Post by reason on Jul 30, 2011 7:15:53 GMT -5
I'm so excited, I get a chance to watch fools in their natural habitat, up close.
Yesterday I was invited to be a guest at the big dinner being hosted by Sheriff Ben Johnson in conjunction with the upcoming Florida Sheriff's Association annual conference in Daytona Beach. I like Ben. He and I have never discussed politics, but given our respective political labels, I strongly suspect we disagree on nearly everything. He's "one of THEM". But as a cop and a man, I respect and like him, and I'm looking forward to seeing him see me at his dinner (he doesn't know I'm coming, I'm a guest of a sponsor).
So this morning I'm catching up on email, and I open the infrequent but always entertaining message from the DeLand 9/12 group (for the unfamiliar, it's a tea-party-like astroturf assemblage created by Glenn Beck, so you can count on goofiness aplenty), this one titled Protest at Florida Sheriff's Association Convention. It's put together by a guy named Keith Wilson, with some content provided by him along with an assortment of announcements from whackadoo affiliates. Keith KILLS! I cannot recall rolling my eyes more than when his emails are fished out of my junkmail box.
The message forwarded by Keith purports to originate from Adrian Wyllie, chairman of the Libertarian Party of Florida. It accuses the Transportation Safety Administration of violating the U.S. Constitution, the Florida Constitution and state statutes against sexual battery in its airport passenger screenings. Wait, it gets better--libertarians, tea-partiers, 9/12 adherents and others all across the state are being urged to gather at the FSA banquet on Monday evening to protest the failure of the sheriffs in this state to arrest TSA screeners for their patdown techniques! Yes, you read that right--a group of protesters will convene Monday at the Hilton to demand that Sheriff Ben Johnson and his fellow sheriffs arrest TSA screeners at the airport! What a hoot!
I've seen this bunch in action before. Back in April when the protests were occurring in Daytona Beach and across the state against Florida Governor Rick Scott's proposal to cut teacher salaries, the 9/12 group similarly urged their local followers to assemble, for the multiple purposes of being a counterweight to the pro-teacher protesters and also to protest against some peerceived United Nations attempt to take away United States sovereignty through the use of some international environmental sustainability initiative blah blah blah. Anyway the point is that the seven of them blended in with the crowd of hundreds, making our numbers appear that much bigger, and utterly failed to get across their bewildering point. I found them amusing.
I'll report back next week on Keith Wilson and his group's antics.
Yesterday I was invited to be a guest at the big dinner being hosted by Sheriff Ben Johnson in conjunction with the upcoming Florida Sheriff's Association annual conference in Daytona Beach. I like Ben. He and I have never discussed politics, but given our respective political labels, I strongly suspect we disagree on nearly everything. He's "one of THEM". But as a cop and a man, I respect and like him, and I'm looking forward to seeing him see me at his dinner (he doesn't know I'm coming, I'm a guest of a sponsor).
So this morning I'm catching up on email, and I open the infrequent but always entertaining message from the DeLand 9/12 group (for the unfamiliar, it's a tea-party-like astroturf assemblage created by Glenn Beck, so you can count on goofiness aplenty), this one titled Protest at Florida Sheriff's Association Convention. It's put together by a guy named Keith Wilson, with some content provided by him along with an assortment of announcements from whackadoo affiliates. Keith KILLS! I cannot recall rolling my eyes more than when his emails are fished out of my junkmail box.
The message forwarded by Keith purports to originate from Adrian Wyllie, chairman of the Libertarian Party of Florida. It accuses the Transportation Safety Administration of violating the U.S. Constitution, the Florida Constitution and state statutes against sexual battery in its airport passenger screenings. Wait, it gets better--libertarians, tea-partiers, 9/12 adherents and others all across the state are being urged to gather at the FSA banquet on Monday evening to protest the failure of the sheriffs in this state to arrest TSA screeners for their patdown techniques! Yes, you read that right--a group of protesters will convene Monday at the Hilton to demand that Sheriff Ben Johnson and his fellow sheriffs arrest TSA screeners at the airport! What a hoot!
I've seen this bunch in action before. Back in April when the protests were occurring in Daytona Beach and across the state against Florida Governor Rick Scott's proposal to cut teacher salaries, the 9/12 group similarly urged their local followers to assemble, for the multiple purposes of being a counterweight to the pro-teacher protesters and also to protest against some peerceived United Nations attempt to take away United States sovereignty through the use of some international environmental sustainability initiative blah blah blah. Anyway the point is that the seven of them blended in with the crowd of hundreds, making our numbers appear that much bigger, and utterly failed to get across their bewildering point. I found them amusing.
I'll report back next week on Keith Wilson and his group's antics.