The Kn@ppster hits a nerve: Apparently fervent Barr supporters have NO sense of humor

Several Bob Barr supporters are giving Tom Knapp a work-out over at The Kn@ppster, not just because he dropped his endorsement of the Barr/Root ticket, but because he posted this image:



And, of course, we wouldn't want to forget the boiler plate legalese:

The image of Bob Barr above is used pursuant to the Creative Commons License under which it was released by author Stephen P. Gordon on behalf of the Bob Barr Presidential Campaign. The other images (of, from left to right, Strom Thurmond, George Wallace and Lester Maddox) are in the public domain.

Doing a sort of six-degrees-of-Kevin-Bacon thing, it is Richard Viguerie who links Barr to George Wallace, with his 1976 attempt to take over the American Independent Party, which had been created originally as a vehicle for the segregationist Governor of Alabama. Wallace and Maddox, of course, were fellow massive resistance governors following Brown v Board of Education of Topeka KS, and spiritual descendants of Senator Strom Thurmond's Dixiecrats in the 1948 election.

Here's how Rock Howard's objection to Knapp's visual editorializing went:

As someone who grew up in the deepest nether regions of the Deep South, I find your posting to be tasteless and offensive. You are effectively attempting to label Barr as a racist by using a geographical stereotype. As a libertarian who happened to grow up in Dixie but hated the racial stigmatism that went on there, I have but two words for you: Bite me!

Oh one more thing. Your blog and all of your work are dead to me now. I will be actively spreading the word that people should not waste their time with your news digest and other claptrap. Needless to say I will not advertise there ever again nor donate to support what is apparently a bunch of hypocritical small tenters.

And--as usual, without equivocation--the Kn@ppster replied:

Actually, the "new Dixiecratism" uses homosexuals and immigrants, rather than blacks and "outside Communist agitators," as its bogeymen of choice.

Yes, I am "labeling" Barr as a Dixiecrat -- because I believe on the evidence of his own words and actions that that's what he is.

As far as the size of tents is concerned, I'm more than happy to share a tent with anyone who consistently calls for less, and less onerous, government.

Regular readers of this blog will know that I am a strong proponent of bare-knuckles, George-Carlin-type comedic and satiric ridicule, and that I can't stand people who think the lumps that their candidates excrete don't have an odor.

Give 'em hell, Tom.