Overton Window: Chapter 12-13
Aug. 24th, 2010 08:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sabotabbyChapter 12
The scene that begins Chapter 12 would, in the hands of a more capable author, be completely hilarious. Noah trolls the teabagger meeting. He tells them that their whole convoluted conspiracy theory is true—and he should know, because he works in PR—and no one will ever give a shit.
Wow, it’s like Glenn Beck looked in the mirror. Ham-handed, because no one talks like this, but not wrong. It’s almost enough to make me dislike Noah a degree less, were it not for the fact that immediately after his tirade, the redneck bar gets raided by the Ebil Gub’mint, demonstrating that in fact the teabaggers are a significant threat taken seriously by someone.
You gotta wonder at the teabagger worldview. I buy the theory that Beck is just cynically exploiting his terrified and ignorant audience, but even so. He is coy about not naming the president or ruling party in his Twenty Minutes Into the Future scenario (warning: all three links go to TVTropes), but the book is obviously a cautionary tale about how Obama’s weaksauce health care bill will result in everyone being put in FEMA concentration camps. So do they think that government raids on teabaggers are happening now? I think they think that, and despite their hero working for Fox News and broadcasting to 102 million American households, the Mainstream Media is covering it up.
So Danny abandons the whole Gandhi track and starts calling forjihad armed revolution and the government thugs storm in and start beating, tasering, and teargassing everyone. Not since Red Dawn has a story had me rooting so hard for the bad guys. Noah—the same guy who let the ambiguously Middle Eastern guy get shoved into an unmarked van several hours earlier—suddenly feels the stirring of a conscience at the thought of white people getting beat up. He hilariously tries to go Rambo on one of the officers, an attempt that is cut short by him getting walloped on the head by a baton.
And there was much rejoicing.
Chapter 13
Unfortunately, he then wakes up.
Everyone gets hauled to the police station. Noah, being one of those douches who actually bought a class ring and wears it, gets the special treatment. The arresting officer tells him that Homeland Security is involved and everyone, innocent or guilty, is facing hard time if he doesn’t narc. While Noah considers such weighty matters as whether it’s true that snitches get stitches, his lawyer arrives and tells the arresting officer that Noah is going to be freed and the arrest record shredded.
By the way, all of the obvious racists in the crowd turn out to be police informants. Of course. Because the teabaggers aren’t racist at all. Noah tells this to his lawyer, who wins points with me by replying, “So?”
Inconveniently for the lawyer, Noah has discovered something in his pants that, were he not a sudden convert to wingnuttery, might almost resemble a set of balls. So he refuses to leave unless all of his new friends get to come with him.
I liked Noah more when he was unconscious.
Conspiracy count: Still 8.5. One chapter of plot is more than enough for Beck and ought to be enough for you, too.
The scene that begins Chapter 12 would, in the hands of a more capable author, be completely hilarious. Noah trolls the teabagger meeting. He tells them that their whole convoluted conspiracy theory is true—and he should know, because he works in PR—and no one will ever give a shit.
There’s a Birther, and a Truther, two Paulites, a John Bircher, a Freeper, a white supremacist, a pothead, three tea-partiers, and that guy there is the jackpot: a Holocaust denier. From there it’s easy to roll you all up together so that no one in their right mind would want to join you. Why would they? According to the network news, you’re all borderline-insane, ignorant, paranoid, uneducated, hate-mongering, tinfoil-hat-wearing, racist conspiracy theorists.
Wow, it’s like Glenn Beck looked in the mirror. Ham-handed, because no one talks like this, but not wrong. It’s almost enough to make me dislike Noah a degree less, were it not for the fact that immediately after his tirade, the redneck bar gets raided by the Ebil Gub’mint, demonstrating that in fact the teabaggers are a significant threat taken seriously by someone.
You gotta wonder at the teabagger worldview. I buy the theory that Beck is just cynically exploiting his terrified and ignorant audience, but even so. He is coy about not naming the president or ruling party in his Twenty Minutes Into the Future scenario (warning: all three links go to TVTropes), but the book is obviously a cautionary tale about how Obama’s weaksauce health care bill will result in everyone being put in FEMA concentration camps. So do they think that government raids on teabaggers are happening now? I think they think that, and despite their hero working for Fox News and broadcasting to 102 million American households, the Mainstream Media is covering it up.
So Danny abandons the whole Gandhi track and starts calling for
And there was much rejoicing.
Chapter 13
Unfortunately, he then wakes up.
Everyone gets hauled to the police station. Noah, being one of those douches who actually bought a class ring and wears it, gets the special treatment. The arresting officer tells him that Homeland Security is involved and everyone, innocent or guilty, is facing hard time if he doesn’t narc. While Noah considers such weighty matters as whether it’s true that snitches get stitches, his lawyer arrives and tells the arresting officer that Noah is going to be freed and the arrest record shredded.
By the way, all of the obvious racists in the crowd turn out to be police informants. Of course. Because the teabaggers aren’t racist at all. Noah tells this to his lawyer, who wins points with me by replying, “So?”
Inconveniently for the lawyer, Noah has discovered something in his pants that, were he not a sudden convert to wingnuttery, might almost resemble a set of balls. So he refuses to leave unless all of his new friends get to come with him.
I liked Noah more when he was unconscious.
Conspiracy count: Still 8.5. One chapter of plot is more than enough for Beck and ought to be enough for you, too.
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no subject
Date: 2010-08-25 12:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-25 12:27 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-25 12:32 am (UTC)both have their points
whoops microwave lasagna's done
no subject
Date: 2010-08-25 12:48 am (UTC)I think that Truthers actually think that, or at least people "to close to the TRUTH" at getting assassinated. But that most right-wing/white supremest tea-partiers think that it's just around the coroner.
I find it strange that speculative FEMA camps filled with speculative white people are somehow something to be concerned about but the the very real and documented Gitmo filled with very real and documented people of color is never mentioned by tea-party types.........
......oh wait, it isn't strange, it makes perfect sense.
no subject
Date: 2010-08-25 01:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-25 05:36 pm (UTC)Hey! I wear a class ring!
It's essentially a signet ring -- sort of like this but in the smaller women's version. And the main reason I bought it was because I saw a sample in the bookstore and thought "Hey -- that ring isn't awful! That's something I would actually wear."
Moral of the story: There are class rings for people who have taste and aren't douchebags. :)
More proof that my class ring is classy:
Date: 2010-08-26 02:27 am (UTC)Re: More proof that my class ring is classy:
Date: 2010-08-26 12:58 pm (UTC)Noah's class ring can be used to identify which school he went to at some distance.