So, I spent last week just outside of Richmond, VA visiting one of my oldest and dearest friends (I'll spare them the embarrassment of having to admit to knowing me, but refraining from using their names here). At any rate, I first met my friend (We'll call him "Ben") some 30 years ago when we briefly worked together. In spite of the fact that we really only worked together for about a month, we remained friends, with us becoming "Uncle" to each others' kids.
Well, "Ben" moved to Virginia some 25 years ago, and remained there.
Much as you would expect, living in back hills Virginia has (shall we say) "altered" their political perspectives. (OK, they are Tea Partyers, but not the rabid crazy ones). Seriously though, I like to think of myself as a reasonable adult (in spite of what you might have heard from the Mrs.), so, after several debates, I agreed to attend a Tax Day Tea Party rally in Richmond.
Turns out, it was, well, interesting. I wanted to see if these folk were as Nutzy Fagan as I've seen, and, as it turns out, they weren't quite. Their speakers not only made sense, but they weren't anti-Gay, racist, and they did appear to be pro-Israel (all of which was very much surprising to me).
I did, however, see at least one misspelled sign; a woman held a sign that admonished the government to "Stop sucking her teet (sic). There was also someone holding a sign stating "Jesus didn't need a bailout." Which was interesting, except that neither I nor "Ben" quite understood what that meant. (I did want to point out to the fellow that not only did the sentiment made absolutely no sense, but couldn't Jesus rising from the dead be considered something of the ultimate bailout? Only I was admittedly outnumbered, and wasn't sure that they guy would get the joke.
A third fellow was carrying a pole with three flags on it, the top two were a yellow "Don't tread on me" coiled snake, I don't know what the second one was (either a Tea Party flag or a VA State flag), and the bottom-most flag was a variant American flag with a dollar sign in the blue field and the aforementioned snake (uncoiled this time), stretched across the stripes. Again, this bothered both "Ben" and I, as neither of us could figure out what the dollar sign meant, and the American Flag should fly equal to or above (never below), another flag.
So I (politely) asked the guy about it. He responded that he got the "American" flag last, and well, it wasn't really a US flag, so the rule didn't matter, whereupon I backed off (although it was clear that he didn't appreciate that I had the audacity of question him, which made me feel better about not confronting the other two protesters).
All-in-all, the event was well-behaved, organized, and civil (the keynote speaker did make a a few disparaging references to the recent Captain America comic that (negatively) cited the Tea Party, holding up the comic and then tossing it aside. I mentioned to "Ben" that if I didn't already own that comic, I would have chased it down).
The rest of the week was relaxing and, just before leaving, "Ben" proudly showed off his collection of handguns and rifles. Now I'm neither an aficionado, nor a detractor of guns. I (naturally) have opinions (they don't bother me, but I really don't understand why you need a fully auto weapon that fires armor-piercing shells), so the guns in and of themselves didn't really bother me. So the .45 & .38 were fine, as was the old .22 rifle. The AR rifle (with he extending stock), did cause me to twinge a bit (OK, it was wicked cool looking), however I personally would have drawn the line just before the street sweeper shotgun he hauled out.
So, now that I'm back in the safety of my liberal, elite, late-drinking effete friends, and feel comfortable laughing at them. However, I felt it necessary to report that not all of them are nut-balls, and, in fact, some of them are quite reasonable.
The Perfessor (now would someone pass me some o' dat White Lighting I brung North)
