Tag Archives: protest

What Annoys Jeff this Week?

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1. Reading badly written books. One of the small manifestations of my particular flavor of alleged OCD is found in the fact that even when I find something I’m supposed to be reading for pleasure and the sheer joy of the English language tedious, I can’t seem to stop. It’s the feeling of having a personal obligation to keep on with a book I’ve started no matter how badly it sucks. It’s infuriating. I hate to imagine how many books I’ve plowed through over the years long after I’d lost interest just because finishing what you start is the right thing to do. I’m getting better at ignoring that little voice in my head the older I get (and the correspondingly less I care about the “right thing to do”). Life is too short to read badly written drivel. Except when it’s something posted here, of course. Then you should definitely read it.

2. The Fight for Fifteen people. I wonder if these people realize that the minimum wage is exactly that. It’s the minimum wage set by the government. It’s not as if the government is telling business that they can only pay someone $7.25 an hour. It’s the absolutely minimum threshold for pay (as long as you’re not working a tipped position). Businesses are free to pay employees as far above that minimum basic wage as they are willing and able to pay – or more reasonably at any amount higher than the minimum than the prevailing market rates call for. It’s why you make more flipping a McBurger in Times Square than you do in Pig Knuckle, Arkansas. Wanting to make more money is fine – noble even – but you do that by making yourself a more valuable commodity and developing skills that are more marketable in the workplace. Expecting anyone to willingly hand over more money just because you show up with a sign still just doesn’t make any bleeding sense to me at all. It seems to me that if you have time to stand around on the sidewalk holding a sign, you might just be better served by doing something income generating with that time. I know I keep coming back to this well, but every time I forget about it and then see it pop up again, the annoyance mounts afresh. It can’t be helped.

3. People who put tartar sauce on a fresh made, Maryland lump crab cake. I can probably allow it if you’re feasting on fish sticks or if you lower yourself to buy flash frozen imitation crab cakes, but when you slather it on to the culinary gem of the Chesapeake, well, you’re just a monster.

Not a fan…

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It was hard to miss the “breaking news” today that the US Patent Office vacated multiple trademarks owned by the historic Washington football franchise. I’m not a fan of the Washington Redskins. In fact I can’t remember the last time I watched a football game from Washington-Redskins-Logostart to finish. It was probably sometime in the 90s. Fortunately, this post is only tangentially related to football because it provides the backdrop for the point I really want to make tonight.

There are a lot of appeals between now and anything that might resemble a name change for the team, but if I were Dan Snyder, I’m pretty sure my plan of attack might go something like this: 1) Halt the sale of all items bearing the Redskins team logo; 2) Discontinue all team related activities – shuttering their training facility, FedEx Field, and offices; 3) Inform the NFL of my intention to sit out the 2014 season rather than being forced by the mob to do business as “Generic Washington, DC Football Franchise.” But then again, I’m the kind of guy who will cheerfully slice off my nose to spite my face.

Look, if you’re offended by the use of the name Redskins, then by all means avail yourself of the opportunity to not purchase a ticket. Show up at the stadium on game day with your protest sign. Send a letter. Do whatever it is you feel you need to do to make your voice heard… but in my final analysis, I get a cold chill every time some random agency of government is allowed to tell us what words are offensive, unacceptable, or otherwise “not nice.” I don’t want government within a country mile of making decisions about what words any one of us can or can’t use, from team owners to town drunks. Words are just words. They’re not imbued with any magical meaning or significance until we chose to give them that meaning.

I have a hunch that if Redskins was really an “offensive” term, we wouldn’t need government to save us from it. It would be reflected by the thousands of empty seats at every home game when when fans were too mortified to show up. I’m not sure when we came up with this idea that we should be able to get through life without ever being offended or having our little feelings hurt, but for my money it’s done us more harm than good.

For the first (and probably last) time in my life, I say this without a hint of sarcasm: Hail to the Redskins!

The thing I miss least…

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Now and then I post about things I miss about working in DC. Today I was reminded about one of the great big hairy things that I don’t miss – trying to fight my way into and out of the city when the work day coincides with a major event or demonstration on the National Mall. Whether it’s a march on the Capitol or a memorial dedication, there’s nothing worse than being some schlub just trying to get to the office when there are roads closed all over town and hippies are packed into metro like sardines. When you’re just a guy trying to make a buck, thirty minutes of ye olde protest songs sung in an enclosed space and people dragging train cars full of kids to “see something historic” really just have a way of getting under your skin. Don’t get me started on the douchebaggery of not knowing you should walk to the left and stand to the right.

