Yes, they sure did have more stuff than last time, which was a few years ago. The walls were festooned with T-shirts comparing Obama to Mao Zedong and a whole pandemonium of tyrants. One showed some Greek columns and read "Obama -- molon labe" a reference to the words the Spartans supposedly said to the Persians when asked to turn over their weapons: "come and get them." Tools, motorcycles, construction equipment, raggedy stereos, drum sets, guitar amplifiers and shelves full of stuff to the point where I could hardly walk -- and guns: lots of them.
A large plasma TV had Fox news blaring out the hysterics of the day and the friendly pistol packin' proprietor oversaw a forest of racked long guns and glass cases of overpriced handguns.
"You can't trust the government to do anything" he was saying to a couple of camo hatted compatriots. "Except maybe to run an army"
"Not even that!" replied one. "They should just tell the generals what they want done and then let them run it the way they want."I feigned interest in an 1851 Colt Navy revolver with all the original finish gone (I'm quite sure it was a fake) while the conversation shifted to why they weren't racists for hating "that
SOB" it's just that he's such a far-left radical and why any competent president would have restored the economy to it's former glory under George Bush - he's had months, after all.I grew up on science fiction and I'm used to stories that begin with someone walking though holes in space-time into other universes. I thought maybe I'd just walked into the fantasy universe of the Republicans but I'm not too sure what I walked back into is real either. In the "real" world, there's a new video game out, I read today. It's another alternate reality where "patriots" can compete to capture Obama before he can:
"toss out the Constitution, ban guns and merge the U.S. with Canada and Mexico into a 'North American Union.' "As with science fiction, the stuff I liked best had some degree of possibility attached to it. This thing only stinks of stale sweat, damp basements, fear and industrial disinfectant -- like a madhouse: like America.
Capt, that video game is surely interesting:
ReplyDeleteIn this virtual world, the magazine notes that players can also add to their fun by making up news headlines about events like Michelle Malkin writing the Second Declaration of Independence or Hillary Clinton using children to shield herself from attacks.
Fun and classy! No small feat.
Fox News has been shut down, Glenn Beck has been found dead of a suspicious aspirin overdose
An aspirin overdose? Now that's a stretch. Aren't aspirin containers child-proof these days? Hm, I guess that's why it would be considered suspicious.
The escalation Sturm und Drang would suggest increased opposition, but I read today that the Republicans' positive ratings are the lowest in 25 years, the average guy's taxes haven't gone up and are probably lower under Obama who still has better than 53% approval which is nearly twice that of Bush over the last years. Obama hasn't further limited Bush's limitations to civil rights or pushed through any "gun grabber" legislation or done any of the things they've hysterically predicted -- yet they haven't noticed. In fact gun rights have been expanded. You can carry weapons in National parks now.
ReplyDeleteSmall fires make a lot of smoke, but I don't want to downplay the insanity. For a hard core, it's getting worse and worse even when it isn't.
From John Birchers to Birthers: The right's paranoid political style has gone mainstream, by Thomas Frank (WSJ, October 20, 2009):
ReplyDeleteJust a few years ago the right percolated with grand schemes to "defund the left," to win a "permanent majority," to destroy the Democrats with a "K Street Project," to outsource government itself and wreck the regulatory process—but now its liveliest leaders turn to us, fat glycerine tears running down their cheeks, and complain that the libs just don't play fair.
Invoking Richard Hofstadter's "The Paranoid Style in American Politics," some flea market stuff is perfectly serviceable ... even after 45 years.
I keep hearing, from folks who think that the 2nd Amendment IS the U.S. Constitution that the "left" wants to take away their guns.
ReplyDeleteI must have missed the literally hundreds of bills that have been passed by both house and senate during each and every administration going back to General Washington's and, and--where was I? Oh, yeah, effin' lefties aren't goin get my guns!!
"going back to General Washington's and, and--where was I?"
ReplyDeleteWow, and I thought I was old for remembering Truman!