One thing I learned early in politics is that attacks on opponents must be credible and based in truth, even if they’re exaggerated. It’s why over the top accusations fall flat. They might fire up the people who already agree with you, but they do little to persuade anybody else.
The language of Phil Berger and Tami Fitzgerald of NC Values Coalition is not credible. When the backlash to House Bill 2 began, Berger doubled down claiming that the ordinance was pushed by “…Roy Cooper and his left-wing political correctness mob with their agenda-driven allies in the liberal media, who will never stop trashing North Carolina until they achieve their goal of allowing any man into any women’s bathroom or locker room at any time simply by claiming to feel like a woman.” Fitzgerald chimed in with, “These opponents of privacy and freedom will stop at nothing – until young girls are forced to shower, undress, and use the restrooms with grown men.”
Nobody believes that Roy Cooper wants grown men showering with little girls. And nobody believe that Cooper is the leader of a “leftist mob.” He and his allies didn’t bring up the conversation but now that we’re talking about it, they want to prevent the GOP from overriding local ordinances and stop discrimination against the LGBT community. They also want to restore the rights of people to sue in order to seek justice in incidents of discrimination.
Cooper’s been in office for than 25 years and in the Attorney General’s office for the past 15. If he were way outside of the mainstream people would know it by now. Besides, he’s siding with Bank of American, American Airlines, Google, and host of other large companies and small businesses. Not exactly a “leftist mob.”
On the flip side, though, Phil Berger and his allies like Tami Fitzgerald have only been on the scene for about five years and aren’t well defined in the mind of public. They’re trying to remedy that situation. Berger and his allies are using inflammatory rhetoric that might fire up their base, but alienates most of the rest of us. They are defining themselves as right-wing culture warriors, not thoughtful leaders. Their accusations are not believable and their credibility is sinking. They might take Pat McCrory down with them.
Thomas Mills is the founder and publisher of PoliticsNC.com. Before beginning PoliticsNC, Thomas spent twenty years as a political and public affairs consultant. Learn more >
Caitlyn Jenner has a New York birth certificate that designates her as female. In NY, no reassignment surgery is required as a condition for changing the gender marker on one’s birth certificate.
Thus, any New York-born adult living in NC has a birth certificate that can’t be used to infer anatomy. No way of knowing if the named person is transgender who’s applied for & been re-issued a birth certificate or if that’s the case (which is an unknown), if the person chose to keep the private parts they were born with intact.
The same goes for adults living in NC, but who were born in DC, MD, RI, NY, CA, OR, and WA. Gender on those birth certificates do not infer anatomy, as the requirement for sex-reassignment-surgery has been dropped as a condition for changing the gender marker on one’s certificate.
HB2 bathroom portion is a hoax. It depends on the use of birth certificates, many of which cannot be used to infer an individual’s private parts.
The law is a testament to irrational fear, blatant ignorance, stupidity, and a desire to discriminate against the lgbt community.
Nice to know England has a NC & MS travel advisory alert for lgbt folks traveling to the US. HB2 is so unnecessary
McCrory should make an executive order and insist the members of the NC General Assembly be put on Prozac…(There is a pill for what ails most of these jerks). Just think-the General Assembly hates women, children, black people, Latinos, brown people, Muslims, dogs, cats, clean water and air, and everything that is not just about WHITE MEN and “THEIR RIGHT TO HATE everyone and everything”…If we insist they take their meds, then they won’t be out here acting crazy…As a byproduct, when the NC General Assembly member goes off his meds and the police escort him to the “facility” (county jail) maybe just maybe the police will shoot the legislator in the head or resisting-I’m sure we will have statewide mental health laws once they are on meds and understand their delusions of grandeur and how unvalued they truly are.
So the “Arizona case” was a state court case involving the state’s Constitution? If so, it has no bearing on NC’s Opportunity Scholarship Program. Zellman was a federal court case and could serve as precedent if NC’s voucher program was challenged in federal court.
NC’s voucher program has been ruled legal under the state Constitution by the NC Supreme Court. Since it seems to meet the criteria that the U.S. Supreme Court spelled out in Zellman, it is unlikely to be successfully challenged in federal court. In fact, there is no report that any person or group is contemplating a federal lawsuit challenging the NC voucher program.
