((Brian's note: Trent Rice is a talk show host at KASI Radio in Ames, Iowa. He is married with one son and twin daughters. His kids were born on the same date, just five years apart))

 Can we PLEASE quit using the word "liberal" like it's one of those words Mr. Carlin said a long time ago we couldn't say on TV (or radio, for that matter?) There used to be a time when people were proud to be liberal. Now they run away from it like it's on fire. Good work outta you, conservatives!

 I trace the whole thing back to a pair of things that happened back in 1988. Then Vice-President George H.W. Bush beat at little known Massachusetts governor for the presidency, and the Godfather of Talk Radio got his first national syndication deal. Both men found success by tossing around the word "liberal" like Jay Z "makes it rain" $20 bills in strip clubs. Bush hung "liberal" around Mikey Dukakis' neck like a 10 ton anchor chain and Rush Limbaugh helped-- in spades. By the time Newt Gingrich issued his GOP-lead "Contract On America" in 1994, conservatives had painted anyone remotely to their political left as patchouli-stinking, tree-hugging, baby-killing, Jesus-hating, tax-raising, American-bashing hippies. Now, there may have been some of those folks around at that time, but methinks they were too busy driving their VW buses from one Grateful Dead concert to another and don't give a whit about politics. And yes, I just used the word whit.

 Flash foward to 2008. Today, any half-witted talk show host (post, meet kettle-black) who wants to get off on a political blast will blame everything from the faltering economy to the cancellation of "Manimal" on "those damn liberals". In our poltiics for the lowest common denominator world, "liberal" in 2008 is what "communist" was in 1953. Added to the mix in 2008, a fleet of local and national talk show hosts, on radio and TV, who are more than willing to bat clean-up for Joe McCarthy.

 Here’s a challenge to you true liberals out there.  TAKE BACK YOUR TITLE! Quit calling yourself “progressives” and proudly wear the tag.  In the 1940’s “liberals” pulled the county out of a crippling depression, put a spring back in our collective step, and won a world war.  At the very least, take your title back just so conservatives will quit using it like a dirty word, spit from between clenched jaws and gnashed teeth.

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