"Eat your broccoli! It's good for you!" snarled the evil Liberal giant.

As I was saying this morning, all the things the Right Wing bedtime story, Help! Mom! There Are Liberals Under My Bed!, says we nasty Liberals want to do---confiscate 50 per cent of people's income for taxes, force broccoli down their throats, and make them take down their pictures of Jesus---are all true.  We really do want to do all that.

True, if looked at from a certain point of view.  As Obi-wan tells Luke, much depends upon your point of view.

Many Liberals tend to be somewhat cavalier about how to pay for all the social programs they endorse.  Often, boiled down, their only plan is "Tax the rich."

But responisibility and good sense usually win the day---or used to, when the Democrats ran things in the 90s---and taxes are more universally levied.  The working and middle classes are expected to chip in their fair share along with the rich, and when you add it all up---Federal, state, and, in some places, local income taxes, property taxes, sales taxes, and the occasional user fees---the Tax Man's taking a pretty big bite.  Nobody pays 50 per cent, but many people do kick in between 30 and 40, and that's a lot of money.

We Liberals are all for that.    Meanwhile, conservatives think---I repeat, think---they stand for lower taxes.

So it's true, from a certain point of view, it's Liberals who are coming for our money.

The book of course doen't get into what the taxes buy---just for a for instance: the clean water the boys in the book use to make their lemonade (see Phoenecian in a Time of Roman's comment at Shakespeare's Sister for an amusing riff on what would happen to the boys and their lemonade stand if there were no evil Liberals regulating and taxing their business)---and it certainly was never going to mention that with the Rich being more and more exempted from paying any taxes at all, the burden of paying to keep the country up and running is weighing more and more heavily on the middle and working classes.  It's not Liberals proposing a heavily regressive national sales tax and calling people whose poverty has so far excused them from paying Federal income taxes "Lucky Duckies" as they resentfully plot how to rob the ducks of the "luck" they get as an unfair bonus for being poor.

(And sadly we do have to remind people that the poor do in fact pay taxes.  They pay sales taxes, they pay user fees, and they help pay property taxes, either directly or through the rent they pay to their landlords.  The idea that the poor get a free ride is a useful one to people who are really arguing for a free ride for themselves.)

As for the broccoli that the boys in the book have to hand out with their lemonade, that's a symbol, and a pretty good and amusing one, for the Liberal urge to nanny and nag.

Some bloggers have been arguing for the Democrats to embrace the image of themselves as the party of the nuturing mother as a counter to the idea of the Republicans as stern fathers.  But from time to time all mothers have to resort to scolding---Wash your face, brush your teeth, do your homework, eat your vegetables--- and scolding has a way of becoming a bad habit.

Various forms of Liberal broccoli (and things we often resort to scolding about) include tiny cars that get good gas mileage but aren't any fun to drive or ride in, Public Television, which a lot of people resent paying taxes to support because it's dull and "good for them," gun control, and environmental laws and regulations that protect wildlife at the expense of people having fun with their guns, fishing rods, and All-Terrain Vehicles.

The broccoli is also symbolic of the Liberal urge to regulate business, which some conservatives, and many small businessmen and women, see as needlessly burdening entrepreneurs with paperwork, extra taxes, worries, and potential lawsuits all to protect stupid people from themselves.

Symbolically this is stated thus:  "If they aren't smart enough to know to eat their vegetables themselves," the conservatives and small business owners want to know, "Why make it our job to see that they do?"

In reality it is said like this, "If they are too dumb and lazy to figure out how to go to the doctor on their own, why should we have to pay for their health care?"  "If they are too dumb and lazy to work hard to earn homes in areas where we don't want to dump our toxic wastes why do we have to pay extra money to have it carted somewhere else or go through all the extra work and expense of not polluting to begin with?"   "If they are too dumb and lazy to read the labels, follow the directions, recognize shoddy workmanship, or not fall for bait and switches and false advertising, why should we have to pay so much in liability insurance and have to go to court to defend ourselves when what we sell them up and bites them on the ass?"

The broccoli, then, is symbolic of the Liberal belief that we're not allowed to hurt other people in the name of making a buck.

That's the Liberal point of view, and from that point of view it is most definitely true.  You'd damn well better put broccoli in the lemonade.

Now, about those pictures of Jesus...

I'm getting close to the main point I wanted to make when I started on this this morning.  But I'll have to get to it later.  Yes, there's a Part III.   Maybe even a Part IV.  You've been warned.  Don't say you weren't.  Now, go eat your vegetables.

Update:  Part 3 is done.  The Coming end of the black velvet Jesus.  There's not going to be a Part 4, praise the Lord!

Comments

[mac macgillicuddy]

The now too familiar -- and increasingly infuriating -- Limbuaghian battle cry is that a tax system is unfair when it levies increasingly higher taxes on us the more we make. Unfair because it "punishes" people who are successful.

I don't follow the logic, unless it is simply an argument for a flat tax. But it doesn't appear to be that argument. It appears to be a bold-faced argument for the belief that success should be rewarded by allowing the "successful" people to keep more to themselves than anyone else is allowed to keep to him- or herself.

I don't follow logic that seems founded on the premise that the more money you make, the less responsibility you should have toward supporting the society in which you live. People do forget that taxation is not stealing. It's our obligation to put into the pot what we can to keep civilization afloat.

I once heard someone call into one of those awful talk radio forums and declare that he resented having to pitch in to support the public library because he doesn't read. (He actually didn't seem to mind admiting this on national radio.)

