Defining the Pale

There is a phrase, "beyond the pale" that means those things that are considered totally unacceptable. Interestingly enough, it derives its meaning from something beyond the bounds of law. As the Tea Party movement, is largely unorganized in terms of "official" organization and membership, how do we police behavior that is "beyond the pale" and indeed, what is behavior that is beyond the pale. This is potentially a real issue for us, as some lefty wingnuts think they can infiltrate to make us look bad.

So first, we should ask what is out of bounds for us. I think that all the craziness has to be a start, first and foremost, racism. I'm not talking about the faux racism of saying Obama has a good basketball shot either. You know it when you see it, but in general it is the use of demeaning stereotypes. Right up there with racism, are the truthers and birthers. Both of these types of conspiracy idiot savants have put 2 and 2 together and gotten 22. If you listen too long, it sounds plausible, but it just ain't so. Finally, I would also say that anti-gay sentiment has no place here. I admit to voting for Proposition 8, but if you are against and are also against big government spending you are welcome here. That is just not our issue.

Now the tougher question of what to do? I propose a two prong approach. First, just like the Apache example in the Starfish and the Spider, we should shun those beyond the pale. We should ask them to leave, repeatedly, and we should make it clear that they are not welcome. Unfortunately, for the hard core lunatics this may not work. The other thing to protect our image would be to interrupt any effort by news media to take their picture, video them or interview them. We need to make it clear that they do not share our core beliefs and this is about the size of government, the intrusion of government and the preservation of the republic, nothing else.

Time to get ready, Thursday is going to be a busy day.