From those of us whose time in commuter hell is complete, all I can say is good luck and Godspeed you brave suburban voyagers. May your travels tomorrow not end in chaos and gridlock. If you can’t have that, at least try to remember it’s technically illegal to jump the curb, drive down the sidewalk, and run over the tourists. Sometimes staying out of jail is as much of a victory as you can expect.

NATO…

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The logic behind protesting against the one international institution that has actually accomplished anything since its inception is sort of beyond me. The UN, that loveable gaggle of windbags created in San Francisco and headquartered in New York, never seems to be able to find its ass with both hands and a map. On their watch North Korea got the bomb and Iran seems to be right behind them, the Middle East is as much a hotbed now as it was fifty years ago, and a dozen genocides and failed peacekeeping missions dot its less than impressive resume. Since 1945, the UN has been the preeminent forum for talking about the world’s problems and promptly doing nothing about them.

By way of comparison, the signatories of the North Atlantic Treaty have spent the last 60-odd years deterring communist aggression, policing Bosnia and Yugoslavia, raising arms against the common foe when the United States was attacked in 2001, and more recently using air power and special forces troops to knock over a two bit dictatorship in Libya. It seems to me, all of those are good and commendable things to do.

So yeah, when it comes to understanding why the streets of Chicago are full of protestors, all I can do is scratch my head. Godspeed Chicago PD, knock heads and take names… and try to get a few licks in for those of us who can’t be there in person to help out.

Occupy What?

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I’ve always loved a good protest. Mostly because I enjoy both pointing and laughing. Even so, I was delighted to see the particularly dismal turnout for the “General Strike” called by our friends at Occupy. In case anyone out there missed it, yesterday was May 1st, also known as International Workers’ Day. Back in the heyday of the Soviet Union, it was marked my parades and rallies in Red Square. If you’re a kid of the 80s, you’ve got to remember the footage of smiling, waving Soviet strongmen standing atop Lenin’s tomb watching the cream of the Red Army passing in review. You could always depend on the USSR to put on a good show. Their dependability is something I’ve come to miss in an international adversary as of late, but I digress.

Occupy Wall Street was a media darling last Fall. They were going to change the world and now they’re barely a whisper. It’s got to be hard for a movement when even their own spokesmen can’t really identify what they’re for and against, or even really what they’re doing other than causing problems for working stiffs like cops and small business owners unfortunate enough to be in the areas they’ve decided to “occupy.”

So it seems their call to action went largely unheeded by rest of us who celebrated International Workers’ Day by, you know, going to work and earning our pay for the day. Now that’s something worth celebrating. Happy belated IWD, Comrades.

Goddamn hippies…

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While today has been mainly about catching up on class work, I’ll admit to occasionally checking in on the course of the filthy hippy protest in DC this afternoon. Listening to the so-called “leaders” of this movement was quite simply horrifying. The words “we support out troops,” was featured frequently in statements, but it seems that phrase has been picked up as a throw-away line, by those who neither understand nor appreciate the sacrifice the troops are making. That the protest was shown live on cable television, that these people would stand in front of the world, and call for the US to disengage from the war on terror, to retreat back behind the walls of a fortress America that can no longer exists, provides nothing short of aid and comfort to the enemy. Because those who truly do support the troops, those who undeniably know that they only way to win is to destroy the enemy where he lives, remain silent because to speak out is to be labeled a warmonger.

I don’t love war. And in a perfect world, there wouldn’t be a need for America to garrison the world. The world isn’t perfect and that’s why we stand a watch while other countries cower in dark corners. Let’s not pretend that we started this conflict. Despite what the protesting mob thinks, we did not ask to be attacked. It wasn’t 90-year old grandmothers who attacked us. It wasn’t even the French whose main mission in life is to be collaborators. Each and every one of you reading this knows who attacked us and you know, even if you won’t admit it in public, why we are where we are in the world today and not in Europe or South America waging this war.

We’re not waging this war on the streets of America, either, but mark my words, if we throw up our hands and declare that defeating terror is too hard to do. If we cut and run. If we abandon this mission, then mark my words: In our lifetime, and sooner rather than later, we will face this enemy here. We will face him at home in our towns and cities. Because we were unwilling to take the fight to the enemy, the enemy will most certainly bring the battle to us.