Friday, July 10, 2009

We the People eat Fruit Salad ...

Invitation found stuck on my front door regarding a neighborhood rally: "WE THE PEOPLE invite you to join your neighbors for an informational meeting about protecting your rights. Learn about our constitution and government. Don't miss this opportunity to get involved. Fruit salad will be served."

Suspecting this "WE THE PEOPLE" group to be a spawn of the Tea Baggers or Birthers, I had no interest in attending. The Tea Baggers held local rallies here over the 4th of July weekend featuring T-Shirts, bumper stickers and coffee mugs sporting old tired propaganda about Obama not being an american. yessiree. time warp.

But as fate would have it, tonight the D.K. family found themselves walking our dog near the neighborhood park where the "Fruit Salad" being served by WE THE PEOPLE was already in progress. We witnessed a small gathering of people rapturously listening to a lively speaker. As we drew closer, our ears began picking up isolated words like, "Hitler" and "Propaganda Machine".

Taking our time walking the dog around the perimeter of the gathering, we were able to hear more than we cared to about how Obama is worse than Hitler, about how socialism and communism are taking over america, about how it is now up to the people to revolt and take back their government. Hoping to hear HOW they intend to this, something that eluded democrats during Bush's 8-year reign of constitutional assault, we hung around long enough to understand that their insidious plans include, gasp, the compilation of an email list in order to alert fellow like-minded people of further Hitlerian activities as they occur!

Jeez, we thought, is that the weapon they intend to fight Hitler with, an email list? Needless to say we did not eat any fruit salad, which in any case had attracted more flies than people to the rally. The lack of people who showed up did not go unnoticed by the speaker who taunted, "your neighbors are AFRAID to show up because they are anti-christian." REALLY? In the most religious state in america, my neighborhood is full of christian-haters? Good to know!

I think what we witnessed is an example of the mental break-down of right-wingers who just cannot stand it anymore. It's happening in every state to those who follow the ravings of Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity, et al. I feel kind of sorry for them because they are apparently experiencing the same feelings of powerlessness that many of us felt for eight long bush-years ... not sorry enough to suppress my inner glee, but as long as they stick to verbal or email rallies, they are not violating any laws, assuming they are not promoting violence.

I didn't always feel so tolerant, but after viewing the HBO documentary, "Shouting Fire: Stories from the Edge of Free Speech", I feel pretty good about resisting my urge to shout at my fruit salad eating neighbors ... where was their constitutional concern when Bush was suspending Habeus Corpus, extending Illegal Wiretaps, invading a Foreign Country based on a pack of lies, setting himself up as a Wartime President with unprecedented powers, using fear to enact The Patriot Act, implementing free speech zones and loyalty oaths, etc/etc/etc????

{Link to 1-minute Promo YouTube for "Shouting Fire"} ... produced by Rory Kennedy and Liz Garbus. The whole documentary is definitely worth seeing, especially the conclusion about how our first amendment rights will continue to be adversely affected for at least the next 30-years by Bush's "young" Supreme court appointments. And yes, that is Prof Ward Churchill saying 'kiss my ass' in the promo (click his name to read the "manifesto" that got him fired from Univ Colorado Boulder).

Final D.K. thought of the day: avoid the fruit salad at any neighborhood rally, especially if Hitler is being discussed! Luckily we had already eaten our dinner, which included the salad pictured, and so were able to leave the rally with our brains still intact.

17 comments:

Annette said...

The wing nuts have really gone around the bend. Between spouting claims that the President is Hitler, and marching us toward Socialism or Marxism or something ism...lol Or just destroying our country, when I thought the Former Occupant had already done a pretty good job of that. I guess since he "kept us so safe" for the last 8 years, except when he didn't.. they slept through all the things he did wrong and really didn't pay attention to everything else, besides they had "Fair and Balanced" Fox News to stay on top of everything, making sure that Limpaugh was backing them up with guard duty..

D.K. Raed said...

Annette:
oooh, that "Former Occupant" ... took him 8-yrs to totally eff things up, almost beyond repair. That's why I can't understand complaints about Obama's plans not working. Hey, no one said this was gonna be easy or quick! He's been there less than 6-months and the FOX zombies are already calling him a failed prez.

in UT, we are "treated" to Fox News in every public place imaginable ... Banks, Post Office, Restaurants, even the freakin' Pharmacy fer crissakes! It reinforces the zombie brains that they are right and everyone else is wrong. No wonder they are so afraid to step outside of their little cocoon world!

Annette said...

