I've seen tv footage of Claire McCaskill trying to charm the country men folk in Missouri by meeting them where they live -- in breakfast restaurants, burger joints, veterans halls, and cafes. She's trying very hard to show them that she's not threatening their livelihood -- or their manhood.
I don't know. When I came out of a burger joint yesterday in St. Louis, someone had thrown coffee all over the corner of my car where I've got 2 Claire McCaskill bumperstickers. The customers are always a mixture of blue collar guys and retired guys at the bar, white collar guys in the restaurant, and guys in suits waiting for their clients by the front door. But one of them was an Akin fan? Really? Still?
In 2008, someone peeled the Obama stickers off my car during an art fair in Clayton. The St. Louis Art Fair attracts a professional class of people who pick up a little tchotchke for $1,000 as entertainment. You stroll around the fair with the professional class.....people who spent $2,000 on clothes, trying to look casual. It's all very civilized. So who in this kind of crowd would rip my Obama stickers off?
Days later, someone stole my Obama yard signs. I got new ones. They stole those, too.
In 2004, I made my own signs protesting the candidacy of Matt Blunt (R) for governor. He was 33 years old. My signs said "No Baby Blunt." I put them on the inside of all my windows that face the street. Nothing. Now I know I was lucky that no one threw a rock through my windows.
Since I didn't grow up here, I don't know what all the Republican anger is about. Missouri is a red state. My house is surrounded by people with Todd Akin signs in their yards. What's so threatening about me challenging the state's overwhelming majority?