My sister’s cats are creeping me out. Wherever I go in my condo, they follow me around like they’re stalking prey. And sometimes they’ll simply sit and stare at me until I start getting self-conscious. Oh, and one of them decided my carpet looked an awful lot like a litter box. Charming creatures.
The way some Republicans are behaving towards Cindy Sheehan, the grieving mother of a soldier killed in Iraq and who is camped outside Bush’s Crawford ranch, is so vitriolic it’s almost bizarre. Whether or not you agree with the symbolism of her vigil, she certainly doesn’t deserve to be called a “whore” or peppered with taunting chants of “We don’t care.” I’m not sure this is even about Iraq anymore. It’s about quashing any display of speech that a small but potent group of ideologues deem threatening. And yes, there are rude, overzealous liberals who also behave badly. But if someone from the left made derogatory remarks about the mother of a dead soldier, that individual would quickly be vilified by the right. But because the right feels like they are the exclusive proprietors of star-spangled patriotism, it somehow excuses their conduct from the normal bounds of decency and compassion.
