Speech reaction overheard in my gym's locker room today...

[onehandle]

Laughter and sneers as a local radio station played a snippet of the chimp over our speaker system.

See that light at the end of the tunnel, Mr. President? That's your porch light in Crawford. Happy retirement.

[ixion]

1. The light should be

moonlight through the cell bars of his prison, IHHO.

[HootieMcBoob]

2. what part of the country are you in?

I'm always curious to hear how differently people react in different parts of the country.

[onehandle]

3. Atlanta...

This gym is a pretty good mix of people, politics-wise. Mostly professionals in the Communications industry. 60 or 70% Caucasian, 30 or 40% African-American, 10% other. This was the men's locker room.

[liberalhistorian]

5. I'm getting the same kind of reactions from

the wingnuts at work and elsewhere, and hearing things I NEVER thought I'd hear from them! I think Chimpie has FINALLY gone too far this time and people are (hopefully, PLEASE God!) finally starting to wake the hell up!

[joeybee12]

6. Good sign that it was the men's locker room

Men support Dumbo in higher numbers than women--good sign that he's losing that support.

[Avalux]

4. Delighted

by the comments on a local radio station this morning. I'm in Texas, and criticism of chimpy NEVER happens. But this morning...very vocal DJs wondering if he's insane, saying we were misled and shouldn't be in Iraq. Maybe, just maybe, people are starting to get it; seems to me they've had enough. I was giggling like a little girl and couldn't believe my ears.

[LoneStarLiberal]

7. Reaction in Texas Interesting Mix

I'm in North Texas and the reaction I've heard this morning in my routine has been interesting. Most people around here are hear-no-evil, speak-no-evil, see-no-evil Bush supporters; he could do just about anything he wanted to and blame it on Martians and they would go along with it.

However, if there is one thing that Republicans in these parts are really intolerant of it is foreigners, the federal government spending money, other religions besides Christianity...well, you get the picture. It's basically the Republican religious shit sandwich around here. I've already heard a lot of grumbling this morning from the see, speak, and hear crowd for two reasons: First, spending that much more money for anything. Of course I went out of my way to remind them that is only for the next YEAR and not for years after that. Second, they don't like the fact that all this money is being spent on non-Americans who are Muslim.

I know I'm commiting an environmental fallacy here by extrapolating to the general population from a small sample, but you get the point. It looks like the Bush base of support isn't happy.

[joeybee12]

8. Re: Republican religious shit sandwich

Good news about them--they probably will never vote for a godless Dem., so this might mean they won't vote at all in 2004! Sounds like the best you can hope for from this group!

[LoneStarLiberal]

9. Yeah that's the downer to the talk

Is that it's not as if most of these people would ever vote for a Democratic candidate instead of Bush. It's too bad that there isn't someone running to Bush's right this year; if he keeps up this pattern of behavior, he would be a perfect target for ticket-splitting.

[catmandu57]

10. After last night there'll probably

be a wingnut challenger to draw off the religio whackos, followed by some fiscal conservative to draw off the money people.

[LoneStarLiberal]

12. We Can Hope, Right?

Good gods if someone or a couple of someones would jump in and split the Republican ticket on fiscal conservation and religion, then that would be...well...miraculous. Unfortunately I don't think the fundies are going to be easily split...they know they have their man in Bush and if his handlers sense the fundie block moving away from him, we'll see that Constitutional amendment on defining marriage as a heterosexual union in no time flat!

Not much he could do against a fiscal conservative, though.

[wtmusic]

14. I've heard Dean has a surprisingly solid base in TX

That your experience? His policy on gun control seems to be a potential magnet for swing voters.

[LoneStarLiberal]

18. Guns and Bubba

From what I have seen of the Democratic caucuses so far in Texas, Dean is just about it. I read that he has a lot of support in the Austin area and he's spoken in Dallas, too. I think the only two Democratic candidates who have a chance down here are Dean and Clark (if he runs).

The guns issue is a very big one for most Texans. Whether or not people own guns down here they still tend to be very much against gun control and Dean's regional idea of gun control plays well down here because it combines the best parts of no more federal gun laws with state's rights, something most Southerners I know believe in whether you are talking about in the racist context or just in an anti-Federalist context.

Dean's populist message will play well here in Texas with Democrats because we spend so much of our time brawling and losing with the Republican jackasses who have run our state into the ground. I don't know enough nor have a good enough idea about what kind of message Wesley Clark might bring to the table, but given that we are in the South and militarism has a pretty broad base of appeal here, his military experience will be a big bonus to him if he runs.

I don't see any of the other candidates making anything more than a lower-single digits impact here in the primary. Kerry would probably be the best of the rest down here.

[Cat Atomic]

11. I must just be incredibly naive.

I've been hearing similar scoffing and disapproval, and it surprises me every time. Honestly, I'm disgusted by how quickly they flip-flopped when the issue became entangled in their wallets.

Three guys I know were complaining about the whole situation in an off-handed sort of way this morning. They were completely pro-Iraq invasion at first. They had boundless reserves of patience when the only "sacrifices" they were being asked to make were the lives of US soldiers, Iraqi civilians, respect for international relations and international law, simple morality... all that. That was all just sacrificing for "Freedom".

But boy- you touch their wallets and the attitude changes immediately. This morning, talking with a co-worker of mine, a very big bald headed guy named Bill, it was like I'd stepped into Bizarro Land. Here I was arguing that, of course you have to spend the money to reconstruct the country- the infrastructure's been blown to bits by our shit-for-brains, imperialist leadership, and if you leave it now, you're setting up another Afghanistan- like Bush Sr. did.

And there he was saying that we should just leave.

The only consistency I saw in his arguments, from the "defend our freedom" of 4 months ago to the current "we should just pull out" was "ME FIRST- give it to me, make me safe, make me comfortable, me me me".

Anyway, yep- I've heard disapproval from 3 diffrerent people who were very pro-Iraq invasion. Honestly, it saddens me more than their original war zeal did.

[joeybee12]

13. "It's the economy, stupid"

Boy, does that phrase still say it all. I wonder if the economy were better if people would be so reluctant to spend money over there. I think we have to--if we don't, the world will be an even more unsafe place. The Muslim world hates us, and then we destory a country and don't help rebuild it. Seems improbable that they could hate us even more than they did, but leave it to Dumbo to find a way.

We broke it, we bought it.

[pansypoo53219]

15. indeed stupid

because if we don['t do IWaq right, it will cost a damn sight more. too bad they just do NOT SEE ANYTHING but their wallet.

[Gin]

16. The light at the end of the tunnel is a train coming at us.

gin

[LoneStarLiberal]

17. The Bounds of "American Generosity"

Bush mentioned something about how generous Americans were three times in his speech last night...tying his three mentions of September 11th.

The thing that the Bushies are trying to push here is something they have to know is false. Americans are very generous, but there are very distinct boundaries to that generosity. Specifically we tend to be more generous when things are copasetic domestically. Since they aren't right now, we don't tend to be generous.

The rhetoric in that speech last night was geared to make us feel generous and focus on generosity because the Bush administration knows that they are asking for a very big pass from their base of support.