My son's encounter with a wingnut today...

[Joe Fields]

My 21 year old son, A. J., and his girlfriend came over to the house tonight. He had a story that he KNEW I would just love, the type that drips with irony.

It happened in the perfect setting: In the PARKING LOT OF A WALMART....

To set the scene, my son and his girlfriend had just come from a wedding, and had stopped at the local Walmart to get her some allergy relief medicine. They were still dressed up, my son, a suit and tie, Kelsey a nice dress.

As they stepped out of my son's car and walked through the parking lot, a man comes up to them and addresses my son.

"You look all dressed up nice," the man told my son. "What do you think about o-BAM-a? (hard emphasis on the middle syllable)

Okay, so my son has his hair cut short and wears nice clothing. That automatically makes him a young republican? Anyway, back to the story. Naturally, my son is taken slightly aback. It's not like this is an every day occurrence. The strange thing was that my son said this man looked like a derelict, with three or four days worth of beard growth, and acted somewhat intoxicated. He appeared to be, by my son's calculations, in his late 50's or early 60's.

"What about him?" A.J. asked. He had a good idea where this was going.

"Well, how do you feel about the way he's turning the country socialist?"

My son was starting to enjoy this, now. "Well, he's just trying to help the people," he said, smiling.

"By taking away our freedoms?" the man fumed.

My son told me that the man looked at him suspiciously and then asked, "Who'd you vote for?"

A.J. smiled and said, "President Obama."

At that, the man huffed and walked away, toward the entrance to Walmart.


Not much of a story, granted. Just a brief encounter in a parking lot. But it says a lot to me as to how the warped minds of the wingnuts work.

My son is a pacifist, eschews confrontation at all cost, but he admitted extreme delight in being able to blow that walking contradiction's mind.

This story struck me, because I just don't ever recall this kind of fervor against a president. Not against Clinton, not against George W. Bush. It's quite ugly out here, people.