Deplorables were out in full force last night
Yip, at the VFW, the first question being why does a stalwart Dem go there. Well, despite the downsides (putting it mildly) of being in the military (counting the days to get out), a few years afterward nostalgia can happen, blurred out negatives and blurred in positives - fellowship, earthquakes of life paradigms, the World eclipsing the previous small life.
The first fit of nostalgia was ten years after active duty, joined the Reserves and soon remembered the non-blurred realities, and got out. Then in the next ten years I started going to the VFW for bingo/beer. There were lots of "scenes" that I now recognize as two things: PTSD outbursts and proto-Deplorables outbursts - all in the time before the labels as such. So I met several members who were friendly and reasonable and gave signs of the nostalgic fellowship, such that I let myself be recruited, but I told them from the start I wouldn't go to meetings and would not *salute* them because all it meant to me was that we were just a bunch of drunks.
So it was basically bar camaraderie with a few people and steering clear of the occasional outbursts, especially of the proto-Deplorables variety (Deplorables before that label.) The politics was bad after Coup-2000, worse with the illegal Iraq Attack. I usually navigated around and out from the outbursts, but Election 2004 with the Swiftbots was the final straw. The official magazine was blatantly attacking the honorable veteran KERRY. I called the Editor to complain and figured out he had laid the receiver on the desk. So I drifted away from any visits to the bar.
A year ago I started going to another post bar about once per week, saw a couple of faces from the past, but we've been beaten down by knocks and age so the hothouse outbursts are fairly gone, now just about a drunk being thrown out instead of politics. I know that many of the patrons are SHITLER-ites. but it says something that they don't mention him much.
***********So yesterday late afternoon, the place was empty except for a large group around the "Commander" (kissing his ass), clearly having been drinking all afternoon, being very loud, but not about politics. Then ABC news started and the group flamed out, yelling, "That's a f***ing Democrat station!1 Take it off!1 Put Fox News on!1" The barmaid muted the volume, didn't put Fox on for whatever her reason.
So they were gone in another half hour. So I thought I was out of the woods. Then two dudes of the construction business-owner type took the stools next to mine and did the greeting and started talking about one of them having travelled to Seattle recently. I was included in the conversation, especially since my second ship was built in the Bremerton shipyard and we lived off base in Seattle for seven months until it was ready for us. The fellow said his son is in the Navy but at an Air Force base near Seattle, so to me this was a bonding type of conversation. But to him it was a one-upmanship type of exercise, like, my son puts the missiles on Air Force whatevers. Fine.
But then all hell broke loose. The other dude, like in his 50s (I'm in my 70s), apropos of who knows what, suddenly said something about "Food Stamps people - it's all brainwashing by the Democrats!1" I had already keaned that these two were not candidates for open minded discussion, plus I had already been put on Alert by the departed group of Deplorables, so I was in no mood to participate in this. So I said, "O.K., this conversation is over." And I moved my chair away and put in my earbuds. The Deplorable didn't shut up right away, said to the other one, "So he doesn't want to talk, I'll talk to you: It's the damned Democrats brainwashing Food Stamps people!1" A bit later he continued, "The brother (talking about me) got himself mad, didn't he!1"
My designated departure time is set in stone, and I know that it outlasts most of the barflies. Before that happened, when it was time to use the ("latrine" = Army word), I stood up and the Deplorable was stabbing his eyes at me, trying to decide whether I was coming over to them or leaving or what. I silently passed them by and then back again after the loo back to my seat. Soon after they left.
It's futile to engage, neither side will win. But at least I let them know their crap is not dominant.
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