in writing, advocating the murder of a sitting president. After 9/11, a man publicly disparaged President Bush and the very next day he was paid a visit by the FBI. Did Ann Coulter receive any visits from the Secret Service or FBI? I would think not.
The anti-Vietnam war protests ended the war. When I returned from that war, I joined the antiwar movement. Even though it took me fifteen years of reading and research afterwards to discern what the war was about and what went wrong, I knew it was wrong in 1968. I participated in the march in New York when the construction workers pounded on the demonstrators. I participated in the demonstrations during the Republican convention in 1972 and was gassed. I am an officer in my union. I contact my congressmen and write letters to the editor. And I sure as hell vote.
Now my challenge to you, the opposition, is to get off your duffs and be proactive. Boycott the mainstream media, especially TV. Let them know that the vast, unbiased, news resources found on the internet are rapidly making them irrelevant. They already have no credibility. Write and e-mail your representatives in government. Write your newspapers. Hit the bricks and voice your opposition of a government that no longer speaks for or represents its citizens, as if it ever did. Stump for candidates that really care about you and your country. And vote, vote, vote.
This is my challenge to you. Are you up for it, Do you care enough to act? Prove to me and yourselves that we are not a nation of sheep. YOU KNOW WE ARE IN TROUBLE!
- A BuzzFlash Reader, The Miamullet
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