Bill Maher Interview: A Must Read

Bill Maher mixes politics and humor. Sort of makes the distasteful medicine go down easier! I came across a terrific interview with lots of words of wisdom from the St. Petersburg Times.








He writes about the "sore winners" in the Republican Party:

There's been so much finger-pointing: "Don't you get it now, you liberals? Don't you get it?" (But) it's not that we don't get it; it's that we don't share it. I get what you're saying, I just don't believe in it. I don't think that the morals and values crowd understands what morals and values are. Morals and values, I was taught, are making choices . . . choices that have to do with how you treat people - principles. I think the morals and values crowd is very often talking about rituals, superstitions, beliefs, reciting things, praying, believing in Jesus, loyalty to people as opposed to principles. Those are not morals and values to me.

Maher doesn't mince words. He has advice about what Democrats need to do to win elections. And it isn't about being more like a Republican:

They need to go to their base, as opposed to trying to inch ever closer to the Republican side. You see Hillary Clinton positioning herself more to the right on the abortion issue. (And) once again, the folks in this country who believe in science and rationality as a means of governing over faith are left without a choice. Somehow, John Kerry, Al Gore, they all felt the need to buddy up to the red-state, NASCAR, gun-loving, beer-drinking culture. And I'm perfectly happy to live in a country where there is that culture. I just wish there was somebody to stand up for the other half of us. We have the Republicans and the people who are trying to be like Republicans. I wish we had a candidate who said, "You know what? My religion or whatever it is, is none of your business, and it doesn't really affect how I do the job of president and I'm going to promote science and rationality - how about that?"

And what about Social Security? What about how this President loosely uses "reform" when he means dismemberment?

I don't think Social Security reform is the worst idea in the world. Once again, they're presenting it in a very dishonest way. (Bush is) the morph master. When he ran for president, he morphed monogamy into integrity. He morphed bin Laden into Saddam Hussein. He morphed his National Guard service of 1968 into the National Guard service of today, which are two completely different things. It was a way to get out back then, and now it's a way to get in. And he's morphing the idea of private accounts - which is not a bad idea - with the notion that this is going to save Social Security . . . which it certainly isn't.

Thank you Bill for saying it like it is. Isn't it time that we all did the same?

Bob