Joseph O. Patton: Notes on drinking the Kool-Aid

  The strangest things creep through your mind when you’re just kicking back on the porch in the Alabama heat, watching a squirrel trying to get a nut and a golfer on the edge of your yard slinging angry redneck curses at the 16th tee.

  For whatever reason, I was nudged into childhood reminisces - most likely due to the oppressive temperature, possibly even heat stroke - and I thought longingly of Kool-Aid. But not the sugary, powdered goodness that accompanied many youthful activities, but politically-speaking how conservatives have circled the wagons - at least in terms of political discourse - and dismiss everything individuals have to say that may even carry the slightest taste of praise or approval for anything President Obama has said or done, by condescendingly screeching, “You’re drinking the Kool-Aid!” Of course these are the same sheep-like souls who will hastily redraw their maps should Glenn Beck tell them the world is flat, but….