The New Republicans

Probably no one has ever described Republicans quite the way Russell Baker did in his memoir Growing Up.

His coming-of-age tale about enduring hard times during The Great Depression also includes a colorful portrait of his Uncle Charlie -- an unemployed, die-hard Republican in a houseful of New Deal Democrats.

“Uncle Charlie had four pastimes,” according to Baker. “He slept, read, smoked, and drank coffee.”

He also lectured his young nephew on the evils of socialism that FDR was perpetrating. He complained that millions of Americans were getting paid by the government for not working. He even warned Baker, “You’ll live to curse the day Franklin Roosevelt was born.”

Sound familiar? Uncle Charlie’s criticism of FDR’s policies bears a striking resemblance to today’s diatribes about Obama’s policies. Not much has changed in some 80 years. Republicans still decry Democratic ideology with almost venomous accusations of socialism, injustice, and inherent rewards for laziness. And yet, a lot of these Republicans who now continually criticize the Democrats really have it made. They have what everybody else wants but can never seem to get.

Even in the midst of their country’s latest economic slowdown, they remain employed with good, well-paying jobs. They’re able to live well, eat well, enjoy life. They’re also blessed with luck and family and friends who help them. Although these Republicans are living the American Dream, they’re seem determined that no one else should ever be able to get the money and lifestyle that they’re currently enjoying.  (Are you listening, Koch Brothers?)

“For the longest time,” Baker quipped, “I thought of Republicans as people who rose from twelve-hour stretches in bed to denounce idlers and then lie down with a good book.”

That quote remains one of my all-time favorite political jabs. But now the definition of “Republican” needs updating.

Embedded in my little Richfield neighborhood is a pocket of New Republicans -- different yet similar political animals for the 21st Century. They’re a lot like Uncle Charlie, only they don’t read as much. Most of them, in fact, are functioning illiterates, or alliterates. Sure, they can read. They just don’t like to read. They just don’t want to read. At all. Unless it’s a few phrases here and there on their computer screens. Too many facts might make them question their political beliefs way too much. So facts take a backseat to their beliefs.


They also work hard at jobs they don’t really like. But they will denounce anyone who doesn’t get up at 5 AM and leave the house the way they do as a lazy-good-for-nothing deadbeat. Their list of good-for-nothings includes the disabled, retirees, students, homemakers, and anyone who works in any capacity from the home. (Like me.)

Not a lot of real status with these New Republicans, but they’ve managed to keep the all-important double standards alive and well. All the hypocrisy, arrogance, and misplaced superiority from the 20th Century has remained intact. So, in many ways, they’re a lot like Uncle Charlie. Only they’re infinitely more religious than Baker’s uncle could ever hope to be. They’re good Christian political activists who want everyone to act, think, and believe like them.

Their god, you see, is a Republican. Either that, or else He (not She) told them to become Republicans. Maybe that’s why they feel so unapologetically superior to you and me and everyone else who doesn’t belong to their right-wing Evangelical church.

Maybe that’s also why their pets have become such an active manifestation of their own political ideology. God, after all, is just dog spelled backwards. And these New Republicans sure like their dogs, all right.

They all have dogs, and they all feel perfectly justified in letting them poo in everybody else’s yard. But not in their own yards. After all, they don’t want dog turds ruining their perfectly manicured lawns. They want their landscapes to be green and turd-less and urine-free.

After all, they work hard and don’t expect any government hand-outs. So it’s okay if their pets take a dump in your yard because -- let’s face it -- you’re just not in the same hard-working, superior class that they’re in. You’re just a Democrat. You deserve all the bad things in life that happens to you. They don’t.

That’s how I arrived at my new definition for the 21st Century:
A Republican is somebody who lets his dog crap in your yard but gets real mad if your dog craps in his yard.

That description just about covers it all, doesn’t it? The double-standard. The inherent hypocrisy. The lackadaisical arrogance. Yeah, it’s all here. Whether it’s Uncle Charlie or the self-serving Jesus People next door, Republicans are the Americans with distinctly Un-American attitudes.

Republicans seem to embrace an unreasonable and unrealistic sense of entitlement born from self-ordained superiority instead of universal equality. And when it comes to daily coexistence, that me-first arrogance has morphed into a real inconsiderate double standard.

Why? I can’t say for sure. I can only share my own personal observations. After trying to coexist with these citizens for nearly 20 years now, I have observed this pattern of curious behavior with their dogs.

