I go in that direction. To my right was a big DVD promotion for an upcoming Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson movie. Yeah, he used to really throw a wrench into my Oscar handicapping. I was thinking that they must be bracing themselves for the rush when the Shakespeare box set comes out.
So, I’m walking through the store and these clumps of people are moving to and fro among the aisles. Apparently, the clientele’s fashion watchword is “tight.” Yeah, when in doubt, cut off the blood supply to your lower half.
I think that there must be a special clothing size above XXXL called “Walmart.”
I learned that spandex is the devil’s fabric. I still wonder how muumuus could be form fitting.
If you’re ever in a Walmart on welfare check night, and you shouldn’t be, watch out! Rascal scooters have the right of way! I had no idea so many people were mobility-challenged, and no idea why so many of these riders were about my age. Most of them are immobile because they are just too massive.
I guess whatever government program was giving them free go-carts on my dime decided that the cure for getting too little exercise was to get none at all.
Well, honking their little horns at us losers who actually walked, like suckers, was a kind of exercise, I guess. Feel the burn in that thumb!
I passed the greeting cards aisle. It had sections of cards designed for “Fathers” and “Grandfathers,” but they really needed one for “That Random Dude Who Shacked Up With Mom.” I didn’t stop to inspect the bizarre familial arrangements acknowledged by the greeting card cartel. The best measure of the spread of social pathologies is your local Hallmark display.
There was an astonishing variety of foot-related products. Apparently feet are very important to people who rarely get up off the couch and onto them.
I swear I saw a tumbleweed bouncing down the lonely, deserted dental hygiene products aisle.
A lot of people were doing a lot of scratching. I’ve rarely been so happy that a place requires pants.
The forklift rumbled through to deliver a crate to the pharmacy. It read “Valtrex.” I didn’t use the water fountain.
The skin care aisle was packed. If government has to get involved, it should mandate that Walmart sell a cream that fights both chronic acne and chronic sloth.
There was a wide variety of birth control products, but judging from the number of little urchins running around, no one used them. Walmart could have made a fortune selling at-home paternity tests.
Here’s a helpful observation: moms, dads, maybe your precocious 13-year-old daughter ought not to be wearing shorts with the word “Juicy” emblazoned across her ass.
Now, if you have to ask me why that’s a bad idea, okay, she’s probably pregnant already.
Congrats—you’re on your way to being a 39-year-old great grandma.
So, eventually, I get to the medicine aisle. I will say this—300 low-dose aspirins for $3.99 is a killer buy. Love those Malaysian pharmaceutical companies and their rock bottom prices!
Time to make a break for it. But I made a few more observations on the way out.
I’d never seen so many unironic mullets. You know, Unironic Mullets would be a great band name. Not that these folks would be fans of the Unironic Mullets’ alternative proto-fuzz guitar skronk. Their T-shirts let me know many were fans of rappers I’d never heard of like Killa Z, or terrible nü metal bands with names like Blaaklyst. It would have been a great venue for a Limp Bizkit reunion concert.
There’s nothing like a label assuring you that your cheese product is “Made with Real Cheese.” I found myself pondering the question, “Who buys a gallon jug of Utz Cheese Balls?” Anyway, I soon found out. Okay, let me put it this way: some questions you just don’t want answered.
I also found out from watching one elderly gentleman that if you’re lonely, you can have a chat with the ATM. A long chat. With questions. And, apparently, it will answer you back.
Yeah, the goth trailer park look many of the folks were rockin’ was awesome. Here’s another idea that popped into my head: when thinking about tatting up your whole arm, understand that someday you’ll be 80. Unless, of course, you want that barbed wire ring around your bicep to fade over time into a Dada-esque blur.
At the counter, I watched a clerk say, “No, EBT don’t work for Night Train.” The disappointed customer should have known that, since he had clearly never actually had any real money.
Another highlight was the guy with “666” tattooed on his neck trying to cash a personal check without ID. He seemed legit. I mean, in comparison.
I paid with a credit card, which seemed to freak the checker out. He asked for my ID, and when I had some it freaked him out even more.
The whole time, everyone seemed to be on the verge of asking me, “You a cop?”
When I walked out of there, I felt like I just left an off-Broadway production of Megan’s List.
You’ve been a great audience! Good night!
Chapter Seven: The Safe Haven of the States
Conservatism was rising, and it faced enemies not only on the left but from “moderate” Republicans more concerned with losing their personal influence than in pushing conservative policies. Though the conservatives took the GOP by 2020, the third party campaign (aided and abetted by rich liberals and disenfranchised Republican establishment veterans) of a “moderate” GOP defector was sufficient to allow Hillary Clinton a second term with a pathetic 39% of the vote while the Democrats held the Senate. But the states were another matter, and it was from this base that they moved toward a 2024 presidential victory.
Colonel Jeremy Denton, US Army (Ret.) (Insurgency Expert)
Nothing succeeds like success, and one of the keys to a successful insurgency is successfully governing in the liberated areas outside the control of the powerful central government. You have to demonstrate that the alternative works or the people—who are what you need to be focused on—won’t be with you.
We had that in our insurgency. We had the red states with conservative governors showing that we weren’t incompetent, and at the same time letting us build strength for the fight. They were our liberated territory.
Tamara Hayes Smith (Professor/Activist)
Thanks to the wisdom of the Founders and their recognition of the sovereignty of the states, we had an essential sanctuary where conservative ideas could flourish. And, critically, it demonstrated to a dubious national electorate that the constitutional conservatives were competent and capable of governing.
Our opponents faced a daunting problem because the states we controlled—a slight majority—continued to improve and prosper while their blue state neighbors continued to spin around the toilet bowl, awaiting the inevitable moment when their profligate spending pulled them down the drain. The Illinois bankruptcy was one example—Hillary bailed it out, which cost her greatly politically because it was so unpopular, but then California followed and that was much worse.
Look at California, hamstrung by its own liberal incoherence. The rich liberals on the coast who controlled it, with the assent of the mass of poor and generally hopeless, had managed to take a state packed with incredible riches and essentially write off any industry that focused on exploiting those resources. California guzzled power, but it outsourced the dirty work of generating that power out of state. So red states that did use their resources got paid by California, a state with even greater, but untouched, resources.
California was a huge engine for growth and opportunities, but liberalism didn’t just kill the goose that laid the golden egg. It killed the whole flock. By the 2010s, what manufacturers remained in California (they had been leaving in droves for a decade already) faced new and even more ridiculous rules designed to address the global warming scam. These rules crushed manufacturing and transportation sectors and drove them east. The Golden State, suffocating under unfunded pension liabilities for an army of do-nothing, layabout government drones and run by and for the benefit of their unions, was pretty much doomed.