If Bush instituted government-paid medical care for everyone, or subsidized your gasoline bill, would you let him tap your phones? Become President for Life?

Dude, look around you! Bush is already tapping our phones, and while it's too late for Republicans to amend the Constitution to let Bush be Eternal President, their quest for a "permanent Republican majority" would accomplish the same thing.

Seems to me we'd at least be getting a better deal if we got universal health care and cheaper gasoline. Republican rule seems to result in all pain, no gain, for most of us.

Aren't you one of those who wails and rends his garments at the slightest hint that your personal freedom might be encroached upon by your own government?

Once upon a time, didn't you wail and rend your garments at the slightest hint that your personal freedom might be encroached upon by your own government? Wasn't that once the RightWing Rap? Evaporated instantly upon gaining power, and for reasons noted next.

Sometimes I wonder how many people would, not reluctantly but cheerfully, sell their freedom for a full belly and 24 hour electricity.

How many people voted Republican in exchange for a promise to be kept safe from terrorists? How many people have been scared into giving up their personal freedoms in exchange for a promise of security? How many people don't rock the boat for fear of jeopardizing that full belly and the electricity that powers our gadgets?

I couldn't resist paraphrasing this one:

But let's assume that there actually was a chicken in every pot under the GOP, if, of course, you belonged to the right group of people (capitalists). If you were Republican, and a good party member, you could live a fine, long life if you ignored the the ghettos in the centers of our cities, that guy down the street who starved/died of a preventable medical condition last week, and the Blacks and Hispanics and a good few Caucasians living in poverty. If you were careful what you said in public or on the phone (regular line or cell--the NSA is everywhere), stood dutifully at the curb during all the official parades or stayed dutifully in the pen o'dissidents away from the cameras, and voted for the single candidate the Party gives you in your gerrymandered electoral district when "elections" came up.

Yes, Tom, the difference between Iraq under Saddam and America under Republicans is like night and day, isn't it?