I’ve been to many places in the United States, and I’ve also been to Lynchburg, VA. I assume Mr. Roberts has done some traveling, when he presumes to speak for American values, because Lynchburg may as well be Moscow, or Beijing, or Tehran. It’s one of the least American places on the planet. Pork-barbecue theocracy with a dash of scuba-suit kink and compulsory inbreeding is by no means a plan for the rest of this nation.
I know many Republicans are distressed that the promised thousand-year Reich didn’t materialize under their beloved imbecile king, but democracies have a way of sweeping the trash out periodically, especially when the trash has presided over the looting of the treasury, the delivery of the public trust into the hands of some pompadoured thugs, and the use of the Constitution as a doormat.
It seems obvious to me, given the expanded wiretapping capabilities and the suspension of habeas corpus by the previous administration, that it would be prudent on the part of anyone to resist screaming “Fire” in a crowded theater, or calling for yet another treasonous attempt at Balkanizing the US, unless they feel like a trip to Gitmo is their only shot at a Caribbean vacation.
In addition, proper English usage dictates “Democratic ” congress or party. The substitution of “Democrat ” when the proper modifier is called for, makes you sound like you were a forceps birth, or at best, raised in the woods by feral hogs.
UPDATE: They didn’t publish my letter, but they did publish this letter, for which they deserve a round of applause: It’s in response to the same goober I was poking fun at.
To the editor:
I am sick and tired of phony patriots like Ronnie Roberts bellyaching about our president. We held an election and the people have spoken. They said Barack Obama.
As a real patriot, I served in the Armed Forces of the US under six presidents, from Eisenhower to Jimmy Carter. I have bullet holes in my body as a reminder.
In my opinion, making public statements declaring that you hope our elected president fails goes beyond freedom of speech. To a patriot like me this borders on treason. If our president fails, then we fail as a nation. No American in their right mind would wish this. I didn’t shed my blood so some wing nut can make statements like this.
I am an African American who grew up during the 40’s and 50’s. Because of Mr. Roberts’ brand of Christianity, I was forced to attend a segregated school system. We had rundown buildings, outdated equipment and outdated books; however, we had great teachers. My teachers taught me that America was founded as a representative Republic and not a Christian nation. Nowhere in our Constitution does it mention anything about a deity.
I ask Mr. Roberts if he was forming a Christian Nation would he write into his constitution the State’s right to import slaves for the next 20 years? Would he write in his constitution that the descendants of Africans will be counted as only 3/5 of a person and that Indians would not be considered at all? Would his Supreme Court follow the Christian Doctrine of love thy neighbor as thyself and then uphold the constitutionality of racial segregation, even in public accommodations?
America is the greatest country in the world not because of Mr. Roberts’ brand of Christianity, but in spite of him and his wing nut friends’ brand of Christianity. Good will always triumph over evil.
Ernest Poole
Roxboro
I don’t think you’ve told us if these letters ever get published. And I imagine the standard response it “what does scuba-diving have to do with any of this?”
They publish them, but I may have exceeded the arbitrary limitation they I’ve placed (One per month) with this letter. I wish this paper had a web presence, so people could acquaint themselves with the nonstop bullshit the rural South is bombarded with through Womack Publishing, Inc., and in our case, independent papers run by unapologetic racists who can’t even write a complex sentence. The letter I was responding to, is I suspect, a sockpuppet of the owner, or the Liberty College educated features editor. Otherwise I can’t quite imagine why someone in another state would be so interested in the political goings on here.
Anyway, it was a dogwhistle for the Police-State Libertarians and neo-Confederatards, calling for folks to oppose “Obama and everything he stands for, and to make sure he fails, yadda yadda, road to Socialism, yadda yadda”
The only reason I respond at all is to let them know Bibleland is a fillin’ up with “Freethinkers, Masons and Jews”.
I don’t pretend to engage them on any level other than to make fun of their prose, and to call attention to the fact they’re not merely intellectually dishonest, but morally retarded.
I doubt they get the scuba reference, either, but I suspect they know their noses are being rubbed in shit.
These assholes run everything down here from the police to the public schools. That’s why it’ll take us another fifty years to crawl out of the crater.
I left Kentucky after 5 years of that crap. You are made of stronger stuff than I am. God bless you.
Not stronger. Crazier. Folks will pretty much leave you alone around here if they think you’re batshit. It also helps that we’re a good distance from the road, because the locals don’t walk much anymore.
Is it one of these papers run by Womack Publishing? http://www.vancnews.com/
Bill: This one is still family owned, but it does hew closely to the Womack brand of astroturf. We used to subscribe to the Warren Record, who featured essays by Frank Newell, a guy who extolled the “Old South” virtues of paternalistic racism, Old Testament misogyny, and “You ain’t from around here, boy” xenophobia. We canceled after he compared his Vietnam service (some kind of tech/ motorpool jockey) with John Kerry’s.
A lot of it is resentment over the outcome of the Civil War, the implementation of desegregation, and the collapse of big tobacco. Womack makes its money stoking those resentments, while curiously ignoring the time-honored Southern habit of in-your-face nepotism. These aren’t locally produced papers, but a few bobos can be called on for the Jim Crow take.
Just another Republican Party organ.
“Pork-barbecue theocracy with a dash of scuba-suit kink and compulsory inbreeding is by no means a plan for the rest of this nation” is the “Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, son” for the new millennium.
Thanks, Lex. If only they were just drunk. I get a very strong sense that they’ve been whipped up into a frenzy of late.
Oh, no kidding. Scott Roeder is only the most horrific example, and I fear he might not hold that title for long.
Wonder what they will make of the Holocaust museum killing?
Moe: Nothing even on the Tiller murder yet. I think incidents like these are the ones that make them temporarily fall back to the “We’re only a local paper” position.
Considering the number of times my wife and I heard people refer to Obama as a “baby-killer” at the polling place, it’s not unlikely that they’re savoring the moment privately.