I know, it is almost as bad here in MO.. we are still a very red state in most ways.. Kansas City and St Louis go Blue, but these out areas where I live are very red.. So I know exactly what you mean.. My landlord and my mailman were amused with me and made several little comments about my Obama/Biden 2008 signs in my windows and on my door...lol But that's okay, I left them there for a long time and still have one up...just to rub it in...lol

Yes, I am treated too, to the "pleasure" of Fox in almost every place I go and if not then it is CNN, which in my estimation is almost as bad...lol

D.K. Raed said...

Annette:
Good to know the ubiquitous public Fox TV isn't just a local phenom! I've tried complaining to the post office & bank. Their TV's are mounted high up on walls to provide "entertainment" for people standing in line. I would much rather they tuned to CNN, but they think that is too liberal! I've been told I'm the only person who has EVER complained!

At a restaurant I spied a reachable remote control and flipped the station to MSNBC. It was very gratifying to see the TV was still on MSNBC when I went back to that same restaurant a few weeks later! I like to think the employees & patrons liked the change, not that they are too lazy to care.

I won't say anything to our pharmacy since I depend on them for vital meds! I don't want them making avoidable errors while fuming over my complaint about FOX, lol. That's all I'd need!

My Obama yard sign is STILL a topic of conversation among our neighbors. I only put it out for the final week of the election and left it up for a few glorious days afterwards (to gloat). So now I am constantly treated to their sarcastic remarks about our country turning socialist and that Obama himself is a baby-killer. Their discomfort level is palpably rising which pleases me greatly!

ps, you should know it was one of your posts asking what the right-wingers are doing locally that inspired me to tell about the fruit salad rally. thanks!

Annette said...

D.K. you had asked about Ensigns's parents being part of the Gaming Crowd.. I couldn't remember for sure where I had seen it..but I just found something again about it.. Now they may be retired, I am not sure, but here is another reference from TPM that I found, They are or were part of the Mandalay Group and had shares they had sold that was valued at around $300 million...just a small chunk of change there.. so the $96,000 they gave to the Hampton's wasn't going to hurt them...lol

I have the link if you want to read it.

D.K. Raed said...

Annette:
I was just reading that Ensign's father (adoptive) is a retired CEO of Mandalay Bay. The father (adoptive) and mother are "fabulously wealthy", so $96,000 means nothing to them -- in fact, IRS rules allow them to keep giving that amount EVERY year to The Hamptons and their 2 kids without incurring the gift tax ($12K/yr per spouse to each recipient)!

Ensign (whose membership in the weirdly named "Pentecostal International Church of the Foursquare Gospel" makes me laugh) is a self-righteous born-again evangelical promise-keeper prig who started his Nevada political career by sliming his democratic opponent (Bilbray) for something Bilbray's aide did. I hope the people of Nevada oust his hypocritical keyster soon.

Fran said...

Step away from the fruit salad???

Run DK RUN !!!!!!!!!!!!

I loved all your appropriate points about the Bush regime's vast array of fuck ups & law breaking & criminal activities (ohhhh the list is long).

It's mind blowing to think they never once noticed the *flaming constitution* of the Bush years.

This broken record of Socialism....
half these people just echo the talking point without realizing the Social Security check, the Medicare prescription plan, the Disability program & senior care offerings ARE "socialist programs"....

It's what your hard earned tax money should be doing..... get filtered back to you when you have needs.

Or we could just buy Wars & have the Military Industrial complex be our buggest line item in the budget.

Oh wait! We are already doing that!

D.K. Raed said...

Fran:
I know I will NEVER be able to look at Fruit Salad in the same way again! Whatever those zombies were eating should be avoided by any rational person.

You make excellent points about socialist programs we've had in place for decades. I don't mind my tax money going for those programs at all. It's the obscene amount going toward war and death and spying on citizens that cause me chest pain, as well as the unfairness of bush's war expansion (enriching halliburton & blackwater etc) being pushed through at the same time as tax cuts for the wealthy (investors in halliburton & blackwater etc) -- and that doesn't even begin to touch on how tax cuts for the wealthy coupled with financial deregulation inspired the big banking investment scams that brought the world economy to its knees! Does any of that penetrate the zombie right-wing brain pans, or do they think we just landed in this mess since Obama took office?

When one of my neighbors cornered me about the U.S. "turning" socialist, I just shook my head & murmured, "it's about time we caught up with europe". Now this neighbor is a guy who has spent a lot of time in europe, who loves it there, but is simply unable to make the mental leap about WHY he likes it so much there. All that socialism, the proverbial safety net, is what keeps europe humming. His response to me is that he wouldn't want to be taxed like europeans. When I try to point out we already ARE paying just as much, whether it's called income tax or not, he simply cannot see it. Zombie-brains cannot think beyond their next fruit salad meal...ick...

Mauigirl said...

I've never understood this hatred of "socialism" among the right wingers. Especially since a lot of their supporters are not very well off and probably would benefit from some of the so-called socialist programs themselves.

