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Yeah, it's a pretty amazing job of fox news brainwashing to get most of the nation's morons to vote against their own interests. You almost have to have a begrudging respect for how completely they've convinced these people that universal healthcare is bad and that the middle class's interests are aligned with those of billionaires. Every bailiff in every courthouse who I've ever met is a giant flaming republican. Nevermind that they barely make a living wage and have ridiculous deductibles to meet in their spotty health insurance plans-- they keep right on spitting out Hannity talking points. I swear, there's like a manchurian candidate quality to the right in this country-- all of them lack any kind of understanding of issues beyond the superficial and all of them are embarrassingly programmed.

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I'm not trying to change anybody's mind. The point of my comment was that you can't do that anymore anyway. Drudge Report for breakfast, Rush for lunchtime, and Hannity and O'Reilly bat cleanup. The right wing media outlets in this country provide this cozy nest of never-ending propaganda that perpetually skews the real issues or-- more often-- ignores them completely in favor of ancillary shit like who pays for somebody's birth control pills. When you live in that insular little world, somehow it's possible to be convinced that paying for somebody else's birth control pills, the 'war on christmas,' the welfare queens who soak up all our money, etc., account for all of our problems. I can't imagine ever getting to a place where I really believe that the things like that are more important than providing health care for everybody, keeping the tax code relatively progressive (not that it really is now) or letting people marry who they want. In the continued spirit of not trying to change minds, I think there're really three classes of republican voters: 1) Very rich people who want to keep more of their money-- I'm not talking about 100 K a year people; I mean actually rich 2) Danielle's favorite category-- people who believe in an invisible man in the sky who tells them to follow certain rules, to own guns, and to prevent gay people from having the same rights the rest of us have, and 3) idiots. Understand that I'm not including libertarians in this paradigm because I can at least appreciate the idea that the national debt is a looming problem, although I WOULD include libertarians who begrudgingly vote republican in the final category because I see nothing in recent history that would indicate that republicans are more fiscally responsible than democrats-- matter of fact I have a real problem with the idea that taxes should never be raised, ever (a la Grover Norquist). I hope I've really built some bridges with these opinions.

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I'm not trying to change anybody's mind. The point of my comment was that you can't do that anymore anyway. Huffington Post for breakfast, NPR for lunchtime, and Matthews and Maddow bat cleanup. The left wing media outlets in this country provide this cozy nest of never-ending propaganda that perpetually skews the real issues or-- more often-- ignores them completely in favor of ancillary shit like how large your sodas are. When you live in that insular little world, somehow it's possible to be convinced that animal research, the 'war on drugs,' the billionaires that get to keep some money after taxes, etc., account for all of our problems. I can't imagine ever getting to a place where I really believe that the things like that are more important than protecting our liberties from encroaching governmental overstepping, keeping the tax code relatively simple and fair (not that it really is now) or protecting the sanctity of marriage. In the continued spirit of not trying to change minds, I think there're really three classes of democrat voters: 1) Very poor people who want to take more of your money-- I'm not talking about government cheese people; I mean actual freeloaders 2) Danielle's favorite category-- people who believe their spirit guide tells them to follow certain rules, to outlaw guns, and to prevent rich people from having the same rights the rest of us have, and 3) idiots. Understand that I'm not including libertarians in this paradigm because I can at least appreciate the idea that the national debt is a looming problem, although I WOULD include libertarians who begrudgingly vote democrat in the final category because I see nothing in recent history that would indicate that democrats are more fiscally responsible than republicans-- matter of fact I have a real problem with the idea that taxes are too low (a la Ben Stein). I hope I've really built some bridges with these opinions.