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I don’t know Frank Scavo…..other than he used to be a school board President in Old Forge……and has sort of a creepy obsession with former President Donald Trump.

There’s nothing illegal about being creepily obsessed with a politician. It’s weird and…well….creepy….but the world is filled with weird and creepy people who are, ultimately, quite harmless. When weird and creepy people are made school board Presidents, however…..and thus are tasked with guiding young people to hopefully not become weird and creepy themselves……well……that’s when the problems start. And I haven’t even gotten to the attempt at violently overthrowing democracy yet. That’s another bad look for a grown-up tasked with molding young minds. More on that later.

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So this Scavo fellow chartered a bunch of buses to head to DC in the pre-dawn hours of January 6th, because….well…..see above. Some creepily obsessed people keep their creepy obsessions to themselves, but Scavo is one of the red-hat boyos that want the world to know that they adore the Putin-loving tough guy who called Nazis “very fine people”. He and his brother-from-another-mother Bob Bolus probably go bowling together.

Scavo and his merry band were incensed that their boy had lost the election, and were absolutely convinced that the entire thing was a huge rig job, set in motion in the basement of a pizza parlor / pedophile factory frequented by Tom Hanks and Hillary Clinton. I made that last part up, but I wouldn’t bet my life that a healthy percentage of the 2021 freedom riders didn’t think it true. Joe Biden was about to get the rubber-stamp of approval from…..of all people…..Mike Pence….and even Mother wasn’t gonna stop him this time.

Apparently the rationale went “when you lose obsequious toadies like Mike Pence, it’s time to fuck shit up yo…”

So they all got to DC and waved Trump and Confederate flags and listened to a parade of speeches not exactly of the “I have a dream today” or “ask not what your country can do for you” or “the better angels of our nature” variety…and then their boy came out and basically told them that if they didn’t march to the capitol and stop this thing he’d consider them a pack of ANTIFA loving liberal pussies.

And so off they went, bellies filled with rhetorical kool-aid……being led by a shirtless organic food-loving Momma’s boy wearing a Viking helmet and screaming like Mel Gibson in “Braveheart”…..and we’d still be laughing right now if they didn’t actually kill people…including a police officer….part of a group they repeatedly attempted to impale with “Blue Lives Matter” flags.

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We all know what happened next. Scavo came home, undoubtedly dejected that Mike Pence wasn’t hung, but smart enough to immediately deny that he was anywhere near the capitol. He then changed his story and said….well…..maybe he was there but he never went inside. And then….well….

Pictures. This gang was anything but stealth. For the next insurrection somebody needs to be in charge of collecting cell phones at the door.

Yea. There he was. In the middle of the mob. Inside the capitol….looking like the bullseye on a target practice poster.

And now all of a sudden the FBI wants to have a word.

Awkward.

***

My friend Alan Stout reminded me this morning that 3 years ago yesterday, the same day it was announced that Scavo faces charges, kids the age of many Old Forge school children managed to hold a huge rally in Washington DC without breaking into the Capitol and/or killing anybody…..so it’s not like Scavo didn’t have a blueprint to follow for this type of thing.

My kids were there 3 years ago. They traveled down in separate groups. On chartered buses.

I told my oldest how proud I was of her and she replied… “you don’t have to praise a fish for swimming.”

My youngest told me that at one point her and her friends wanted to move closer towards the speakers. The adults in the crowd all parted like the red-sea, allowing them to pass over and over again, saying “we’re here for you today…..we’re here for you kids….go on….get closer.”

These kids are direct descendants of the ghosts sitting at that Greensboro, North Carolina lunch counter….and the marchers crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge…..and the Memphis sanitation workers. They refuse to accept that their lives don’t matter. They instantly spot hypocrisy, and stomp all over it.

Sure, they’ll look to adults for guidance and leadership, but if the adults aren’t up to the job, these kids are gonna cut the line.

You can have Donald Trump and his cronies firing up the Scavo’s of the world with hate.

The adults clearly need some schooling.

I’ll take Emma Gonzalez’s extraordinary call to action that day, putting herself on the line using only grief, tears and 6 minutes of bated breath.

The Kids, at least, are Alright.

In a bit..

–tf