Today is Thanksgiving day in the US. It is a holiday that has problematic roots in history and now has become associated with the kick-off to an orgy of shopping. But despite all that baggage it is a nice holiday that celebrates wholesome virtues such as getting together with family and friends and we will spend it with some old and dear friends as we always do.
Yesterday president Obama went through a more modern ritual associated with the holiday and that was the pardoning of two turkeys, who this year had the names “Honest” and “Abe”. The Guardian used the occasion to write a light-hearted story that shed a pleasant light on the clearly warm relationship between him and his teenage daughters who have become resigned to serve as props for this hokey ceremony and take it in good humor.
But right in the middle of the article was this passage:
Both turkeys hail from California, are 18 weeks old and weigh about 42lb each. Their names were chosen from submissions entered by schoolchildren in California.
The turkeys were raised by Dr Jihad Douglas, whom Obama referred to simply as “Dr Douglas”.
Wait, Dr Jihad Douglas?
The turkeys were actually raised by a farmer named Joe Hedden but Douglas is the president of the National Turkey Federation who was on hand for the ceremony. But while Obama referred to Hedden by his full name, he omitted Douglas’s first name.
Wait until Fox News and the Republican noise machine (or Sam Harris for that matter) get hold of this. Given their determined efforts to paint Obama as a secret Muslim who hates what America stands for and would like ISIS to win and impose Sharia law on all of us, this damning evidence is all they need to raise a stink.
Without actually accusing him of anything, they can raise questions in the manner they have perfected over time, such as: What do we know about this Jihad Douglas person anyway? Has he been properly vetted? Could he be one of those infiltrators that we have to guard against? Was Obama sending a secret signal to ISIS that he is one of them by pardoning turkeys belonging to a jihadist? And what do we know about those turkeys? Are they Christian or Muslim turkeys? Where are their birth certificates? Why didn’t he pardon born-again Christian turkeys? And if it all innocent, why did Obama not mention Douglas’s first name as he did for Hedden? What is he hiding from us?
And while they are worrying over this, let me wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving!
I’m Canadian and in general, we don’t pay any attention to the Canadian thanksgiving (second Tuesday in October). The holiday itself doesn’t bother me and is easy to ignore, unlike christmas. The disgusting the excessive commercialism annoys me, but I get why they do that.
What I don’t get is the American obsession for mass migration. Why do family reuinions all have to take place at the same time? Why not travel at New Year like the Scottish? Or spring break, summer vacation? It brings a new meaning to the term guilt trip (Grandma cries, “You’re not coming for thanksgiving? Don’t you love me anymore?”). Fortune magazine estimates that forty seven million Americans will travel this year, about 15% of the population. It’s ludicrous and wasteful.
Then again it pales in comparison to the world’s largest annual mass migration of human beings: Chinese New Year in the PRC dictatorship, where an estimated 3.6 billion transits take place in a six week span. Obviously some of those are repeat movements by the same people, but still the numbers are staggering. Here in Taiwan, only a few million people move around, and most do it by car or rail, and they’re only going a few hundred kilometres to do it. Many families still live in the same cities as their relatives and don’t travel at all.
Myself, I’m bugging out for Chinese New Year in the Philippines, but that’s to get away from the fireworks. Exploding waste is the only time religion in Taiwan ever gets annoying.
And a happy friday to you too!
Wait a minute… how did Dr. Douglas become Dr. Jihad Johnson?
“You can call me Jihad, or you can call me Douglas… but you don’t have to call me Johnson!”
DonDueed @#3,
I don’t know what happened to my brain that made me temporarily switch his name! I have corrected it. Thanks!
And congratulations for remembering that old commercial.
Actually, Mano, I’m not sure I ever saw the beer ad. I was familiar with the comedy routine by “Raymond J. Johnson Jr.” which predates the ad and inspired it. It’s one of those weird bits that stick with you from its sheer absurdity. “You can call me Ray, or you can call me Jay…”
Taiwan being a tiny Island helps. When my parents and I lived on two different continents, family reunions tended to balloon our carbon footprint.