Bogus Right Wing Emails

OK, this is a particularly large thorn in my side. Can someone please explain to me why there are so many of these fallacious emails circulating on the web that originate from the right? Obama is a Muslim. Clinton was in bed with Enron. Obama is a Socialist. The ACLU is trying to keep Marines from praying. That whole "Swift Boat Campaign" against John Kerry. What's up with all this? Has the right become so unbelievably desperate that they are willing to resort to out and out lies in their feeble attempt to garner support?

I participate in a rather interesting diologue via email with a small group of friends and acquaintances. We happen to be split down the middle with three of us being liberal minded and the other three conservative (one of them claims to not be conservative.... but he is). I have asked repeatedly for evidence of the same type of tactic from the left. To date... nada. I think on one occasion someone sent me some flimsy example that was so irrelevant I can't remember it's specifics. Can anyone out there point me in a direction that will uncover the same kind of crap emanating from the left?

I find these emails to be both irritating and frightening. The irritation is obvious. I lean left so of course I would be irritated by shit like this. It's the frightening part that is... well... frightening! The number of these things out there can only be explained by two conclusions. Either the people making this stuff up believe that there are enough Americans ignorant enough to believe it OR the people making it up are ignorant enough to theorize it. Either way, when ignorance becomes the basis for anything American I think we have a problem.

I have said many times in the past that we are rapidly becoming a nation of morons. If you need proof, take a good hard look at the most popular shows on television. Better yet, go to any Internet portal (is that the correct lingo?) like AOL or the like, pull up an article, and read the posts below it. It is horrendous. Now like I said in my first post, I wasn't an English major. But too many people writing this stuff spell like 3rd graders, have the grammar of a functional illiterate, and proclaim their stupidity to the world through their racist, ignorant ranting and raving. And we, as a nation, seem content to accept or ignore it.

How in the world did George W. Bush get elected (twice mind you) when things like that swift boat campaign were sweeping the web. How could we, as a nation, not stand up and say "whoa... something here isn't right... do I want to support a party that would knowingly defame a veteran who honorably served his country?" "Do I want to put in power, those that would turn a blind eye to falsified rhetoric and anti-American innuendo?" How could we as a nation not be outraged by this? WTF? Hey, I'm not a big fan of John Kerry but I certainly do NOT question his service to the country. And to those that would point to a picture of him in the close proximity of Jane Fonda and make that a basis for degrading him, well, all I can say is fuck you.... The thought of intentionally slandering an honorably discharged vet through the use of lies is repugnant to me.

And a quick aside about Jane Fonda, John Kerry, and any perceived association between the two. First of all, one of the benefits bestowed on us as citizens of this great country is the freedom to express our views without fear of reprisal. That any veteran of a foreign war can come home and state his disapproval of that war should be viewed as a testament to our freedom, not used as a condemnation of the vet. It's not like he was the ONLY person who didn't approve of the conflict in Viet Nam. You young people who think there is controversy surrounding the war in Iraq "ain't seen nothin' ". So to single out Kerry is ridiculous. To put him in bed with Fonda because of a picture is likewise ridiculous. And to continue to beat Fonda over the head for mistakes she made as a teenager or young "twenty something" FORTY YEARS AGO is also ridiculous. She has apologized. Let it go for crying out loud. We release convicted felons from prison in less time than that.

But, to get back on subject, my challenge to you is two-fold. First, when you get an email that is in any way suspect, take ten minutes and check a website like Snopes or Political Fact Checker to see for yourself if it has merit. Then, do your own analysis. Ask yourself whether the number of emails of this nature you see that degrade the left equals those that degrade the right.

Now here is my prediction for the future. What we will start to see is unbelievably stupid emails that do in fact defame the right. So stupid that even the most hapless moron would see them as bogus bull shit. And these will also emanate from the right. And the right will use them as examples of the left playing that game as well. But they will need to be REALLY unbelievable to insure that the idiots out there don't believe them. After this, the right will at least be able to claim the left plays dirty too, even if they can't deny their own participation in this crap. So, expect to see emails claiming that fat bastard Rush Limbaugh performs abortions and Ann Coulter digs group sex with orangutans.

I leave you with this, my personal favorite of the slanderous right wing proclamations. And my theory on why it came about (is it a theory or am I stating the obvious?). My favorite is the email that proclaims Snopes to be run by ultra-leftist radicals that don't do a lick of research on the topics they address. Why did this one spring forth? Could it possibly be because the right one day realized that Snopes was dismantling their propaganda machine? What better way to put an end to that than to call into question the legitimacy of Snopes? Now the morons out there can believe this bull shit, even if Snopes says it's bogus.....