TomFlannery.com

I’m not that quick to jump on the “hate speech” bandwagon. Let’s face it. If a guy can be talked into shooting someone by listening to Glen Beck or Rush Limbaugh on the radio, it’s a good bet he’s pretty far gone already. Folks who listen to talk radio of any sort are defective enough to start with. The last thing they require is a push off the ledge.

I do feel a bit of a twinge that it’s perfectly legal in Arizona for a diagnosed mental defective to walk into a store and walk out with a Glock 19…..but at least I’m 2,386 miles away from Tucson. I like to look at the bright side. However, Glock sales have surged since the shooting, coincidentally, which probably says more about where we are as a nation than all the rest of this story combined.

We’re pretty fucked, basically. Mired in a pile of shit. That’s what it says. But while rationality may have left the building, Elvis never truly died….so he’ll be back and the old biddies will be tossing underwear at him again in no time. You know that sentence makes perfect sense so there’s no need to read it again.

I used to dive headfirst into political debates but no more. Political bloviatiers are even worse than the politicians they bloviate about. I’ve got my own views, and even if I’m force-fed Fox News intravenously I’m not going to change them. I consider myself reasonably intelligent. I am reasonably educated. I can read (half the adults in this country are illiterate, so reading is not something I take for granted) and I like to think I’m sorta open-minded. I believe in what I can see with my own eyes. I think if somebody falls down you should help them up. If you help somebody up and then they steal your wallet that’s kinda bad form but I think these assholes are pretty rare. It’s been my experience that people needing the most help are often the most helpful. The reverse also seems to hold true, which can really piss a fella off.

Who knows why folks feel like they do? I’m a liberal not afraid to use the word liberal, but I might feel differently about, say, immigration if armed mexican drug smugglers were using my back-yard as a hostel. I might feel differently about guns too. It’s easy to be enlightened when you’re not personally affected, which is why we should always be suspicious of guys who never fought in wars starting them.

No House or Senate member or major political pundit on either side of the aisle is in danger of missing a meal, or of having to choose between that meal or health care for their child. So there’s not a credibility “gap” so much as a credibility chasm. Being lectured at is annoying enough. Being lectured at by a guy making 6 or 7 figures is unbearable. So beware of the screeching head that demonizes those who just happen to be in a way lower tax-bracket. It’s not a crime to be poor in this country, although if Reagan had a third term….

See, I caught myself. If I can do this, surely everybody can.

In a bit…

–tf