Unusual Spin
There have been several reports that lawn signs of Kerry-Edwards supporters have been stolen, trashed, or otherwise rendered useless. The incidents are reported as acts of vicious vandalism by gangs of Republican thugs. Could be, who knows… SG doesn’t care. Staff here have been cautioned about displaying political signs and bumper stickers, because it makes you a target regardless of which side you support.
Which brings to mind an incident in PA where an employee was fired for having a political bumper sticker on her car. That’s how it was reported, but a closer reading shows that she was parking her car on her employer’s property, right by the public entrance, and she refused to either move the car or REmove the bumper sticker. Shades of gray, always. Her car was the vehicle for an expression of an opinion, but the parking place belonged to someone else and her employer owns that particular mode of publishing.
Staff here at SG have been reassured that they absolutely won’t get fired for an exercise of free speech. In fact they are comforted by constant reminders of things that they cannot be fired for. After all, you can’t fire someone who isn’t paid.
But let’s get back on track here. In this morning’s paper there was a letter from a man who claimed that his truck had been vandalized by Democrats. The guy said he had TWO Bush-Cheney signs in the back window of his pickup. He parked his truck in a public place while he went off on a two-day business trip, and returned to find that his truck had no back window!
Obviously one of the roving Democrat gangs had decided to punish him.
He did not say that the signs had been removed, nor did he say whether anything else had been taken.
Hello? The guy leaves his pickup truck in a public place for two days, and it gets broken into! Surprise! To SG the only surprise is that he would try to blame it on politics. OK, may we’re alsoa little surprised that he would be so blatant about it… starting out with the comment that “liberals” were complaining about their missing lawn signs.
More stupidity. Or was it just a clever spin that was a little easier to see through than usual? SG doesn’t care, beyond hoping that the guy’s insurance company tears up his claim on the grounds of stupidity.
–SG
What do you think? Please enter a comment below.
October 19th, 2004 at 11:24 am
Who’d a thunk it? Letter in this morning’s paper (10/19/04):
“[author of original letter] should know that the problem is even worse than he imagined! Recently, my son parked his car on the street in front of his house overnight, only to find his rear window shattered the next morning. Nothing was stolen, just the broken window. Unlike [the other guy], my son had no political signs in his window.
“These liberal vandals are so hell-bent on forcing their agenda on the masses that they apparently broke his window for not having any sign to remove!”
The paper has endorsed the Republican candidate and has a pronounced conservative bias; no doubt the above letter was printed because the editor thought it was anti-liberal. To their credit, they did publish (in the same issue) a big article about a man and his wife who were actually caught stealing lawn signs. The guy’s wife was the getaway driver, with several dozen “liberal” signs and posters in the back of their pickup truck. The man was caught because he tripped over a chain across a driveway and fell, knocking himself unconscious. Need we say more?
OK, why not. Every inch of newsprint that is devoted to hooliganism, stupidity, and looming voter fraud scandals, is space that is NOT devoted to news and the issues, but in fact provides a distraction from them. Whose interests does that serve?
October 20th, 2004 at 11:30 pm
Has a bumber sticker or yard sign ever changed anyones opinion on who they are going to support or vote for? Or am I the only one who saw a Kerry/Edwards bumper sticker and said ” Oh my God, I have been wrong all these years and now I must become a liberal”?
October 21st, 2004 at 9:34 am
Sorry, friend, you are the only one.
We’ve done a scientific study of bumper stickers over a period of about twenty years. Our conclusion is that they could all be replaced by a generic bumper sticker. It says (in red white and blue, of course) “I’m an idiot.”