League of the BartCop Bloggers

 

Episode One:

 

“Cartoons and Heroes”

 

 

Welcome, Gentle Reader. The League of the BartCop Bloggers welcomes you to our Forum. On behalf of Bart and all the crew we say, “Welcome!”

 

 

 

More after the break …

 

 

Just as we bloggers don’t live in our mothers’ basements, BartReaders aren’t FreePers, Dittoheads or Bill-Os. Readers of The BartBlog tend to be independent thinkers with an opinion backed by something more than just what someone else said. BartReaders, speaking as a rule of thumb, know how to use Snopes. Y’all are, statistically, likely to have at least some college and a significant fraction of y’all are even Post-Docs. Unfortunately for the demographic, this last group is likely to live in their Mom’s basement. The rest have Union jobs, own homes, have kids, pay bills, worry about the future and raise Emus for extra money.

 

 

 

Bart started building his tree house way back in 1996 as a response to the rising tide of Hate Radio. The most egregious offender was Rush Hudson Limbaugh III’s daily ration of vile vitriol and brutal bombast built on an agenda of antagonism. To say more would only invite emulation. Really, who wants to be like that? This is the formula of Hate Radio as a genré.

 

 

 

Then came The Coup of the Millennium. How could this happen? Didn’t anyone see what was happening? The impulse to mix things with gasoline competed with the urge to move to Denmark. It seemed like Groundhog Day with the nation thrust back into the Sixties except this time there wouldn’t be any sex! Richard Ayres Was Right! There was one shining breath of hope. Other things had changed as well.

 

 

 

Last time there were three channels. Radio was local. Sure, everybody was Establishment. Establishment was still a good thing back then. Even rebels against the Establishment were speaking to a more open and more widely enfranchised Establishment. Ethics were still an unsullied standard. (Hold your snide comments for the box at the bottom of the page.) Even allowing for the filter any society puts on its media, I will stipulate that journalists came to work with the intention of reporting facts. The likes of today’s Faux Snooze would be quickly sued into oblivion if they weren’t just relegated to an area intersecting Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee. If “Freedom of the Press” belongs only to those who own a press, then the Internet was the true “Ownership Society.” Our voices would be heard at last. The Truth would be told.

 

 

 

“After the election the talk of the town is how do we reconcile? How do we unite? The true question is can we reconcile? Can we unite? Of course possibilities are endless. And as a great nation of freedom and justice and one nation indivisible we will survive. Unity and reconciliation will come if Santa Claus can bring it to our doors. The possibility of a united nation is bleak. At least not in the near future. The differences between the two political Parties are not very significant. But the differences among the Partisan members are at their highest. The only unity the nation will see is if there is a war against Saddam sometime.”

 

http://www.bartcop.com/704final.htm Dec.13 2000

 

How’s that for prescient?  

 

Twelve years later Bart hosts three pages and there is discussion of a music page (or a juke box on the front page so you have something to listen to while you read). Chicago Jim called for voices to speak to the need for more snark. Bart alone, even with the help of Marty and Jim and all the others who will never see the money Bart owes them, can’t write enough to satisfy the demand for thoughtful and plainspoken commentary. We trust that you read Lisa Casey* and Driftglass. If not, git on over there and catch up. While you’re there click on the Google ads. They get, like, a nickel every time you do, you cheap bastards. Open a new page and I’m gonna get some thing to smoke.

 

 

 

—*SnurK!*  cough! cough! cough!

 

 

 

See? Cool shit, huh? You are not alone. Not everyone agrees with your personal solution to the Palestinian / Israeli Question, but at least you’re not the only one who thinks this might be a problem.

 

 

 

The League was formed to finish the job that was set before us all on Nov.4. Our troops are still dying in a terror disguised as a war. The bursting of the Bush Bubble is shattering our communities. Nancy Pelosi won’t allow the Bill of Impeachment out of committee. The tide has turned but a lot of us are sweeping off the waves with a little bitty broom and Katrina is blowing in.

 

 

 

Your involvement will be mandatory. If there was a lesson from the Sixties I believe it was “You can change the world but you have to do it yourself.” We’ll be here to help make some sense of it all and to make fun of the crap that will never make sense. Those of you who left comments on Election Day will be pleased to know that such input becomes part of something greater. The interactive community of bloggers and commenting readers creates documentation. Together we are creating a living history of change. In fact, let’s capitalise “Change”.

 

 

 

Yes, we will be trashing Republicans, Neo-Cons and the Religious Reich. A large part of the grief they can expect from us will be due to their tendency to demand obedience to authority. I don’t mean just listening to people who have been elected or other wise chosen to make decisions on behalf of the communitty. Their version is the idea that Authority must be obeyed without question and that every Official Communication is beyond truth but a declaration of revelation. When uniforms and flags take on qualities of divinity dissention starts to be seen as a moral failing. Sins become crimes and only the Righteous may determine Sin. Yeah, right. You know who else says that? The Taliban.

 

 

 

Don’t worry, though, about standards of “Fair and Balanced” among the League. Barry** modified his stated stance on health care after he got a nice chunk of change (small c) from The Industry. Our own darlin’ Mz. Hillary belongs to a fundamentalist community that may be intending subversion of the Armed Forces. What the hell is the matter with Nancy Pelosi? Those who actively seek power are not to be trusted with it. We’ll be watching them. Who watches the watchers? Does my personal opposition to excessive surveillance put me at a moral disadvantage, and is it voyeuristic if I have hand lotion and tissues out as I watch the Minnesota re-count?

 

 

 

We ask that you keep us honest. Tell us if we are taking a wrong tack or if we’re just full of shit. I promise to not use profanity or to mock any religious belief just because it happens to be held by an ass-hat. I would like to point out that obscenity and profanity are two different animals. I would, also, like to point out that two different animals is a very popular party theme among Republican members of the Congress. I would like to also point out the obscene profits made by everyone involved in the Iraq war with the glaring exception of the American people. My insults will be eloquently pointed.***

 

 

 

Thanks, gang, for coming by. We hope you had a good time. While we intend to edify we try to entertain. Life is much too serious to take seriously. That is why, somewhere between a Saturday morning of cartoons and cowboy movies and the impending Bush Administration Impeachment Trials, The League of the BartCop Bloggers writes again.

 

 

 

Obi-Zen Folksinger

 

 

 

   *LINKS

• http://www.allhatnocattle.net/
• http://driftglass.blogspot.com/

   ** Barry “Hay-sus” O’bama, a nice Irish boy, has a fur-in sounding middle name. That may be why the Greasers all voted for him.

 

   *** Catch Me Wrong!

 

         Mis-Spellings, Mis-Quotes and Missing The Point All Together!

 

             Collect points to win worthless prizes!

 

                  See my website –myspace.com/tomloud- to download a FREE song just for reading this far.