Bill Maher calls out the bullies.
Bill Maher gave a powerful and well written last New Rule. It was satirical, graphic, but reality based. It is something that needed to be said, in full context. The expectation is that this rant will be another debunking of a false narrative. After all, when false narratives are debunked, one can have real discourse that ultimately attains a positive result.
Bill Maher starts with the attack by the Right on President Obama when he stated had he had a son he may not let him play football. The President was excoriated in the Right Wing media. He was blasted for doing what parents should do to protect their kids. Should that not be an independent family’s decision?
That was just the lead into the real meat of what the New Rule was trying to accomplish. To be sure, Americans of all stripes and from all parties have fought, bled, and died for the country. Republicans however for some time have given the false impression that implicit to the Party is a manliness that makes them the party of defense. Bill Maher refutes this. This blogger did it with verifiable factual data.
Bill Maher contrasted the façade of the Right’s manliness with what it really is, bullying. Giving assistance to the least of us is manly and masculine. Choosing not to fight as a first resort is manly. It saves lives.
Bill Maher’s most prescient prose shows the depravity of what an irresponsible macho attitude have made vogue. When a secretary of defense criticizes a president for being cautious about war, one should be concerned. When a secretary of defense criticizes a president for wanting to withdraw from a war, one should be concerned. Worse of all, when a secretary of defense praises a president for not having a second thought about going to war, that is reckless.
For a long time America has allowed word-ology to be used to make things that would otherwise be bad, good. Calling the estate tax a death tax deprived the federal coffers of inheritor taxes on unearned income. Calling an act ‘Clear Skies’ made it easier to pollute the air. Bill Maher pointing this out analogically with the Right redefinition of manliness is a necessary step that should be hammered into every American psyche with a caveat. Strength is not solely inherent to men. Ultimately strength must be redefined to ensure that manly or womanly denotes strength. Strength is really a genderless descriptor.
Transcript of excerpted Real Time With Bill Maher video
Conservatives must be told that president Obama saying he wouldn’t let any son of his play pro football, it’s not controversial. It’s common sense, like telling your kids not to play in traffic. … But on the Right any critique of our holy religion football is blasphemy. Because real men don’t point out facts or consider consequences. And brain injuries are fun.
The National Review said, “If the President thinks the NFL is too dangerous for his fictitious son, what about the military?” Right, because defending your country and kickoff returns are the same thing.
I don’t know where Republicans get this weird delusion that they are the party of manliness. Conservatives, who boasts by far the bigger list of non-serving chicken hawks, see themselves as the tough guys. None of this is going to get better till Democrats stop letting Republicans claim they’ve got the big balls just because. … Democrats have to start being the party that redefines toughness as restraint. And stop responding to Republican taunts that have goaded Michael Dukakis into a tank, John Kerry into a duck hunting outfit, and Hillary Clinton into Iraq. Because it’s not really masculinity Conservatives love anyway, it’s bullying.
Somehow we have gone from Teddy Roosevelt speak softly and carry a big stick to Chris Christie speak loudly and be a big d**k. Fox News’ manly he man Brit Hume said Liberals don’t get Christie because he is an old fashioned masculine muscular guy. … But bullying isn’t a masculine virtue. Standing up to bullying is. Ignoring society’s least able people is not masculine. Taking care of them is.
It’s all part of their narrative. We will keep you safe, ‘because we are the real men. We are not afraid to send your kids off to die in wars of choice. And the Democrats are a bunch of Nancy boys who think of war as some sort of last resort. They believe in engagement and other pansy concessions that could lead to dialogue. Or even worse, peace.
The former secretary of defense, Robert Gates, published his memoirs this month and wrote that something that would seem to be absolutely devastating about Obama. That he wasn’t enthusiastic about our war in Afghanistan, and that for him, it was all about getting out. …. That’s bad? Gates said George Bush was a good president because he quote, had no second thoughts about Iraq. Right! Because to have second thoughts you first have to have first thoughts.
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