Hurricane of hate

As I’m writing this, Hurricane Irma is bearing down upon me like the Alabama pass rush. If the smack down she laid on parts of the Caribbean are anything to go by, she’s even starting to show some blitz.

According to the weather-bot on my TV reading the latest forecast models — in the excitedly breathy tones of a party girl on the business end of date night, I might add — I’m sitting at ground zero of Irma’s big showstopper. I haven’t yet decided to evacuate or ride out the storm. No matter what, I’m hoping my fellow residents follow the example of our compatriots in Texas.

Even as Hurricane Harvey dealt his worst to them, they showed what I think has been nothing short of magnificent resolve to endure and respect one another. I’m sure some of the afflicted have gone full “Ferguson,” but the reports and images from the Lone Star State indicate that along with all the water, Harvey left a swath of decency in his wake.

Unfortunately, Irma sizing up reminds me of the other thing her pal Harvey left behind: a reminder that some of our friends on the left can always surprise me with the level of their ugliness. I suppose it’s the lover in me, but I didn’t expect quite the outpouring of schadenfreude from the port side.

Nationally syndicated cartoonist — and Pulitzer Prize-winner – Matt Wuerker and French rag Charlie Hebdo led the attack on civility; the latter especially ironic given the number of Texans who supported Hebdo following the Islamic attack on them. The media chipped in with grossly inaccurate conflations of prior votes on Superstorm Sandy relief and a borderline-creepy obsession with First Lady Melania Trump’s shoes.

Even the Hollywood blowholes got in their jabs. Texas deserved it for their voter ID laws. Texas deserved it because they don’t buy the “climate change” narrative. Texas deserved it for being a Republican stronghold. Never mind that Texas is a pretty diverse place, and Houston, which took the proverbial horns of the bull, is actually an island of blue in a sea of red. Texas went to Trump in November, so Texas brought it on themselves!

And now, Irma’s approach has rekindled the hurricane of hate. Everything that Texas got, the Southeast deserves it, too. They’re bunch of redneck “deplorables.” Hell, most of them drive pickup trucks, and nothing says “white supremacist” like a Ford F-150, amirite?

Of course, the presence in the dreaded “cone of uncertainty” of a certain president’s Florida getaway has dialed the vicious up to a whole new level. Social media has erupted with liberals hoping that Irma lays waste to Mar-a-Lago. And, like Harvey, Irma brought out not only the soft underbelly of the Democratic base, but the “elites,” too. The New York Times and The Hill contributor Patrick Tomlinson quipped “Dear God, if you’re up there, give us a sign. Like Irma only destroying Mar a Lago. Thanks.” The staff of Mar-a-Lago and their families will no doubt accept that they would be a necessary sacrifice to the greater cause. Of course, hoping for the death of the President of the United States and his family is a perfectly reasonable level of partisanship in the first place. The offenders may even resort to hiding behind “I was only joking;” but they’re not fooling anyone. Imagine how they’d react if I wished for a Super Typhoon to plow under Hawaii while Barack and Michelle Obama were home with the girls.

I may not be a fan of liberals, but I’m not really in the habit of wishing them to die in some horrible catastrophe. I don’t want San Francisco to get ripped to shreds by some 9.5 degree monster earthquake; not even if Pelosi was home. I’m not rooting for a “Day After Tomorrow” superfreeze to entomb New York; not even the parts of Brooklyn which have been ruined by hipsters. Not all the people in paths of these storms are politically bent. And even if they were, telling the “deplorables” you hope they die is a surefire way to ensure they do some killin’ of their own at the ballot box.

— Ben Crystal

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