OR: Just When I Thought it was Safe to Read my E-Mail
I know, it’s campaign season, two weeks from the most important election to ever face our country, so assuming the junk mail was going to stop wasn’t reasonable; I get that. But I was certain by now I had received at least 5 renditions of each anti-Obama smear email that existed. Silly me - no such luck. There I was working on a spreadsheet for a project due tomorrow when Windows alerted me that I had email from Don, a co-worker located in another state. I wasn’t at a good stopping point, but the subject was "Hard to Believe," which sounded important in light of a task we’re working on together, so I clicked over to my email, abandoning my spreadsheet in mid-formula.
What was the important email? An oldie-but-goodie, apparently, but one I’d somehow managed to miss over the course of the last year:
Sun, 07 Sept. 2008 11:48:04 EST, General Bill Ginn' USAF (ret.) asked Obama to explain why he doesn't follow protocol when the National Anthem is played.
The General also stated to the Senator that according to the United States Code,
Title 36, Chapter 10, Sec. 171... During rendition of the national anthem when the
flag is displayed, all present except those in uniform are expected to stand at attention facing the flag with the right hand over the heart. At the very least, "Stand and Face It"
Senator Obama Live on Sunday states, "As I've said about the flag pin, I don't want to be perceived as taking sides, Obama said. 'There are a lot of people in the world to whom the American flag is a symbol of oppression. And the anthem itself conveys a war-like message. You know, the bombs bursting in air and all. It should be swapped for something less parochial and less bellicose. I like the song 'I'd Like To Teach the World To Sing.' If that were our anthem, then I might salute it. " We should consider to reinvent our National Anthem as well as to redesign our Flag to better offer our enemies hope and love. My wife disrespects the Flag for many personal reasons. Together she and I have attended several flag burning ceremonies in the past, many years ago. She has her views and I have mine".
WHAAAAAAAT !!!
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, you heard it right. This could possibly be our next President.
I, for one, am speechless.
Dale Lindsborg,
Washington Post
I was shocked. It didn’t surprise me that Don wasn’t an Obama supporter, but I was surprised to get what I consider "junk mail" at work from a co-worker. He didn’t send it to me exclusively – he sent it to our entire team, including our business unit’s V.P. (Not his smartest move, I’m certain!) I quickly emailed him back, asking:
Don - Did you really mean to send this to all of us? I resent getting crap like this in my email at home; I sure don't expect to get it at work.
I thought if he’d sent it to our team by mistake he might be able to recall it, preventing its delivery to anyone who wasn’t on-line at the moment. He replied:
I won't make this mistake twice, sorry
Then he called and asked
Do I owe you an apology?
I responded with my standard "Fact checking is your friend" message, offered to send him links to some good fact-checking sites, and told him I thought it was inappropriate to send political email at work, especially email that was full of lies. He asked me what Obama had really said about flags and the national anthem and I told him I didn’t know, but I’d read enough BS emails and knew enough about Barack Obama to know that what was in the email wasn’t the truth.
Then I did a quick search and found the snopes link.
I sent it to Don. He replied:
Thanks. I was looking it up as I received your e-mail. I will send it to the others.
It seems I not only think faster than Don, I can research and type faster too. I replied:
Good. As I said, fact-checking is your friend.
About politics: I know that some people see things one way and others see them differently; that's part of what makes life interesting and it doesn't mean that one side is right and the other side is wrong. I'm all for supporting a candidate one believes in or campaigning against a candidate one does not support, but it is totally inappropriate to forward things you don't know to be true. Fact checking really is your friend.
Sometimes I wonder how it is that 25% of Americans still believe George W. Bush is doing a good job; then I get nonsense like this in my email and I understand.
(I think the last paragraph might have been a bit harsh. Insulting? Oh well.)
So far (It’s been about an hour) he hasn’t sent anything else to the team. Color me surprised? Not so much. I'm glad he's just a corporate nobody like me and not my superior: I don't think he's going to like me much after this.
I think I’m done doing productive work for the day; Don’s nonsense ruined my concentration and my mood and I don’t even remember what the formula I was writing was supposed to do. But poor Don - he now has guaranteed that his projects will be low priority for me if they conflict with work I’m doing for someone else on the team and he's bound to get some flack from our (Obama-supporting) V.P.: There’s always a price, Don, and the uninformed masses should learn that.
I guess it's true that all's well that ends well. I’ve just done a little something to make someone think, which is always a good thing, doubly good - if "doubly" is a word - when that someone is a low information voter. And, the best part: I've been inspired to make another donation to the Obama campaign and to the Kay Hagan for Senate campaign. It wasn't in my budget for this week, but I can squeeze it out.
They can thank Don.