Garrison Keillor: "there is more to life than winning"

[Q]

We’re Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore

How did the Party of Lincoln and Liberty transmogrify into the party of Newt Gingrich’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk?

By Garrison Keillor
August 26, 2004


"...Whenever I think of those New Yorkers hurrying along Park Place or getting off the No.1 Broadway local, hustling toward their office on the 90th floor, the morning paper under their arms, I think of that non-reader George W. Bush and how he hopes to exploit those people with a little economic uptick, maybe the capture of Osama, cruise to victory in November and proceed to get some serious nation-changing done in his second term.

This year, as in the past, Republicans will portray us Democrats as embittered academics, desiccated Unitarians, whacked-out hippies and communards, people who talk to telephone poles, the party of the Deadheads. They will wave enormous flags and wow over and over the footage of firemen in the wreckage of the World Trade Center and bodies being carried out and they will lie about their economic policies with astonishing enthusiasm.

The Union is what needs defending this year. Government of Enron and by Halliburton and for the Southern Baptists is not the same as what Lincoln spoke of. This gang of Pithecanthropus Republicanii has humbugged us to death on terrorism and tax cuts for the comfy and school prayer and flag burning and claimed the right to know what books we read and to dump their sewage upstream from the town and clear-cut the forests and gut the IRS and mark up the constitution on behalf of intolerance and promote the corporate takeover of the public airwaves and to hell with anybody who opposes them.

This is a great country, and it wasn’t made so by angry people. We have a sacred duty to bequeath it to our grandchildren in better shape than however we found it. We have a long way to go and we’re not getting any younger.

Dante said that the hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who in time of crisis remain neutral, so I have spoken my piece, and thank you, dear reader. It’s a beautiful world, rain or shine, and there is more to life than winning.

http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/were_not_in_lake_wobegon_anymore/

[Ripley]

1. I heard Garrison speak those words:

as I was driving. I remember feeling great hope as I listened. I live in a very poor Republican state and these words are heard by many here.

Don't count out the non-voters this year. They may be dumb, but as someone said to me recently, they ain't THAT dumb...they know BUSH = BAD.

[Karenina]

2. We ALL need to ask ourselves

winning WHAT??? "WIN the 'war' in Iraq." WIN WHAT??? :shrug:

[Ripley]

3. I forget, what are you talking about?

It's not evident.

[jbm]

4. When he says..

"there is more to life than winning" what does he mean exactly? I'm thinking that there is so much at stake this election that not winning it would have a tremendously huge negative impact on the whole world. I'm not certain if he's referring to the election with that comment though.

[Merlin]

5. It's a justifiable conclusion to a piece reluctantly resigned ...

to the fact that the Republicans have been going progressively crazier and crazier over the past 40 years, and there seems to be nothing anybody can do to stop it. And much of the country seems to be following the slimy lemmings right over the cliff.

So, his last graph says, we've all got to try because the stakes are so high, but--hey--it may not work. That will be horrible, but not worth suicide. Because life still beats Bush.

[jbm]

6. thanks Merlin..

I reread it with your comments in mind and I see it now. I agree with him I suppose, but the thought of coming to terms with these guys retaining power is downright depressing.

[Merlin]

7. Amen to that, jbm.

I can't believe it's happening AGAIN! :mad: