Words to Live By Since 1993 A SPIFF Publication Vol. 3, No. 1 Mr. Spiff goes to Washington We're There Dan Rather? Pfffft! Connie Chung? Oh, please! Wolf Blitzer? Come on! The only way you're going to get the real story of the opening of the best Congress in the 20th century is if you read WTLB. And to better serve you, our loyal readers, the Spiff Executive Plaza is temporarily towering above beautiful downtown Washington, D.C. What will the new Congress bring? Who will be the stars in Washington? What will Barbara Boxer wear on the first day? These and many other questions will be answered by us, personally, on the scene. Memo to the Liberals Thanks to our insiders from the vast Spiff spy network, we have come across a memo from the Liberal Institute for Anti-Republican Strategy. We thought you might like to take a look at how the ohter side thinks (for lack of a better term). To: All libs concerned about the heartless conservatives now standing between America and Utopia Subject: What to do about it With the 1996 elections just around the corner, it is important for us to start pondering about how to take back our great society before it is destroyed by Gingrinch and his ilk. How do we do this, now that the religious right has taken over both houses of our Congress? Fear not. We may have lost our legislative power, but we still dominate that which matters most. We still control the networks and most of the metropolitan newspapers, and we have almost total dominance over the schools. We must rely more heavily on the networks than ever before. While it is true that the pending fall of regulations, which protect us from the evils of capitalism, will begin to erode our power in many areas of society, no one need know that the regulations have been reversed because we can trust our friends in the media to keep it a secret. (The term "evils" in the preceding sentence in not intended in any way to foster a belief in God, good and evil, or any other religion that assigns authority and power to anyone or anything except the state, and our crystals.) It is important that we put our trust in the media the educational institutions, as long political correctness survives there. We have some specific suggestions: ù Call them racists. Whether the issue at hand has anything to do with race or not is irrelevent. We are aware, for example, that California's Proposition 178 applies to all undocumented workers, but by using the networks and schools as our megaphone, claiming that the issue is racist, we are starting to swing support our way. No matter what the issue is, Republicans are afraid to be called racist. Whether or not they are being racist does not matter. They fear the label, and you can use it to back them down. ù Call them homophobes. We are not sure where who made up this word, but it works. We're not even sure what it means, but homophobiaphobia is beginning to dominate the Republican party. Use it just as you would the racist label, and Republicans will back down. ù Call them insensitive to the plight of the poor. Nobody, even Republicans, wants to be known as a person who will not lend a helping hand. We are continuing to do a good job equating government checks with compassion. Everybody knows that only 28% of the welfare budget actually gets to those who need it, and private charities like the Salvation Army make the efficency of the welfare programs look like... well, government programs. The poor would live better if we abandoned the addictive government handouts, but then people might look to the churches instead of looking to Washington. What a sad day that would be! ù Call them insensitive to victims of crime. What most people think of when we say victims of crime would be the people who are robbed, raped, and murdered. What we mean, of course, is the person who does the robbing, raping, and murdering. They are the victims of a capitalist system that places value in responsibility. They can't help what they do, and we must make Republicans feel guilty for having advantages. ù Diefy fairness. No one wants to be labeled as unfair. Since we control the media and education, we get to define fairness. When the Republicans want a capital gains tax reduction, just scream that it is not fair that the rich get a tax break. Never mind that anyone who owns a home or has a pension or retirement plan will benefit. These people should have known better than to be responsible anyway. ù Monopolize the Constitution. Make the people think that it was written to be interpreted only by lawyers and judges, rather than to be understood by "We the People." We know, for example, that the Constitution says nothing at all about separation of church and state, but we have convinced people that they are not enlightened enought to read it for themselves. Otherwise, they would know that that phrase is right beside the "Freedom of Expression" clause. We could add so much more, but we realize that you are only normal people, without the capacity to think for yourselves, and we can only spoon-feed you a little at a time. We'll let you know more when we feel the time is right. Yes, No, Yes, No, Yes Since the awful day they first stepped into the national spotlight, President Clinton and Bill proclaimed that they were opposed to term limits on members of Congress. Why? Because their comrades in liberal thought (for lack of a better word) held the power on Capitol Hill. No, term limits were a bad idea. A Constitutional amendment would take away the right of the people to vote for the candidate of their choice. The people were smart enough to know who to vote for. They didn't need term limits. But a funny thing happened on the way to socialism. November 8 happened. Suddenly, their friends weren't there to help anymore. Suddenly, there was a speaker who was talking about smaller government, cutting off government funding of public broadcasting and the National Endowment for the Arts, and selling off Congressional office buildings. In short, it's a whole Newt world. As part of the Contract with America, the new majority Republicans promised a vote on term limits in the first 100 days of the 104th Congress. Seeing the inevitable coming down the pike, President Clinton and Bill shifted with the prevailing winds again and announced that not only should Congress pass a term limits measure, but they should make it retroactive so it applies to current members and would prevent them from running again. So, the logic here is: We are opposed to term limits, period. But we want the Congress to pass limits that will immediately boot Republicans out of Congress. Isn't that kind of like saying you hate lime Jell-O and then deciding to take a swim in a vat of it? Just a small shift in policy. Did the American electorate suddenly become stupid? Well, the results from the elections blow a gaping hole in that theory. The simple fact is as long as things went their way and they were safe, the libs hated the idea of term limits. Now, with their enlightened allies tossed out of Congress on their, uh, ears_ yeah, ears_ the Clintons are scrambling to get on board a train that left the station a long time ago. Everyone can see that this is nothing more than cheap and cynical political grandstanding by a president (and her husband) who wants desperately to be popular. The president of a group that has been lobbying for term limits for years even rejected their flip-flop as a ploy. The sad, but now all-too-familiar, thing is they don't even stick to their own liberal values. Quote of the weak: "Nay." The Democrats, when voting on the Contract with America Quote of the strong: "Aye." The Republicans, when voting on the Contract with America Words to Live By is published every week at about this time by Spiff. You can send a fax to us here in the Spiff Executive Plaza, towering over beautiful downtown Donelson, Tennessee at 615-883-0435.