Political Arena – Etiquette Hell

Children As Political Pawns

November 12, 2018January 24, 2019admin29 Comments

Over 11 years ago, when this blog was in its infancy, I posted a strongly worded opinion post about anti-war protestors invading the residential space of US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. When you have a basic principle that an action is wrong, it’s wrong regardless of who the victims or who the perpetrators are on the political spectrum. It was wrong then and it’s wrong now although in retrospect the protestors 11 year ago were mild compared to what is happening today.

Fox News host Tucker Carlson was at his desk Wednesday evening, less than two hours before his 8 p.m. live show, when he suddenly started receiving multiple text messages.

There was some sort of commotion happening outside his home in Northwest D.C.

“I called my wife,” Carlson told The Washington Post in a phone interview. “She had been in the kitchen alone getting ready to go to dinner and she heard pounding on the front door and screaming. … Someone started throwing himself against the front door and actually cracked the front door.”

His wife, thinking it was a home invasion, locked herself in the pantry and called 911, Carlson said. The couple have four children, but none were home at the time.

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Antifa thugs chanted “Tucker Carlson, we will fight. We know where you sleep at night”, the oak front door of the house was cracked after being pounded on and the security camera caught someone mentioning a “mail bomb”. These thugs had blocked off both ends of the neighborhood street and posted online the addresses of not just Carlson but also the addresses of his brother and his best friend.

The timing of this home attack wasn’t a coincidence. Carlson was not home but at work meaning that the assault on the house was meant to terrorize the Carlson children and Carlson’s wife. Miserable cowards drag the innocent into their dramas, children particularly, using them as shields and soft targets. Vile. The neighbors on that street are collateral damage as their safety and their freedom to move freely with an expectation of not being in the midst of a melee that appears to be on the verge of violence has been diminished.

You have a beef with a politician or political pundit? Get a permit and protest at their office.

UPDATE 01/24/2019: Several commenters have referred to the published testimony of one protester to downplay the severity of the situation. However, the witness ends his statement with this:

The point, in other words, is to unsettle and frighten — and I certainly would have been frightened had it been me in that house.

The Voters’ Valet

October 29, 2018admin37 Comments

I voted early today at my local voting center and, is my usual custom for the past few years, I used the curb-side voting for handicapped. While being processed and verified, the election worker commented that they had seen an increase this year of adults, well dressed, driving up to the curb-side handicapped voting area thinking it was VALET VOTING. As in, they could sit in their car, avoid the lines, have an election worker fetch a ballot from inside, fill out the ballot in the comfort of their car and it’s returned to inside for tabulating by the same election worker.

I assumed he was referring to ignorant, first time 18-year old voters unfamiliar with the voting process. Nope…mostly in their late 20’s or 30’s. The last couple drove up in a late model Mercedes wearing matching, upscale leather jackets. No handicapped placard or plate. They didn’t want to be bothered finding a parking space, walking into the building and standing in line. They were declined and pointed to the proper entrance to the voting polls.

Dear Voters, Choose The Healthy Narcissists

April 7, 2016admin28 Comments

This is such a good article I had to share. Dr. Craig Malkin posted to Psychology Today’s blog an article he wrote titled, A Psychologist’s Open Letter to U.S. Voters – A research-backed guide to picking the next president.

To summarize, Malkin notes

What we should be far more concerned about is not whether politicians are narcissists-most are—but how healthy they are. And that’s where you come in.

You have the power to shape the future of this country.

Politicians are groomed by us—by our applause, by our polls, by our votes. Whatever you seem to love or hate, they’ll embrace or reject. So be careful what you applaud or attack. It matters what they—and all the little future leaders watching them—think you want in a leader.

Instead, I offer a guide, based on research, for what keeps leaders healthy, so you can applaud the right behaviors, and, I hope, punish the dangerous ones.

People high in healthy narcissism inspire without undermining. They lead with conviction not cruelty. They bring out the best, not the worst, in the people around them. That’s who we need leading the nation.

Malkin then lists 9 ways voters can “train” politicians to not behave in unhealthy narcissistic ways….

Do applaud careful reflection.

Don’t applaud insults.

Do applaud feelings.

Don’t applaud manipulation.

Do applaud collaborative behavior.

Don’t applaud black-and-white thinking.

Do applaud apologies.

Don’t applaud evasiveness.

Do applaud curiosity.

And then he sums it up…

It’s up to you, America. Narcissists will always be drawn to politics. But you have the power to make sure the narcissist in the Oval Office, or in any other elected office, isn’t so addicted to feeling special that they forget the needs of the people who put them there in the first place.

Vote For Rude Candidates And You Get Rude Politicians

March 15, 2016March 15, 2016admin97 Comments

Pull on your asbestos pants, Ehellions, we are talking politics!

Buzzfeed recently featured an article discussing the conduct of the candidates in the most recent Democratic debate. Specifically, there were several times during the debate when Secretary Clinton interrupted Senator Sanders, and Sanders responded by saying, “Can I finish please?” The question is: Was Senator Sanders rude for doing this, or was Secretary Clinton rude for interrupting?

My opinion is that when someone interrupts you, it is perfectly appropriate to say, “Excuse me. May I finish my thought?” But I would love to hear what the EHellions think. 0307-16

Democrats certainly do not have the market on rudeness and interrupting. The Republican debates have been a showcase of how to talk over your opponent so that his/her message is stifled. When anyone begins to talk while you are speaking, it means they are not listening to you but are consumed with forming their own thoughts in order to push the agenda.

