EDITORIAL - Marijuana dealers across the nation are preparing for a forced summer vacation as 250 - 500,000 of their best customers rush to New York City to take part in Bull-crapapalooza 2004 and celebrate the end of all rational political dissent from the Left. The Republican National Convention will draw together thousands of people who protest everything from the War on Terror to men leaving the toilet seat up and hold President Bush personally responsible for their inability to hold down a job, use soap, or buy a hair brush. While Bush "illegally" uses force to remove mass murderers like Saddam Hussein from power, New York?s enlightened protestors will show us the errors of our ways by using violence against the true enemies of freedom around the world: McDonald?s and Starbucks Coffee.

Obviously, not everyone who opposes President Bush?s policies is an antisocial substance abuser with a propensity towards violence. But, those who are not will be noticeably absent from the festivities. The leftist radicals? thinly veiled threats of violence and disrespect for the rule law has estranged or frightened away nearly all moderate voices of dissent. The Democratic Party has allowed these radicals to usurp and pervert their message, and now may be helpless to reclaim it.

There is no denying the fact that many alleged protestors are coming to the Convention for the expressed purpose of instigating tension. The talk show world is abuzz about the interview by Sean Hannity of Tanya Mayo, National Coordinator of ?Not in Our Name?, where she steadfastly refused to urge her organization and its supporters to avoid violence, respect private property, and obey the laws of New York City. Her position can be interpreted several different ways. One; Bush is such a bad President, any violence committed, while not condoned, is understandable (the ?Look What You Made Me Do? approach). Second; any violence during the protests will be in self defense against the police (the ?Yeah, We?re Here to Start Trouble but Don?t Want Sued? approach). Or third; all people are free and they will respond as they see appropriate to violations of their rights (the ?You Try to Control This Pack of Morons? approach). Any way you look at it, there is going to be trouble in New York.

Irresponsible statements like Mayo?s have a polarizing effect on prospective protesters. On one hand, the Republican Convention has been made the travel destination for every sociopath in North America who is itching for a little mayhem. On the other, respectable anti-Bush groups, such as ?Expats Against Bush? (www.expatsagainstbush.org) , are staying away from the Convention just because they want no part in the expected riot, and realize that such displays to anarchy are actually detrimental to their goals of persuading voters away from Bush. The final result will be a media circus where the entire Democratic Party will become identified with these radical groups, and giving George Bush?s Convention message a far larger audience than it would have had otherwise.

The big story of the Democratic Convention was the lack of news coverage. All the major networks drastically cut back their Convention reporting in lieu of stronger ratings from summer reruns. In reality, the best parts of the Convention never received any air time, and the snippets of exposure the Convention did receive where largely ignored by the public. While the major networks are planning on covering the Republican Convention in the exact same way, this will change rapidly if something newsworthy, say a protest riot, breaks out. Americans will be glued to their television sets just to see what might happen next. But they will not hear the messages of any of the groups protesting. Viewers will see the injured police who three years before saved thousands of lives from the World Trade Center, injured innocent bystanders who did nothing wrong but have the misfortune to work near an illegal protest site, and thousands upon thousands of pot smoking, public urinating, traffic obstructing criminals. America will be appalled, and George Bush will be seen as the candidate who stands opposed to this despicable behavior and for our way of life. Do I smell a Convention bounce?

The Democratic Party has let a genie out of the bottle in their attempts to rally the far left to their causes. Now the radicals are here and they are determined to alienate most mainstream voters with their violent, hatful, anti-American conduct. While John Kerry condones none of these actions, he has aligned himself with many of their positions and will be associated with these radical groups by the general voting public. In his desperate bid to pander support from all sources, no matter how radical, John Kerry may have started the fire that will consume him.