Hello fellow bleeding heart liberals! Tonight is the first in my series on how to debate a conservative. Here’s some tips from the bottom of my hormone-free heart to yours:
1. Use lots of capital letters so your conservative counterparts know you’re serious. Example:
Oh groan! So much fear. So much WRONG information. I grew up with “government healthcare” too. And you know what? Even though it sometimes sucked, it was SO MUCH BETTER than NOTHING.
2. Ignore the rules of punctuation, puzzling your opponent. Is it an actual question or a rhetorical statement? For instance:
Do you have any idea how much the uninsured cost.
3. End your opening paragraph by dissing Cheney.
I shake my head at how many people are SO terrified by Obama but thought that Cheney was rockin’ awesome. Scary, scary.
4. Ignore pointed questions with legitimate examples like “If government run health care is so great, why is Walter Reid Hospital in such bad shape?” and instead use Twitter-speak to school those lazy, good for nothing conservatives. Something like this might be appropriate when dodging a question is imperative:
@tarheelpundit- Dude, different words but you sound just like some of my crazier liberal friends during the Bush years. Don’t like the administration? Get off your ass, find a reasonable candidate (NOT Palin. Vagina does NOT equal the women voters), and work as hard as the Obama folks did.
Also, make sure your opponent hasn’t actually volunteered for the GOP, helped organize tea parties, worked phone banks, networked with local Republicans and Libertarians and can recite the Constitution before you accuse them of sitting on their ass. You may end up looking stupid when they inform you of their political involvement. HOWEVER, if you fear you may be in over your head, attacking them personally is the way to go. You may deflect their attention from the actual debate and be able to save a little face. Otherwise, fake a keyboard mishap and only type every other letter. They will get tired of trying to decipher your garbled answers, give up and continue working to pay the bills.
5. As a continuation of #4, you must also malign Sarah Palin whenever the opportunity presents. Above you will see that this feisty liberal managed to kill two birds with one stone by not only smearing Palin but also reducing her to nothing more than her reproductive organs. Some conservatives might point out your feminist hypocrisy here, but that’s just because they’re not down with killing babies and they just don’t get it.
6. Use an example given by a conservative against them. Make no allowances for these examples and take every word they type as gospel. If a conservative dishes up some nonsense about personal responsibility and illustrates it like this:
Health care reform starts with individuals realizing that no one owes them anything. That maybe the money going towards that new car in the driveway should be going to pay for some insurance. That maybe going out to eat or have martinis a couple of nights a week adds up, and that money would be more responsibly spent on some insurance. That there’s a little something called “catastrophic coverage” that is cheap and covers catastrophic illnesses and accidents.
Fake them out by pretending to miss the point completely. It is your job to twist their words and respond accordingly. Something like this would work:
Assuming all people who have had lives ruined health bills are drinking martinis is the most asinine thing I’ve heard all week.
Does your response make sense? Heavens no, but you got to use the word “assinine” and that reflects your vast vocabulary and intellectual superiority. Bonus? It’s got the word “ass” in it! *haw haw haw haw haw!*
7. Never miss an opportunity to bash that fat slob Rush Limbaugh and those right-wing nuts at Fox News. Even a seemingly innocuous reference really sticks it to the conservatives. Just throw it in at the end of your paragraph, just like your “Cheney isthe Devil” comments. Something low-key, but condescending like this works just fine!
Turn off Fox news/Rush for a little while. Just take a little break.
Unless of course your conservative opponent comes back and says they don’t have cable, nor do they have time to listen to Rush. But hey, you stuck it to somebody that was reading your debate, right? That’s all that counts! Let those neocons know you’re on to them and their demagoguery!
8. When you’ve gone through points 1 – 7 it’s time to wrap things up. Using your kids as an excuse works well, as does acting like the conservative is beyond help. Accuse the conservative of “fighting” as opposed to debating. Appear to be an understanding, benevolent soul who just wants to agree to disagree. Point out the wonderful nature of diversity! Heap laud and praise upon our life experiences and our resulting points of view! Let that narrow-minded honkey know you think they’re anti-American because they are still expecting us to follow that mythological Constitution. But before you pack up and leave, make sure you get at least one more jab in regarding someone in the previous administration. If you’ve already played the Cheney card, it’s time to book end your debate with some Bush slander.
Debating is fun, bickering is not. You’re not going to change my mind, and vice versa. Everyone comes to their opinions based on life experience. Yours are *obviously* different than mine. And that’s great! How boring if we all thought alike. And the opposite goal of the USA. But don’t mistake that difference as the thought that I “obviously I don’t know what’s going on”. Because no one knows what the outcome will be and we can only hope for the best. I keep waiting for those WMDs to come out of Iraq. Maybe you’re right. Maybe I am. We’ll see.
Keep up the good work, my fellow progressives! Remember, it’s up to you to spread apathy! If we all try hard enough, we won’t ever have to try again!