D.g., you keep confusing Charter schools with the Opportunity Scholarship Program, i.e., vouchers for short. Charter schools are state funded. I don’t think families are using their educational voucher funds to send their kids to Charter schools. These voucher funds are to cover tuition for private schools.
With regard to the Supreme Court, seems you are advocating a new SCOTUS majority should ignore legal precedent and reverse recent Court decisions which they ideologically oppose. But would you support reversing Rowe vs Wade if a conservative majority gains control of the Court? Again, the ends justify the means, right?
Sorry, D.g., but there is no relationship between Charter schools and the Opportunity Scholarship program. Opportunity Scholarships are not being used to pay for Charter schools. Charter schools are tuition free. Opportunity Scholarships are granted to low income families to help pay TUITION to PRIVATE schools .Charter schools are PUBLIC schools.
Once again, you don’t know what you’re posting about..
It’s the U.S. Supreme Court’s JOB, Ebrun, to judge the constitutionality of state laws. I suppose you’d be in favor of amending the NC Constitution to ban anyone but a card-carrying so-called “conservative Republican” from holding state office, but the USSC would disagree with you there, also.
“Opportunity Scholarships” are just another cog in the current NCGA’s desire to eliminate all public schools in favor of private, religious, and/or charter schools.
And the case to which I referred (Arizona), which you evidently have not read, was a 5-4 USSC decision which parsed the legality of tax aid for religious schools solely on a chimera of state budget categories.
You’re confusing US Supreme Court rulings and NC Supreme Court rulings. There IS a difference.
I am quite aware of the Arizona decision and the NC Supreme Court ruling on the Opportunity Scholarship program. In both cases, financial assistance to families to choose private schools of their choice was upheld. One case involved the U.S. Constitution, the other the NC State Constitution.
I don’t believe anyone has challenged the NC Opportunity Scholarships Program in federal court. Why not, one might ask? Because the challenger would lose under the Arizona precedent. So you and other liberals are going to have to get over this one. Financial aid to families that elect to send their kids to non public schools is here to stay and will no doubt be increased by the GOP.
And, BTW, it’s a big leftist lie to claim that the NCGA desires to “eliminate all public schools.” But rest assured that public education reform will continue to be a top priority as long as Republicans are in charge of the NCGA.
Sorry, the real precedent was an Ohio case, Zelman vs. Simmions-Harris, 2002. Not sure the poster was right about a “similar Arizona case.”
The court found that educational vouchers were constitutional if they met five private choice tests:
Under the Private Choice Test developed by the court, for a voucher program to be constitutional it must meet all of the following criteria:
the program must have a valid secular purpose
aid must go to parents and not to the schools
a broad class of beneficiaries must be covered
the program must be neutral with respect to religion
there must be adequate nonreligious options
Another similar case: Mueller vs. Allen, 1983.
More and more, the label “conservative” has become meaningless. Those who claim to revere the U.S. Constitution are those who have forced me and all other NC taxpayers to support the use of our money to send pupils to religious schools, a clear violation of the Constitution’s “establishment” clause made possible only by legal subterfuge of budget categories (see the U.S. Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision in the similar Arizona case).
Those ‘conservatives’ who decry ‘big government intrusion into private lives’ are the same NCGA members who ride rough-shod over NC cities and towns who dare to pass local laws with which they disagree.
Those ‘conservatives’ are the same ones who, while claiming to champion ‘fiscal conservatism,’ waste thousands-upon-thousands of our dollars passing and defending laws which state and federal courts will declare to be demonstrably unconstitutional.
Those ‘conservatives’ who claim to revere our political democracy are the same ones who have now assured that 40% of their number will face NO opposition in the coming election.
Yeah, right, it’s that darn U.S. Supreme Court. But wait. Isn’t that the same Court that ran “rough-shod” over the NC Constitution with respect to gay marriage? Oh, and didn’t the NC Supreme Court recently uphold the state’s Opportunity Scholarship program for low income families? Must not have been “demonstrably unconstitutional.” I think we can blame the cost of that case on Democrats and other liberals who who tried to get the law overturned—and lost.
“More intolerance from out leftist posters, Sue. Your opinion is just not worth having in this conservation. Only liberal conventional wisdom is tolerated on this blog.”
“…OUT leftist posters”?? “CONSERVATION”???
Looks like someone should learn how to spell before criticizing others their misspellings.
