Lando 
Posted on 01/19/2005 1:00:35 AM PST by Lando Lincoln
As you read this, we are one day away from history repeating itself. A history that has continued uninterrupted since the founding of our nation: the inauguration of the President of the United States. An orderly transfer of power, an affirmation of the Constitution, and a demonstration of the rule of law over the rule of tyranny or blood or military might. We, the People, go through this quadrennial process of debates, and votes, and electoral colleges and induction, to affirm our God-given right to freedom and justice. Oh, we’ll argue over the candidates, the issues, and even the most inane foibles in pronunciation. We’ll have analysts and talking heads parsing words, pauses and eyebrow movement, to tell us “what it all means.” We’ll face more polls than a visitor to a seven-day beer bust in Gdansk, for pity’s sake! However, when the 20th day of January follows an election cycle, we come together to affirm our national pride and confirm the continuity of the United States of America.
At least, it used to work that way.
Don’t get me wrong; we’ve had close elections in the past. Richard Nixon lost by the narrowest of margins to John Kennedy. However, whatever you may think of Nixon, he was a statesman in the truest sense of the word - his duty to the nation overcame whatever personal ambitions he had back then, and he conceded the election to JFK. There was no rancor, no calls for recounts on Nixon’s part. Indeed, if he had, he might have conceivably won. Nevertheless, it would not have been the gentlemanly thing to do.
Sadly, the age of the gentlemanly or ladylike behavior has passed America by. Not only in the realm of politics, which was always a down ‘n dirty profession. Granted, it’s more like a rugby scrum in a pigsty these days, but there’ve been worse accusations thrown by candidates in the heat of the campaign - even in the 18th and 19th centuries. No, the filth has filtered down to the man and woman on the street. And as I look at my country, after so many years abroad, and face my first inauguration home in over a decade, I feel a sense of shame and disgust by what I see.
It started in the 2000 election cycle, which was marked by some of the most base and boorish behavior on the part of a candidate I had ever witnessed. Al Gore conceded the election, only to withdraw his concession about an hour later. He then started the most bizarre recount process in American (and, perhaps, world) history. He dragged the process out for weeks and weeks. He kept claiming that “every vote should be counted” only to cherry-pick the votes he thought would be advantageous to him and to chuck those that wouldn’t. When the Supreme Court finally decided in their 7-2 (NOT 5-4) decision that the Florida Supreme Court overstepped their authority, did we finally get the same result we started out with. Bush won. Gore lost.
Yet, even considering this, the media went to great lengths to minimize Dubya’s victory. It dogged him throughout his first term, except for those three weeks after 9/11 when the lib/dem/soc/commies could tear themselves away from partisan hatred and seething jealousy. It was a very short three weeks, though.
Now, we have an election that went pretty well. I’m still a bit disappointed that the FEC and the various state election commissions didn’t cotton on to my idea to simplify and secure the entire voting process (see The Solution to Voting Problems in the States? from May 21, 2003) but people muddled through nevertheless. No hanging or dimpled or pregnant chads this time, thank Heavens! Still, hoards of (bleep)ing lawyers were assembled to do battle in any state where Kerry had what they considered a “slim” margin of loss. This brought us to Ohio, where a 120,000 victory is considered “slim” by the lib/dem/soc/commies, apparently. Odd that Dubya lost by much narrower margins in other states, and yet he didn’t cause such a brouhaha. I wonder why that might be. Perhaps Bush is more of a gentleman than Kerry. Perhaps rep/cons are more civil than lib/dem/soc/commies.
Such generalizations, I’m told, are quite inappropriate. Not because they’re untrue, but because they might offend. Well, from what I’ve seen of the upcoming inauguration, perhaps I’ve earned the right to be a little bit surly, and perhaps less than gentlemanly in my assessment of the opposition.
I’ve seen the lib/dem/soc/commies squawk over and over about how expensive this inauguration is going to be. $40 million spent on parties and balls and such. Considering the fact that when Clinton was re-elected, the price tag for that was around $41.7 million, it seems a bit disingenuous to bring this up as an issue. But then, the planet suffered a major catastrophe, where over 160,000 people died due to an earthquake on the sea floor and the subsequent tsunamis that devastated countless shorelines. So the complainers said that we shouldn’t spend that kind of money on parties, when it would be better served sent to those poor unfortunates whose lives, homes and families were destroyed. Forgetting, of course, that the money donated to the inauguration was private, and also forgetting that these same companies and individuals had donates so much more than a mere $40 million to recovery efforts.
Finally, the lib/dem/soc/commies pulled the trump card. Saying that we’re at war right now, and that FDR (or, to them, Saint Franklin of the Fireside Chat) only served pound cake and chicken salad at a small gathering for his final inauguration. In their fit of political Alzheimer’s, they neglected to mention that FDR was near death at that point, and that he had a most lavish inauguration during the height of the Great Depression. I think they also forgot to mention that Truman had a pretty big inaugural bash when he was re-elected, and that was during the Korean war. Oh, and Johnson did all right during the Vietnam conflict.
Well, the poor losers of the lib/dem/soc/commie party aren’t content with mere complaining and whining and pissing and moaning. They’re planning more than that. Some are planning to boycott the inauguration. Which is fine, if they want. There’s no rule that says they must attend, must cheer or must make merry under pain of death. No, that was Iraq. Here, they can stay home and pout. Some others are now wearing blue wristbands, to show that they didn’t vote for Bush. An idea and an act that is lamer than FDR’s legs. Childish, churlish and sadly quite typical. It doesn’t matter that Bush won over 50% of the votes cast - something Saint Billy-Jeff of the Zipper never did. It doesn’t matter that Bush won by over 3.6 million votes nationwide. It doesn’t even matter that Bush won the Electoral College, which is THE only vote that matters from the basis of the Constitution. No, THEY didn’t vote for him, so they’ll wear a silly little strip of plastic on their wrist so show how THEY were right and the rest of the country was wrong.
It gets worse. There have already been stories floated that people plan to protest - actively protest - the inauguration and the parade. There have also been reports that some disruptions are planned of parties. For those who don’t believe that this would happen, cast your minds back to Ronald Reagan’s funeral. There were lib/dem/soc/commie protesters there, calling Reagan a murderer and other vile epithets. At a funeral, for God’s Sake! For them, defiling an inauguration should cause no moral qualms. Nothing else seems to, quite frankly.
I’m only hopeful that Randy Moss isn’t planning to be marching in the inaugural parade. I’d hate to see him do to the President what he did to Green Bay Packer’s fans. However, considering how low at least a portion of our society has stooped, it would not surprise me in the slightest if he, or some other partisan putz or mental midget, were to try.
About the Writer: Doc Farmer is a writer and humorist who is also a moderator on ChronWatch's Forum. He formerly lived in Saudi Arabia and Qatar, but now resides in the Midwest. Doc receives e-mail at docfarmer9999@yahoo.co.uk.
Lando
This sounds like a job for Randy Moss.
The funny thing about these blue wristbands is that the Bush/Cheney campaign handed out blue wristbands this summer that said Bush/Cheney on them. My son and many of his friends are still wearing theirs (in fact, you can still buy them on ebay).
The Dems aren't even original in the color, LOL!
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