way from the spotlight, many local newspapers around the country have covered recent incidents of racially-motivated reactions to last week’s election, from flags hung upside down to the dangling of nooses and cross-burnings. As we noted last week, a couple in northern New Jersey who had an Obama sign on their front lawn woke up to find the charred remains of a cross out there. Local residents today announced a "unity march" to protest the still-unsolved incident.
Now come these fresh reports.
The Associated Press revealed today, "Police on eastern Long Island are investigating reports that more than a dozen cars were spray painted with racist graffiti, reportedly including a message targeting President-elect Barack Obama. The graffiti included racist slurs and sexually graphic references. At least one resident in the quiet Mastic neighborhood told Newsday her son's car was scribbled with a message threatening to kill Obama."
Employees at Hampel's Key and Lockshop in Traverse City, Michigan, flew an American flag upside down last Wednesday protesting of the new president-elect, the Traverse City Record-Eagle reported. One worker used a racial slur during an interview with the Record-Eagle: "(The inverted flag is) an international signal for distress and we feel our country is in distress because the n----- got in," said Hampel’s employee Rod Nyland, who later apologized for the comment, according to the Record-Eagle.
Also in Michigan, in Midland, a man dressed in full Ku Klux Klan regalia walked around toting a handgun and waving an American flag. Initially denying it, the man eventually admitted to police that the display was a reaction to the Obama victory. “[The man] had a concealed weapon permit and was walking up and down the sidewalk in front of a vehicle dealership while some motorists shouted obscenities at him and others shouted accolades," police told The Saginaw News.
One North Carolina man who flew his flag upside down claimed that voters were racist, electing Obama because of his skin color, according to the Winston-Salem Journal. “The flag is stretched upside-down between two poles in a field, with a black X running from end to end. The X is a reference to the Confederate flag, said flag-owner Tony Heath. It reflects his belief that the Confederate flag has been unfairly targeted for protest by people trying to be politically correct,” the Journal reported.
In Pennsylvania, an interracial couple in Apolacon Township discovered the remains of a burned cross in their front yard. “The couple discovered the remnants of the cross about 8:15 a.m. Wednesday (Nov. 5) when a man knocked at their door. Johnson looked out the front window and noticed charring on the utility pole, then discovered two charred 1-by-3-inch planks, each about 4 feet in length, beneath it,” according to the Star-Gazette. The woman, who is Jewish, lives with her husband, who is black. "The Little Meadows area was the site of KKK rallies several decades ago, and a local woman who worked on Obama's campaign said Wednesday she heard tales of racist remarks directed at supporters," the story concludes.
Just today, two men were arrested there: 19-year-old Forrest Ashcraft and 22-yearold Stephen Barret of Friendsville. They're charged with ethnic intimidation and trespassing.
Authorities in Temecula, Calif., found spray-painted graffiti on a city sidewalk containing a swastika and anti-Obama slogan.
From today's Los Angeles Times: "Vandals spray-painted swastikas and racial slurs on a house and several cars in Torrance that displayed campaign signs or bumper stickers for President-elect Barack Obama, authorities said Tuesday. The incidents occurred Saturday night in the Hollywood Riviera section of the city, said Sgt. Bernard Anderson. Four separate incidents were reported the next day, he said. No arrests have been made.
"At one house, the phrase 'Go Back to Africa' was spray-painted across the wall, in addition to a racial epithet on the garage door, Anderson said. Several parked vehicles on the streets were spray-painted with racial slurs, he said."
Today, the NAACP called on North Carolina State University to expel four students who spray painted racist messages about Obama. Two of the messages said: "Let's shoot that (N-word) in the head" and "Hang Obama by a noose."
What the hell is wrong with these people? These people, and the idiots going out to buy guns thinking that it'll somehow protect them from either the mythical Bands of Marauding Negroes™, emboldened by an Obama victory, that they think lie in wait to kill them and rape their wives; also seem to think that an Obama Administration is going to take their stuff and give it to black people. Sort of like this:
What's funny is that these are the same guys who put pictures of Osama Bin Laden with captions reading "Dead or Alive" on their SUVs after the 9/11 attacks, then went to Home Depot and loaded up on duct tape and plastic sheeting the minute Tom Ridge announced a heightened threat level -- and they haven't come out from under the bed for seven years, except to call Rush Limbaugh from their cell phones and talk tough about how we have to stay tough in Eye-Rack. What frightened, sniveling little rat-faced gits they are, living their entire lives in fear -- fear of black people. Fear of women. Fear of gays. Fear of Swarthy Men. Fear of Hordes from South of the Border.
The most toxic legacy of the Bush Administration may be that it convinced too many people that to be frightened is to be strong, and to be brave is to be cowardly, and that one should rant loudly and carry a big stick anyway. But like most bullies, the Bush Administration and the dead-ender apologists who still think the Republicans are a majority party despite having lost all three branches of government, are taking to their blanket forts under the bed again, their rifles in tow, and nervously await the dark-skinned menace that only they can see.
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