Visiting Beautiful St. Michaels
I spent summers as a kid on Maryland's Eastern Shore. I've had family there for many years. It's a beautiful place to visit and recreate. Sailing, crabbing, good restaurants, and great estates (mostly owned by various governments now) to drive by and appreciate. St. Michaels has been a tourist destination for many years. It's been a staple of travel writers for decades. It's been a favorite tourist destination for as long as I can remember. How then did a routine article about St. Michaels cause many on the Republican finge to completely lose it this week?
It seems Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld bought a place there about two years ago. I knew this when I was in Easton, Maryland for several weeks last year. Everyone there knows. It's common knowledge. Then Dick Cheney decided to buy a place nearby. Everyone knew that also. There were numerous articles and columns written about some of his new neighbors and their dissatisfaction with having the VP and the resulting modifications and entourages that accompany the man. They thought it quite disruptive of their laid back, sedate lifestyle.
Eastern Shore folk are a different breed. Sort of a "live and let live" mentality. They're used to government people of all ranks, of all nationalities mingling around their towns. It's no big deal and exactly why many of them like the place.
The Times article has stirred up a very violent hornet's nest however. Wingnuts at Redstate.org and other GOP blogs decided this was an attempt to inform people about the Cheney and Rumsfeld residences and put them at risk. Gee, do they have any idea what all those modifications were for? Security folks. Lots of security. Did they think someone would take a john boat, pretend they were crabbing and leave a suitcase nuke on Cheney's dock? Let's get real. This was a routine, typical travel piece about a routine, interesting tourist haven.
The truly bizarre part was these bloggers then decided to target Times reporters and editors (and their children) for violence. They asked readers to post information about their homes, their children's schools, etc. in order to "hunt them down" for retribution. If anyone still has any reservation about how crazy this country has become this is your answer. After the authorities were notified about the terroristic threats published on these blogs they were quickly edited though not before screen shots were taken and pages cached.
Wow, it amazes me that you cannot even write a routine travel piece about a town like St. Michaels any longer without triggering a violent, terroristic blowback from the radical right. Please, if you're going to write about the sites, museums, and other tourist spots in Washington, D.C. be sure to increase your life insurance and hire bodyguards because You Know Who lives at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Oh, and I have news for anyone thinking about going to St. Michaels and looking for those residences.... good luck. Another distinctive trait among Shoremen is that they keep each others' privacy. Odds are that any directions you do receive will take you far from their real abodes.
It seems Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld bought a place there about two years ago. I knew this when I was in Easton, Maryland for several weeks last year. Everyone there knows. It's common knowledge. Then Dick Cheney decided to buy a place nearby. Everyone knew that also. There were numerous articles and columns written about some of his new neighbors and their dissatisfaction with having the VP and the resulting modifications and entourages that accompany the man. They thought it quite disruptive of their laid back, sedate lifestyle.
Eastern Shore folk are a different breed. Sort of a "live and let live" mentality. They're used to government people of all ranks, of all nationalities mingling around their towns. It's no big deal and exactly why many of them like the place.
The Times article has stirred up a very violent hornet's nest however. Wingnuts at Redstate.org and other GOP blogs decided this was an attempt to inform people about the Cheney and Rumsfeld residences and put them at risk. Gee, do they have any idea what all those modifications were for? Security folks. Lots of security. Did they think someone would take a john boat, pretend they were crabbing and leave a suitcase nuke on Cheney's dock? Let's get real. This was a routine, typical travel piece about a routine, interesting tourist haven.
The truly bizarre part was these bloggers then decided to target Times reporters and editors (and their children) for violence. They asked readers to post information about their homes, their children's schools, etc. in order to "hunt them down" for retribution. If anyone still has any reservation about how crazy this country has become this is your answer. After the authorities were notified about the terroristic threats published on these blogs they were quickly edited though not before screen shots were taken and pages cached.
Wow, it amazes me that you cannot even write a routine travel piece about a town like St. Michaels any longer without triggering a violent, terroristic blowback from the radical right. Please, if you're going to write about the sites, museums, and other tourist spots in Washington, D.C. be sure to increase your life insurance and hire bodyguards because You Know Who lives at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Oh, and I have news for anyone thinking about going to St. Michaels and looking for those residences.... good luck. Another distinctive trait among Shoremen is that they keep each others' privacy. Odds are that any directions you do receive will take you far from their real abodes.
posted by PA progressive @ Tuesday, July 04, 2006
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