wandering hillbilly

pinions of buddy don -- book revu:
Big Lies: The Right Wing Propaganda Machine and How It Distorts the Truth
by Joe Conason

thays a book ye oughta cunsider readin ifn yer puzzled bout sum of the lies folks bleeves. it wuz writ by a guy name of Joe Conason, n ifn ye wonta try to keep up with whuts a'gone on, ye mite wonta git in the habit of readin his column ever wendsdy in The New York Observer. he n Gene Lyons wuz the ones writ The Hunting of the President: The Ten-Year Campaign to Destroy Bill and Hillary Clinton.

dont even try readin thatn ifn ye dont have a strong stumack. tiz awful to thank we wood let our cuntry git so far off corse. in amungst other thangs in that book is the innerestin observayshun bout how robert fiske, the furst independent prosecuter, had dun a report that showed purty much everthang charged in whitewater wuz unwurthy of prosecushun. n whenever the final report cum out frum robert ray, twuz the same thang.

seein whut wuz dun by the publicans to brang down a leckted president gut me to the point whar i dont thank i could ever vote fer a one of em. they dun showed they wood do innythang to win, whuther twuz fair or not. n i gut rite sick of the way they wonta attack our own cuntry n gummint ever chants they git. fer sum reason, they cant see how payin yer taxes is patriotick. runnin off to bermuda to pertend lack yer cumpny lives thar sos ye kin git out of payin yer fair share is rong n anti-murkin, but thay ack lack tiz rite up thar with thomas paine, witch it aint.

so i wuz eggcited to git a copy of conason's new book, n it dint disappoint. heres the lies he covers, givin each a chaptur of its own:

1. "Tax-cutting Republicans are friends of the common man, while liberals are snobbish elitists who despise the work ethic." (p. 13)
   
2. "Liberals control the media and misuse their influence to promote left-wing policies." (p. 29)
   
3. "Conservatives truly love America and support the armed forces, while liberals are unpatriotic draft dodgers." (p. 52)
   
4. "Republicans are strict accountants who balance budgets and promote economic growth, while Democrats are tax-and-spenders who bust budgets, stifle the economy, and distrust capitalism." (p. 64)
   
5. "Conservatives are the only reliable defenders of individual liberty, because liberals worhip political correctness and suppress freedom." (p. 89)
   
6. "Conservatives protect family values and moral virtue, while liberals promote immorality and vice." (p. 109)
   
7. "Conservatives believe in color-blind equality, while liberals cynically exploit the victimization of blacks and other minorities." (p. 128)
   
8. "Conservatives are the only true champions of free enterprise." (p. 146)
   
9. "George W. Bush is a compassionate conservative." (p. 171)
   
10. "Conservatives are tough on terrorism, while liberal Democrats are soft." (p. 190)

one of the handicaps folks writin frum the lef side of the spectrum is how they aint willin to bile everthang down to eethur/or thankin. they unnerstan that thangs is not so simple. so joe conason has to add mitt that bof sides have thar shortcummins, sumthin ye dont see frum them that rites fer the vast right wing lie machine. so ye wont git a cumplete whitewash of the demcrats.

but ye will find out bout lots of the lies bein tole. fer instunts, the publicans claim twuz clintons fault 9/11 happent, but the record shows how sandy berger n richard clarke tride to warn the bushes whut they wuz a'gone half to do: "Departing National Security Advisor Sandy Berger and the National Security Councils's counterterrorism chier, Richard Clarke, who was held over by Bush, gave Condoleezza Rice a series of urgent briefings on terrorism during the presidential transition in January 2001. "You're going to spend more time during your four years on terrorism generally and al-Qaida specifically than any issue," Berger told his successor. Clarke delivered similar emphatic briefings to Vice President Cheney and to Stephen Hadley, Rice's deputy. But the supposedly competent national security managers in the new administration, includein Rice, Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfedl, were too preovccupied with other matters (such as national missile defense) to pay heed to to the most serious threat since the end of the Cold War."

as ye mite member, the bushes wuz using the ABC method of gummint, witch that wuz Anythang But Clinton, so ifn clinton dun it, they woodnt.

or ye kin read bout how the publicans is always claimin tiz the tax n spend demcrats thats the problem, but ye never here bout the borrow n spend publicans. fack is, spendin has been rising much faster under bush than it did under clinton, period. n not all of it is frum terrorism. ye gut yer farm subsdy, fer instunts. n how do all them folks who hates payin taxes lack payin at least 11 cents out of ever tax dollar to pay intrest on the debt? that wuz the "vig" on the debt when bush tuck offus. now tiz higher even with low intrest rates. fer this year, federal gummint intrest paymints will be $161 billyun! ye could run a war in iraq fer a year or so with that money.

tiz plenty more in this here book, bout the war-mongerin chicken hawks who luvs to show how brave they are by sendin other folks to war but makin sure they git out of it (folks lack rush, tom delay, dubya, cheney, newt gingrich, trent lott, dennis hastert, dick armey, karl rove, phil gramm, john ashcroft, and dan quayle, fer eggzample).

n thar plenty bout the holier-than-thou folks who attacked clinton fer thangs they wuz doin thar ownself (newt gingrich, henry hyde, dan burton, bob livingston, jim bunn, jim nussle, jim longley, joe scarborough n jon & meredith christensen). amung the wurst of it is how they blamed the demcrats for the debased cultchur n society that perduced sumbidy lack susan smith, the woman who drowned two of her own kids. newt claimed thonly way to fix a society that perduced such folk wuz to vote publican. thang is, susan smith wuz step-daughter of a mr beverly russell, who wuz a member of the south carolina republican party's executive committee n a methodist n close to mr gingrich his ownself. turnt out mr beverly russell wuz also molestin his own step-daughter reglar frum the time she turnt 15 till she wuz 23. mr joe conason documints all this stuff n much more.

thars plenty more. we need to be informed ifn we're a'gone keep this here cuntry under cuntrol of the people. thays folks that know ifn they tell the same lie a nuff, folks will git to bleevin it, lack they do the lie bout iraq havin innythang to do with 9/11, witch a recent poll sez 69% of folks bleeves that. whut bout saudi arabia? theys doin bizness with them bushes, n fack is, bush made it a point to git all osama bin ladens kin out of the cuntry on airplanes when wuznt nobidy else allowed to fly. n they dint even half to talk to the fbi. i hope ye kin say the same in the long run.

n thang is, ye cant educate innybidy but yer ownself. n aint no time to waste.