[Vision2020] New Rules from "Real Time With Bill Maher" (11/10/2006)

[Tom Hansen]

All right, New Rule: Stop calling what Dick Cheney does "hunting." Cheney
spent election day in Pierre, South Dakota, massacring small, tame animals
that someone tossed in front of his gun. The only good news was it was the
first time in months you heard a Republican was in Pierre, and Pierre wasn't
a little boy. 

New Rule: No offense, honey, but just shut up and open the case. [slide from
"Deal or No Deal"] Look, you're eye candy with an opposable thumb, so drop
the dramatic pause and the chitchat. If I wanted to be frustrated by a
half-dressed chick while a fortune slips away, I'd go to the Spearmint
Rhino. 

New Rule: Put the LAPD in charge of Iraq. Someone yesterday filmed an L.A.
cop punching a suspect in the face, and posted it on YouTube. Even more
horrifying, then two Chinese kids come in and start lip-synching to the
Backstreet Boys. Now, we know L.A. cops can handle erratic, Jew-hating
fanatics. They caught Mel Gibson! 

New Rule: There's just something about a crew cut that says, "You can trust
me." There's your boy. This is Montana's new senator, John Tester. I don't
know much about him. And I don't need to. His hair says it all. "I'm
friendly, I'm dependable, I'm literally level-headed." If hair could smile,
it would look like this. And most importantly, it's hair that says, "You
will never ever, ever, ever find me snorting meth with a gay hooker." 

Which brings me to our final New Rule: There is no devil, so stop blaming
your screw-ups on him. Last week - last week, one of the biggest evangelical
leaders in America, the Reverend Ted Haggard, was outed for drugs and
extramarital gay sex with a male prostitute. Or as Fox News reported it,
"John Kerry hates our troops." 

Now, this was big news because Reverend Haggard was frequently at the White
House and a big fan of President Bush, who he described as "tan, supple and
firm where it counts." And as president of the National Association of
Evangelicals, Haggard presided over 45,000 churches and was a rock star for
the Christian right. And like a rock star, he was getting his freak on a
lot. 

Sometimes, the sodomy left him so exhausted he could barely use idiotic, old
fairy tales to get people's money. Yes, Reverend Haggard was leading a
shameful double life. But, hey, you can't keep being an evangelist - you
can't keep being an evangelist secret forever. I could have done that joke
better. All right. 

Now, I bring this up because I believe it connects deeply to the Republican
rout this week. They lost because they came to represent the opposite of
everything they were supposed to be. Competent? No. Spendthrift? Hardly.
Ethical? Rarely. And the last straw was when the party that was at least
supposed to be carrying the water for the gay bashers turned out to be a
closet full of repressed screamers. 

Who knew when the Republicans got in bed with the Christian right, it would
be in a stall inside of a truck stop restroom on the New Jersey Turnpike? 

Reverend Haggard's plight led many to ask, "Is it genetic? I mean, can a man
actually be born a hypocrite?" Because Ted Haggard was the leader of a
mega-church. And mega-churches are presided over by the same skeevy,
door-to-door Bible salesmen that we've always had, just in an age of better
technology. But they're selling the same thing: fear. Fear to keep you in
line. And to get your money. 

And it's not a coincidence the Republican Party has, in recent years,
operated in the same way. It's also no coincidence that people of too much
faith just don't see reality. Bush not seeing Iraq for what it is, is not
that different from the way Reverend Ted's followers still think he's not
gay. 

I'm not kidding. In their world, there are no gay people. There are just
straight people who are sinning. They don't want to do it, but the Devil
makes them! He targets people like Reverend Ted. That's how it happened. The
Devil got hold of Reverend Ted, and Ted said, "Get thee behind me, Satan!
And put it in, gently." 

Come on, the man was anointing people with Astroglide! He was preaching
"fire and rhinestone!" 

In conclusion, I'd just like to say, on this historic week, that the legacy
of the religious right will be that, despite their holy pretenses, they made
politics not cleaner, but dirtier. Because when you're so sure you're right,
you wind up acting so wrong. 

And as for Reverend Ted himself, the good news is that he is in full
recovery, and says he'll be receiving both spiritual advice and guidance.
The bad news is, it's from Andy Dick.

---------------------------------------------------------

Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"Madness does not always howl.  Sometimes, it is the quiet voice at the end
of the day saying, 'Hey, is there room in your head for one more?'"

- Author Unknown