Reply #9: Nice format -- Here's another one! [View All]

Chimp: My opponents trust big government to make decisions for them; I trust the people.

Sane Person: If you trust the people, why didn't you accept their will in 2000? Why didn't you accept their will on Iraq? Why do you proudly claim you don't pay attention to polls? Why don't you trust the people to make life, death, and reproductive decisions in consultation with their own family, doctor, and God?

Chimp: Because I believe in a culture of life. There have to be limits to freedom. We're in a culture war of good vs. evil. We must err on the side of life.

Sane Person: Then why do you embrace the death penalty, even for mentally retarded people, and anyone whose lawyer slept through their trial?

Chimp: We need to be tough to protect the Murcan people. Freedom is God's gift to the world, and we need the freedom to kill people as necessary. We just need to enforce all the laws on the books.

Sane Person: How do you do that while cutting funding, effectively taking policemen off the streets? Who's got the money for more prisons?

Chimp: Those are local issue; besides, my friends needed new yachts. Criminals just need some faith-based initiatives.

Sane Person: Why not invest in crime prevention by eliminating poverty, investing in urban development and education, fair housing, civil rights, drug treatment and prevention, birth control clinics, after-school programs --

Chimp: Oh no, I believe we need a smaller government. The government should stay out of local choices; that's up to states. I believe in state sovereignty.

Sane Person: What about government overriding Florida's state sovereignty regarding its court decisions, both in the 2000 selection and in the Terri Schiavo matter?

Chimp: That's different; they were wrong.

Sane Person: Then if the government is in the business of correcting wrongs, why are the Enron execs still free? Why is corporate corruption rampant? Why are $9 billion missing from funds for Iraq reconstruction? Why isn't there a fair, accurate and verifiable voting system? Why doesn't government work to right these wrongs?

Chimp: We're fixing some wrongs. Social Security, for example, is wrong. Al Gore acted like it was some sort of government program! It belongs to the people. And if the people want to blow it by gambling on the stock market in a way that benefits my friends, so be it.

Sane Person: But that's wrong. The social safety net established decades ago would be gone and many people could become impoverished; there's also no way to pay for it. How could you trick people into making such a terrible mistake, when the government's greatest function is to protect them?

(Start over!)