One of the People Screwing Up America

A friend gave me this book with a fantastic title called 100 People Who Are Screwing Up America (and Al Franken is #37). I can't figure out why the author, Bernard Goldberg, didn't put himself in there somewhere.

Oh, I guess I get it. He basically only targets Democrats because he's a Republican. He uses the terms "liberal" and "conservative", but come on now. Those terms have never accurately defined the Democratic party which caters to big business with tax incentives and tarriffs and so on and so forth, nor the Republican party which embraces welfare programs like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

I'm liberal because I'm for freedom. And I'm conservative because I don't want people violating freedom. The Democratic and Republican parties are both just a bunch of sold-out hypocritical socialist crony parties. But I digress.

So this joker goes around digging up quotes (most of which are quite funny and the type of thing I'd enjoy making fun of) from Democrats and what mainstream America considers "liberal" and ignoring the many identical quotes and commentary from Republicans and what mainstream American considers "conservative". How about a little objectivity and even-handedness? I mean, why kill his credibility by only going after like-minded people (Democrats being essentially equal to Republicans after all) who happen to pretend they're liberals and give themselves the title of "Democrat"? Sigh.

But what really ticks me off is his utter hypocrisy exemplified by such things as starting off the book whining about how our standards for civility have fallen because cussing in public isn't the horribly unsocial thing it was 50 years ago. He uses a quote from some dude he sat next on a plane:

"It's all f**ked up," he tells the guy at the other end of the phone.

And then Goldberg finishes the introduction saying:

I'm afraid he got it right: It really is all f**ked up.

What an utter hyprocrite. As if 50 years ago this very author would have been able to print "F**ked up". And as if we the readers aren't somehow fully subjected to what the term really means and sounds like anyway!

And worse he later complains about some jokes from TV shows like Will & Grace which center around husbands and wives cheat on each other so much that it's almost accepted as standard. So he's upset that someone would put such humor on the TV. But in his book he later (rightly, btw) makes a point about how it's seemingly acceptable to sell T-shirts that say:

"Stupid Factory -- Where Boys Are Made"

But he makes his point by printing in his book:

So here are a few suggestions, which I offer to them [the guys who sell these T-shirts] free of charge
"Stupid Factory -- Where Mexicans Are Made"

So we, the reader are supposed to be intelligent enough to understand that he's being sarcastic by printing his joke. But the viewers on TV apparently aren't smart enough to know that said joke on Will & Grace was also sarcastic?

Gimme a "frickin" break.