Video we'd love to have: "Proud right-wing terrorist" claims Mayflower settlers "didn't arrive with their hand out"
At at GOP town hall meeting in Redding, CA, attendee Bert Stead declared himself a "proud right wing terrorist" to a round of applause and the assurance of Congressman Herger that he's a "Great American." Earlier in his remarks, Stead mentioned that he could trace his ancestry back to the Mayflower, and that those people sure "didn't arrive with their hand out."
In this meeting, Stead and his Congressman demonstrated that 1. They don't know what a right-wing terrorist is, and 2. They are surprisingly unfamiliar with the story of the first American Thanksgiving, in which Native Americans saved a group of pilgrims by offering them enough food and supplies to get them through the winter. Funny. I thought it was a better-known story than that, what with all the talk about it in, like, kindergarten and stuff.
Newspaper article link is below. If anyone can secure the video, it would no doubt be very useful in the War on Brainlessness.
http://www.mtshastanews.com/news/x769902147/Congressman-Herger-calls-Obama-plan-threat-to-democracy
Oh, I'm sure that they know the story very well. Conservatives are masters of self-deception and selective recall.
With the recent passing of the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing, I had read a conservative blogger beaming about how NASA and the Apollo program best exemplify what used to be great abut America, instead of the socialist Obama nightmare it had now become.
The utter ignorance and falsity of his comment still makes me shake my head. Of course, I was compelled to inform him that the space program, in all it's magnificence and glory, not only was among the most socialistic endeavors, but lacked the profit motive necessary to have been anything else.
August 24, 2009 4:20 PM | Reply | Permalink
But wait, are you saying we did a Socialist project to show the Socialists how Socialism doesn't work? Brain...melting...can't...compute.
Yeah, funny how memory serves, or doesn't.
This one just made me roll my eyes--as you point out, of course they know the story. What they choose not to remember is that it applied to THEM.
The other historical detail that makes me grit my teeth is that people have forgotten the impact of distribution of free land to people who showed up to take it. Many of those people were sneered at by the higher classes as the undeserving poor, but they did ok once they got a real break.
How different would it have been if the US had been divided up into serfdoms and people made to work the land as slaves? Ooops, I forgot--that was how they did it in the South, and it didn't go so well long term for them.
August 24, 2009 5:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
erica wrote: "How different would it have been if the US had been divided up into serfdoms..."
Isn't it interesting, how so much of the Republican base seems to relish the role of serfdom to the wealthy elite? Every 'Joe-the-Plumber' type who is more concerned with the tax treatment of the rich than he is with his own tax treatment plays such a role.
August 25, 2009 8:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yup--that bootstraps/trickle-down theory is a pretty clever bit of marketing on the part of the rich....
August 25, 2009 11:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
Have to admit, your title drew me to reading your blog today, erica. Anything "Mayflower" interests me because not only did I have ancestors arriving on a different ship of that era who were part of the Plimouth Colony in 1627, I had other ancestors meeting them on the shore. I admit to conflicting interests on the subject, but I have no conflict about this fella Bert Stead and his 'proud to be a terrrrst' crapola.
And this from the article:
It's stuff like this that makes me believe all the threats, veiled and unveiled, all the noise, has nothing to do whatsoever with healthcare reform. Why are these people not angry about the financial burdens placed on their family members? Why are they not angry about this and blistering mad about what is or is not in the Constitution? It makes no sense to me.
People like Bert Stead and Chris whatshisname are using this issue to act out. This is like Beatlemania...all those girls screaming and fainting and crying because of a music combo from Liverpool? I mean, WTF? It was just some tunes, fer crying out loud.
Bert and Chris want to be famous and now they are. They are rockstars. They have screaming fans that include a Congressman. Yay for them.
They're not the Beatles.
They're not Elvis.
No way are they Mozart.
A week from now they will be Brownsville Station.
Who?
August 24, 2009 8:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wow--how many people can claim to have both pilgrim and native american heritage? And yes, I agree with you--there's something here about cheering on the team that has zero to do with healthcare.
August 25, 2009 12:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
But they didn't reach out their hand. Because they were too stupid to know they needed to.
But in the end they were forced to accept welfare, they survived, and went on to commit genocide against the original inhabitants, perhaps in revenge for their forcing them to accept the food stamps, because putting their hand out wasn't sufficient to persuade the wizened original inhabitants to give up their lands voluntarily.
August 24, 2009 11:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Video is available at krcrtv.com
August 26, 2009 4:03 AM | Reply | Permalink