sorry, charley--i needed a post, and you were it

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for those of you who do not know this already, blogging (at least, the way i do it) is hard fucking work.

and this is especially true when, like me, you're not only (a) self-defeatingly perfectionistic, but (b) clinically-depressed to the point that the only time you care that you even have a blog (much less feel like contributing meaningful content to same) is when you're about half-drunk and thus in rare contact with all those endorphins that make such caring possible (in other words, i'm exactly like fitzgerald and hemingway, except for the talent part).

and since one can't get drunk every night (although god, one wishes sometimes), one tends to find oneself limited in terms of content-potential to certain nights of the week.

and tonight? tonight was gonna be one of those nights. and what can i say--i blew it.

see, i had my sarah palin follow-up post planned for tonight--it was all laid out in my head, i was all primed up with alcohol and it was gonna be good, goddammit.

then i got sidetracked--i hit my blogroll first and came across this joe.my.god post (yeah, him again), coincidentally about the redoubtable governor palin. except this time, it wasn't joe's post that captured my attention; it was the resultant comment thread--most particularly, this one about her decision to give birth to a down-syndrome child, by someone who calls himself charley:

Down syndrome babies will never learn how to use a computer, never know how to drive a car, never know how to look after another person, never get married or be a productive family member, ect ect.. Most will be a drain on the social welfare of the state. Their unfortunate condition and it destroys the best of couples. Their condition brings pain and hardship of looking after them. My choice if I was a woman, I would abort the defective baby as soon as I got word from the lab tests. I would not want to pass that gene along. It's not fair to the child. It's not fair to humanity.

well, needless to say, this immediately got my attention, because, based on my experience on this site, ol' charley was about to get himself hammered, and i sat back to watch the fun.

and hammered he got--but charley wasn't finished; when challenged on his position, he then had this to say:

Name one down syndrone person that has ever accomplished anything for the benefit of humanity. If you do, then I rest my case.

and as you can imagine, several folks came to the defense of not only kids with down syndrome, but even to the hated right-wing sarah palin's right to bring such a child into the world. to which charley, unswayed from the rightness of his cause, replied:

That's her choice, and she is rich and famous and can afford nannies. I wouldn't give up my freedom to wheel a defective kid in a wheelchair around the rest of my life. I feel sad for the circumstances, but abortions are a choice and many women have made that choice.

and then, in response to all the liberals telling him how horrible he was, charley--pumped up, no doubt, with the courage of his convictions--went on to say:

Just being practical and not emotional. I am also compassionate thinking about the hardship the child will have to endure. Natural selection to improve the breed.

this, as you might imagine, evoked further outrage and more back-and-forth between charley and his detractors (which i'm not bothering to include here, because up to this point it's repetetive).

but then all of a sudden, charley divulged the following little nugget in response to a detractor who had taken exception to his previous mention of wheelchair cases:

I'm in a wheelchair, idiot. I was not talking about disabled people. I was thinking about the child. You are thinking in sentimental terms that all life is sacred.

that's when i started to smell blood--and i'll bet you can only imagine my delight when, in response to doubts from commenters that he was really in a wheelchair, charlie gave up the following:

I had a stroke at 74. I am not sure I will be permanently in a wheelchair. Hope not.

that was all the raw meat i needed--i was in. and my comment back to the estimable charley (and, ultimately, the reason you're not getting the palin post tonight) is as follows:

so charley, lemme get this straight: you're 74 AND disabled?! my goodness, talk about a "drain on the social welfare of the state!" i mean, seriously, chances are you're consuming far more than you're contributing these days--and, given your obvious concern for social welfare and shit, shouldn't you feel bad about that? oh, and gay, i presume? well, let's check off the "defective" box too, while we're at it.

so maybe when they've improved society by eliminating all the down-syndrome kids, they'll swing back around and put you and people like you outta your misery in the second wave--hell, they'd be doing you (and god knows, your family) a favor; i mean, how good could the quality of your life be with all that against you anyway?

are you pissed at me, charley, or do you see where i'm going with this? i mean, who are you--who is anybody--to presume to tie a human being's right to live to their potential for productivity to the state, or to judge the quality of someone else's life from the standpoint of one's own limited perceptions?

see, i'm a great believer in the slippery-slope theory, charley--especially when it comes to even the idea of deciding in advance whose life is worthwhile and whose isn't. because the folks who end up drawing that line might not be you--and if you're not careful or lucky, you just might find yourself on the wrong side of it.

anyway, think about it.

[good god, it's finally happened--i've righteously come down on the bleeding-heart side of a jmg comment thread. i can die now, i think.]

apologies to all of you, but this pithy comment not only took all the creative juice i had to offer tonight (and how fucking sad is that?), it's the reason some poor jmg commenter named charley got hisself thrown to the wolves on a blog he's never even fucking heard of.

and i'll give you some sarah lovin' tomorrow. or not.