The movie "Aliens" has a parable for *everything*... March 21, 2010

To John Boehner and the rest of the republicans... I would like to quote this relevant passage from the movie Aliens:

"You had your chance, Gorman".

You had years to set this right. Don't bleat sanctimoniously about the burden upon the tax payer while your party's president presided over the greatest growth of the deficit in our nation’s history, and the launch of a war that shamed our nation and continuous to drain precious dollars from our budget like a fat tick. Don’t you fucking dare grandstand and state that the institution of democracy is shamed – not when your party did everything they could to sabotage this simply so it wouldn’t happen under the watch of a democratic president.

You’re right – it’s not a perfect piece of legislation. You speak the truth that no one agrees that this is a bill that covers all of the bases. But that’s democracy – it is a rarity that everyone shouts in one voice, and marches to one drum beat. As we are a nation of many, so are our viewpoints – and compromise should never be cast around as an epithet, haunted with darkness and evil. No, that’s the time when we shine. Of course it’s not perfect – but if we strived for nothing less than perfection in every single effort, we would be weighted down with self-imposed failure.

So what have you done? You have taken the justified fear of a nation and whipped it into a frenzy for callous, personal ends, with no heed paid towards the long term damage to this nation. Am I afraid? I am terrified that this will not work as planned. But we haven’t any other options…

… you’ve seen to that.

So what happens now? We’ll see. I hope that this works out – not because I want to self-righteously crow at your defeat, but because I want people to stop hurting. So in the same way that the republican party exhorted everyone of all stripes to get behind a war, it’s time to get behind taking care of us, of we the people.

And now we see what happens.