Glad you avoided that fruit salad! Yours looked much better anyway!

a ball of Light said...

congratulations on your 200th post! way to go DK

lol @ zombie brains... as in desiccated, moldy and dripping out their noses onto their paper plated fruit salad?... that image was good for a belly laugh...

shame you can't tell the zombie brain reinforcement establishments that you develop hives after 37 seconds of FAUXtruth® and it is too bad FOX has the court's blessing to lie to it's audience. apparently what is legal for the pentagon to do is also a legal right for FOX.

...the herd grazes contentedly on, actually favoring those water holes where their FAUXtruth®Fix™ awaits and slakes that terrible thirst brought on by dimly and unconsciously sensed extinction-event foreboding...

your commandeering of the brain-drip control device is a fiendishly clever counter-zombie move. rather than liking the change or being too lazy possibly they simply have not noticed any thing different, except maybe that their exposure to and tendency towards tourette-like exclamations of "SOCIALISM" has been reduced by what... 1/(88%ofPubliclyPlayedTV)(TVSetsinYourHood).
if that became a foundation act of semi-passive resistance to group-mind hypnosis it would, at the very least, allow some of the more higher functioning of the herd a chance to exercise their atrophied right pre-frontal cortex and a feeling in the morning that maybe people are mostly good and maybe even more important than 'things'...

i kinda think that having FAUXtruth® endlessly blaring at the consumption-zombie herd and reinforcing the accepted, acceptable conservative group meme is a technique for soothing the beasts until Rushboreilly Limpbeckerman-Sachs decides it is time for civil war (or cover for the bankster redoubt retreat). then FAUXtruth® will have its fingers made to go "SNAP" and the zombies will rampage. (Be sure to stockpile enough fruit-salad to use as bait and distraction. rancidity may even make your bait more attractive.)

D.K. Raed said...

Maui Girl:
good point! how on earth do they get people to vote against their own interests? oh yeah, by appealing to a made-up set of moral values. holy crap do I find it offensive that my values are so offensive to them. ps, I thought our salad looked much nicer, too. Must've been the creamy cucumber dressing the Hub made. At least it wasn't floating in flies!

Mr Ball:
thanks for noticing it was my 200th! never thought I'd make it this far. thanks too for all the interesting links. I want one of those TV remote jammer thingies for some covert de-zombification of the local public TV fox fixation. and yes, I do wonder if the fox herd have been the secret victims of mass rightbrain PFC excisions. maybe in their sleep, since they probably leave fox running on the TV all night. how would we (or they) ever know, eh?

enigma4ever said...

omg...scary...I hope Dear Dog took a GIANT dump by this "gathering" holy hell - HITLER?????omg...

wow....

be careful out there...

sheeeesh WHO are these people ?????what year is it ????

D.K. Raed said...

Enigma:
aaahhhahahahah, if only our scurrilous hound had had it in him, he would've willingly complied, I'm sure!

I can just see the headlines next day: "HOUND ATTEMPTS TO DUMP ON HITLER while Socialist owner praises his efforts, vows to feed him more metamucil before next We The People Gathering!"

sadly, these people are my neighbors and their brains are stuck somewhere back in the twilight zone.

a ball of Light said...

i've read that the republicanism sub-species is looking to celebrate St. Ronnie's 100th birthday in a couple of years.

We celebrated early...

Chip says Hi to your scurrilous hound...

D.K. Raed said...

Mr Ball:
OMG I almost fell off my chair! That is the funniest (and MOST appropriate) dog dump pose! Chip is very, ummm, talented! I especially liked that he was licking his lips, no doubt over what he was anticipating would be his greatest masterpiece, one that would attract many ooohs & aaaahs, at least until the next gardner clean-up. Thanks for the wonderful belly laugh!

Dada said...

Jesus Christ: Someone needs to seriously talk to your neighborhood "We the People" fruit salad gathering event coordinator. (Hmmm, maybe it you were to take up the challenge, D.K., you could work your way up the organization?)

But what the hell kind of enemic crowd draw do they expect, serving fruit salad without serving the Kool-Aid® too?

Dada ~ (now officially employed as a Kraft Foods sales account executive.)

D.K. Raed said...

Dada:
whoaaah ... how could I have forgotten about the Kool-Aid ... I'm sure they must've had some out on the fruit salad table. How else to explain the glazed faces and nodding heads of the "enemic crowd"? BTW I got such a huge laugh from your phrase, I hope it wasn't a typo, that you were deliberately making a new word combining enema with anemia!

and hahaha! no I will most certainly NOT be attempting to infiltrate their organization or speak at one of their events. I value my neck too much. however if I find they are needing some food advice, I may recommend your craft skills. oh wait, since they don't imbibe fermented brew, maybe that's not such a good idea.