In case you’ve been living under a rock recently, the
presidential debate is in a mad dash to the finish line, with both sides
clearly convinced their candidate will not only win, but that he’ll get America
back on track. Feelings are running high, and that even applies here in
northeast Iowa.
When I came into work the other day, the coffee station had
several mini brochures advertising Ben Lange, the Republican representative
running for office. Usually this is frowned on, but I happen to know that quite
a few people in my company support the Republicans. A LOT, and some of them are
in the position to make hiring and firing decisions. I’m not entirely sure what
they’d do if they saw brochures for Lange’s opponent on the coffee table.
The interesting thing about living here is that, while I
think a lot of people are Republicans, there are also a lot of Democrats, too. You
see a lot of signs for Obama planted in front yards, along with the occasional
“superfan” who has yard signs from everyone in either the Republican or
Democratic party scattered throughout their lawn like mutant plastic flamingos.
Of course, feelings run hotter in Decorah. The town’s
liberal population is pretty vocal in their beliefs. After all, this was the
place that had the Inaugural Ball for Obama in January 2008, and it’s the town
where fans turned out by the hundreds to get a look at Obama when he stopped by
here last year.
The town’s conservative element is pretty vocal, too.
There’s a branch of the Tea Party in Decorah that was very vocal when President
Obama visited, to the point where the apparent leader of the Tea Party faction
sounded like a campus preacher, barely able to finish up how much he hated
Obama for one aspect before he had to launch into yet another aspect. There is
a Christian bookstore in Decorah that leaves no doubt as to where its political
loyalties lie, since greeting you when you walk in are a list of best-selling
books by noted conservatives and conservative Christians.
I point this out because of an item in Decorah’s newspaper a
week or so ago. Apparently, someone had gone around and stolen several
Democratic yard signs from people’s lawns and tossed them in a ditch out of
town. Since this is northeast Iowa and not, say, New York, Chicago, or even the
Twin Cities, the police were investigating this and trying to find out who
could have committed this act of vandalism. It’s funny, this is not something
you normally associate with an act of vandalism, but it is defacing other
people’s property.
That’s as good of an illustration of how divided things have
gotten around here as any. There’s been a pretty nasty undercurrent this year
anyway. The little jabs have a bit more of an edge to them, as though the other
side is really going to do whatever it can to destroy the American way of life.
Personally, I do feel that one of the candidates is much worse than the other,
but I don’t know that I’d go so far as to say the other side is Anti-American.
We’re supposed to be the melting pot, anyway, right? Doesn’t that mean that
every point of view, no matter how different, gets to have its say? Apparently
not this time around.
What really worries me are the people who believe the stuff
that should be reserved for conspiracy theorists. Barack Obama wasn’t *really*
born in the United States, you know. He’s *actually* a Muslim, you know.
Probably with Al Quaida too, if I had to guess. Seriously, there’s at least one
person at my office who knows for a fact Barack Obama put Osama Bin Laden in
the Witness Protection Program. He knows this for a fact. (Also, I apologize to
Republicans. I wanted to find something equally as crazy about Mitt Romney, but
there really doesn’t seem to be anything similar.) Given this environment, it
doesn’t strike me as odd that someone would get it into his or her head to go
around taking down lawn signs of a candidate they don’t like. It does make me
wonder, though, if you hate a candidate so much you want to rip out other
people’s lawn signs and throw them away, how do you escalate your attacks?
Hopefully no one in this area has to find out.
No comments:
Post a Comment