A couple excerpts from a Philadelphia Enquirer story from 1994 regarding a rodeo that used a presidential prop- "The big white gate flew open. The bull came out bucking. The rider flopped from side to side and the bullfighters held back, letting the bull make his moves until the rider dropped off. Licciardello crouched in a heavily padded barrel, a human target should the bull decide to charge. Hawkins waited near the barrel, holding his big inner tube. A dummy with a George Bush mask stood beside the clown, propped up by a broomstick." "T.J. Hawkins rolled out the big inner tube, and the bull lowered his head, shot forward and launched into the tube, sending it bounding down the center of the arena. The crowd cheered. Then the bull saw the George Bush dummy. He tore into it, sending the rubber mask flying halfway across the sand as he turned toward the fence, sending cowboys scrambling up the fence rails, hooking one with his horn and tossing him off the fence." Link
You can't mock dear leader. HBO can impale a GWB mask but don't mock Obama the great leader. Americans don't believe in free speech. The left always cries about McCarthy going after commies but now they are doing the same thing and going after right wingers or anyone who does something they don't like.
I said it when he was first elected..speak against Chocolate Jesus in any way = racism.....NAACP asking for Secret Service and Justice Dept. investigation...
Amazing how thin-skinned the left is. Honestly, I feel the President and more plainly, the office of the President, command a certain level of respect. Many people will find things like this, to be in bad taste. Usually, you should have more freedom when it comes down to comedy and entertainment, because the individual doesn't have to be "serious" with his mockery. But still, you're always going to have people whining and complaining, on either side of the aisle...no matter how meaningless it was. It's just when we get to the point where lives are effectively destroyed over meaningless incidents like this. I mean, they want to destroy this guy. Make certain he's no longer a rodeo clown, and now try to sic the Secret Service and FBI on him. Maybe the IRS can further destroy the guy. Drive him to suicide or something. This overreaction would then prevent anyone, in any forum, from mocking the President. Or in this case, the first African American President. You can't even jokingly make fun of black people or you run the risk of destroying your career.
A fucking disgusting display of political correctness. A Rodeo clown, libs - seriously? Forget about how bad Obama bungled Egypt or how the IRS politically targeted a perceived conservative news anchor, this is the real outrage!
I saw some people spinning it like it was a death threat. "It's not that he wore an Obama mask, it's that he wanted Obama chased down by bulls!" Someone actually said that seriously.
Someone on HLN actually said that, or something very close to that. I couldn't fucking believe it. Sometimes, it's just a fucking guy in a clown costume, not an OMGOVERTHROWTHEREGIME statement.
We are straying dangerously close to topics one shouldn't discuss on the internet, but let me put it this way - No one, and I mean NO ONE, wants Obama to be trampled by a wild bull. Even people who wish him harm in like Iran or the ranks of Al-Qaeda don't want it to happen like that. In fact, that's exactly why it is ok. If some guy wore an Obama mask during a play about the Lincoln assassination, that would be a major problem because the scenario is way too close to real life (like that video game where you could assassinate Bush - that was way way over the line in my opinion). It's the absurdity that clearly shows it isn't any kind of threat. I don't know what's worse - someone believing that was a threat, or someone saying so even though they don't really believe it was just for the political pile on.
To be fair, it WAS HLN. Everybody on that channel has to be overly dramatic in case Nancy Grace gets so infuriated that her uterus falls out and needs to be replaced.
I saw some people saying it on twitter. Talk about turning everything into a scandal. Personally I think many white liberals, especially ones in the media, have a morbid obsessive fear of being thought of as racists so they feel the need to doth protest too much. Whenever I read a tweet like that all I can hear is "SEE?? JOHNNY Q. NOTRACIST JUST HERE BEING MY NOT RACIST SELF. I'M SO OUTRAGED ABOUT ANYTHING RACIAL BECAUSE I AM THE NOTRACISTINGEST NOTRACIST IN THE WORLD. PLEASE BELIEVE I'M NOT A RACIST PLEASEPLEASEPLEASEPLEASE!!!"
But in this case they really came across like a bunch of clowns (meh meh). I gotta think a lot of regular people thought the opposition really overreacted here. I think most people have a sensible barometer on this stuff. Nobody was burning him in effigy or anything like that. It was just a goofy bit. I think they really shoot themselves in the foot when they are hysterical about nothing shit like this.
Seems to me that it just fuels a whole lot of unnecessary bullshit. I HOPE most people get it, but the ones who don't are the loudest and most obnoxious about it.
Bush wasn't president in 1994, and that's not a rodeo clown. But don't let that get in the way of your fake outrage against the fake outrage. The guy shouldn't lose his gig, and the usual suspects shouldn't be losing their minds, but it is classless and tacky. It's a fucking rodeo, not a U2 concert. Shut the fuck up about politics. This clown sounds like the type of clown (meh meh) that turns every YouTube comment section into, "But if Obama hadn't..." We get it, "Tuffy." You're a hillbilly and there's a Negro in the White House. You're understandably upset, but tell a few silly jokes and amuse me. You know, like a clown.
I would wonder how they would feel if this was a political cartoon rather than some white guy in a mask.
Why is it that this guy have to be a racist or even "upset"? This is such a fucking ridiculous assumption. Perhaps he just wanted to get a laugh, just like most of the people who have joked about every president we've ever had.
I sometimes wonder if some of this Twitter over-reaction is failed sarcasm, and we're the ones not getting it. It doesn't seem possible that there are people out there that are legitimately this stupid.