She’s a Democrat.

She’s a dirty, smelly, unshaven, tree-hugging, homeless-aiding,frog-licking Democrat.

Or…

She’s a Republican.

She’s an uptight, cranky, homophobic, oil-grubbing, tax-cutting,squirrel-chasing Republican.

Yes, it does get that ridiculous.

Seriously.

When did political-party affiliations become the worst insultswe can level at each other?

The latter half of 2004 has left me longing for the playgrounddays of calling each other monkey face, booger head, or buttbreath. Those days were simpler, safer, less angry.

Lately, we’ve all been so busy calling each other those dirtynames – Republican, Democrat, conservative, liberal – that we’vesacrificed coherent political dialogue, and more than a bit of ourpersonal dignities.

And neither side is innocent when it comes to this juvenileslander. Yes, Democrats do swear at the TV when Bush comes onscreen. And, yes, Republicans do come to speeches just to causetrouble. Propaganda is mass-produced and delivered by both sidesduring rallies and meetings.

The problem is, both parties seem to have taken a “my way or thehighway” mentality. To Republicans, nothing Democrats do is right.To Democrats, nothing Republicans do is right.

To me, neither side is right.

Party names have become swear words. From now on, I’ll refer tothe two parties as booger heads and monkey faces. I don’t want tooffend any sensitive readers with excessive use of the R and Dwords.

Monkey faces and booger heads have been so wrapped up in sayingthat their side is right and the other side is wrong that they haveeliminated any chance of a compromise.

While the booger heads were busy saying how a monkey-facepresident would be bad for homeland security, 400 pounds ofexplosives went missing in Iraq.

While the monkey faces were busy saying that the booger-headpresident is losing the war on terror, many of Osama bin Laden’saides were being captured.

The monkey faces make sure to mention that the booger headdoesn’t give speeches well. The booger heads make sure to mentionthat the monkey face is a flip-flopper.

Yes, being a monkey face or a booger head comes with manynegative connotations.

But it’s not just the national booger heads and monkey facesthat are guilty of the degrading party affiliation titles toinsults.

Honestly, the worst thing you could call a monkey face is abooger head.

And the worst this you could say to a booger head is, “You’resuch a monkey face.”

And calling people these things only makes the situation worse:It’s like telling a guy he’s a wimp. You tell him that, and thenhe’s got to go and beat up three other guys just to prove he’s nota wimp.

So call a monkey face a booger head, and he’ll just go out andact more monkey-faced just to prove he’s not a booger head.

All this name-calling eliminates the chance for intelligentdialogue between the two sides. Neither side wants to be anythinglike the other, slamming the door on any hope of cooperation.

Republicans and Democrats have been so wrapped up in provingthey’re not the other side that they’ve largely missed a discussionof the important things: America’s lack of a national health careplan, why college grads can’t find good jobs and why women stillearn less money than men.

Not only is this kind of name-calling a blemish on our nationalunity, it doesn’t speak well of our creativity. Seriously, theworst names anyone can think of are Democrat and Republican? Can’twe be more creative than that?

At least when we were kids we were more descriptive.

Now that the election’s over, hopefully the two sides will getaway from their playground actions and actually focus on thepressing issues.

Will monkey faces and booger heads actually be able to coexistpeacefully on the swingset of life, now that the voters havespoken?

I hope so.

I don’t know if I can take any more days of dodging partyaffiliation mud slinging.

As for me, I’m sticking to my playground roots – yes, I remain abutt breath.

I’m a no-good independent.