Hammond, Indiana is Burning

On Friday we went to a Halloween house party in Hammond Indiana.

The party was scheduled to start at around 9. Little did the lady and I know that Barack Obama was in Hammond, Indiana for a campaign rally, which ended at roughly 9:30, so the festivities got going slightly later than we had thought.

When the crowd started filtering in, the word of the day was Obama.

One woman clad in a cowgirl outfit said that she had been on the fence, but that she was pushed to the other side because Barack had been tardy for his speech.

Another guy dressed as the man himself said that he was inspired and the whole event was a life-changing experience.

A witch had been touched by the part when Obama stopped his speech to make sure that a woman who had passed out got medical attention. I said that that wasn’t the first time that this had happened: that dozens of women have collapsed at Obama rallies and he’s always interrupted his speech to make sure that they get the help they need. Just a harmless political stunt. The witch says that, well, maybe, but those people wait for hours for him so they could pass out because they’re just tired or thirsty. Maybe.

I nodded and walked outside to enjoy a smoke, even though I don’t smoke. My Dr. Thompson costume required it for the evening, or so I said to the lady when I bought the pack of unfiltered Camels.

Outside the air is crisp and clean and we’re the only people around in a 2 mile radius, so we can say or do pretty much whatever the hell we want. This town is still devastated by the flooding that happened over the summer: the waters have receded, but most people have yet to return to their homes. While driving in we saw entire blocks of houses abandoned.

Darkness. Freedom.

Tony Montana and a guy wearing a mirror are discussing Obama’s radical affiliations. When I ask the guy wearing a mirror what he’s supposed to be, he says “you.” Then in his thick Indiana drawl he says:

“Did you know Barack Obama is a communist?”

“Really?”

“No not really. It’s just a joke that they try to peddle on us. He ain’t no communist or socialist.”

“Muslim Socialist.” I correct him.

“Right.”

I had gone outside to enjoy the fresh air and get away from politics, but the blasted thing was following me everywhere I went. The arrival of the liberal savior in the tiny town had awoken a spirit of conversation and controversy. When people weren’t talking about the election, they were talking about race, prejudice, and the roll that it plays in our lives.

Later, while getting high in the backyard with a Marine dressed as a Demon-Pig, we talked about basketball, when he told me:

“You know why black people can’t beat white people at basketball?”

“Why is that?”

“Well, cuz they’re dumb. And I’m not being racist or anything, it’s just a fact. They try to do all this fancy-shmancy crossover stuff and then we just reach in and take the ball away, and they don’t learn. They just keep trying to show us up and we end up winning.”

“I guess.”

Something deep inside of me was screaming that I should correct the man. But another part of me knows better than to correct a drunken Marine, especially when he’s the only other person at the party who has pot. So I bit my tongue and nodded and smiled through his absurd explanation.

Luckily the black guy dressed as the Joker was inside ranting about the pitfalls of capitalism while this was going on.

We returned inside where I turned down shots of Jameson and sat in on the Joker’s economic lecture, with 3 or 4 Latin witches listening intently.

“It’s just gambling! That’s what capitalism is. They just go up and down through these peaks and valleys and there’s no system or rhyme or reason to it, it’s just hog wild speculation and greed and eventually the whole thing will come crashing down on top of us.”

I said something about communism leading to inevitable failure as well, and the best system is a mixed economy. The Joker nodded his head, then returned to his rant.

“It’s just these white pig capitalists who are dividing us along racial and ethnic and gender lines, it’s a divide and conquer strategy so that they can clean up whatever is left and get rich!”

After he finished, I walked back outside to smoke again. The fresh air might do something good for my head, which was getting cloudy. Mixing Baileys with Crown with Sierra Nevada with Peroni in a giant cauldron in your liver might do that to you. Outside there was no reprieve from the political arena.

A man dressed as a Court Jester had stolen the neighbor’s McCain/Palin sign and had set it up again in the backyard. The party’s host, dressed as Tinker Bell has promised to move back to Ireland if John McCain wins on November 4th, and she means it. The sign was dented and battered, clearly the result of the Jester kicking it around. He explains:

“I just didn’t like seeing it there in the neighbor’s yard. It disturbed me, so I brought it here.”

He looks down at the sign, then winds up and kicks it back over the fence. I chime in:

“Hey! I was gonna burn that!”

I was merely joking, but I fear now that I put an idea into the Jester’s head. Somewhere between the bells danging by his hairline and his goatee, a light-bulb turned on. The Jester took a swig of beer and ran back over into the neighbor’s yard again and returned with the sign. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a lighter, then he set the McCain/Palin sign aflame.

Everyone turned to watch. It’s amazing that in a state as closely contested as this that nobody objects. By the sheer law of averages there should be at least one horrified person in the small crowd watching this, but I sure didn’t see them.

Part of me thinks, hey wait- he’s a war hero.

Another part of me thinks, well, he’s a warmonger. So fuck it.

The sign curled inward as the flames licked upwards and the scent of burning plastic filled our nostrils. It’s the same scent that comes when you line up a row of GI-Joes in your backyard when you’re in 7th grade and drop a mini-napalm bomb on them.

Black Joker started singing when he saw the sign burning.

“Oh beautiful, for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain…”

I joined in.

“For purple mountain majesty, above the fruited plain…”

The Krishna next to me joined in.

“America! America! God shed his grace on thee!”

Tony Montana joined the chorus for the finish.

“And crown thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea!”

We cheered and shouted God Bless America as the last of the sign disappeared into black smoke, then drifted away into the night.

The Krishna turned to me and spoke:

“So whaddaya think, Doctor Thompson?”

“What a time to be alive.”