Another day. Another tea bagger.
If Dubya, the Voldemorts, Michelle Malkins and Dinesh D'Souzas of the world have done nothing else, they've introduced many to the world of the written word. I've seen it. I see it every day. Standing behind the cash register at a book store, I handle all these titles which I'd never bother with otherwise. And it's fine with me. Something called our First Amendment right to Freedom of Speech is something I cherish, and as long as Voldemort gets to say what he says, I feel fairly comfortable that I can say what I need to as well. That's how it works.
There are days, however . . .
There are a few customers, always white males, who like to challenge me when they see what I imagine the feel looks like a somewhat aged hippie with a (distinguished) white beard and a ponytail (short and neat). Well, it evidently ignites a few angry synapses in susceptible males.
It doesn't happen often. Most tea baggers I've met would rather engage in spirited, though ultimately civil discussion, and I've on very rare occasion allowed it, even though it is expressly against store policy. Being charged with real information and facts, and the fact that I always ask them not to believe me, but to verify things on their own, usually makes any discussion manageable fairly quickly. I've found, btw, that people are mostly looking for the truth, and with families, multiple jobs, an MSM which is, frankly, untrustworthy, and always, always, always being told that the sky is falling, people are usually very receptive to anyone who can point them to factual, authoritative sources. I'm a huge believer in primary sources, by the way, and well, I like to share. Outside of academia, however, I've met almost no one who has ever bothers, and like I say, people have very full lives with little time to wade through them. They can't be blamed for that, it's just the way it is.
It's just the way it is as well that I'm going to be confronted with people like the guy I had to deal with today. He wanted to start a fight. (He will with someone. He'll find someone he think he can take and just go for it. Just a matter of time with this guy.)
And this was the phrase he used to try and get a rise out of me:
"That thief, Obama."
With an unblinking stare straight in the eye and the invitation to say something, anything that'll give him a reason to lose it. No mistaking the look or the body language. It was very pointed. There was more than a philosophical challenge going on today.
That's just the way it is outside the beltway, and sometimes within it as well, as those black gentlemen who happened to be democratic congressmen found out last year, or what happened to Stephen Tyrone Johns at the US Holocaust Museum.
Here, even in Massachusetts, we have our wingnut brigade of tea baggers. Working with the public, and I get a challenge like this maybe once a week. It's not especially frequent, but it happens on a regular basis. Just the way things are, and have been for about a year. If you happen to be a black man, you might expect that kind of thing every day, I cannot speak to whether this is true or not, but it is about what I expect.
An Aside: As a white man, I apologize for this, even though I know apologies really don't cut the mustard. There's no reason under the sun for anyone in America to feel like he might be a target every time he leaves his home because he's Black or Hispanic.
However, for myself, and myself alone, I just accept that it's just the way it is. Today, I did what I always do. I let my innate courtesy, natural good cheer (yes, believe it or not, my diaries notwithstanding), and professional mien rule, and all was well. I took his money, handed his copy of (you're gonna love this) "The Roots of Obama's Rage" and he left.
But he's a repeat challenger, who was in not long ago and tried to get a rise out of me then too. Yesterday, however, there was nothing but pure hostility in this guy, sharply focused. Which means I've been noted. I cannot say targeted, because I haven't caught the guy going out of his way to locate me, but I'll be watching for that.
But I don't know this guy at all, or what's driving him, and it could be anything. He could be having a major life crisis, such as a divorce, in which normal people can become truly unhinged. It happens often enough.
It's the way things are.
I'll have a chat with a manager tomorrow. I'll continue to be cheerful, courteous, professional, and alert. Because I don't know the guy. He could be a gun enthusiast for all I know. He may have been carrying yesterday. I haven't a clue, but simple prudence dictates I consider the possibility. I'm a big boy and have had a weapon pointed at me before, so I think I can assess a situation and act appropriately. After today, I'll be careful and very alert. But that's not stopping me. I will delete a diary because I'm ashamed of how petty I've been (it has happened) or how poorly I've written it long before I delete one in which I've worked hard to share what I know, or learned, and gone out of my way to source well. And this guy may be reading me here. That's very possible, though improbable, as well. After long thought about it, I've been fairly open with myself online, deliberately, and and I can imagine a pathway where he could easily trace what I've posted online and could possibly have recognized me.
I'm not changing a thing.
And I'm not stopping, or taking a hiatus, or backing off. I'm not the only kossack that I know of who has been recently threatened or challenged in real life for our real or perceived advocacy. Each of us must assess our situation and decide accordingly. The other kossack I know decided to take a break, and this was correct, and for the right reasons. I don't have to deal with quite the same situation for a variety of reasons, and I'll continue, because the cost of backing down is not one I'm prepared to cede. Welcome to American politics. We fought a revolution, and then a civil war, and in the interim, there are little episodes like these. Constantly. This is our history, though we don't talk about it much.
People like Joyce Kaufman and Sharon Angle are deliberately trying to intimidate, and I guess they haven't figured out that it pretty much always backfires. I expect they'll find out the hard way because part of what they want is a hard lesson. Figuring that out would take some real critical thought on their part, and as we've seen, it's not one of their strengths.
So when I say, "that's the way it is," Imean that this just happened to be my turn to catch some of it, as many others here have done for years. I'm getting off easy, I know. One of the people I bused into DC with for 10-2-10 lives in a small NH town overflowing with tea baggers. He had some stories to tell. There are many of us here with other tales.
So while we're all out here facing this kind of thing in our lives, one thing I want to tell the white house and to our elected democrats:
You do NOT have my permission sell me out. You do NOT have my permission to tack to the right without a fight. You do NOT have my permission to preemptively cave in. While we are out here maintaining a rear guard action against forces who don't even believe in democracy itself, you most certainly do NOT have my permission to do any less.