ELECTION DAY RIOTS?

ELECTION DAY RIOTS?
boblonsberry.com ^ | 10/23/08 | Bob Lonsberry

Posted on Thursday, October 23, 2008 11:24:23 AM by shortstop

Riots on Election Day?

Apparently that’s what big city police chiefs are worried about.

According to the news, big cities across the country are beefing up their ranks for Election Day and the day or two which follow it.

It seems these various law-enforcement professionals believe there is a possibility of rioting and neighborhoods being set on fire. They think it is possible that some people will respond with violence and mayhem to the outcome of the election.

Oddly, the chances of social disruption are about the same, win or lose.

The fear is that if Barack Obama loses, there might be rioting among black supporters in urban neighborhoods. The fear is that these disappointed supporters might feel that they or their candidate were robbed.

The outcome: Rioting and neighborhoods set on fire.

But that’s only half of it.

The chiefs apparently also fear that, even if Barack Obama wins there will be rioting among black supporters in urban neighborhoods. The fear is that these jubilant supporters might react the way they do when their team wins the NBA championship or something.

The outcome: Rioting and neighborhoods on fire.

The upshot: If you’re a cop in a big city, expect to be on duty or on standby on the evening of Election Day. And keep your riot gear handy, just in case.

This all is, of course, freaking insane.

At least from the standpoint of us McCain supporters.

Over on our side of the political spectrum, we don’t believe in rioting and burning down neighborhoods. Pretty much, win or lose, we’ll just watch the results on TV and go to bed.

We have jobs to go to in the morning.

The last riot we engaged in was the Boston Tea Party, and we don’t burn neighborhoods down, we build them up.

So we can’t really relate to pillaging as a manifestation of disappointment or glee. No matter what, we McCain supporters are not going to loot the WalMart.

We kind of thought that our whole system of elections was intended to keep riots – and worse – from happening. We thought that the peaceful transfer of power was one of the things our country does right.

On our side of the political spectrum, we don’t see how rolling over a cop car expresses anything other than criminal, anti-social behavior.

And so we’d like to put the police chiefs at ease. On behalf of all John McCain supporters, I’d just like to pledge that win, lose or draw, we will be good citizens and obey the law.

We will not riot, we will not set anything on fire, we will not throw stones or beer cans at the cops.

Not that this isn’t an important election. Not that we don’t think a great deal is at stake. Not that we don’t want to win this with everything in our beings.

But we’re good Americans.

And we act like it.
Ref
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2113188/posts

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