The Froot Loop candidate for Colorado Governor Dan Maes warned voters that a program to encourage bike riding in Denver is really a UN plot to take over the world, or something like that. Maes hoped his stupid theory would appeal to people who share the assumption that cyclists are a monolithic group of granola munching commies, but it seems like it back-fired. In recent interviews, Maes claims he's not picking on bicycles or bicyclists, he's just trying to appeal to cabin dwelling, UN fearing nut-cases.
The assumption that cyclists are a bunch of pinko commies is wrong. The people I've ridden with and raced with over the years is a diverse group politically and otherwise. It's hard to tell if the person you're working with in a breakaway is a professor, a laywer, a welder, a teacher, or a student. It's even more difficult to know if they listen to Rush Limbaugh while polishing their hand gun collection, or read the HuffPo while campaigning for gay marriage. I'm pretty sure that the only thing they have in common is they happen to enjoy riding a bike.
I guess it's nice to know that, at least in CO, cyclists aren't a viable political hate-totem, so hopefully politicians will leave us alone. They will have to pick on other groups, for example immigrants, to create issues that divide the dumb public into dumb groups that distract from their lack of competence, or that they are enriching their buddies on the public dime, or that they have no solutions to the real problems facing the country.
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