I’ll just say this and let the chips fall where they may.
Ron Cunningham is a liberal.
I know, you’re shocked. And appalled.
“But you told us you were a progressive, Cunningham.”
Yeah, that’s just something I say in polite company so as to not cause anybody vapors or scare the horses.
Not that there’s anything wrong with being, you know, the L-word. I hear they may even have a cure for it now over at Shands. A vaccine maybe.
But I’m not taking the cure. I’m just going to stop humoring the absurd but carefully manufactured mythology that we liberals are aliens from outer space out to Destroy Civilization As We Know It.
Truth is, most of us are perfectly reasonable carbon-based life forms.
Oh, and don’t call me a socialist either. Not that there’s anything wrong with socialism. I’m just not all that social a guy.
Apropos of nothing at all, I see that Andrew Gillum (also not a socialist) is officially The Most Liberal Candidate Ever Nominated For Governor Of Florida.
Everybody says so. Trump. DeSantis. Newspaper nabobs of negativity.
How liberal is he? Gillum wants health care for all. He wants to crack down on gun violence. He wants us to stop turning our rivers gunk green and our seas dead red. He favors quality public schools. And he wants to tax corporations more to help pay for it all.
Gee, doesn’t sound so bad when you say it fast like that.
Anyway, it’s not just Gillum who’s finding his liberal voice in this Age of Trumpian Discontent.
Heck, ole Willie Nelson himself is helping Democrat/liberal/socialist/progressive (choose one) Beto O’Rourke take away Ted Cruz’ U.S. Senate seat.
“Beto embodies what is special about Texas, an energy and an integrity that is completely genuine,” Nelson said.
Sing it Willie.
Admittedly some of his fans think this is, um, one toke over the line, even for a guy who never passed up a toke in his life. “Let me know when you come back from your bad acid trip” an ex-Red Headed Stranger groupie grumped…I mean tweeted.
But polls indicate that Beto’s got a fighting chance in red Texas, as does Gillum in red tide Florida. So maybe this whole idea of liberals being persona non grata in American politics is no longer being swallowed hook, line and sinker by the electorate.
Not that the Republicans haven’t tried long and hard to shame us libs into shutting up and sitting down. They’ve done it for virtually my entire adult lifetime, and mostly it’s worked pretty well for them.
It worked when they convinced voters that George McGovern – who had one of the most dangerous jobs in World War II, bomber pilot – was unAmerican…unlike Dick “I am not a crook” Nixon. It worked years later when they got another war hero, triple amputee Max Cleland, tossed out of the Senate to make room for a Georgia fried chicken king.
On the notion that losing two legs and a forearm to enemy fire does not a patriot make.
But I’m not sure it’s working still. Some early election results this year indicate that voters are beginning to think that good government may actually require more than tossing rolls of paper towels at hurricane victims.
So liberals of America unite! It’s time to be loud and proud. We have nothing to lose but the phony “libtard” rep that GOP shape-shifters have been furiously trying to graft onto us since the 1960s.
Voters are wising up. Thanks, Donald.
(Published in the Gainesville Sun, Sept. 23.)
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