DOUGHTY, KANSAS — 48-year-old Kansan native Robert Ryan calls himself a “right leaning, God fearing, ammo-hoarding, conservative patriot.” Ryan runs several right-wing Facebook pages and hosts a couple of conservative podcasts he’s become known for among his friends and some in the alt-right movement at large. Ryan frequently tells followers of his pages and his podcast’s audience that he believes in his “heart of hearts” that the “lamestream, liberal media” is deliberately not covering the Benghazi story nearly as much as they should.
During a recent recording of his Tuesday evening podcast, Ryan told his viewers he was “growing real damn tired” of what he calls “the violence and disrespect” of liberal Americans. He pointed to some recently released videos from highly-debunked right-wing provocateur James O’Keefe that allegedly show Democratic operatives conspiring to incite violence at Donald Trump rallies. Though the veracity of the tapes hasn’t been verified, and despite the fact that Mr. O’Keefe’s reputation is far from truthful, Robert says he believes the tapes, and is convinced that only liberals are capable of political violence.
“But what about those three morons who were just arrested in your state,” a called identified as Jim asked Mr. Ryan during a call-in segment of the show.
“They arrested who, where, for what now,” Ryan asked incredulously. He chided the caller for trying to “muck everything up” and he said he didn’t believe the story because he hadn’t heard about it on either Fox News or on any of the multitude of talk radio shows he listens to.
“No, really, it’s true,” Jim insisted, “just check another news source. I mean, those guys were planning to blow up an apartment complex just knew a lot of Muslims from Somali live in it. That’s pretty violent, I’d say,and they were right-wing conservatives.”
“No, they weren’t,” Ryan said emphatically.
“Really, though, they were,” Jim insisted back.
“No. They. Weren’t,” Ryan said even more emphatically.
“Seriously, Robert, I’m a long-time listener and a conservative, and I’m telling you,” Jim said, “three right-wing conservatives were just arrested for plotting to bomb Muslims in Kansas. C’mon man, you gotta check other sources.”
“No, I don’t, and no, they weren’t conservatives,” Ryan said, “because no true conservative would do such a thing. These people are obviously liberals lying to people about their politics. You know who was a liberal?”
Without hesitation, but just a little resignation in his voice, Jim said, “Hitler…right? It’s Hitler?”
“Yes, you’re damn right it’s Hitler,” Robert shot back, “because the word ‘socialist’ is right there in Nazi. Nationalist SOCIALIST Party. Boom. Checkmate.”
“Except, well, from a historically accurate point of view,” Jim replied, “Hitler may have promised the workers of Germany some socialist stuff, but he never went through with it. He kinda just promised them stuff to get power and then did whatever he wanted. In fact, Karl Marx was a Jew, so it’s really hard to see how the guy who killed and incinerated millions of Jews getting cozy with one’s economic vision, doesn’t it?”
“Get off my show, libtard,” Robert said. Jim tried in vain for several moments to convince Mr. Ryan that he is just a well-informed conservative, but Ryan had none of it. He insisted Jim had “drunk too much Obama Kool-Aid in college” and he was therefore “compromised.”
Robert disconnected Jim’s call.
“Look, I don’t believe this Kansas bomb plot is real,” Mr. Ryan said, “but I do know that the media ain’t talking about Benghazi enough. I know they’re deliberately hiding news from us. I also know that if this Kansas bomb plot thingy were real, Fox News would have told me about it, because they are NOT mainstream. Just one look at their huge ratings shows how not-mainstream they are, right? Right? Right. Anyway, fuck Hillary, vote Trump, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
Follow James on Twitter @JamboSchlarmbo.
