Eighteen hours ago, I was the victim of a hate crime.

Ok, that’s a little extreme, but my dorm room door WAS vandalized because of my proudly displayed, conservative ideals. They weren’t obnoxious adornments or anything offensive, just a Fresh Elephant advertisement and a John McCain sticker. I’ve been choking on Obama merchandise since I got here, so I figured I’d be allowed my drop in the political bucket. But evidently contrary opinions are not entitled to free speech. As it turns out, basic courtesy and first amendment rights are reserved exclusively for people who have identical thoughts, and if anyone with ideas outside your comfort zone rears his head, it’s fully justified to lash out in irate attacks, stomping the stranger to death until he curls up like a wounded spider, spasmodically twitching his daddy-longish legs.

Sarcasm.

So here’s what happened: I’ve had my Fresh Elephant blog (freshelephant.blogspot.com, if you haven’t visited yet) advertised on my door for about a week now, but the Republican elephant symbol on it is subtle and faded, so no one really paid attention. Yesterday, my roommate stuck a John McCain sticker (a little one, mind you) below our peephole. That’s it. I strolled back from the dining hall in the evening and saw that someone had scribbled “REPUBLICANS SUCK” over our whiteboard messages and had also used the dry-erase marker to cross out McCain’s name.

Sure, whiteboards are fair game. Everyone has them hanging up and anyone can write whatever they’re motivated to. I didn’t much care for the message, but it wouldn’t have hacked me off too bad. The sticker, however, is now forever smudged with slander, and no matter how much I rub it or how much Windex I use, there is the faint outline of a thick, black squiggle through the name of a man I respect and support very much.

I do not expect everyone in this building to honor John McCain as I do. I’m in the Performing Arts hall, for crying out loud, I know we’ve got Democrats. And I’m ok with it. But if they run all over the place preaching a message of love and tolerance, they cannot turn around and alienate anyone dissimilar. I am also a believer in an almost universal acceptance, but I make an effort to practice such theories as well. If I went door-to-door down these hallways and tried to vandalize every liberal token, I would run out of ink. So I guess it’s a good thing I’m not that insolent and closed-minded.

Disagree with me; I encourage it. But have the balls to approach me, not a sticker, about it, and be prepared to show me that you know what you’re talking about. Because if your vocal arguments are as cowardly and hot-headed as your marker demonstration, you’re not going to win with me. Say it’s an oxymoron, but I am an informed Republican, and I am ready and willing to articulate my support for my party sans name-calling and defacement.

Bring it.

I was half-heartedly watching some late-night television before bed when everyone started insulting Sarah Palin, her pregnant daughter, and the family’s very lifestyle. Conan O’Brien, pretending to quote the governor, said “everyone knows marriage isn’t for gay people—it’s for pregnant teenagers!” He also said that as Palin is a member of the NRA, she must be in favor of “shotgun weddings.” Craig Ferguson, in reference to McCain’s recent endorsement from the Log Cabin Republicans, said, “Here’s a group that won’t embarrass (him) with any surprise pregnancies!” Finally, Jimmy Kimmel jested that Palin’s main campaign promise was to put “a walrus in every igloo and a whale tooth in every papoose.”

Now, I understand that these men make jokes for a living and I’m not to take these words as venomous or hateful or serious in any way. But the above words of these men are simply humorous retellings of actual arguments brought up by the media and the Democrat party. These most recent slams are utterly dripping with hypocrisy and mixed messages, and it’s all leaking in and oozing out from every imaginable angle. I’m appalled that that party hasn’t yet registered some of this double-talk and tried to bathe away the shame. If you haven’t yet figured it out, allow me to enlighten:

The situation with Palin’s daughter is not only a living testament to the ticket’s strong pro-life backbone, but an embodiment of a class of women that the Democrat party says it fully supports. One major demographic for liberals, now and in past elections, has been single mothers. They struggle to make ends meet, they are sacrificial and selfless, and they deserve a leg up from the government (although Obama seems to think otherwise, if you’d like to reference http://freshelephant.blogspot.com/2008/08/fillet-mignon-and-fatherhood.html). Bristol Palin could be one of these single mothers, should her boyfriend flake out, and she’s having her baby anyway. She is going to face extreme emotional hardship, as all teen mothers do, and, if they are to be true to what they’ve always said, the Democrats should be eager to help her and all those like her.

Instead, they say that she’s proof of Palin’s irresponsible parenting (because all the Democrat kids I know obey their parent’s moral code 100%), and rumors have arisen, tabloid fire and TMZ igniting, that Palin’s youngest son, Trig, is secretly Bristol’s.

This isn’t The Young and the Restless, people, it’s a presidential election. Can we grow up, please?

Furthermore, people seem to discredit Palin because she’s from Alaska. It’s a small population, it’s separate from the rest of our states, so she’s obviously out of touch with everyone else (wait, isn’t Obama from Hawaii? Interesting…). This is another major flaw in the Democrat’s logic: Palin is a middle-class, hard-working woman, and her family is completely average. She has both been and lived with lower and middle-class Americans, just your typical blue-collar men and women, all just making a living. The people Palin governed were our bread-and-butter citizens.

Aren’t these the people the Democrats say they want to help? They’re going to get tax cuts, they’re going to get affordable health care. They’re our focus, our drive, our neighbors. They love them! But when a real, live member of the average American populace shows up, she is not in for love, but for criticism and disdain. Sure, maybe the Democrats want to help these people, they just want to keep them at arm’s length while they’re doing it. They’re fine giving them handouts, but not allowing actual success.

So Palin’s government experience isn’t good enough because it was “just Alaska.” Well, hell, at least it’s experience.

Palin has agreed to put herself up for public office and, therefore, we’re all entitled to poke and prod at her life and figure out if she’s up to par. Feel free to criticize. Just make sure that the things you chose to hate about her aren’t things your party stands to support.