Ah, yes. two (not too) typos in one post. Bad proofing. But what about intolerance?
Right, Ebrun. Sure. The appended (below) sure sounds like a hate group’s dastardly deeds. Sure it does. Can you be more biased and blind? Probably, but you’ve now topped yourself with your latest attack.
I think your view on SPLC will finally convince any and all readers — who, to this point, may have reserved judgment — that you are truly one disturbed individual.
“SPLC successfully argued cases enabling new civil-rights legislation to be implemented, challenging segregation of the YMCA (Smith v. YMCA, 1969), the state police (Paradise v. Allen, 1972), and unfairly drawn electoral districts (Nixon v. Brewer, 1972), as well as the practice of eugenics (Relf v. Weinberger, 1973). Advocacy on behalf of women in the workplace and welfare recipients also resulted in landmark decisions. During this time, the organization also focused on the racially unbalanced death-row populations in U.S. prisons. SPLC provided legal representation in individual cases of poor black defendants who had not had the benefit of adequate counsel in their original trials. SPLC lawyers argued successfully before the U.S. Supreme Court that Alabama’s laws regarding the death penalty were unconstitutional and won the freedom of 11 inmates in 1980.
The organization truly raised its public profile and institutional momentum with litigation, spearheaded by the charismatic Dees, aimed at breaking up the Ku Klux Klan. In 1979 Klansmen attacked a peaceful civil-rights march in Decatur. The SPLC filed a protracted, though finally successful, suit against the perpetrators (Invisible Empire of the KKK) that resulted not only
in punitive damages, community service, and enforced participation in race-relations education courses for the defendants, but also the cessation of all their hate-based activities. As the SPLC continued to pursue the Klan, they developed a simple strategy—win huge civil settlements that would leave targeted hate groups in financial ruin. For example, in 2000 Dees and the SPLC won a $6.3 million settlement, believed to be the largest punitive damage award in Idaho history, against Richard Butler, the head of the Aryan Nation. The group was bankrupted and forced to sell off its property. In a stroke of irony, the plaintiffs, a mother and son who had been shot at and harassed by Aryan Nation members, bought and occupied the property of the group that had once brutally harassed them. In another landmark victory SPLC won a $7 million decision in 1987 against the United Klans of America in favor of Beulah Mae Donald, whose son was lynched by two Klansman in 1981.”
Source: The Encyclopedia of Alabama
1972, 1987, 1979, 1980, 1981, 2000. Like I said. the race card has pretty much run its course. But I am truly “one disturbed individual” for pointing that out?
When the race card can’t be applied, resort to nasty personal attacks. Par for the course, A.L.
I guess you can’t or won’t read when it screws up your narrative. There are posts above from others that list more recent SPLC accomplishments.
That’s your opinion not every one’s opinion. Its not called profressive or progressive to demand exposure of our children that is simply deemed stupidity. In my book that covers any Male having a desire to be in a restroom or shower room with my children. I could care less about there sexual preference Thats there personal life choice.
Well Sue, you’re not wrong; that isn’t everyone’s opinion and it is their life choice. But consider this for a moment if you will.
Will a law requiring that you use the gender appropriate bathroom according to your birth certificate keep the pedophiles, molesters, and sexual predators out?
Just out of curiosity, Sue, which restroom would you prefer for Caitlyn Jenner to be using? When a transgendered person looks completely like a man or a woman do you still want them to use the restroom on their original birth certificate? It seems like that might cause a stir but what are your thoughts on the matter?
If Jenner’s sex change is official and medically certified, she should use the female rest room or locker room.
What if it’s not official on paper? Just appearance, then what?
Jenner is a national celebrity and her sex change has been well publicized. If she used female facilities in NC, I seriously doubt any one would object.
From the number of sexual predators arrested in NC that were MINISTERS, PRIESTS, or PASTORAL YOUTH WORKERS and the fact that zero LBGT people in NC have been arrested as sexual predators ……………………………..
Your children and you are safer in a shared public bathroom than in church!! Stupid is as stupid does.
Sue, I need to pee sometimes. I’m a Male. I’m a grown man. And when I need to pee, I look for a bathroom. If your children are in there, I don’t give a damn. I just want to pee.
