A sanity-neutral lifestyle
By Dustin Hawkins
web posted September 4, 2006
How much do Republicans care about national security? Figure that it will take roughly 80 per cent of the Connecticut Republican vote just to keep a liberal, pro-choice, anti-business, anti-gun, former-Vice Presidential candidate of the Democratic Party in office. Joe Lieberman lost his primary bid for apparently not being crazy enough, losing the "prized" endorsement of the Party of MoveOn-and-Huffing-til-you-Puff-Kos. Conservatives might be unhappy with the Republican Party, but at least Republicans aren't crazy. Figure what these prominent liberals are up to these days:
Al Gore is now leading a "carbon-neutral lifestyle." A carbon-neutral lifestyle is how liberals get around being hypocrites. It seems that a carbon-neutral lifestyle means that Al can drive an SUV, fly in privately chartered jets, and heat multiple 10,000 square foot mansions, so long as he offsets his carbon-dioxide emissions by planting a tree in the desert or installing solar panels in Africa.
Tired of being photographed and appearing on the Drudge Report leaving global warming summits in Hummers and Escalades, liberals have come up with an elaborate scheme of explaining away their do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do ways. Arianna Huffington is noted for complaining about global warming and then explaining her high-class jet travel thusly: "The plane was going there anyway." But now she can say: "Yes, I do drive an gas-guzzling SUV, but I planted a tree in my backyard!"
Off-setting is a great idea when it comes to, oh say, dieting whereby if you promise to run an extra mile at the gym you can eat some birthday cake. But when it comes to an action that is constantly being stated by liberals as resulting in a life-threatening, world-ending, glacier-melting, hurricane-causing mess, one would think that they would stop constantly doing those problem-causing activities. I mean, they complain all the time. Constantly. Daily. And make long, boring movies about it.
But cutting out such evil is not a very convenient solution for liberals. A liberals' idea of rationality is that if they do one thing they consider to be "the good" then they have a free pass to do however much of "the evil" they want to. Imagine the absurdity of other possible "neutral" lifestyles. Why not lead a "human-neutral" lifestyle? For every one child brought into earth, you get credit for one free murder. Whoops, the Party of Abortion already practices that one.
If something is declared as evil, it should be done away with altogether, not merely excused away. But then this level of reasoning perfectly explains liberals' take on the War on Terrorism. When conservatives declare something as "the evil" they pretty much cut it out of their lifestyles. In dealing with terrorists, we are all too happy to kill as many of them as possible as often as possible. On the occasional circumstance when liberals are forced to call terrorists evil, and not the more-favored "freedom-fighters" or "disgruntled ethnic-minority youths", liberals show how they go about handling their evil.
That is to say: they oppose killing terrorists in Iraq, oppose detaining terrorists in prison, oppose the surveillance of possible-terrorist suspects, oppose trying to narrow down potential terrorists on airplanes... I'd go on, but I don't want to leave the false impression that liberals don't want to fight terrorism. I guess we'll just call it their "terrorist-neutral" policy.
But being "whatever-neutral" is the in-thing these days. Howard Dean was going to live a sanity-neutral lifestyle but could only find one rational thought for every ten conspiracy theories. Conservatives may be a lot of things – what is it; we are mean-spirited, selfish, and intolerant? – but at least we aren't crazy. For liberals, it's a requirement for elected office. Figure that Hillary Clinton has already lost the vote of Madonna, Cindy Sheehan, and Charlie Sheen for not being crazy enough.
And it's not just that liberals are crazy when it comes to covering up their hypocritical and intellectually void tracks. Liberals haven't met a conspiracy theory they haven't liked. George W. Bush either knew about or helped to plan the twin tower terror attacks, plus a plane never hit the Pentagon, and crazed right-wingers rig every election that Democrats lose with their electronic voting schemes, voter-scaring dogs, or butterfly ballots. Hillary Clinton's theory was that all of Bill's women were part of some vast right-wing conspiracy (at least if true, it would have been an amusing conspiracy). And lest we forget, with the Hurricane Katrina anniversary just past, George Bush let the levies break in order to drown the New Orleans population. It was either that, or Bush caused global warming, which caused the hurricane, which caused flooding. I can't keep track.
While there is no shortage of sanity-neutral conspiracy theorists on the left, all the conservatives have is Pat Buchanan. And he isn't the leader of the Republican Party (or even a member of it), a US senator, or a president's wife. (In fairness, he was part of conspiracy theory #2043-B, whereby elderly voters in Palm Beach County were tricked into voting for him for President instead of Al Gore, costing Gore the election!)
So, conservatives are mean-spirited and selfish. Fine. I'd actually welcome a liberal who was mean-spirited and selfish yet sane. It's getting to the point where I'd be compelled to switch parties, just to vote in a primary to help nominate a Democrat who at the very least doesn't want to see the United States in flames. I started to have some hope when Georgians booted the fanatical Cynthia McKinney from the Democratic primary in favor of someone who is at least grounded in reality. But then Connecticut happened. 
Dustin Hawkins is a social and political writer. His first book, Stuck on Stupid, is now for sale. His website is www.dustinmhawkins.com.