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The Peanut Gallery is Nuts
Author: BobR    Date: 07/18/2012 12:42:46

We heard them during the 2008 presidential campaign - the stupid people that thought Barack Obama was born in Kenya, the people that thought he was a Muslim. We heard them during the health care debate - people that claimed "death panels" would determine if Granny lived or died. It seems we hear them every time a piece of legislation comes up that the Republicans want to make a stink over. It's been four years and with the presidential campaigns in high gear again, we are hearing them ever louder.

There's an old saying that says "ye reap what ye sow". These people have evidentally sown seeds of hate, because their venom, paranoia, and willingness to believe and repeat the most absurd allegations about President Obama has reached full blossom.

Predictably (and against all evidence), they are CERTAIN that the president is scheming to violate the 2nd Amendment in totality. I've read on numerous occasions that the REAL reason the president hasn't made a single move towards confiscating everyone's guns is because he's trying to lull us into complacency so he can go full-on anti-gun in his 2nd term. Yeah, that makes sense (*rolls eyes*). The latest gun-grab-paranoia is the UN Arms Trade Treaty. This is designed to minimize arms trafficking. Combine the UN with anything related to guns, and these people will assume a conspiracy.

There are also the political science-challenged "experts" that tag President Obama with labels like "Marxist", socialist, and a dictator, bent on becoming dicator-for-life with the help of his "friends" in the Muslim Brotherhood. They use terms like "Community Organizer" as if that was a bad thing (kind of like how the word "liberal" was equated with unAmerican 10 years ago). They claim the president is "destroying America" and "destroying our freedoms", yet when pressed to enumerate which freedoms are being destroyed, they are unable to articulate them. Even pundits can't help themselves, comparing Obama to Mussolini.

There's also the cognitive disconnect when people criticize the president for something he didn't actually do, while ignoring when their candidate actually does it. Here's a post tacitly accusing the president of going on a worldwide campaign tour to get donations from foreigners. These are actually fundraisers hosted by expats, getting donations from expats, and the president is not attending any of them. Meanwhile, Romney actually IS attending a fundraiser in England.

It seems the further you get away from the actual candidates themselves, the crazier the rhetoric. Yet there is plenty of bile to spread around, and sometimes people who should know better let their Id take over and open their yaps and vent their spleen. Most recently, former NH Governor John Sununu called the Obama campaign a "bunch of liars", a comment for which he was later required to apologize. A Republican official in Vermont ended up apologizing for a post he made on Facebook:
The original post talked about a "2012 Social Security Stimulus Package" that included cornbread mix, discount coupons to Kentucky Fried Chicken and a prayer rug. Prayer rugs are used by Muslims in religious observances.

It added that the contents of the "stimulus package" included an "'Obama Hope & Change' bumper sticker, and a 'Blame it on Bush' poster for the front yard. The directions were in Spanish."

The nastiness from the right-wing started on a low burn in '94, and the heat has been slowly increasing. 9/11 really DID change "everything", as well. Common decency and respect fell when the towers did, and it's been wide open vitriol ever since. Regardless of who gets elected, I don't see this changing. The nuts have come out of their shell, and won't be pushed back into them.
 

42 comments (Latest Comment: 07/18/2012 23:42:30 by BobR)
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