Controversial float meant to inspire citizen voices

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Source: Mount Vernon News (Mount Vernon, Ohio)

FREDERICKTOWN — Richard and Jacqueline Ruhl weren’t trying to offend anyone with a float they created for the Fredericktown Tomato Show Parade, they were merely trying to get the attention of their fellow citizens and encourage them to let their voices be heard.

They designed a float that coupled the Nazi flag with an image of President Barack Obama with a swastika around his arm. It also contained the phrase, “Wake up America.“ The float was denied entry into the parade by the Tomato Show Board of Directors because board members felt it detracted from the family-friendly atmosphere the parade was dedicated to creating.

“We felt the parade was not the right venue to air such negative political statements,” a member of the board of directors said.

The Ruhls, however, felt they were on target with their float and their message

Read more: http://www.mountvernonnews.com/local/09/09/22/controver...

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This is the area of Ohio where Guns, God and Gays are the main issues. Right now they have a Blue Dog congressman. If you think a progressive could win there, think again.

Mount Vernon is the town where a teacher tattooed a cross on a student's arm.

These people are just plain crazy.

[Blue_Tires]

1. .....

[Soylent Brice]

2. Richard and Jacqueline Ruhl are fucking idiots. n/t

[Xipe Totec]

14. Their parent's are. Richard and Jacqueline are just the inevitable consequence n/t

[HopeHoops]

3. Why didn't they invite the WBC morons to ride on it?

I'm sure a few "God Hates Fags" and "God Loves Dead Soldiers" posters would fit right in on that thing.

[tavalon]

10. yep

[Devil Child]

4. The reporter should be ashamed...

The sympathetic tone of that article is quite disgusting. I wonder how many "citizen voices" were inspired by a swastika.

[JBoy]

5. Hope they wasted lots of money building their hate-mobile.

[wicket]

6. Ummmmmmm

[OneBlueSky]

7. people in this country are fucking crazy these days . . .

where in the hell are they getting these analogies to Hitler? . . . is this the kind of stuff that Beck and Limburger are spreading (I don't listen to either, so I don't know what they're saying)? . . . if so, they need to be shut down before they do some real damage -- like get someone killed . . .

what's this country coming to? . . .

[peace13]

8. Aaaakkkk...ten miles from where I live!

No wonder I feel like the energy is being sucked out of me. Ignorant fools, for sure!!

[JonQ]

9. Not the best forum for that.

But it's hard to get up in arms about comparing presidents to hitler, after the last 8 years.

Maybe as a nation we can take a hiatus from the whole "everyone I don't like is hitler" thing. Give it 10 years, see if everyone is happy and we'll go from there.

[No Elephants]

16. Not hard at all. Obama is trying to make health care more affordable. That is why they are

comparing him to a man who slaughtered 12 million people. Does that make sense to you? Is that the same as comparing Hitler to a President starting an illegal war? Or a President initiating the unitary executive?

Some people here consistently sound more conservative than Joe Scarborough. He, too, is overly fond of false equivalencies.

[DavidDvorkin]

11. Lots of negative comments in the discussion forum in the paper

Plus a few disturbing supportive ones.

[Bette Noir]

12. Somebody send flowers to the directors who banned this float.

[daggahead]

13. They were only concerned about their family ...

That seems to be as far as the nut-jobs on the right want to take things ... unless, of course, there's a fetus 500 miles away that needs to be "rescued."

[Berry Cool]

15. Reading this article made my head hurt from the stoopid.

Issues such as the expansion of Americorps, gun control, the ability to turn off American access to the Internet and the North American Union make the Ruhls feel their fears are substantiated.

Because Americorps is a Nazi organization? Oh, and Obama is going to take away their guns, right? Oh, and I LOVE this part about how Obama has "the ability to turn off American access to the Internet." Did you know that?? That there's a great big spigot in the White House that controls the access of all the American people to the Internet, and Obama wants to TURN THE SPIGOT AND SHUT IT OFF? That all he has to do is turn that spigot, and all the Internet stuff will stop flowing down to us through the series of tubes and we won't be able to access it anymore?????

Although Richard wasn’t permitted to be part of the parade, he feels their message was probably more widely spread because of the controversy. After leaving the parade staging area, he drove his tractor through the parade route and parked it near a restaurant while he ate lunch...

...After his lunch, Richard was driving his tractor and float back to his home when a man tore off a swag from the float and stole it.

“He denied us our First Amendment right. He is an extremist. Without it, we don’t have a democratic form of government. We can vote but we have no control over the issues,” Jackie said.

Um, yeah. The guy who tore a swag off your float is the "extremist." And by doing so, he DENIED YOU YOUR FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHT. I mean, in that one small action, he squelched you completely, completely robbing you of your ability to get your message across to people, ever. Which is why YOU ARE TELLING YOUR LOCAL NEWSPAPER ABOUT IT AND THEY ARE WRITING A STORY ABOUT YOU.

...Oh man. I have to go to bed.