The penetration of the far right into America's minds

[DFW]

I was being driven from downtown Dallas to the DFW airport today, and the driver was a perfectly nice guy who had moved down here from Brooklyn a few decades ago. The Dallas traffic will be a mess starting this evening with all living presidents being here for the opening of the Bush Lite Library.

The discussion inevitably got to politics. The driver immediately started in about the "community organizer," and he didn't mean it in a positive way. He meant it in a denigrating tone, just like his interpretation of the word "liberal." he had no earthly clue what a community organizer does, had no idea what the word "liberal" meant, had no idea what the word "conservative" meant.

This guy was well-spoken, maybe in his early sixties, and lived in a solidly middle-class part of Dallas. Yet his vocabulary and comprehension were straight out of Fox "News." This was EXTREMELY disturbing. We all know that Fox Noise panders to the under-educated and intellectually lazy, and is comfort food to selfish billionaires. But when an educated New Yorker spouts their garbage as his understanding of the way the world is, it is disconcerting. If these people are reasonably intelligent, reasonably well-spoken, and yet intellectually lazy enough to let Frank Luntz and Sean Hannity do their thinking for them, what has our electorate become? I know, I know, Obama WAS re-elected, and the Senate stayed Democratic, but in places like Texas, which we hope to turn blue some time during my lifetime, especially in a reasonably progressive urban place like Dallas, it is disturbing to hear people spout this garbage when they have not only every chance to know better, but every personal incentive to know better.

[sharp_stick]

1. Anybody who relies on tips

or repeat business as a major way to make money should keep their mouths shut about politics unless they know the politics of the person about to give or not give the tip or repeat business.

If this had of been me riding in the cab the guy would have driven away with exact change on the meter reading.

We had a liquor store near my house that put out all kinds of pro Linda McMahon bullshit during the 2012 election. I used to drop in there every now and again for some beer on the way home from work. I haven't been back since I saw the damned signs and I really doubt he managed to increase his business with others from this in my neighborhood.

[hamsterjill]

4. I'll take it a step further...

We had a hotly contested Senate race in my district and my veterinarian put up a sign for the Tea Bagger candidate.

There's no law that says he can't do that.

There's no law that says I can't take my business elsewhere either.

While I think a yard sign at his personal residence is one thing, I think using his place of business to further his own political agenda went too far. I want a vet whose priority is my pet, not politics.

[Zoeisright]

2. The cabbie doesn't sound much like an educated anything.

Anyone who listens, slack-jawed, to Faux Noise is uneducated, lazy, and unintelligent. He also sounds like a complete bigot.

[dem in texas]

3. The city of Dallas is majority Democrat

Don't put all Texans in the same basket. The city of Dallas has a Democrat majority as do other large cities in Texas; Austin, San Antonio, El Paso and Houston. The Rio Grand Valley is solid Democrat, too. It is just that there is so much gerrymandering to break up the Democratic areas that is hard for a Democrat to get elected, plus the Texas Democrats put up the dullest candidates for elections, if there is even a Democrat running. Not to worry, Texas will soon be blue, the old white tea party crowd is going to die off and the young hispanics are starting to pay attention to Texas politics. You can't judge Texas by remarks from a cab driver from New York!

[SmittynMo]

5. I'm sure there are a lot of good dems in Texas, but

with idiots like Rick Perry running the show, and George Bush living there, and the fact the the GOP won the state, what is the rest of the country to think? They also wanted to secede from the US. I'm sure there are many more examples on how this state is considered far right. Some of the laws there are so marxists, it's hard to believe they are actually part of the US. I have absolutely no interest at all in ever visiting this state. I suggest you move to a different state where you're wanted. It makes for a much better conversation when running into people in public. I don't put all the people of Texas in one basket, but the state is definitely far right. I feel sorry for those Dems that live there and deal with such radical opposing views.

[DFW]

10. You suggest I move to a different state? Why?

What makes Texas "their" state any more than it is "my" state?

Massachusetts once had an idiot named Romney as their governor, and an idiot named Scott Brown as their Senator until recently. No one has ever endorsed the secession of Massachusetts as far as I know.

Besides, as someone else pointed out, Dallas is a Democratic oasis is a sea of red(-necks), and we are not the only one in the state.

And last but not least, I have just landed back in Düsseldorf, where I am stationed. Texas is now again 6000 or so miles from here.

[SmittynMo]

15. All very good points

I agree. My reference to moving was the fact that if you want to decrease your odds of conversing with the far right idiots, move to a Dem state. Your chances are less that you'll run across another right winger. I'm not saying they are not there, it just decreases your chances of overhearing and possibly conversing with them.

If anyone brings up Ann Coulter, McConnel, Rush, or Hannity, I immediately remove myself from the room.

[DFW]

16. Dallas being sort of a sane oasis in the "Red Sea" and all

It's fine as is. For all the time I spend in Texas these days anyway. As of this morning, coming to you live and in color from Düsseldorf in the German Rheinland.

[KennedyBrothers]

20. If only Kinky Friedman had been elected governor...

...there might have been some hope for the Lone Star State.

[IrishAyes]

9. Gotta love the Castro brothers.

I just want to pinch their cheeks, God bless 'em. The Browning of America? I look forward to it with those two to take on Cruz and Rubio.