Now if I were a transgendered Female — either by surgery or through pre-operative hormone treatment — I’d want to go into the ladies room to pee. And if your children were in there, I STILL wouldn’t give a damn. I’d just want to pee.
Your obsessive fantasy that “any Male” who need to pee is actually in the bathroom to be with your children says a lot about your twisted mind. Transgendered people are not pedophiles, like right-wing Republican Denny Hastert and numerous other “conservative” Republicans. Nor are gay men pedophiles. The reason gay men are gay is because they like MEN — not boys, not children, not women, but men.
If you aren’t capable of distinguishing between gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people, you aren’t capable of adding anything to this conversation.
More intolerance from out leftist posters, Sue. Your opinion is just not worth having in this conservation. Only liberal conventional wisdom is tolerated on this blog.
You had better stop correcting others’ spelling and grammatical mistakes, Ebrun, because you just emitted a whopper.
OMG, are you calling me an “internet troll” and not a “serious contributor” here. Then why not ignore my opinions instead of posting long lectures and diatribes whenever I post something that you dislike. I must be hitting a sensitive nerve that sets you off.
“Professive” …..”to demand exposure of our children that is simple deemed stupidity….. Is that a sentence? I know that you object to the bill, but learning to write coherently would make your argument seem stronger. I think you mean “That’s their” instead of thats there. If you have something serious to say, learn to say it seriously. I’m a poor typist, but I do take time to correct my posts.
I don’t know where you live or what bathrooms you frequent: but all the public bathrooms with the word (or symbol for) “women” on them I’ve ever been in have had doors on the stalls. The whole point about transgender people is that they are transitioning from a (relatively) male appearance to a more female appearance (or vice versa): therefore, not only are they not in the women’s/girls’ bathroom to sexually assault women/girls, it’s highly likely they are female in appearance as well as orientation (or, again, vice versa). Furthermore, there are a significant number of people who are not easily identified by gender–but that doesn’t make them sex offenders by any means. I recently went into a public restroom and saw what I thought at first glance (from the back) was a man: tall, heavy-set, dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, with short hair. My immediate reaction was that I’d gone into the men’s bathroom by mistake. Then the person I’d taken for a man turned to me and said, “I know I look like a man, but I’m a woman”–and from the front, I could see that was the case. I didn’t feel threatened: I did feel embarrassed for having made an inappropriate assumption–although it wasn’t precisely the assumption the other woman had assumed of me.
A lot of the “divisions” between groups of people are in our heads, not in our or other people’s bodies. I learned that when my daughter was a toddler: we lived in a mainly African-American neighborhood, and some of the local kids became fond of our daughter, who was a toddler (and “white”). Initially she made no distinction between those “black” children and the “white” kids we sometimes visited with; around age 4-5, she began to note that some people were “brown” and some (herself and parents included) were “pink”. In the early elementary grades, her best friend was the granddaughter of an African-American GI and a German woman: she had cafe-au-lait skin and curly dark-blond hair. This girl, who I’ll call “Betty”, came home with my daughter one day on the school bus. My daughter said, “Mom, everyone on the bus was asking ‘Betty’, “Are you black or white?”‘ I asked “What did you (‘Betty’) say?” and she replied, “I said, ‘I don’t know: I guess I’m white.'” Later on, I mentioned to my daughter that many (perhaps most) people would identify ‘Betty’ as black: my daughter’s indignant response was, “Nunh-uh: ‘Betty’ doesn’t even know any black people–except her daddy.”
Transgender people are in a similar position, except that that they’re transitioning from one gender to another: so it makes sense for them to use the restroom that fits where they are in that transition. That being the case, this whole controversy is a tempest in a teapot–or was so prior to HB2.
Anyone who believes that the SPLC is a “hate group” has a truly warped perspective. It goes beyond partisanship; it more indicative of mental issues.
The list of court cases regarding discrimination and intolerance that SPLC has won, agency settlements it has forced, and civic awards it has received for its good work would fill pages and pages. In 2014-15 alone, it forced the city of Montgomery AL to end a “debtor’s prison” policy; issued a classroom curriculum that teaches tolerance; won a $14 million jury verdict for Indian guest workers who were defrauded in a labor-trafficking scheme engineered by a Gulf Coast marine services company and its agents. The verdict ultimately becomes part of a $20 million settlement on behalf of 200 workers; helped win a NJ jury verdict that a New Jersey provider of gay “conversion therapy” violated the state’s consumer fraud law; conducted an investigation that led US Department of Justice to stop a school system in Mississippi, from arresting children for minor school violations.