And for those who like to base government on what the Bible says, the Bible seems to disagree with their logic. Sorry, but it's true that yet another Bible-based belief isn't in the Bible. God expects much more of Moses because Moses, unlike the other Isrealites, has the rarified advantage of being able to converse directly with the Lord. THAT is why, when he gets angry and throws his staff down, his punishment is to be allowed merely to view the Promised Land, but not to enter it. One of the other Israelites who had such a temper tantrum in response to God's will might have been granted amnesty. But more is expected of Moses because he has more entrusted to him.

We really ARE punished for our priviledge -- if responsibility is viewed as a punishment. And yes, it is unfair. It's not supposed to be fair.

[carla]

Over at PK, I have a discussion going with a conservative who feels great consternation at the idea of liberals being the predominant group with college professorships.

Here's the post, comments obviously follow.

The upshot is that there ought to be some sort of rule that politics can't be a litmus test for who gets hired and who doesn't at institutions of higher learning.

My initial reply was: fine. But extend it to all vocations (especially news organizations). Then I got to thinking.

Aren't conservatives the ones who are all about the free market? Doesn't that mean that organizations hire and fire who they want, without interference?

It's fine and dandy for conservatives to piss and moan about liberal interference into the free market lives of the citizenry. But when it starts looking like it's not going their way..they're the first to stand up and demand that someone make a rule to change it.

[Pepper]

I love broccoli and PBS. I genuinely like them. In fact, I have plans to bake an absolutely delicious broccoli-tortellini dish, and I will be watching 'PBS News Hour' while I do it, I kid you not. Perhaps I'll drink a glass of Riesling at the same time and really imagine that I am flipping the bird to the writers of that book!

[Kevin Wolf]

Goddam it Lance, stop being so reasonable! They aren't!

I kid. I'm a kidder. Looking forward to Pope VII - ah - oops - Part - ah -

Do agree with Carla - they change the rules when convenient. Human nature, I know, and the left might do the same. But the left admits the possibility while the right - well...

[Lance]

Pepper,

Guess I'm probably too late for dinner.

Kevin,

Gosh darnit, I'm not trying to be reasonable. I'm trying to be as unreasonable as all get out. These people make me so doggone mad, sometimes I just forget myself.

Carla,

Thanks for the link. Interesting discussion. Couldn't help noticing that your conservative commentator kept misspelling professor. "Proffesor." When I taught, I gave A's to conservative kids who earned them and B's, C's, and D's to conservative kids who didn't. Invariably, the conservative kids who earned B's and C's believed they'd been punished for their politics and they refused to believe that I'd given an A to any of their conservative classmates. They also refused to believe that the fact that the misspelled words, forgot to document their sources, lost track of their own arguments, and not only failed to support their own theses but couldn't identify their own theses when asked had anything to do with their lower grades.

I should finish this in your comments area. Think I'll go do that.

[Exiled in NJ]

'I knew it, Ricky, you're becoming a sentimentalist.'

'No, Louis, I have enough belief in the good sense of youth to grow up and think for themselves. I see my sister-in-law and niece following the fundamentalist values that made each visit a dental ordeal, but then I see my nephew, her son, out there with demonstrators when Rummy and King George come to town.

'Then I remember Lynn, who comes to my office and lectures me on recycling the paper in my waste baskets, gives me organic grown fruits to replace the chinese noodles I munch on, and asks how many miles a gallon my Outback Sport is getting. While she is prattling on about my faults, I am kicking myself under the table for not changing the locks on the door to keep her out.

'Louis, no matter what, people don't like scolds, no matter which side they come from.'

'You're becoming a Pollyanna, Rick'

'No, Louis, what the two boys will do is skim enough off the top of their receipts to make up for the taxes, while hitting the beach or the golf course on Sunday Morning rather than going to hear their local stemwinder tell of the glory of some god who has no idea how to really turn a buck.'

[KathyF]

Hey, I love broccoli! So do my kids.

But wait...I see you're using broccoli as a metaphor. It really means taxes and tiny cars, doesn't it?

Oh darn. Why'd you go and take all the fun out of broccoli?

[jwhook]

Who says

"tiny cars that get good gas mileage but aren't any fun to drive or ride in"

Take a look:

http://tinyurl.com/7qgh8
http://tinyurl.com/d775a

[Lance]

Jwhook, I stand corrected. Or rather I sit very low to the ground with truckers looking way down over their arms and laughing at me.

There are also some Shriners who would have something to say in defense of tiny cars.

Kathy, I didn't mean to ruin broccoli for you. I hope Pepper's dinner menu restored your faith in that fine vegetable.

NJ, Great!

[Phoenician in a time of Romans]

Lance, I resent you mentioning my comment unless you also provide a link to my blog.

Alas, I am too lazy to actually have a blog - but as good Liberals, I'm sure you'll all support me in my attempt to get the government to provide a state-funded blogging service for all free-range pundits and humourists such as myself.

My motto - "A Johnson for every Boswell, dammit!"

[Phoenician in a time of Romans]

And a fact-checker. Make that "A Boswell for every Johnson, dammit!"

[Lance]

Phoenician,

I've always felt you've had a sort of floating blog, like Nathan Detroit's floating crap game. You show up, leave a comment, move on to another blog before the cops arrive. I keep an eye out for your name and if you ever do settle down and open up shop for yourself let me know.

Mac, you too.

[Phoenician in a time of Romans]

Phoenician,

I've always felt you've had a sort of floating blog, like Nathan Detroit's floating crap game. You show up, leave a comment, move on to another blog before the cops arrive. I keep an eye out for your name and if you ever do settle down and open up shop for yourself let me know.

How do you feel about contributions to established blogs?