"If you're gonna dance with a bear, just remember... it's a bear."
My mom is a great teller of stories and a lover of words, but no phrase ever struck such a harmonious chord with her as that one. Since the first day she told me she had chosen those words for her epitaph, they've skittered around in my head and to my surprise, applying to a variety of situations, to which I never imagined there'd be one, universal phrase that could so succinctly express my emotions on the subject.
And now, in the midst of this election - and my emotional struggle with understanding the local congregation of gun-toting, Bible-thumping, gay-bashing, grudge-holding, amnesia-prone, white-washed, low-class ratfinks in the Church of I Hate You that I have to suffer every day - I found that once again, this phrase might be helpful. This time, I'm bringing it down as a little unsolicited advice to the parishioners.
If you're gonna dance with a bear, just remember... it's a bear.
I think you'd be hard-pressed, even where I live, to find a man who'd lay his body down in front of a parade float for Mitt Romney, let alone somebody willing to tout his nobility. They're dumb but they're not that dumb, you know? This year the election for many self-professed (no supporting evidence) conservatives is between the lesser of two evils. Barack Obama, of course being a socialist, America-hating, foreign Muslim just waiting for the right moment to direct another round of planes to lower Manhattan can't possibly be allowed to be President again and therefore in the name of patriotism and "ALL THAT IS HOLY" (shrieking with a southern accent) they will deign to pull that lever (or fondle an artfully hacked touchscreen put in by the jewliberalcomputernerdconspiracy) for Mitt Romney. And I don't blame them. If the blather that comes out of their mouths really are thoughts pirouetting around their spasmodically firing synapses, then I can see how they would truly feel that Mitt Romney is the only option to save America, even if he's an asshole.
Fine... you do that, my friends. But if you're gonna dance with a bear, just remember... it's a bear.
Maybe gay people being relegated to second-class status and all minorities subjected to state-sponsored hate speech is more important to you than any other campaign issue. Perhaps to you, the idea of every rape victim in the country being required to carry to term a fetus that reminds her of the worst moment in her life is justified punishment for wearing that skirt that went above her ankles. Or it could be that you just don't like black people. Whatever your reason for giving Mitt Romney a big, wet sloppy kiss on election day, you should be aware that's a big damn bear you're smooching, lover.
Maybe Mitt actually does one or two of those things on your Christmas Hate List, but I wouldn't bet your trailer hitch testicles on it. Just about every position that man has taken... wait, I can't finish that sentence because it's accurate without a second half. But you know what position he hasn't taken? Giving a flying fish about people like you.
I agree, those magical tax cuts Mitt talks about sound delicious until you ask him to explain the tax cut. I'll put his explanation into a totally non-mathematical formula for you (a la your rockstar Glenn Beck):
20% tax cut +
end all kinds of deductions for 99% of people =
tax increase for everyone that doesn't have diamonds on the soles of their shoes
Wait... What?
That smelly old bear is taking you for a waltz again. If he won't tell you how he's going to cut taxes in this spending-spree economy of ours, you can bet your NFL beer stein the cuts are coming from your broke ass. Student loans, Medicare, Social Security, public education, roads and bridges, job stimulus. You don't use any of those things, right?
And you and your wife have never used birth control to keep from having Thing 18, 19, 32, and 47 instead of just Thing 1 and Thing 2, have you? Well, no worries, he probably won't let anyone ban things like that, but if he does it's no big deal... just stop having sex. And if you can't because that truck pull on Saturday night got you just a little too excited and before you knew it you were ears to ankles in the bed of that pickup, I just hope you saved a little for pregnancy healthcare, child care, and their 22 years of education.
And heck yes, that trickle down economy sounds like the most delightful fantasy, imagining when the Rockefellers and Waltons ride through town throwing hundred dollar bills out of their moderately-priced sedans, jovially laughing and saying "you have given us so much we cannot possibly spend all of our wealth and are returning it to you, good people!" But what does history tell us? That ain't exactly how it works out.
Were you better under Reagan, Bush, Sr. or Clinton? Are you better now in 2012 than you were at the end of Bush, Jr.'s eight years of blooper reels? Seriously, consider that and if you still think supply-side economics is the only way to the American dream, I've got something to trickle down on you... don't look, it's a surprise!
If you know he doesn't like people like you - wouldn't be caught dead at one of your hometown football games, potluck dinners or homecoming parades unless he wanted something from you - then I don't have to tell you, you're dancing with a bear. If you know he doesn't pay taxes but expects you to, doesn't want to pay you fair wages but hasn't worked a labor job in his life, and would happily say you're a victim for believing you have a right to the food, housing, and healthcare you busted your hump to earn... then I don't have to tell you, you're dancing with a bear.
But what I will tell you...
If you're gonna dance with a bear, just remember... it's a bear.
And when he bites you, I just hope you remembered to pay your insurance premium on time.