While SPLC can be (and has been) criticized for its stridency in identifying and prosecuting hate crimes and hate groups, any cursory or in-depth research into any groups or individuals that have accused SPLC of being a hate group will find that those entities themselves have long records of advancing a message and mission of hate and intolerance.
Our radical extremist Governor and legislature do not represent the progressive values of most North Carolinians. Tens of millions of dollars will be lost this year… with hundreds of millions over the next few years. Hopefully enough critical thinking voters will turn out in November… and throw out as many of these “radical right wing-nut warriors”. We need to get ready for the 2020 US Census… and have a chance to change extreme gerrymandering districts.
That’s your opinion not every one’s opinion. Its not called profressive or progressive to demand exposure of our children that is simply deemed stupidity. In my book that covers any Male having a desire to be in a restroom or shower room with my children. I could care less about there sexual preference Thats there personal life choice.
Sue
The people that hide behind “religious rights” are the worst racist and hypocrites there are. They want everyone to look, believe, think, and act like them and for those who think for themselves and believe “to each his own” is somehow undeserving of respect, to me that is quintessential Sharia law. Yet, they put their hope and faith in the very people that break all of their supposed religious laws and hate their own “god’s creations”. As Americans we are entitle to our own opinions, and as Americans our freedom ends where another’s begins. Once again this is a law in search of a problem just like the voter ID issue. Hate will never win and I feel sorry for those who have that much hate in their hearts.
It’s not hate per se that feeds the monster, but fear. They mock, demonize, de-personalize what they fear, don’t understand, or see as different from themselves. It’s easier to hate, castigate, and yes even assault and use violence against, when the object of your emotion is viewed as being less than human.
I subscribed to a publication for years put out by SPLC called “Intelligence Report.” Reading it, you find yourself sobered to the fact that there are not hundreds but thousands, if not hundreds of thousands who march to the drum of hate and fear. They don’t recognize nor are they interested that your right to chose is just like theirs.
The Republican party was a good catalyst for them. But they quickly grew beyond what that group was willing to bear. They wanted votes and money but otherwise loathed those groups. Well, now they’ve adapted and grown even more extreme and some of them have used those party connections to foist themselves into government.
Bringing us to where we find ourselves now.
I hope you don’t mind my paraphrasing it a bit differently; I am completely in agreement.
The Southern Poverty Law Center is a far left hate group. For years they’ve been playing the race card against any right of center organization that doesn’t adhere to their leftist dogma. But in recent years, SPLC has lost credibility, even with the liberal press. They now parrot the LGBT agenda hoping, I suppose, to regain some lost credibility and influence.
You didn’t read Mr.Mills’s post, did you?
Wow Ebrun…what evil pixies dance in your head and whisper absolutely stupid and certainly not factual little tales for you to vomit ?
The SPLC has existed for a very long time..you are correct and they have fought for, defended , and educated . They have been leaders in fighting for civil rights and making sure that racists, bigots like yourself are shown for what you are. As for regaining credibility they have never lost it. I believe that it is you and your evil pixies that have no credibility. So hush now and go back to sleep and dream your dreams.
I can see that you’re simpatico with SPLC. Those who do not share their far left outlook are labeled “racists” or “bigots.” You certainly fit that mold. Wise up. The race card has pretty well run its vitriolic course. Time to adopt the LGBT dogma and stop fantasizing about “evil pixies.” Some may think you’re a little paranoid.
If you are not a racist or bigot, then what are you? Is it so hard for you to live and let live?
I am a conservative. Make with that what you will. Most liberals who comment here are very intolerant of conservatives’ opinions.
I’m trying to figure out why we’re expected to be tolerant of those who want to vilify LGBT neighbors and friends.
Ebrun is a vicious liar if he thinks racism has run its course. But he is indeed the NCGOP base… and he’s what they’ve been nurturing since Lee Atwater explained the “Southern Strategy” way back when. NCGOP is reaping what they’ve sown – hatred, racism and violence.
See what I mean, Otis? Intolerance personified.
The obvious hatred prominent on this blog is exhibited by those left-wingers who HATE Republicans and conservatives.
