A Liberal Walks Into A Bar..

From Daily Kos

by georgia10

Sat Sep 02, 2006 at 02:45:25 PM PDT

As many of you know, I spent most of August vacationing on a small Greek island. My nightly ritual included visiting a tiny rock bar owned and inhabited by my friends. Beyond the draw of its brick walls (which remind me of home sweet home), there's four computers tucked into a corner with satellite internet access. Internet access AND a friendly bar. Heaven, some might say.

A few nights before I came back to America, I was finishing up a column, and after a bit, I signed off and went over to the bar. This guy (oh, let's call him Dick, shall we?) approached me. He was a young thing, slightly younger than me, I would say, and it was his first summer in Greece. He was a friend of a friend, and he was about to regret approaching me. Really, really regret it.

The guy committed several sins when he plopped himself next to me (chief among them were wearing more jewelry than I was and dousing himself in half a bottle of cologne). But the night really took off when, upon learning that I was a political writer (and a liberal one, to boot), he laughed, said that "liberals suck" and declared George W. Bush to be "the best fucking President EVER."

Ahem.

Now, many of you I'm sure had heard the same stomach-turning phrase, and it never ceases to have to same effect. I reflexively cringe, shake my head, and wonder how on earth a single person can be so supremely ignorant of the truth. I could have ignored him, I suppose, but there wouldn't be any fun in that, now would there?

Join me on the flip...

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I took a slow sip from my drink, smiled, and asked Dick "why?". "Why what?" he asked. "Why do you think he's the best president ever? Enlighten me."

He belted out the predictable GOP answer, something about "fighting those fucking Muslim terrorists" and "not taking any shit from no one."

"Which terrorists is he fighting, exactly?"

"The ones in Iraq," he stated flatly. "Because Iraq attacked us on 9/11."

Oh boy. He shouldn't have said that.

"You trust your President, right?", I asked, knowing full well that his answer would be "absolutely." Then what, pray tell, would Dick make of the fact that his President just acknowledged in a press conference that Iraq had "nothing" to do with 9/11?

"He said that?"

Yep. Needless to say, that sure cut the Iraq conversation short.

Onto abortion.

Abortion is "murder", he proclaimed (but in cases of rape, it's ok, because, you know, "it's not the girl's fault, she wasn't a slut"). "You're absolutely SURE that a fertilized egg is a human being, worthy of protection?" I asked. Of course, he replied. So why should a fertilized egg, (or a "human" as he called it) that is the product of rape be any less valuable than a "human" which is the product of a loving relationship, I asked?

Silence.

And why, if he really believed abortion is murder, I asked, was he so unwilling to jail women who had abortions? ("Uh, ok, you got a point"). By the time I got to the burning building problem (you've got a toddler and a petri dish full of fertilized eggs, which would you save?), a small crowd had gathered around the bar. There were a couple chuckles and a very loud "She's got you there, man!"

At that point, he did what any cornered conservative would do. He whipped out Clinton's penis and waved it in my face. "Well, back to terrorism. It's all Clinton's fault you know. If he wasn't so busy getting blown, he would have killed Osama. You know he knew exactly where Osama was, but didn't pull the trigger?"

Rather than try to dilute the man's Koolaid, I decided to poison him with his own drink. I asked, assuming his assertion was true, did he believe Clinton's alleged failure to aggressively going after Osama was an impeachable offense? Of course! he replied. I then proceeded to educate him on Tora Bora, "I truly am not that concerned about him," and introduced him to three little letters: PDB. All three instances of Bush incompetence were completely foreign to him, but as I laid fact after fact at his feet, his brow furrowed and his head dipped down. I finished. He remained silent.

I'll spare you the rest of the bloody details, but suffice it to say that a lethal dose of logic left transformed this cocky young Republican into a quivering pool of confusion. I won't claim that any conversion took place at that bar that night; however, at the very least, some seeds of doubt were planted.

My little anecdote is nothing special. Many Kossacks have shared similar experiences. But not enough.

Millions of us wait around for the 247 Democrats in Congress to speak up and stand up. Brilliant diaries are penned about exactly what Democrats should say, and how they should say it. Other diaries rightly rail on "spineless" Dems who shrink from confrontation.

But we must never forget, my friends, that we are also Democrats. And every time we let a wingnut email go unanswered, we are the spineless Dems. Everytime we hesitate to jump in when our family or friends complain about politics, we are the cowards.

We're the front lines of progressivism, a 50-state army composed of millions of articulate, informed, and fundamentally right soldiers of truth. We're armed with facts, that weapon that deals a deadly blow to any Republican propaganda. And yet, in the chambers of our daily lives, I think we don't use them enough.

For example, why is it that my inbox is cluttered with right-wing chain mail but rarely any liberal forwards? And why is it that upon reading yet another email about "staying the course", my tired self is tempted to just click "delete" instead of "reply all"?

Because it's easier to let it slide, of course. It's easier to ignore than instigate. Too often, we are so afraid of getting into political fights that we shy away from having political discussions. But if we don't defend liberalism and our party, who will?

So, Kossacks, let us not shrink from educating the ill-informed, from converting the conned with logic, and from building a new Democratic majority, one voter at a time.

From now until election day and beyond, I want anecdotes. I know you have them. I want to hear about how you debunked economic myths at your Labor Day picnic, how you struck up a conversation with your co-worker about universal health care, and how your managed to get your dittohead brother to grudgingly admit that maybe, just maybe, Republicans have lost the ability to govern.

Whether it's at work or in a bar, in the presence of friends or strangers, let us become the Democrats we urge our elected leaders to be--"political warriors" in every sense of the phrase.

Cheers.