I called the man a racist—though not in so many words. I also called him an idiot, and an ass, and a fucker and assorted other things nobody likes to be called ever, let alone at a party. I called him a dick and a dildo and a bleeding canker and a twat and a know-nothing, and a greed-headed candidate for the worst person I’d met in ages.
The poor sonofabitch never saw my evil rant coming at him. How could he? It just escaped from my lips like a bunch of spring-loaded snakes from a fake can of peanut brittle. It was triggered by the following words:
“There’s something about Obama… and I can’t put my finger on it. I don’t think I know who he is and that scares me.”
“It’s because he’s a black man,” I said, walking away from the conversation and not looking back. “You’re afraid of him because he’s black. It’s as simple as that.”
“You don’t know me well enough to say that,” the guy called after me coolly, following in a non-threatening way.
Funny how these sorts of things never work in reverse. Moments ago he knew me well enough to adopt a fatherly tone and tell me that my feeble mind couldn’t grasp the economic sodomy Obama was prepared to unleash on small business owners.
“You don’t run a business,” he said warning me of the Democrat’s “Socialist agenda.”
I almost lost it then, as I’m quite unable to endure another lecture about how people who don’t run a small business don’t know beans about counting. I thought I might scream and call the guy an elitist and a brute. But I didn’t. At least not right off.
“Obama’s a Socialist,” I asked instead, almost civilly. He knew exactly where I was going. Obviously the Government had just taken over a huge chunk the mortgage and banking industry making America the first Socialist country in the world that didn’t even pretend to give a shit about its workers. This had happened as the result of Republican authored legislation and on the watch of a Republican President. But it was Obama--scary-ass Obama-- who was certain to suck all the blue and white off the flag leaving nothing but red.
The man paused and became defensive. He accepted that the current administration was a mess then complained that both parties were too corrupt to effect any real change. He ran through a long, weird litany of things that were wrong with John McCain whose policies he readily admitted would do nothing to stave off another Great Depression. But since the country was doomed no matter whatit’s probably better to have the former POW in charge he said.
“No matter what McCain or Palin say about war with Iran or Russia, we don’t have to worry about that,” he argued, unconvincingly in light of the past seven years. “Because America doesn’t have the money to pay for more war.”
“You do know that McCain’s economic advisers are the architects of the banking and lending crisis,” I asked, still calm. “You know he’s got Neocon foreign policy advisers who are too hawkish and out there for Bush and Cheney? Randy Scheunemann, who’s been tutoring Sarah Palin on foreign policy, was a paid lobbyist working for the Republic of Georgia.”
The guy just shrugs the information away as though he fails to see any problem.
“You say you think the country’s swirling down the crapper but you’re supporting a ticket insuring four more years of the same,” I said. I was no longer able to completely hide my contempt for the less faulty than phony reasoning behind the man’s stiff resolution. This fucker didn’t care if the whole Earth exploded as long as he didn’t have to pay more taxes and we both knew it. He’d confessed as much already and everything else that tumbled out of his mouth was either moral accounting Enron-style or nauseating personal affirmations to make himself feel a little better about being a complete tool.
“You don’t like where we’re headed but you think we should stay the course,” I scolded. And that’s when he pushed my button.
“There’s something about Obama… and I can’t put my finger on it…”
I’d thought about seeking common ground. I was on the verge of launching a discussion about how, in spite of lingering Socialist stereotypes from the 1960’s, post-Reagan Democrats like Clinton and Harold Ford Jr. had regularly enabled the worst aspects of contemporary conservatism. But instead I walked away calling the man a cock a prick and a doofus. I deeply regret that I didn’t also call him a self-deluding stooge and a coward.
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