The Kind-Hearted Smart Aleck

Democratic California Representative Maxine Waters has come under fire after making the following comments at a weekend rally in Los Angeles: "You think we're rallying now? You ain't seen nothing yet! Already you have members of your Cabinet that are being booed out of restaurants ... protesters taking up at their house saying 'no peace, no sleep.' Let's make sure we show up wherever we have to show up. If you see anybody from that Cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd and you push back on them and you tell them they're not welcome anymore, anywhere. History is not going to be kind to this administration. We want history to record that we stood up, that we pushed back, that we fought and that we did not consider ourselves victims of this president." House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has since responded to Ms. Waters' call with this: "In the crucial months ahead, we must...

I got into an interesting yet frustrating discussion the other night regarding the election. I was joined by two fellow "younger" progressives, as well as two more middle-aged conservatives. The two conservatives were "excited" about Donald Trump's election, while the three progressives often provided a WTF look in response to their seeming giddiness. Opinions were flung around faster than you can say "o-face," voices were raised, interruptions were frequent, and it came to the point where I felt the need to raise my hand so I could be called upon to speak. When I finally got my chance to talk, interruptions and denials were fast and frequent, before I finally spoke up about these rude breaks in my responses, and heard, "I'm/We're listening." This, of course, wasn't the case, and I feel is a key factor in our country's seemingly increasing problem of being (un)able to engage in civilized discourse with those on the other side ...