In a political debate, it’s a dirty tactic, imo, to interrupt and talk over an opponent because it diminishes the power of another person’s spoken word so that either the candidate becomes confused/distracted or the more likely scenario is that listeners never hear a complete, cogent presentation of a candidate’s position because of the auditory dissonance of trying to concentrate on only one voice. I’m offended as a listener of these televised debates when the interruptions and talking over each other commences because I feel like I am being treated like an idiot who cannot listen to opposing viewpoints and make an informed choice but instead must have my access to different viewpoints artificially restricted.

Then there is the issue of not honoring the debate rules that each candidate had agreed upon and which prescribes a predetermined amount of time to respond to moderator questions and give rebuttal to opponents. To interrupt is to be a pig taking more time than allotted and deny to others the time to present their own views. It’s verbal bullying.

Miss Manners addressed rudeness in politicians in a 2011 column where she writes,

Miss Manners reminds you that every rude person in Congress was elected to that office. This is why she feels it urgent to point out the fallacy of voters who believe that candidates who refuse to deal politely with their opponents make effective leaders. By showing contempt for those who disagree with them and by declaring a refusal to compromise, such candidates clearly demonstrate their inability to cope with a system that requires respect and cooperation.

Yet Miss Manners understands why those who are elected using that style of campaigning persist in behavior that has proved so successful at the polls. They must have pleased the voters, they figure, because they won. They cannot fail to be puzzled when the constituents who elected them start characterizing them as those rude politicians.

Hence her warning is to the voters: If you don’t want badly behaved people in office, do not vote for badly behaved candidates.

Political Curmudgeon Sours The Experience

February 3, 2016admin67 Comments

I’ve kept this particular submission in the “hold” folder for quite some time while I pondered whether to include the real name of the alleged offender or edit it out. I finally decided to edit it out.

I am very politically active in my local area; I have previously done door-to-door volunteer work for the municipal-level party, as well as some phone banking at county HQ, and I receive many invitations to rallies, committee meetings with bigwigs, and so on and so forth. In 2008, as the infamous presidential primaries were starting to wind down, I was invited to a rally at the county’s party headquarters in honor of my Congressman (who is a gentleman and a warrior) and his primary Senate run, which coincided with the day of the final presidential primaries.

I put on my best casual clothes, tied my hair back, and drove to HQ. All the TV stations from across the river had sent their vans to HQ, and they were milling about interviewing people and people watching. Most of the people present were dressed ranging from street clothes to business casual, excepting mayors, assemblypeople, state senators, committee members, and other elected and/or party officials, who were in their suits, and, where necessary, ties. I met local news anchor and got my photograph taken with her; she was incredibly nice and good humored. We talked for a few moments and shook hands before she went back to her job. One of the volunteers informed all of us that there would be food served in an outdoors pavilion within the next ten minutes, and that the actual rally would start a little later afterward. I didn’t expect catering beyond the soda, wine, and cold cuts I’d previously enjoyed at other functions, so I got in line.

And who was behind me in line? Nobody but the big political boss himself. This man, while having no office himself, elected or appointed, pulls many of the political strings in the region, and having him behind me was, to say the very least, intimidating. The food service wasn’t open yet, so I looked up at him and gave him a sheepish smile, extending my hand.

“Hello Mr. XXXXX, it’s an incredible honor to meet you.”

He gave me a look that was a cross between catching me keying his car and not being impressed, and didn’t bother raising a finger in return. I swear I could have heard him snort. He then chewed his bottom lip slightly as though I had committed some unforgivable sin. Apparently in the moment this all occurred, food service had started, when I heard him cough the following.

“Well, are you hungry or not?”

Initially, I was embarrassed at my unwittingly holding up the line, but when I turned around to face the food service volunteers, they were as mortified as I was. Mr. XXXX did not intimidate me anymore, but for all the wrong reasons. He made some patronizing small talk about the food selection but I simply nodded in reply, dished up my share, and then sat as far away from him as possible, which admittedly wasn’t too difficult. He sat at another table surrounded by two or three other men similar in age, apparently wanting to keep other commoners away from his sphere of presence. Oh the horror.

Ultimately, my Congressman lost his bid for the Senate primary, though all present were relieved the presidential primary battle was finally concluded. As soon as the losing news hit, I didn’t even stay to meet my Congressman (I had not met him at the time), as the sour taste in my mouth from my earlier encounter with Mr. XXXX lingered, so I went home.

Safe to say though, since that incident at HQ, I haven’t been back to HQ for anything but sign collection and/or return. Mr. XXXXX even had the gall to try and harass me into patronizing his favorite charity through various mailings. For some reason the fundraiser and rally invites have all but stopped too. Hmm. At least his brother and everyone else in this party doesn’t view me as a lowly peasant. Every other person in this organization has helped me out in some way, from work on Election Day to Senate gallery passes and a tour of the Capitol for me and my mother, but not the boss man. What a snooty grouch. Our party’s emblem may be a jackass, but its downstate leader sure is a horse’s you know what. 0108-11

My opinion on the situation is that the OP allowed the actions of one person to negatively affect her perspective on her political party and her favorite candidates and even her enjoyment of volunteering. Just because Mr. XXXX was an inhospitable curmudgeon shouldn’t have deterred her from introducing herself to the candidate. I do, however, relate to feeling marginalized politically when I attended a fundraising BBQ for a candidate running for the US Senate. I should note that this was the first political fundraiser event I have ever attended and probably my last. My perception was that unless I was a big dollar donor, my value to the candidate was low and therefore my thoughts on certain issues were not worth spending the time to hear. He did not win election to the office he was running for.