[DFW]

12. We will suffer the effect of Tom DeLay's gerrymandering for a long time

Until we have a Democratic legislature and a Democratic Governor in a census year, they will try to legislate us out ofo existence, and it won't matter one bit if we are the majority party. They aren't interested in majority rule, they are only interested in their own rule.

As for Dallas, along with a few other towns, we are an island in the middle of an unfriendly sea. Fred Baron may have passed on, but we still have fundraisers for Democrats (look up Lisa Blue) on a VERY regular basis. After the Bush Library circus, Obama will be at some very well-attended fundraisers while he is in Texas.

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[zeeland]

6. This is passive-aggressive

behavior I've experienced from wing nut strangers before. It usually
starts as soon as they think I'm a Liberal. They spout their crap in a conspiratorial
way acting as if they innocently think we're politically on the same page knowing
damn well we are not. While I've said or done nothing to indicate my political
position, it is assumed by where I'm from, my appearance, some vague Lib
stereotype.

[DFW]

11. Ironically, when the guy saw from where he was picking me up, he assumed wrongly.

When he heard that I was director for the whole foreign operation for my outfit, he made a completely erroneous assumption as to my political leanings.

In the immortal words of Rick Perry: Oops!!

[IrishAyes]

7. Conservatives don't know

And worse yet, don't want to know anything about reality. I don't think the level of education figures into it at all. They're too besotted with fear driven hate.

This morning I sat in the hospital waiting room with several other people there to get blood work drawn. One of them I knew to be a retired nurse, who supposedly got her degree somewhere other than the inside of a Cracker Jack box. The tv was on, thankfully to CNN at least, not Fox Noise, and the subject was still the Boston bombers. When the two brothers' pictures came up, this retired nurse snarled, "... and one of 'em was a cop, too. Just goes to show you can't trust inny of these furriners. Ought not to let 'em be cops or innything else!"

At first my jaw dropped open, and then a correction of her mistake leapt to my lips, but then I slowly recovered w/o a single word. Fortunately several of the other people were rolling their eyes and the others suddenly showed a rabid gleam that made me wonder why bother just before my blood pressure gets taken. It was a huge row waiting to happen, and a mere correction of facts no matter how sweetly offered would've touched off a conflagration. Maybe Limpy told them that version of the story, and if so Jesus Christ himself couldn't convince them otherwise.

So I left the waiting area in silence for the first time to get my blood work and blood pressure done. Normally I pipe right up when somebody says something that crazy. So I don't know if I'm getting too old and lazy to jump into every fight I see coming anymore, or whether I'm learning to choose my battles more carefully. Before, if there was any kind of argument going on, you'd find me in the middle of it.

But then I get to thinking about my dad's favorite old saw, "Only a jackass answers every donkey that brays."

[IrishAyes]

8. I can tell you something else, too

The religious right sees red when you say or wear a tee shirt announcing "Jesus Was A Community Organizer!" They seem to think he was a Kock Bros. prototype or something Randian.

[LeftInTX]

13. I saw this in San Antonio today:

In a nice part of town a vehicle in front of me. It was an expensive Suburban with a Texas Tech Medical School Decal. With a "SECEDE" bumper sticker.

Someone in the family is a doctor and they are into the Texas secession thing? WTF

[Silent3]

14. You have your own airport?

Wow.

[Coyotl]

18. It took a while

but i finally got it DFW post about D-FW airport.

[Cosmocat]

17. It isn't stupid, it isn't intellectually lazy or whatever

I don't know what it is.

MOST of the people I know are "conservatives" and most of them are darn good people, intelligent, capable, decent, giving and honorable.

It truly mystifies me, I just don't get it.

There are some asshole types, but most of them know my politics and we either don't talk politics or we have respectful and courteous political discussions. They support my personal electoral efforts because they know, like, respect and trust me.

It is a mystery to me, and I have spent a LOT of time trying to figure it out.

[Sunlei]

19. It is my dream that Mrs. Clinton would run for Gov. of Texas.

By now everyone knows fox lies and is a propaganda arm of the republican party. To late now the damage is done to those humans. Maybe if enough untainted people get to actually vote. Before republicans change the entire system to their advantage.

[DFW]

21. Dream on

I've met her a couple of times, and she is a brilliant mimic. She can do a hokey Texas accent that would make you think she grew up down the street from Louie Gohmert. However, after representing the USA around the world as our top diplomat, I doubt that she would see living in Austin and cutting ribbons at mall openings as a career advancement.

[Sunlei]

22. No, she would be a real Gov. of Texas, the state needs someone like her.

It's just a dream. She dedicated hard work, more than half her life to America. Mrs. Clinton has earned the freedom to relax away from usa politics.

[SmittynMo]

23. Republicans change the entire system?

Only if they keep their mouths shut. And we all know, that is NOT going to happen.

[DFW]

24. The trouble with Texas is that they DID change the entire system

Until we undo the gerrymandering of our districts, they will have a huge advantage in their numbers in the U.S. House and the state legislature. The only thing Texas Republicans are scared of is increasing numbers of Hispanic voters who don't like them. The only thing Texas Democrats are worried about is those numbers not increasing fast enough to save our state from Texas Republicans.