Stepping on my last nerve

I have just about had it.

Up to here.

You might guess what I've had it with, but here's a little backstory if you haven't yet:

In 2000, George W. Bush was elected President. By the Supreme Court. 5-4. If you are a rightwinger reading this, don't bother giving me the old song and dance. This and This tell the tale. OK, we who voted for the actual winner that year should have been doing an Iran and hitting the streets demanding that the person we elected President be sworn in.

Didn't happen. OK.

Still not on my last nerve yet.

I'd always wondered why, given all of the elections for President in our history, it was so important that George W. Bush become President no matter what you had to do to put in the fix. It struck me as very strange. Then I found out why. 9/11 happened. We were attacked and even diehards like me were giving the new guy in the White House a chance. Now, don't put me in with the "Bush did 9/11" crowd - give me a second to make my point. We had the country as united as it ever is when faced with an external threat - even those outside of the US who were supposed to be against us were horrified at that act of mass murder and offered their sympathies and condolences. We were all pretty stirred by W's speech to Congress too, as well as when he stood in the rubble of the World Trade Center and promised that the ones who did this would be hearing from us soon.

I'm going to stop rehashing history here. We all know what happened next with Iraq and the lies told to us to get us to support going there. Bush's presidency survived a strong challenge for a second term then it all went to shit.

We could hardly wait to replace the Bumbler and Liar in Chief.

We did with an intelligent, eloquent man from Illinois and made history. Our first black President! My God, I never thought it would happen in my lifetime and was in tears on election night both in relief of finally getting rid of Dubya and the Neocons and in sadness that my late wife hadn't lived long enough to see it with me.

Ah, there's that word. Finally. Oops on me.

I think a lot us were a bit too full of hope that election night. We never saw Obama as a "Messiah" like the far right liked to pretend, but we also didn't see him first as a black man. The tears in Obama supporters wasn't us seeing him as the Second Coming, it was joy that we didn't have to deal with daily scandals and outrages presided over by a semi-literate party hearty "good ol' boy" from Tex-onnecticut. The tears during the inauguration was because not only did we get a very good man elected, we showed the world that we'd moved beyond racism and hate.

Or, we thought we had. Our mistake.

First mistake: we thought that the over the top rhetoric from the fringes of the right really didn't run the GOP. OK, yeah we poked and teased them over it but we didn't really didn't think that the regular Rpublican party was personified by Rush Limbaugh and Mann Coulter. Saying that was just to get the goat of the people who had rubbed our noses in Bushit for 8 years. Then out came the crazies, blaming the new President for all the bad things the previous one actually did and more without his being in office even a year yet. We said to ourselves, "Oh crap, we were really right about the Republicans?"

Getting close to that last nerve now.

Mistake #2: believing that we'd finally staked that old monster Racism in the heart and it was gone for good. OK, for a far right party these aren't necessarily racist. Tea Parties. Obama as Hitler....well, OK, not that one so much - let's be honest with ourselves here, we did do it to Bush first. Whatever the right considered "bad" they said Obama was one of them. Shouting matches at town halls over health care reform (that was a strange one).

OK, that could all be put down to partisan overzealousness as much as anything else.

However....

Postcards of the White House with watermellons on the front lawn.

Photoshopping Obama into a stereotypical African witch doctor, complete
with a bone through his nose.

Buttons saying, "If Obama wins will we still call it the White
House?"

Bumperstickers saying, "Do we really need a black man begging for CHANGE in
the White House?"

"Obama Bucks" with pictures of watermellons and fried chicken along the
edges.

A stuffed monkey in a suit with "Obama '08" on its lapel.

Try Googling "Racist Obama images" and see what pops up - the above is just a small list of examples.

If that ain't flat-out racism, I don't know what is.

Closer to that last nerve...not quite there yet......

The kicker to all of this? The racists aren't even trying to hide it anymore. Oh, they'll do their usual shuffle to avoid being called what they are. You know, if you talk about race issues at all you must be a racist...especially if you aren't white. Say some anti-Obama people are racists then start screaming "You called us ALL racists!!" The usual male bovine excrement.

However, it's not just that. The people who send this stuff out will stand there before God and a TV camera and not only not deny they sent it, they claim they didn't realize it was offensive.

What? WHAT?!!

Do you all think that when Obama was elected the heat was off and you could let that racist freak flag fly?!!!

Were you all hatched yesterday and have no clue what is racist and what isn't after all this country has gone through because of it?!!

ARE YOU SHITTING ME?!!!!

NOW we hit that last nerve!

Alrighty then. That's how you want to play it, eh righties?

Fine.

You are total ignorant assholes. I have no interest in what you think or what you say. I will no longer argue with you over what's true and what's not. I don't care what you believe in or don't. I'm not your friend and you are no friend to my country. I will not debate you. I will barely acknowledge your existence. I will not indulge in a shouting match with you. I don't care what Rush or Glenn or Sean or FOX told you to think today. You are a danger to the Republic. You are traitors to the real America. You are just enough to rate a derisive laugh.

The only thing that interests me about you is seeing to it that your empty head is beat down so far that your ass is a planter in China. I can't defeat you enough. Kick you when you're down? I'll be running a steam roller over you.

You want a war? Bring it on.