Mixed Nuts
“Hey joe, Where you gonna run to now where you gonna go”
Obviously Senator John McCain’s brother Joe doesn’t believe that little things like the law applies to people like him, as is witnessed by this 911 call that he placed on October 21 into Alexandria’s 911 system:
Operator: 911 state your emergency
Caller: It’s not an emergency but do you know why on one side at the damn drawbridge of 95traffic is stopped for 15 minutes and yet traffic’s coming the other way?
Operator: Sir, are you calling 911 to complain about traffic? (pause)
Caller: “&%@k you.” (caller hangs up)
The 911 operator, apparently, unnerved by use of the 911 emergency number to complain about bad traffic, called back the phone number that placed the call.
The operator reached a voice mail message that said, “Hi this is Joe McCain I can’t take this message now because I’m involved in a very (inaudible) important political project… I hope on Nov. 4th we have elected John.”
Outraged by the operator’s action, the man called 911 a second time. That conversation went as follows:
Caller: Somebody gave me this riot act about the violation of police.
Operator: Did you just call 911 in reference to this?
Caller: Yeah.
Operator: 911 is to be used for emergencies only, not just because you’re sitting in traffic. (http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/10/report-john-mcc.html)
Those McCain brothers sure have problems with their tempers, but calling 911 because you’re stuck in traffic? I’m glad Joe’s hand won’t be anywhere near any important buttons . . .
Stories From The Phone Bank
I was doing more work on the phones at Obama headquarters, and I have to share two stories with you. The first one is really wonderful but a bit disheartening at the same time. I spoke with a woman who is a very big Obama supporter who was telling me that her mother lives in Florida and is voting for the first time in 76 years. The woman’s mother is Puerto Rican, and at first, she had no plans to vote even though her daughter was pressing her do to so. What changed her mind? The women at her church.
Seems that the lovely church ladies accosted her mother and said something along the lines of “you aren’t going to vote for that n**** are you?” Her mother was so insulted that she registered to vote the next day. She proudly called her daughter and told her what happened and how she had registered in protest of the women’s close-minded, racist remarks. They had helped her mother to cement her position.
Score one for the good guys!
I also spoke to another lovely woman who was very concerned about voter fraud. She wanted to be assured that she wouldn’t have any problems once she got to her precinct on election day. I did what I could to reassure her. I reminded her about Virginia’s laws about not allowing anyone to vote if they were wearing any kind of political garments or buttons, and told her to make sure she had a valid driver’s license. Other than that, I really wasn’t sure what else I could tell her. The thing that really disturbed me about her question was that it was a valid concern, one that I really hadn’t given much thought to in Virginia before. I cannot tell you how naive I felt, and how much it sickened me to realize that voter fraud may play a big part in this election.
The Obama campaign has registered unprecedented numbers in Virginia this year. It’s one of the reasons Democrats actually have a chance of winning not only the presidential election, but also numerous House seats, and the Senatorial race in Virginia. The grass roots campaign has been extremely well organized and executed. And the thought of losing because of people being turned away at the polls, well, it just makes me violently ill. Shades of Jim Crow.
The Unbelievable Stupidity of it All
I cannot let this pass. I was going to; I really was. But some things just need to have a spotlight shone upon them because, well, they are just so incredibly stupid and because some people are going to believe them. But I won’t give them excess coverage. Conservative radio hosts Michael Savage and Rush Limbaugh (and I use the term radio host very loosely when speaking of Limbaugh), actually had the audacity to question Obama’s trip to Hawaii to spend time with his grandmother, claiming that in fact, it was a ruse to cover up the Senator’s ongoing problem with his birth certificate.
Birth certificate???? Dear god men, have you no shame. Simply because Obama did not leave days earlier, they claim that his grandmother could not have really been that ill and that he was going to Hawaii to create a birth certificate. EGADS!!! What about John McCain rushing off to Washington immediately during the financial crisis, only to leave a day and a half later after doing an interview with Katie Couric and having a sumptuous lobster dinner?
These people (and I use the term loosely) are scum.
No Real Winners Here
And finally, there is the story of Ashley Todd, a McCain field supporter. Todd is a 20-year-old college student who claims she was mugged by a 6’4″ black man who became enraged when he saw her McCain bumper sticker. The man, claims Todd, stole $60 and carved a B on her cheek. One big problem with Todd’s story, the B was backwards.
The good part of this story is that the Pittsburgh police who heard Todd’s story did not immediately lose their heads and start rounding up tall black men, reminiscent of what happened in the Charles Stuart case in Boston almost two decades ago when Stuart claimed that a black man had assaulted him and killed his pregnant wife after a birthing class. The Boston police overreacted by rounding up every Black man who fit Stuart’s description. However, in this case, the Pittsburgh police immediately suspected that something was not right with Todd’s story.
The sad part of this story is that Todd suffers from emotional problems, and as a result, she is being held for psychological evaluation instead of being charged for filing a false police report.
The pathetic part of this story is how it was handled by some in the press. Conservative columnist Michelle Malkin is jumping up and down saying “I told you so” because she decried Todd’s story as a hoax as soon as it hit the airwaves. To which I reply, so what?
No one wins in a situation like this. Not McCain. Not Obama. And certainly, not Ashley Todd. If not for the cooler heads that prevailed, this could have escalated into a horrible situation all the way around. Now, perhaps Todd will get the treatment she needs instead of the publicity she sought but did not need.
More later. Peace.
Lola's Curmudgeonly Musings 