"...giving alcohol a bad name..."

You've got to love Wanda Sykes! She cuts through the typical BS and gets right down to "brass-tacks" (as my Southern grandmother was want to say). Like Wanda, I'm really tired of people blaming their bad behavior on alcohol or abuse or whatever is "in" at the moment. Unfortunately, all too often when one of the "moralistic" crew screws up (ala Mel Gibson, soon to be former OH Rep Ney or Mark Foley), it seems that the first inclination is to find something or someone to blame. And lately it's been alcohol. Like Wanda, I've been pretty drunk on occassion and guess what...I haven't tried to blame the world's problems on Jews, accept bribes in exchange for doling out political favors or lure uncomfortable teens into something sacred that should be reserved for consenting adults!

People wonder why "God's Own Party" seems to get punished harder by scandals that without fail touch both parties. Could it be that maybe, just maybe, the GOP, who has loudly proclaimed itself to be the party of morals and moral values, has shown complete failure when it comes to keeping it's own house clean. Personal observation has taught me probably what it's taught you, that those who bleat the loudest about moral issues are usually the ones with the biggest problem. The funny thing is that these people preach like they were at an old-fashioned arbor camp meeting from back in the day, loudly and longly proclaiming that those without a moral compass take the easy way out by finding scape goats (i.e. assigning blame). But as soon as you catch one of these moralistic, bombastadeers with their pants down, or their hand in the cookie jar, they conveniently find something or someone to blame their behavior on. Practicing what they preach isn't really a main-stay from what I see of the zealots on the extreme right.

I was thinking about this the other day, particularly in reference to some who believe that being gay can be blamed on past abuse. They bang the drum that says the reason they had a "gay phase" was because they were abused when they were underage. They then proceed to blame their promiscuous, drug-addled experience on said abuse. I saw someone recently who said that their entire "gay phase" (and did they ever have a doosey one of) could be blamed on that fact that at 13 they messed around with a 16 year old. It would be laughable if it weren't so sad.

It all comes back down to the fact that people, no matter what label they want to use, don't like to accept responsibility. It's so much easier to point fingers than it is to look at the hard reality that maybe, just maybe, we screwed the pooch all by ourselves. That no one held a gun to our head and forced us. That it wasn't that older teen who diddle us that forced us into a life of promiscuity. That it wasn't the fact that we have a drinking problem that caused us to rail against the Jews, hand out political favors like they were candy, or chase after under-age boys. NOPE! Looking at the mess we've made honestly is hard! I know...I've had to do it!

It's time to quit the blame game!! Quit blaming the alcohol or abuse or whatever and start pointing the finger directly at the source of the problem...YOU!!! It seems that people conveniently forget is that alcohol, or any other drug, only serves as a highlighter. Blaming is easy and convenient and takes the focus off of where true responsibility lies! Plus, as long as you find someone else to blame, you'll never really find help! The moralistic crew needs to quit blaming everyone else for their screw-ups! They need to quit speaking out of both sides of their mouth like Hastert recently when he said the "buck stops here" then proceeded to try to pin the blame for his shortcombings on his political opponents!

You know, they really should write a manual for the high and mighty moralistic crew. The first rule should be...if you are going to screw up and make a jackass out of yourself then DON'T blame alcohol!! It gives alcohol a bad name!!

j.