"Protest Warrior is a new way for fellow liberty-lovers across the planet to mobilize against the left within their own cities. As you know, those on the left usually carry the loudest microphones... but they go silent quickly when truth is thrown back in their face."
This is the mission statement of the Protest Warrior, a rightwing organization whose sole objective, it would seem, is the staging of venomous counter-protests to liberal protests. With its cunning motto Fighting the Left-Doing It Right! and persuasive online arguments, ProtestWarrior.com reminds me that I too love both liberty and throwing truth back in the left' face (presuming, I guess, that they threw it at me first. It' self-defense!).
While surfing through the Protest Warrior website, I log into the Sacramento chapter. To my considerable astonishment, under the position of Chapter President, it reads, "Leader Not Assigned." A button prompts me to consider running for the Chapter President office. With lightning speed, I push "Yes." In the hopes of clinching this lofty and esteemed position, I use the patriotic pseudonym Monroe Jefferson in my application, quipping, "It' time to show those loony liberals what America is all about!"
A few days later I receive an email congratulating me on becoming the new President of the Sacramento Chapter. They refer to me as "Sergeant." This will look incredibly good on my resume.
"The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph." Thomas Paine
(a quote pasted on the Protest Warrior' website)
As new chapter president, my first order of business is lighting a fire under my chapter (or, using their terminology, my "strike force") through an email list provided to me. I decide the use of superfluous exclamation is the best way to accomplish this:
Sacramento Protest Warriors
I am your new chapter president! In my first chapter president address, I'd like to declare, LOONY ALERT!!!!!!!!!! Hey, it's time to get the chapter going again and take action against the loony left. Who's with me!!!!!!! I'd like to conduct meetings where we can plan various missions against traitors to our country (you know those who should be singing the French national anthem).
ATTENDANCE IS MANDATORY!
Fighting the good fight!
Sgt. Monroe Jefferson
Protest Warrior Chapter President
For the meeting, I request that people dress patriotically.
Upon arrival at the reception area of Carrow' Restaurant-the Denny' of Northern California-I spy a blonde woman and a man with a receding hairline and a T-shirt emblazoned with the face of Ronald Reagan. They sit awkwardly, eyeing people as they enter. Luckily I've come prepared:
MY OUTFIT: American Flag bandana; patriotic red, white, and blue tracksuit top; T-shirt that says "We Love the USA!"
MY OBJECTIVE: As chapter president, to go completely mad with power
Adjusting my American flag bandana, I take a stab in the dark. "Are you here for my Protest Warrior meeting?"
"We are!' the man proclaims.
With two clenched fists, I cry out my mission statement: "It' time to show those liberals what America is all about!" When their lackluster reaction dies down, I turn to Hairline and address him man to man. "That T-shirt shirt is fantastic!" I coo, adding with a respectful nod, "You just might make a good Protest Warrior chapter vice president!"
I turn towards the blonde woman, who' decided (rather unpatriotically) to dress in unauthorized civilian clothes. "Didn't you read my email?" I bellow, reprimanding her for not following my Protest Warrior chapter president orders in front of the patrons of Carrow'. I briefly toy with the idea of seeing if I could make her drop and give me 10 pushups. She makes an unhappy face at me.
The hostess steers us towards a table where we make, rigid uncomfortable right-wing small talk. "The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph," I state, quoting Thomas Paine (certainly not for the last time tonight).
"Is this the Protest Warriors?" asks a man with glasses, who claims to be a schoolteacher, as the rest of my unit slowly files in.
"It is!" I bark. Then with abrupt anger, "And you're late!" I give him something to think about: "What if you were late for an Operation? That just won't do!" Like an authoritative dick, I lean far back in my chair, adding, "Pull up some table!"
A gung-ho guy with moustache and glasses joins us next. So gung-ho, in fact, that he wears a Protest Warrior T-shirt. I like his moxie!
"Where did you get your awesome T-shirt?" I ask, planting him a patriotic high-five.
"I ordered it right off of the website!" he proudly proclaims, gesturing to the emblem of an angry shirtless, muscular guy wielding a large sword and sign, that reads Protest Warrior Now! (Politics aside, I have to say the Protest Warrior emblem, is well, a little gay.)
"You just might make a good Chapter Vice-President," I state, slapping him on the back, eyeballing the guy in the Ronald Reagan T-shirt in a way that says, I'm keeping you on your toes, pal.
Suddenly, the meeting takes a serious right turn, as we all get a chance to meet a professional, full-time Protest Warrior. Much more intense than my other chapter members, this very large, very humorless and very intimidating arrives with his girlfriend and proceeds to give everyone at the table a no-nonsense handshake and stress his military background. (He doesn't bother to introduce his girlfriend, and she doesn't speak once during our entire Carrow' Protest Warrior meeting.)
"Is someone going to take notes?" our newest arrival scolds us, looking to buck my authority at the first chance, it would seem. He can barely keep himself from rolling his eyes at the lack of military professionalism of my meeting.
With that, our Carrow' food arrives. The blonde woman in our Protest Warrior group bows her head and prays out loud over her quality budget-priced food. It' awkward. The rest of us look uncomfortably at each other, unsure if we should also bless our budget-priced meals.
Once the prayers wrap up, I get down to business. "One of the big things is the liberal loony fest down in 'Frisco," I tell them, referring to the third anniversary protest of the Iraq War while annoyingly calling San Francisco 'Frisco. "This is our Super Bowl," I declare, taking care to make strong, creepy eye contact with everyone at the table. Next I open up the floor for some serious Protest Warrior brainstorming, inviting everybody present to put our collective brainpower together to strategize how best to break up the liberal Iraq protest.
"Bullhorns!" I tell them. "We need lots of bullhorns!"
"No bullhorns," nixes my imposing military nemesis.
"How about a bake sale?" I rally. After a moment of dead silence, my nemesis takes the floor, ignoring me entirely. "Remember, everyone: no fighting. Unless it' one-on-one in an alley," he tells us, miming a headlock/punching motion.
"Everyone should start going through physical training for the event," I break in, eager not to lose my president status. "Start jogging three miles a day!" As the ingenious ideas keep rolling, Imposing Military Guy throws me a curveball and compliments my dedication. "You got balls to get this going!" he tells me. My chest puffs up with the knowledge that these people look up to me and my balls.
"This will double," he continues. "It will blow up!" We do a cool-guy handshake.
"But that' when we'll get infiltrators," he suddenly warns, ruining the cool-guy vibe. "When we get big, you can expect that from the other side."
I suspiciously eye the schoolteacher, who hasn't spoken the entire meeting, and stare at him while intoning, "Maybe we have some infiltrators here tonight?!" I let this hang in the air for gravitas.
As we collect money for the bill, the large, intimidating guy concludes, "It' all about exposing them for who they are and making them look like jackasses."
"Exposing and making them look like jackasses," I repeat, adjusting my American flag bandanna. "I'd loooove to infiltrate the opposition and make them look real stupid," I say, wiping crumbs off my We Love the USA T-shirt.
NEXT: LEADING MY TROOPS TO BATTLE...
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