Debb and I were complaining about the minimum wage increase being held up in the Senate…well, not so much the minimum wage, but the fact that the voting mostly went along party lines. This is just so often true in our government, and it galls me. WIth the collection of beliefs and values I have, I’d likely be called a liberal. But does that mean I hand my brain over to others who define what “liberal” means? And if not, why is it usually easy to predict that Democrats vote this way, Republicans vote that way?

And then I see this.

Crooks and Liars » Chuck Hagel on fire…

A Republican saying that he shares some of the responsibility for lack of oversight on the war, that all the Senators who have been there for the past four years also share the blame, and nearly yelling at the assembly, with angry pointy fingers, like I’ve been doing at my TV and newspapers and Internets for the last couple years, that nobody in here wants America to fail, and just because you disagree with the President doesn’t mean you want the terrorists to win.

This is not a new idea for me but goddamn it is good to hear a Republican be passionate about this point for once.

I saw on some liberal blogs recently that 24 is conservative propaganda because it shows What Could Happen if terrorists were allowed in the country–and in fact, liberals “hate the TV show ‘24′ because it dares to remind us” how dangerous our enemies are. And I’ve also seen on conservative blogs that 24 is liberal propaganda (“Features ACLU-CAIR-John Conyers Message“).

Okay, while I was writing this in my head a few days ago, here’s what I was going to write: liberals say conservatives hate 24 for the show’s liberal message, conservatives say liberals hate 24 for the show’s conservative message, and it’s funny how all these politically-minded people take the parts of the show that agree with their own views.

But now I can’t find the original post where I thought I read a liberal saying conservatives hate 24. So I had to go looking for it. And over the past half hour I had a hard time finding conservatives complain about the show. For the most part, it’s liberals complaining about the show’s conservative message, and conservatives laughing at liberals for complaining about it.

How can this be? If you’re going to take this fictional show to a level high enough to apply it to real life, how can conservatives not complain about it? Information collected on people without warrants for being the wrong race? Innocents scooped into detention roundups with no charges? The beginnings of internment camps? I mean, the liberals’ upset with torture and racial profiling is pretty obvious. But why aren’t conservatives saying “we wouldn’t mangle our American values in this way”?

I mean. I think I’m actually a little scared about this.

Been a while. My leisure time is being split between World of Warcraft and getting SpinnWebe back online. Admittedly WoW is in the vast majority of that pie chart, but things are actually getting done.

In the meantime:

<agto> have I introduced you guys to the world’s worst metal band?
<agto> http://www.cockandball.de/media.htm
<agto> I so love them
<agto> dude’s voice sounds like a clogged toilet
<agto> http://www.cockandball.de/media/cbt_tampont.mp3
<spinn> gahahahah holy shit
<spinn> you are totally not kidding about him sounding like a clogged toilet
<SeanQ> wahahahaha
<SeanQ> shit, I’ve paid admission to listen to bands like this open for my brother in law
<SeanQ> except this guy has the whole reverb thing PWN3D
<spinn> it’s like there’s a big, basketball-sized frog on stage
<SeanQ> spinn, if you make it to the second verse, it sounds like the clog breaks
<agto> that’s supposed to be scary and threatening by the way
<SeanQ> he sounds like an ewok that fell down a cistern
<spinn> well it /is/ scary and threatening. I freakin hate getting the toilet clogged
<spinn> if the backup singers sounded like dripping water in my basement, I’d be shitting myself

I remember flipping through some conservative blogs a few months ago, where some people were talking about Bush’s handling of the Iraq war. And one common theme I recall, when other people were complaining about staying the course and etc., that there were those who would defend Bush because “that’s what a leader does” and “he’s made a decision and stuck with it, even when it’s unpopular.”

Wish I could remember where I saw these things. I’d love to go back and see if any of them would like to respond to his “well, I’m thinkin’ on it” for the last month or so.