They don’t like to put their dogs on leashes. They want them to roam free, without any pesky city ordinances fencing them in. They just don’t want them to pee or poo in their yards. They want their pets to go in somebody else's yard. Not in their yards. Not in their friend’s yards. Just in the yards of other people -- who happen to be Democrats.

It happened when we first moved in. Actually, we didn’t have any problems until our lawn signs came out during an election year. Then the New Republicans started connecting the dots. Lawn signs for Democrats, not Republicans. Not a Dittohead. Doesn’t attend our right-wing Evangelical church. Works -- gasp! -- at home. Uh-oh. Sound the alarm! There’s an outsider on the block, right next door! NOT ONE OF US! NOT ONE OF US!

That’s when our yard became gifted with all manner of dog turds from pet owners who just happened, by coincidence, to be Republicans. I know because these dog whisperers I saw all had signs for Republican candidates and incumbents -- and we were surrounded. My partner and I were the only Democrats on the block...and our little lawn paid a heavy price, especially when that bulldog went for a walk.

What made their pointed inconsideration worse was that I actually knew who these dog owners were. I saw them, they saw me.

I could look out the window and see them nonchalantly standing nearby while their pets pooed on our property. Sometimes they even saw me. And what did they do then? Nothing. Nothing except give me dirty looks. That’s right. Poo in my yard, but give me dirty looks!

It was as though being pro-Democrat made me and my shrubs fair game for the pro-Republicans and their pets.

The worst offender, by far, was our next-door neighbor Steve-O. He and his family would blatantly walk their dog over to our backyard whenever nature called. A few bathroom breaks here and there would have been understandable. But Zero the rescue dog spent so much time on our property, we not only had scorched earth, we had a nugget trail that would have grossed out Martha Stewart.

On some level, they must have known they were violating both city ordinances AND unwritten good neighbor policies. But they just didn’t care. Unfortunately, it was hard to catch them and Zero trespassing, even harder to confront them.

Seeing Zero and his enablers in our yard was one thing. Being able to throw on shoes and coats and run out there before they left was quite another. I only managed one confrontation and that was with Jewel, who was acting as their one-time dog walker.

I looked out the front window one afternoon and I saw her staring at the clouds while Zero took his daily dump in our front yard. Our front yard. Now Zero and his enabler had relocated! Hours later, while she was outside near the back door, I approached. I began on a friendly note. “Say, that dog sure has a hard time staying in his own yard.” I said.

Jewel feigned ignorance in the must annoying way possible. “Really? Oh, really? I didn’t notice!” She gushed in faux astonishment.

“Yeah, really.” I continued, “You’d think if he had to go outside, he could at least stay in his own yard.”

“Oh, is that so? I hadn’t noticed. How about that, hmm, you don’t say --”

I couldn’t take any more of it. “Oh, come on, Jewel. You’re busted. I looked out the window and saw that dog taking a dump in my front yard. And you were right there. Holding the leash and letting him do it. So don’t act so surprised. You were there. You let him do it, too.”

Jewel’s face turned red. “Oh, I guess I’ll have to watch that... be a little more careful.”

And true Republican that she was, she immediately launched into damage control. After I went back in the house, she made up a story about how I “yelled” at her when I didn’t. Jewel deftly managed to get the next door neighbor and her husband into sympathetic and protective mode. Nice way to play the victim card.

The next-door neighbor continued to use our yard as an outdoor bathroom -- until Zero’s urine marks burned up most of our grass. But God help the new dog on the block who made the mistake of peeing in his yard.

Poor BooBoo. The Chihuahua who belonged to new Hispanic neighbors did the unthinkable. He ran out of the house one morning and made it to Steve-O’s front yard, just when nature called. Then he ran back home. A few minutes later Steve-O  banged on the front door of these new residents with a threat: “You keep that $*%&! dog outta my yard, or I’m calling the police.”

Guess he really showed them. In his world, only real Americans like him have the right to let their dogs wander free range. Foreigners don’t have that privilege. Neither do pets of “illegal immigrants.” And for him, anyone who wasn’t white was illegal.

Such is life with the New Republicans here in what should be a Democratic stronghold. Unlike most of the district, though, these residents continually vote against their own best interests: they vote Republican.

They’d vote a poodle into public office -- as long as that poodle was a Republican. And if that dog won the election, they wouldn’t say, “Our new governor is a poodle!” No, they’d say, “That sure was a close one. A Democrat almost won the election!”