The world has been turned upside down when the most intolerant among us attempt to label those calling them out as the intolerant ones.
50 years ago the same argument would have had those marching in the streets for civil rights as being “intolerant” of those who believed in segregation.
Calling out bigotry is not intolerance.
Standing against hate is not intolerance.
You are so right, Albert
But don’t expect warped and bigoted minds to understand it…..
Thanks. I don’t think most conservatives are not per se bigots, but too many of them allow their beliefs re how to govern to be hijacked by accepting the association with bigotry on so many fronts that they have cheapened the notion of conservative political analysis. Not helpful in serious political debate.
If the shoe fits, then wear it. Your projections is pathetic.
Didn’t you mean “my projections”… ARE …”pathetic?”
So you support big national and multi national corporations trying to coerce NC into changing a state law? With liberals, it seem their ends always justify any means.
” The race card has pretty well run its vitriolic course.” Wishful thinking in the minds and rhetoric of those reeling at the possibility that the days of white privilege’s leverage may be numbered.
In August, 2012, a man named Floyd Lee Corkins used a “Hate Map” put out by the Southern Poverty Law Center to find the Family Research Council headquarters in Washington, D.C. and then tried to “kill as many people as possible” and “smother Chick-fil-A sandwiches in their faces” because he disagreed with the conservative organization about gay marriage.
He seriously shot and wounded Leo Johnson, a security guard who grappled with Corkins to keep him from shooting other staff of the FRC, and was sentenced to 25 years in prison on terrorism and related charges.
Makes one wonder which organization really promotes hate–the FRC or the SPLC?
Any organization that publishes a”hate map” to vilify organizations that do not share their political agenda must be motivated by a deep seated hatred for those with whom they disagree.
I’ve been reading your posts, Ebrun, and I am convinced that you are some sort of an employee of the RNC or one of their PACS. I always say that every job has dignity so I am not blaming you for it; only pointing out something that is becoming blatantly obvious.
Sorry, but you’re quite wrong. I’m retired, a former government employee, and a conservative activist in my FREE time.
Don’t you mean “TOO” many mistakes. Using correct English composition can help you with your communication skills.
CBS has discovered that the source of HR2 is a fringe hate group called Liberty Counsel. The group is listed by the Southern Poverty Law Center as one of the prominent hate groups fighting against LGBT rights. Liberty Counsel gained national prominence when they defended the actions of Kim Davis in Kentucky after she refused to abide by the law permitting gay marriage. Liberty Counsel has been behind aggressive efforts to demonize LGBT advocates using a false connection between child safety and the civil rights of LGBT people. Liberty Counsel creates a false connection between pedophilia and homosexuality. Pedophiles are criminals who hide among “normal” people, not drawing unusual attention to themselves. Denny Hastert, Speaker of the House who presided over the Clinton impeachment, passed for a normal person. He was not a cross dresser; he was a wrestling coach and a child molester.
HB2 derives its power from the false connection between child safety and advances in the civil rights of LGBT people.
The financial support for Liberty Counsel comes from many of the same right-wing groups working toward the destabilization of American institutions. Fracking billionaires Dan and Farris Wilkes along with the Koch network have provided valuable assistance to Liberty Counsel. Liberty Counsel, like ALEC and other secretive special interest groups, has provided legislatures in dozens of states with model legislation called “religious freedom” laws. Like the anti-environmental laws and the anti-union laws drafted by right-wing law firms, the religious freedom laws are prepared for the legislatures and handed to the Republican leadership (along with money) to advance the notion that the tolerance of civil rights of LGBT groups interferes with the rights of religious people to practice their faith and endangers our children.
North Carolina has become the most fertile incubator of right-wing extremism and our Republican legislators are THE most receptive to the vast funds flowing from the billionaire network.
We could take some solace in the knowledge that our legislative insanity is not home-grown, but we must be disappointed that our legislature is so susceptible to suggestions from the darkest, craziest corners. Importing the cookie cutter laws crafted by hate groups is no way to run the State of North Carolina.
“They might take Pat McCrory down with them.”
From your lips to God’s ears.
Amen to that… Can we get a Hallelujah?
I was going to say the same thing, but you beat me to it, James. Thanks!
Absolutely agreed. Somebody get Phil a talk show. Then elect a leader that is worthy of the title.