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How to be a liberal in one angry letter
Dick Yarbrough
Dick Yarbrough - photo by File photo

I want you to hear this from me rather than from Donald Trump. I have been outed. I am a “bed-wetting liberal.” No longer can I hide in the closet, among my bell-bottom pants and Nehru jackets that I am sure will be making a stylistic comeback one of these days.

One of my adoring fans — let’s call him Angry White Guy — didn’t think much of my recent suggestion to U.S. Rep. John Lewis, D-Atlanta, that since Lewis wants to remove the statue of Alexander Hamilton Stephens of Crawfordville, Georgia, from the National Statuary Hall Collection in Washington because Mr. Stephens was vice president of the Confederate States of America, that the logical choice to replace him would be Ray Charles Robinson, of Albany, Georgia, who never held public office but who could sing a tad.

A.W. Guy thinks that is a terrible idea and one that could only emanate from a “bed-wetting liberal.” Mr. Guy doesn’t like Ray Charles. He doesn’t like Lewis. And he really doesn’t like me. I’m not sure about Alexander Stephens. I was afraid to ask.

Mr. Guy said a lot of other interesting things that shall go unpublished, but one in particular was that he is positive I voted for Barack Obama (actually, I voted for Millard Fillmore but that’s a story for another day) and so did my friends. This revelation is going to come as quite a surprise to my friends, especially to my buddy, James. To say that James sees things from a rather conservative point of view is to severely understate the obvious. I am fairly certain that James didn’t vote for Obama. In fact, I would put the odds in the same category as betting the sun will rise in the east.

What I am not certain of is whether or not I have stretched the limits of our friendship if James thinks that A.W. Guy thinks he voted for Obama. James is going to have a hard enough time as it is dealing with the fact that he may have played golf with a bed-wetting liberal. I hope James doesn’t see this column.

It is going to be interesting to see how liberals will react to the news that I have been outed and may have been one of them all along. I don’t think they are going to like it.

In the first place, they will tend not to believe it because it came from A.W. Guy, who is probably not the highest and best source for insightful and articulate political commentary (a view I suspect most conservatives would share, as well). Liberals would likely have given it more credence had they heard it from some Hollywood actor. It has been my experience that liberals think Hollywood actors and their opinions are politically relevant unless, of course, their name happened to be Reagan.

And then there is the real possibility that liberals would have to find someone else to lecture if I did go over to the dark side. Liberals have this strong urge to lecture me, bless their condescending hearts.

No longer would I get to hear firsthand about the federal government’s essential role in improving the lives of all Americans, except for the Veterans Administration’s treatment of veterans; the Internal Revenue Service’s treatment of anybody they don’t like; illegal immigration and robocalls — neither of which the feds can stop — a severely underfunded Social Security system that is destined to crater sooner rather than later; and the recent news of the hacking of the personal and financial information of an estimated  20 million federal employees, which has to make us wonder if and when Russia or China will decide to launch our missiles and turn off our lights in one fell swoop. It’s enough to make you wet your bed.

Despite A.W. Guy’s best efforts, I have a feeling liberals won’t accept me as one of their own because I don’t drink chardonnay, and I refuse to watch any movie with Sean Penn in it. You can bet your American Civil Liberties Union card that Mr. Guy is not going to be happy to hear that news and that you-know-who is going to catch you-know-what again. I suspect “bed-wetting liberal” was just the start. I’m thinking something along the lines of “Godless Commie Pinko” is coming, but that’s really A.W.’s call, not mine.

Please don’t tell A.W. Guy, but I’m headed back to the closet. Being a liberal isn’t as easy as I make it look.

Contact Yarbrough at yarb2400@bellsouth.net; at P.O. Box 725373, Atlanta, GA 31139; and online at dickyarbrough.com or facebook.com/dickyarb.

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