Political SmackDown!
Satire is no longer what closes on Saturday night, as George S. Kaufman once opined. It is alive and thriving, and you’re as likely to find it in Wheeling and Indianapolis as you are at the Public Theater. Let’s begin a search. Hey, small-time wrestling might be on to something.(Singing) In the/deep/ dark/ hills/of/ eastern Kentucky (end singing)-- and Appalachia thereabouts, the grappler making headlines these days goes by the sobriquet “Progressive Liberal." He's Dan Richard, and a good guy in the ring he ain’t. Recalling Andy Kauffman, circa 1983: Progressive Liberal is smug. He condescends. He gripes. He corrects the fans: “Do you live in a holler?.. No!.. You live in a hollow.” Beware his knock-out maneuver. He has dubbed it “the liberal agenda.”
Progressive Liberal? That’s pretty bad. Infinitely worse, you would have to concede, than being just one or the other. He’s gotten death threats for voicing his opinions so unabashedly. Why wouldn’t he? He told a crowd in West Virginia that the government needs to take people’s guns away. When he spoke that night, according to Deadspin, “a patron displayed a pistol in a holster on his right hip and started rubbing it.” Wow, Kathy Griffin much? When Richards’ real hometown, Richmond, Virginia, didn’t add enough sizzle to the promotional card, he changed it to Washington D.C. He’s greeted at each event these days by chants of “Trump, Trump, Trump.” Interestingly, in Mexico's lucha libre wrestling circuit, a "heel" named Sam Adonis touts the accomplishments of United States President Trump.
You can find a lot of information now online, whether it’s at the Washington Post or Salon or wherever, about whether or not the Progressive Liberal that appears in entertainment venues really represents Richards’ political outlook, but I have no interest at all in that exploration. As far as I'm concerned, Richard’s life constitutes an alternative reality that lies outside the arena. Is this character a new mirror upon Trump America? I don’t think so exactly. It’s easy to imagine reactionary crowds just as angry at such an athlete if Hillary Clinton were the president today. Fans on both the left and the right seem to be enjoying the Progressive Liberal. For different reasons, naturally. On the alienation/affection spectrum, let’s place him at “Archie Bunker.”
I depart today with this treasured comment exchange between two anonymous web surfers, found beneath the Deadspin story earlier this week…
“I am absolutely mystified that people attend something like this. Like, I realize that this takes place in bumfuck wherever, but still. Don’t they have something more productive to do with their time, like sniff glue?”
(reply) “Is that you, Progressive Liberal?”
posted by CM @ 10:56 PM
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