So by the time anyone reads this, we’ll either be packing our bags and preparing to apply for Canadian residency and be cocking a snoot at Bevin, McConnell and all the other fascist nabobs we’ve had to endure since 2016, or the cavalry will have arrived.
We need to have a word in Young Yarmuth’s shell-like [Ed. note: ear]. With Tuesday voting, this Wednesday publishing schedule is very bad form. I’m pretty sure the old fart who wrote in to LEO recently to complain about your foul language would delight in the knowledge that the blue wave didn’t happen and that you’re being given the elbow. As it is, the silly, old fucker will have to wait another fortnight to find out.
If we’ve now got Mayor Leet, he won’t have to wait long; this will probably be our last column. The tanks will be tearing up Broadway — her idea of urban restructuring — and Louisville, or as she likes to think of it, the Mogadishu of the Bluegrass, will already be under martial law.
Anything west of St. Matthews is a terrifying hell-hole if you never leave The East End. Here’s hoping the city, and more importantly, the country has displayed a modicum of good sense since this went to print, and we now have a significantly larger number of Democrats with proper jobs. If we don’t, and God’s Own Pricks have retained all three branches of government, it’s the gulag for us. At least we’ll go down knowing that Yanks are every bit as thick as the events of 2016 suggested.
If the country has come to its senses, it’ll be somewhat disappointing for us, though. Less to look down our noses at. Brexit and all.
Don’t be downhearted, chum. This is still a rich hunting ground for superior Brits to talk about Americans in an utterly patronising and obnoxious manner. Superior Brits like us. We could start with Nazi Klan cosplay on sale at the state fairgrounds, for example.
Curious how that was the most offensive thing there. I mean, it was a gun show, right?
I believe so.
I don’t know. I feel as if you can rock up in your rusting, Confederate flag-flying F-150 and spend the children’s lunch money on guns and ammo, loopholes galore, designed with maximum killing power in mind, then it’s questionable that some shit-stained, moth-eaten old Klan robe is the worst thing there. Place is probably crawling with members. It’s disgraceful that the government allows that sort of thing in a public facility in the first place.
Legal though, isn’t it?
A pathetically weak argument. So is abortion. Can you imagine “Abortafest 2018” at the fairgrounds? Somehow I don’t think that would wash.
Always look on the bright side of life, mate: Klan-Nazi cosplay got Joe Gerth into the Washington Post. It’s overdue recognition for Louisville’s second-best columnist. After me.
Speaking of Courier Journal columnists, if you didn’t see Max Boot giving that false-equivalency peddler Scott Jennings a good shoeing on CNN, then you missed out. It was delightful, in a sort of dawning-horror-how-does-the-Courier-Journal-justify-giving-space-to-someone-who-thinks-racist-trolling-makes-good-electoral-politics way. A proud, yet also totally shameful moment for the CJ. Weird knowing that Jennings might be the one celebrating right at this very moment.
One thing I’ll say for the conservative press is that they don’t give a rat’s arse about showing their bias. They — rightly — don’t give a crap for any shallow, faux “objective journalism” conceit that says you have to present both sides. It’s just pure, distilled cynicism. On the other hand, supposedly-liberal media such as NPR and the NYT bend over backward to present bad-faith, conservative liars as a necessary equivalent, even if the former’s doing it only because it’s shitting itself about funding, and the latter’s doing it simply to troll its own readers. But back to gun shows: It wouldn’t be America without regular blood sacrifices. That people are still shocked when it happens is the most shocking thing of all. Even just down the road at Kroger in broad daylight. It’s as endemic as drink-driving here.
I remember the Virginia Tech shooting took place just before I first moved here. I had my old girl crying down the hand-bone begging me not to leave Blighty. And you know what, I can’t for the life of me remember what that bloke’s name was — and probably the only people who can are relatives of the 27 people he murdered.
Come off it: Some inadequate wankstain shot 500-odd people in Vegas a year ago, and nobody can remember his name anymore either. Weird as hell, that one. But only in this country can someone mow down more people than Rambo, and, within a year, be relegated to historical obscurity.
They don’t get forgotten elsewhere because they are not ten-a-penny. Michael Ryan in Hungerford and Thomas Hamilton in Dunblane. I can remember them both. The names, the places, the years. Christ, Hungerford was in ’87, over 30 years ago. I’ve never been to either place. But I remember them both very clearly and where I was when I heard about them. Mass shootings are so rare outside this country that’s probably true everywhere except here.
It’s the price people — people including us — seem willing to pay to live here. But at least if you go on a hate-filled, racist killing spree in Kentucky, you can’t get charged with a hate crime. So long as, you know, you actually succeeded in committing mass murder.
Right? Feels as if that’s the most idiotic thing I’ve heard since I moved here. And I’ve heard a lot of dumb shit: Early Trump speeches and interviews before the sound of his voice was enough to make me scream; Sarah Palin; the 2013 Cards team claiming innocence; you twice a month. Kudos to Kentucky for having a dumber law on the books than Chester, which technically still allows any Englishman to kill a Welshman with a bow and arrow if they enter the city.
Taff gits. If they come here, I’d shoot them with worse. And thanks to our idiotic laws it wouldn’t be a hate crime either.