Recently some local students at the Martin County High School Junior Achievement Club put together a website and planned a "Recovery Rally" to bring attention to the unemployment and the high foreclosure and business failure rate which plagues our county. They put together a video with the object of sending it to the President as an invitation to attend. It ended with a proud "yes we can!" Some would call that sort of community spirit and enthusiasm inspiring, others:
COMMUNISM! MARXISM!
Imagine allowing citizens to petition for redress of grievances! Why that's just like Pol Pot or Ho Chi Min! What kind of good ol' cracker conservatives would permit that without a fight? I mean it would have been OK to invite Bush and indeed when he made a five minute appearance after Hurricane Frances flattened several counties; when he disrupted critical activities at the Red Cross and then promptly forgot about us, he was sold as a hero, but then, he wasn't a Marxist, Muslim, Communist, Kenyan Antichrist who pals around with Terrorists and murders old women, you betcha.
Yes I'm ashamed. I'm ashamed at the letters from idiots who write to the local paper. I'm ashamed of people who want to pull their kids out of a school that allows kids to participate in peaceful attempts to attract government interest -- because Government is, by the Gospel of St. Ronald, all evil. Diana Blackard went on Fox last week to howl at the moon about her daughter's future being ruined by having said "yes we can" in public.
“I’m concerned about this turning up 20 years from now when she’s running for political officer [sic] herself, trying to get a high-profile job,”Certainly it constitutes paling around with terrorists to promote local businesses. It's almost treason to suggest that the people can do anything at all in a democracy without it being communism and Fascism. It's dangerous to respect the president, said another deranged citizen writing to the paper.
"since the dems think respect is given like all their other entitlements."Hard to know what he means but then insanity is like that, Republican politics are like that.
"I resent dealing with people who believe they can spit on us and burn our flag "says the dishonest but passionate Fox-Republican of the President of the United States -- without any apparent concern that he's done neither, or anything remotely like it.
"Filled with vile hatred, there is no common ground"says a writer of all who support any effort to let the government be the government, all who are willing to use the government to serve the people, all those who reject the cancerous, self-hating, self-defeating Fox-Fundamentalist doctrines choking the life out of our country. Unaware like so many of the brown-shirt thugs of Martin County Florida of being a maggot, a vile worm eating away at the heart of America.
Why those little commie-islamo-fascist pinkos! How dare they invite the Great Satan to their school?
ReplyDeleteAn optimistic general thought: in spite of all the savagery and stupidity manifesting themselves on the part of the "(white is) right" crowd of racists (and that is what they are, those who so passionately and personally hate Barack Obama rather than simply disagreeing with his philosophy and policies), demographics tell us that their day has come and is rapidly receding. The country at large is increasingly diverse in its racial composition, more accepting of its gay and lesbian citizens, and more open to women being in positions of authority.
That is, in fact, why the right-fringers are becoming so vicious now, even though some of them are too dim-witted to comprehend the details of the demographic and cultural trends.
MLK and others involved in grand historical movements have always known that change for the better WILL provoke the remnant who can't tolerate alteration of any kind. In this sense, their bad behavior is actually a sign that things are moving forwards all around them: the dogs and the water-cannons are only brought out when somebody's demanding rights, when somebody insists that old wrongs be redressed.
But this, too, will pass -- if we can deal wisely with and divert some of the "passionate intensity" of the worst among us, we have a good chance of making it to the other side with the republic intact.
On better days, at least, this is my "historicizing" outlook, and it largely pushes aside a sense of impending tragedy that is also drawn from a reading of American history.
But this, too, will pass.
ReplyDeleteWise Dino's words -- and dinos know a thing or two about things passing, having a unique perspective that's allowed them to witness passing of just about everything that's existed on this planet.
I too believe so -- but I am frustrated by the slow progress of "the passing" in this country. We are, as it is, decades behind the rest of the civilized world. I'd like to see some decisive change for the better in my lifetime (without moving to, say, Finland -- I'm "homeless" as it is).
P.S. This is just dreadful, on so many levels:
“I’m concerned about this turning up 20 years from now when she’s running for political officer [sic] herself, trying to get a high-profile job,”
Ugh.
(This too shall pass. This too shall pass. This too...)
Thanks, Elizabeth,
ReplyDeleteI have indeed seen much pass into prehistory. Yes, the quotes Capt. Fogg references are awful -- particularly the "20 years from now" one, which seems to be implying that by then we will be able to look back at the Obama years as some kind of coup period, an aberration, an intrusion wrought by sinister outside influences. Hmmmm.... Doesn't this person realize that BHO WON THE ELECTION, AND WON IT RATHER HANDILY AT THAT?
That's one awful thing about it, Dino.
ReplyDeleteThen there is the paranoia.
Then the fact that the paranoia is related to her child's spontaneous expression of optimism, hope and good will.
Then the sense of entitlement -- really, is your child destined to run for political office or high-powered job?
Then the grandiose (and authoritarian) assumption that she knows what her child will (should) do in adulthood.
Then...
Eh, I better stop.
If it's any consolation to robo-Mommy regarding her concerns about her bewildered offspring's career opportunities in the future it's possible the little tyke will grow into an adult with issues surrounding infidelity and substance abuse for which she will be 'forgiven'. I can imagine rolling this childish misstep into the mix and receiving a one size fits all absolution.
ReplyDeleteWe are, after all, a Christian nation.
Summers - “Our tax dollars go to finance the school system. Those kids have a hell of a lot more to do in the classrooms than going to parade up and down in an open field to send a video to Washington ...”
ReplyDeleteAnother hot-headed parent dictating terms to the students, the school, and the community. 'Authoritarian' isn't quite the right word, and I don't know any word, or phrase, or sentence, or essay, or volumes of books, or even centuries of civilization that can sum up this momentary stupidity ... except for this thought:
Kids are not stupid, and they have instincts and perceptions that are sharper than those of any adult. If there is a teaching moment here, it will certainly be lost on the adults but not necessarily on the kids.
Thank goodness the kids have some brains! They'll no doubt go far in life if they can withstand their oppressive parental heavy handedness.
ReplyDeleteThey're no smarter than their parents, they just have slightly different software that allows them to watch Jon Stewart, for instance, instead of Murdoch's propaganda machine.
ReplyDelete