"My name is Elbow... And I'm a Snope-Fiend"

I love it when…especially down here in Texas, some seemingly normal WASP will blurt out Republican propaganda and try to pass it off as blessed fact.
Generally these blatherings that emerge from their yaps make about as much sense as Farrah Fawcett on an ether binge.
But they say it with enough conviction that, to the unsuspecting ear, it seems credible.

Such is the wheelhouse of strength with Conservatives; peddling dubious facts in small snippets that SOUND like they “could” be true.

This is why I truly thank GOD for http://www.snopes.com/. On several occasions, I have been presented with these bizarre sounding assertions like: “Democrats are statistically more likely to kill puppies”

Or, “John Kerry massacred the San Diego Padres with an Iraqi bayonet”

Most of the time when you hear something like this -- if you’re not a Kool-Aid drinking conservative -- you lift an eyebrow and say, “Really? I didn’t know that.”

That is, mind you, if you don’t already know it’s pure bunk, or if you don’t have a computer and/or reference book close at hand.

Then you usually sit there perplexed and think to yourself, “That doesn’t sound right… how can that be?”

8 times out of 10, if you rush to a computer and enter the claim into Snopes.com, you’ll discover the assertion is either false or at least heavily embellished and largely inaccurate.

The same thing happened to me the other night. I was attending an evening class when, for no relevant reason, the subject of military deaths came up.
One of these grinning good ol’ boys says, “Well actually, I read that military deaths were higher during the Clinton Administration than the Bush administration.” “Hyup,” he guffawed, “it’s true.”

The whole class kinda looked at him and muttered “rrreally?” under our breaths.

No one there could be sure. But it added up like snake with a broken calculator.

So everyone just let it go.
I mean, how could George W’s six years of Iraqi and Afghani conflict eclipse those of Clinton’s admin?

Was there a Malaria outbreak at the Pentagon in the 90s? Sheeit! Musta missed that!

So the next time I got in front of the computer, I immediately queried the great and powerful Snope.

Sure enough, the story was steaming malarkey, pure baloney: http://www.snopes.com/politics/military/deaths.asp

Just like the viral e-mails that portray:

• Andy Rooney as a gun-toting, lunkhead: [http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/rooney4.asp ]
• George Carlin as a closet Republican: http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/carlin.asp
• Barak Obama as a Muslim: http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/muslim.asp
• John Kerry as undeserving of his service medals: http://www.snopes.com/politics/kerry/service.asp
• Or Donald Trump as a generous benefactor to the average Joe: http://www.snopes.com/luck/trumptip.asp & http://www.snopes.com/luck/trump.asp

All points rubbish and all points largely accepted as truth by dullards and GOP faithful.

It’s a wonderful world that twirls around by the forces of the cosmos and, evidently, the sheer force of flying, bubbling BS.

Still, it’s not to say that Democrats never lie or start dirty falsehoods on the Net. It’s just that, for some reason, I don’t seem to run into it as much… and when I rarely do, everyone, including myself, laughs and points at them... then kicks them in the groin, so they’ll know better next time.