My Two Cents...With A Penny Left Over

Seeing as how hundreds dozens two or three people might be influenced by what I think, I'm prepared to postulate about the Georgia Governor's race.

Roy Barnes is a Democrat.  Nathan Deal is a Republican.

Now, let's be honest.  Most of the time there ain't a nickel's worth of difference between the two parties.

And why do they call them "parties"?  They always seem to be fighting someone about something--mostly each other--and rarely smile.  Except when they're backslapping each other, planting the knife a little deeper with each pat.  Doesn't look like much of a party to me.

Anyway, I was fortunate enough to be living in the Hurricane Sunshine State the last time Barnes was the top Dawg in Georgia.  But I read about him periodically in the Atlanta Journal periodical.

The biggest thing I remember is how Roy changed the State Flag.

For the uninformed, the Official State Flag of the Great State of Georgia used to be this:

Then Ol' Roy got elected, and the State Flag was changed to this:

I've seen Ol' Roy's flag before.  It's been at Six Flags Over Georgia since it opened in the 1960s.

Now the state flag looks like this:

The first flag is the one I grew up with.  Notice anything unique about it?  That's right, the Great Seal of Georgia is on the left.  Naw...that ain't it.

It's got a racially insensitive, redneck-inspiring, Rebel-yelling symbol of the Confederacy just screaming for attention.  And getting it.

I won't get into all the ramifications of the Stars and Bars, the Battle Flag of the Lost Cause, the remnant of what true Southerners like to call The War of Northern Aggression.

My Lumpkin County Berry ancestors were a part of the famed Blue Ridge Rifles of the Confederacy, the Marines of North Georgia, whose name and reputation live on at North Georgia College in the ROTC program, another pain in the ass for liberals.

But I digress.

While flags have little or nothing to do with how government is operated, I think they do serve as a symbol of whatever they're supposed to represent.  The first flag is Dixie.  The last flag is Safe.  The Ol' Roy flag is just Dumb.  It looks like whoever designed it was trying to please everyone while inspiring no one.

Oh, wait, that reminds me of the current election.

I've decided, based on my vast knowledge of the Roy Barnes era, to call him Ol' Roy for the duration of the race.  Here's why.

Ol' Roy was the name of Sam Walton's (he of Wal-Mart fame) dog.  And the name of the Wal-Mart brand of dog food.

Ol' Roy dog food is manufactured by some mysterious company, name unknown, and labeled for sale in all the Wal-Marts of the world.  I assume it's like every other generic product sold anywhere under any name--it's the lowest bidder's product.  It serves a purpose, but you never really know what you're buying until your dog pukes his guts out because he's eaten lead-laced bovine by-products produced in China.

I wouldn't feed my Sir Jack Ol' Roy if it was the only dog food left on the planet.  And I won't vote for Ol' Roy for Governor.  I'd like to think the voters of Georgia had enough sense to impose term limits on him the first time he served.

Of course, I thought Americans had enough sense in the last presidential election to choose wisely.

So I could be wrong this time too.