Size Doesn't Matter
Hello, folks - my editors have mandated that all opinion articles be roughly 500 words, so these updates are now a tad shorter than usual. If I weren't so busy, I'd find a way to make it up to you, but to be honest I think worse things will happen to you than having a little less Hair Guy to read every week.
Also, a special message to Sasha - in the interests of our continued friendship, maybe you shouldn't read this update.
***
“We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit… [These] Pro America areas of this great nation.” – Former Miss Alaska runner up Sarah Palin, Greensboro, N.C., October 16th, 2008.
We have a little saying around my house – “God, I HATE Sarah Palin!” And if you wonder why my roommates and I are so harsh on such a cute, homey, seemingly friendly mother of 5, it’s because of this sort of thing.
Since when is it a crime to not be from a small town? It seems that a recurring theme in this election has been the common, salt of the Earth goodness of small town Americans. For the past few months, the GOP candidates have been attempting to appeal to the masses by touting their rural backgrounds in contrast to their Democratic opponents, who they uniformly paint as hedonistic city slickers with no morals and an all-encompassing hatred of kittens. In retaliation, the Democrats have dredged up their own small town street cred, and what had once been an election has now become a heated debate over whose hometown has fewer traffic lights.
You know who was born in a small town? Ted Bundy, infamous serial killer. Timothy McVeigh called a small town in upstate New York his home. Hitler was from a town of less than 16,000 people – of course, that town wasn’t in America, so perhaps that’s why he went astray. I could keep going; there are lots of small towns, and I guarantee you that every one of them has produced at least a few stinkers. Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Carnegie, and Jesus were also from small towns – this disparity suggests that judging people by the size of the town they were born in makes about as much sense as judging them based on the color of their skin.
I grew up in Salem, a town of 150,000 – perhaps not a small town by all definitions, but Sarah Palin referred to Greensboro, home to some 250,000 people, as small, so I imagine that I’m even more Pro-America than everyone she was talking to that day. This is interesting, given that I am an anti-war atheist who frequently refers to our commander in chief as a “motherfucker”. My friend Mike, who has refused to vote in previous elections due to his outright lack of faith in all candidates, is even more Pro-America than I am, because he’s from Medford, population 75,000. His girlfriend, who frequently smokes an herbal substance classified as illegal by our government, is the most Pro-America of all of us, because she’s from Grants Pass, home to 30,000 of the most patriotic small town folks you’ll ever meet.
I don’t think that the best of America is in the small towns. I also don’t think the best of America is in the big cities. I think that the best of America is in America. And I think that a candidate seeking to reunite a country ideologically divided by eight years of mismanagement would do well to stop playing its citizens against one another.
Also, a special message to Sasha - in the interests of our continued friendship, maybe you shouldn't read this update.
***
“We believe that the best of America is in these small towns that we get to visit… [These] Pro America areas of this great nation.” – Former Miss Alaska runner up Sarah Palin, Greensboro, N.C., October 16th, 2008.
We have a little saying around my house – “God, I HATE Sarah Palin!” And if you wonder why my roommates and I are so harsh on such a cute, homey, seemingly friendly mother of 5, it’s because of this sort of thing.
Since when is it a crime to not be from a small town? It seems that a recurring theme in this election has been the common, salt of the Earth goodness of small town Americans. For the past few months, the GOP candidates have been attempting to appeal to the masses by touting their rural backgrounds in contrast to their Democratic opponents, who they uniformly paint as hedonistic city slickers with no morals and an all-encompassing hatred of kittens. In retaliation, the Democrats have dredged up their own small town street cred, and what had once been an election has now become a heated debate over whose hometown has fewer traffic lights.
You know who was born in a small town? Ted Bundy, infamous serial killer. Timothy McVeigh called a small town in upstate New York his home. Hitler was from a town of less than 16,000 people – of course, that town wasn’t in America, so perhaps that’s why he went astray. I could keep going; there are lots of small towns, and I guarantee you that every one of them has produced at least a few stinkers. Abraham Lincoln, Andrew Carnegie, and Jesus were also from small towns – this disparity suggests that judging people by the size of the town they were born in makes about as much sense as judging them based on the color of their skin.
I grew up in Salem, a town of 150,000 – perhaps not a small town by all definitions, but Sarah Palin referred to Greensboro, home to some 250,000 people, as small, so I imagine that I’m even more Pro-America than everyone she was talking to that day. This is interesting, given that I am an anti-war atheist who frequently refers to our commander in chief as a “motherfucker”. My friend Mike, who has refused to vote in previous elections due to his outright lack of faith in all candidates, is even more Pro-America than I am, because he’s from Medford, population 75,000. His girlfriend, who frequently smokes an herbal substance classified as illegal by our government, is the most Pro-America of all of us, because she’s from Grants Pass, home to 30,000 of the most patriotic small town folks you’ll ever meet.
I don’t think that the best of America is in the small towns. I also don’t think the best of America is in the big cities. I think that the best of America is in America. And I think that a candidate seeking to reunite a country ideologically divided by eight years of mismanagement would do well to stop playing its citizens against one another.