Amazing

Well - this weekend at work, I got into a political discussion in the breakroom. It was with a young kid named Howard, who is 17. Howard is a nice kid - always polite. He looks all of 14 years old. But then again, as we know, people say I look 30, so I'll shut up about that.

Anyway, we were eating dinner on Saturday evening and he was flipping through the channels. I said something about ZZ Top being Bush supporters, and he asked me if I was. I gave the slow turn and glare, then replied in an very even tone - "No."

He asked me why, and I didn't want to jump into a whole mess, so I asked him if he was sure that he wanted to talk politics with me. I said I would, but that it might not be a good idea and that he might not like me after I was done talking. He decided that was something he could handle, so we started up. He asked me why I didn't support GWB, and I told him that since I was eating and he was done that it might be better if he explained to me why he did support him.

What follows is the discussion, almost verbatim.

Howard responded with, "well he's a lot better than Kerry."

Me- So you like Bush because he's better than 'the other guy.' That's great. Why?

H- John Kerry is a crazy lunatic!

Me- Wow. It's a good thing he didn't get elected. Um...why is he a lunatic?

H (very animated)- He is! Like his plan for the country - it was just crazy!

[Jeff just read this over my shoulder and told me that I am the "proverbial intellectual bully." I asked him what was proverbial about intellectual bullies and he rolled his eyes.]

Me (imitating his animated state)- Really?! What was his crazy plan?

H- Well. I don't know - you expect me to remember his plan from like six years ago?

Me- Um...when was the election?

H- What?

Me- The election was less than one year ago.

H- But he ran before, in the one before that one...(trailing off)...wasn't that him?

Me- I think you might be thinking of former Vice President Al Gore.

H- Oh yeah, that guy. He was crazy too!!

Me- Uh huh.

So we kept this up for a while until he started making it obvious that the reason he supported Bush, and Republicans in general, was that he was a big gun rights guy.

H- Well, I like guns. I think they're fun.

Me- Really? Why?

H- Because the Second Amendment says we can have them.

Me- Wow, so you like guns because the Second Amendment says you can have them? Cool. You must really, really hate illegal seach and seizure then.

H- Huh?

Me- Nevermind.

Howard eventually caught on that I was having a lot of fun at his expense and started asking me to say specifically why I didn't support our dear leader, but almost immediately leapt to another tactic.

H- You probably love Bill Clinton, don't you?

Me- I thought we were discussing the Bush Administration.

H- Come on, I bet you love Clinton. Just admit it!

Me- So we're moving on then, eh? Well, I think Clinton was probably among the more decent presidents we had during the 20th century, but he was much further to the right on the political spectrum from where I am.

H- He got us into this deficit, you know. He set it up for the next president, if he was Republican, to have the country go into deficit.

Me- Strictly speaking, the United States was in substantial debt before Clinton took office, but during his second term in office, the country began to produce annual surpluses, not deficits. But the nation was still actually in debt - it's just that we were not adding to it. After Bush took office, he got a tax cut plan passed through Congress. Two thirds of that tax cut went to wealthy Americans. So you think that the President controls the entire economy of the United States and that Clinton just decided to throw an entire nation of more than 280 million people into debt so that he would look good?

H- Well, he did.

Me- Do you realize that anything Clinton did would have had to have Republican support, since from 1995 on, he was dealing with a Republican-controlled House and Senate?

H- That's not true!

Me- Wow, really? That's weird. I'm pretty sure that's exactly right. In fact, it is right.

H- No it's not.

Me- Alright, man. That's fine. So what do you think about this war that we're in now that has nothing to do with September 11th?

H- What do you mean?

Me- I'm talking about the war in Iraq, a country that had nothing to do with the events of September 11th.

This is where it got a little more ridiculous, since poor old Howard, along with the majority of those that voted for Bush, was under the impression (despite evidence to the contrary, from such sources as the bipartisan-produced 9/11 Report) that Saddam Hussein had a direct link to bin Laden and the hijackers. Howard didn't like it when I told him that there was no evidence of this, and in fact refused to believe me, giving me a blank stare. For my part, I couldn't actually believe that I had actually encountered someone who still believed this gross fallacy. I explained that the US had supported Hussein in the 1980s because of the secular nature of his government, explained what 'secular' meant, and then told him that bin Laden's and Hussein's goals were not compatible for this reason (secularism and Muslim fundamentalism don't mix).

Howard replied with this gem: "But that's what they told us before the war! Why would they tell the whole country something that wasn't true?"

Me- (through raucous laughter) That's a good question, Howard. That's a very good question.