Posted on 10/23/2004 10:27:51 PM PDT by alydar
WATCHING WEDNESDAY night's stunning Red Sox victory in a New York bar full of Boston fans, a friend turned to me and said, "You know what the Yankees have in common with John Kerry? A nasty sense of elitism and entitlement!"
This friend is the editorial page editor of a big New York newspaper, but he's an unabashed Red Sox fan. He wears his baseball cap around the newsroom and sows discontent among his staff. ("I can't wait till the season is over, so he'll stop," one of his colleagues groaned to me.) So he may be a little mental. But in the case of John Kerry and the Yankees, he's right.
Now, I don't follow sports and I have been known to root for both teams during any given competition. But it did strike me as pathetic that many Yankees fans were actually physically ill on Wednesday, stocking up on Imodium and Pepto Bismol, disgusted that they had been forced into a seventh game, and sick with worry they wouldn't win yet another World Series. Yankee fans feel that they own the World Series, after all, and they feel the need to continue owning it.
The same "ownership" mentality exists in the mind of John Kerry, who is so elite and far-removed from the unwashed masses that his favorite Red Sox player is some guy the rest of us have never heard of: Manny Ortez.
Kerry's owned his senatorial seat in Massachusetts for 22 years, and it must make him sick that in order to ascend to the Presidency, he's in the fight of his life to defeat a marble-mouthed cowboy who's been in elective office since only 1994 — and from a banana republic of a state that sometimes thinks of itself as a national entity separate from the rest of the United States. Oh, the disgrace of it all!
There's a presumption that if you are an educated, urbane person walking down the street in an East Coast city, you will of course be a John Kerry fan (and in New York and certain other environs, a Yankee fan as well).
I've traveled from Maine to Virginia this October, and in every town someone wearing a Democratic National Committee jacket approaches me with a look of familial recognition and a big excited grin and asks if I'd "like to help defeat George W. Bush?" (Rarely do they mention their own candidate, who is too boring to elicit voter excitement.)
At first I'd politely respond, "No thanks," and keep walking. But then I realized that doing that allowed them to keep existing in their elitist vision of America, where all "normal" people hate George W. Bush.
Maybe they think I turned them down because I'm a safe female Democratic voter, but I'm late for my Botox treatment — akin to the elitist Teresa Heinz Kerry, who sniffed at Laura Bush for not having held a "real job" while raising her twins. Or maybe they think I already gave to Kerry at the last Barbra Streisand tea party.
To dispel such notions and demoralize the elites and explode their warped reality, I've begun taking the time to respond, "No thanks; I'm actually a big fan of President Bush's." (That's only a white lie. Bush disappoints me on lots of policy issues, but I like him just enough to vote for him. Kerry nauseates me.)
The look of stupor on the faces of these volunteers is priceless. Utter shock. One of them, a Manhattan lesbian, recovered in time to try to rattle me by leering, "But you're too cute to be a Bush supporter." I winked, blew her a kiss, and thanked her. It felt great to spoil another Kerry supporter's day.
Twice I was walking with right-wing European friends — one Scottish, the other French — when we were accosted. What delight to watch the horror on the DNC volunteers' faces when Europeans replied with thick accents that they preferred, in the parlance of the Frenchman, "Boosh."
The Yankees — renowned and reviled for their arrogance, glamour, and glitz — finally got their come-uppance Wednesday night. The Red Sox victory could only be the work of the gods. If the cosmos indeed has it out for elitists this season, John Kerry is next.
I guess this is true considering Hillery Clinton is a Yankee fan
:) If New jersey comes thorugh I will forever exempt them from the larger group of yankees I cannot stand.
I'm going to do my part too, out here. Bush might not get any electoral votes, but if Kerry feels uneasy enough about the state he might spend some money out here that he could spend elsewhere.
Hey, New England clam chowder is wicked good. Don't knock the chowder.
Well, I've probably had a little too much to, uh, "imbibe" after the Sox win (GO SOX!), but I think elitism of *any* fans is a given. They are promoting their team over another, sometimes in the absence of any objective fact whatsoever. But maybe it's just bad mojo from previous live threads here - I shudder at the thought of tying Kerry, the slimy cretin, to anyone's fans, be it Sox or Yankees. I think that's a generally underhanded trick.
The most rabid and unreasonable fan of whatever team is probably most like Kerry - completely ignorant of the facts, and willing to say whatever to make him (his team) look better. But that's not the majority of Yankees, Sox, Cardinals, or any realistic FReeper fan. Sports is never as important as is defeating someone as vile and dangerous as Kerry. On that, we can ALL agree.
It is going to be tough. the county I live in is very pro Bush but we live in the Western past of the state. Trying to convince the more populous part is gonna be hard.
Right... When she showed up to march in the St Patrick's Day parade when Rudy Guliani said "Gee...I hope she doesn't get lost..."
It's enough that Jersey is close--Kerry cannot win without that state. He'll have to shore it up with money and appearances during the last week of the election. That's time he could spend registering illegal aliens and convicts to vote in Florida, Ohio and Wisconsin.
So do I, but I keep coming across articles like this, and, well - you already know about many of the comments on the recent baseball threads. I think this is the first article I've seen pairing up Kerry with Yankee fans... usually he's associated with the Sox and their fans.
Sports is never as important as is defeating someone as vile and dangerous as Kerry. On that, we can ALL agree.
Amen to that!
But claimed to be a lifelong Cub's fan BEFORE she became a Yankee's fan.
http://www.fotototo.net/coppermine/displayimage.php?album=4&pos=6
As far as the baseball discussion going on here... must be nice to come close. For some of us, it's been so long, we might wish the Commish could have changed the leagues rules or if that didn't help, outright cheat for us. ;o)
GO COLTS!...? (Hehehe)
Perception is reality.....
Indeed!
Bump!
We should all root for the Cubs anyways.
I liked Bernadette's article and her feisty Irish attitude; I liked the idea she could walk the streets on the east coast stepping on the toes of Democrat dimwits. Head in the air and feet on the ground, she'll make her decision on election day and it will be the correct one.
George Steinbrenner of the Yankees has the largest sports market to serve and probably the toughest fans to satisfy. Yankee success thoughout the century is and has been driven by the market demand. Ol' George has to meet that demand, to extend the Yankee history and to do so pays the largest salaries in all MLB to get the best players and biggest box office draws. BTW, he also pays the enough to get haircuts and buy razors and demands that his players show up clean cut.
One way of looking at this is that the Yankees are comprised of the finest players from across the land and rather than being an elitist team, they are America's team.
I'm a Yankee fan but I look for upstart teams who can come in and upset the baseball kings; Remember, so does Steinbrenner.
I saw just as many ill-looking fans in Fenway during Game 3 and 4. And Fenway was less than half full at the end of Game 3, thanks to fans who couldn't take watching the carnage anymore. The same thing happened at Yankee Stadium at Game 7. I was at Game 6 and 7, and I'm sure I looked physically ill in person, and I did feel like puking. Why wouldn't I? This was an unprecented choke of epic, historic proportions. At least I stayed around to the bitter end on both nights, to support my team.
Bravo! Although I've been in a state of disappointment, disgust, and despair since the Yankees lost, I will be able to feel okay about it in another week and a half if W is re-elected!
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