From vandalism and childishness, to possibly violating Federal laws and maybe even trashing the Constitution, DAMN is this an ugly election!
Earlier this week Kevin & Bean did a segment on people who've had their cars vandalized or been threatened because of the bumper stickers on their cars. (For a sample of really obsessive blogging—and to read about the segment—you can check out I'm Just Saying: A Kevin & Bean Blog.) Stories abounded, from people getting run off the road and guys tearing down Bush signs and peeing on them, to a woman getting flipped off for having "Libertarian" plates because the moron flipping her off confused that with Liberal. My favorite of the day had to be the guy that got his car keyed for having a Bush sticker on it and went out and got a shirt that had a picture of a scratched-out Bush bumper sticker and the slogan "A person of conscience and tolerance keyed my car". (Great shirt!) One day he couldn't find the shirt and asked his wife (a Kerry supporter) where his shirt was and she said she'd thrown it out. She "never liked that shirt"
I guess the "reassuring" thing here (or perhaps the most depressing) is that this doesn't seem to be limited to either conservatives or liberals. There were just as many stories of liberals trashing Bush banners as there were conservatives smacking Kerry supporters around. (What's really interesting/disturbing to me is that I know that I'll see a Bush/Cheney sticker in someone's car and I can feel an automatic lip-curl starting. I'm not running anyone off the road, mind you… but I'm not overly surprised when I see the Bushite doing something stupid and arrogant on the road. I am, however, disappointed any time I see someone with a liberal slant to their bumper stickers being stupid on the road. I guess I expect better from my fellow liberals.)
Then they had a story yesterday about investigations into one of the commercial election registration companies in Nevada that's not paying their people for registering Democrats. Seems the people processing the applications have been seen pulling Democrat registration forms out of the submitted apps and shredding them, in full view of the people getting paid, based on how many forms they submit, for collecting said forms. I may be jumping to conclusions here by assuming that there's probably some kind of Federal law that prohibits this kind of behavior, but suffice it to say that the company is under investigation.
And THEN there was the story in the New York Times last weekend (you'll probably need to be logged in at the Times to see that one) about Catholic Bishops and priests organizing to support the Bush campaign. Since the Church views abortion as a sin and Kerry is pro-choice, their message to their parishioners is that it would be a sin to vote for Kerry. It can probably be argued that they're not actually telling anyone who to vote for, simply informing them of the consequences of their choices (at least, that's their argument and it's the explanation most often quoted in the article). But come on, we're hair-splitting here. They're endorsing Bush and they're doing it from the pulpit as a representative of the Church. Of course, the Bush team has been courting this support ever since the last election… so much for separation of Church & State. Guess it's not just fundamentalists and the Religious Right that think it's a bad idea.
(Is all this ugliness something I can blame Bush for? I mean, didn't he campaign in 2000 as a moderate Republican, one who was going to stop all the partisan bickering in Washington? At least, that's what I remember. Oh well, if he did, it probably falls into either the "typical campaign promise" category or the "yet another spectacular failure" category, so I guess I can't blame him for this. Sure, his administration's attitude towards anyone that disagrees with them hasn't been particularly friendly and probably contributes to the ugliness. But to actually blame him for it? Nah. Not this time.)
Earlier this week Kevin & Bean did a segment on people who've had their cars vandalized or been threatened because of the bumper stickers on their cars. (For a sample of really obsessive blogging—and to read about the segment—you can check out I'm Just Saying: A Kevin & Bean Blog.) Stories abounded, from people getting run off the road and guys tearing down Bush signs and peeing on them, to a woman getting flipped off for having "Libertarian" plates because the moron flipping her off confused that with Liberal. My favorite of the day had to be the guy that got his car keyed for having a Bush sticker on it and went out and got a shirt that had a picture of a scratched-out Bush bumper sticker and the slogan "A person of conscience and tolerance keyed my car". (Great shirt!) One day he couldn't find the shirt and asked his wife (a Kerry supporter) where his shirt was and she said she'd thrown it out. She "never liked that shirt"
I guess the "reassuring" thing here (or perhaps the most depressing) is that this doesn't seem to be limited to either conservatives or liberals. There were just as many stories of liberals trashing Bush banners as there were conservatives smacking Kerry supporters around. (What's really interesting/disturbing to me is that I know that I'll see a Bush/Cheney sticker in someone's car and I can feel an automatic lip-curl starting. I'm not running anyone off the road, mind you… but I'm not overly surprised when I see the Bushite doing something stupid and arrogant on the road. I am, however, disappointed any time I see someone with a liberal slant to their bumper stickers being stupid on the road. I guess I expect better from my fellow liberals.)
Then they had a story yesterday about investigations into one of the commercial election registration companies in Nevada that's not paying their people for registering Democrats. Seems the people processing the applications have been seen pulling Democrat registration forms out of the submitted apps and shredding them, in full view of the people getting paid, based on how many forms they submit, for collecting said forms. I may be jumping to conclusions here by assuming that there's probably some kind of Federal law that prohibits this kind of behavior, but suffice it to say that the company is under investigation.
And THEN there was the story in the New York Times last weekend (you'll probably need to be logged in at the Times to see that one) about Catholic Bishops and priests organizing to support the Bush campaign. Since the Church views abortion as a sin and Kerry is pro-choice, their message to their parishioners is that it would be a sin to vote for Kerry. It can probably be argued that they're not actually telling anyone who to vote for, simply informing them of the consequences of their choices (at least, that's their argument and it's the explanation most often quoted in the article). But come on, we're hair-splitting here. They're endorsing Bush and they're doing it from the pulpit as a representative of the Church. Of course, the Bush team has been courting this support ever since the last election… so much for separation of Church & State. Guess it's not just fundamentalists and the Religious Right that think it's a bad idea.
(Is all this ugliness something I can blame Bush for? I mean, didn't he campaign in 2000 as a moderate Republican, one who was going to stop all the partisan bickering in Washington? At least, that's what I remember. Oh well, if he did, it probably falls into either the "typical campaign promise" category or the "yet another spectacular failure" category, so I guess I can't blame him for this. Sure, his administration's attitude towards anyone that disagrees with them hasn't been particularly friendly and probably contributes to the ugliness. But to actually blame him for it? Nah. Not this time.)
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