Warnings: Immature puns, potentially controversial depictions of the extreme right (although that's more next chapter than this one...)

Chapter Twelve: The Mad Tea Party, part 1

Even though Alfred had just finished discussing something as serious as the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, it seemed that his companions were still stuck on the whole pundit issue. "Honestly, if that's the way your commentators act, then I'm shocked that it didn't get to you before now!" Feliciano exclaimed. "But your people don't act the same way, vee?"

"Of course they do!" Alfred snapped, his voice coming out harsher than he intended it to. "And then they take what they hear from their favorite pundit and start acting out based on what they hear! There's this movement called the Tea Party-"

"For god's sake, you lot haven't stopped throwing tea in the bloody harbor?" Arthur interrupted. "I thought you grew out of that phase!"

"I'm not the one throwing tea off boats anymore! There's not even any real tea involved, anyway! They're basically a bunch of protests held all over the country, and at first, they called themselves teabaggers, of all things!" Ivan snickered, Kiku looked as though he was trying really hard not to laugh, and Arthur's eyebrows raised. The others either had a quiet chuckle or shared looks of disgust. Well, all except for Peter, who just looked confused.

"I don't get it," the micro-nation said.

"Well, uh, it's, well..." Arthur stalled for time, really not wanting to explain to the tiny nation what was meant by that comment. Yao coughed and looked away politely, prompting ,ost of the others to do the same. Ivan, however, just smirked.

"Peter," he began, "that word is used to describe an act in which-" here he was cut off by a whack upside the head wit a frying pan. Rubbing his temple, he glared furiously, coming face to face with an angry Elizaveta, who was holding her pan like a baseball bat.

"Don't even think about finishing that sentence," she warned Ivan under her breath before turning to Sealand. "Peter," she said, schooling her facial features into a softer expression. "Teabagging is when you drop a tea bag on someone's head." The boy looked disappointed.

"That's all?" he questioned.

"Yes," the woman replied, the look in her eyes challenging anyone who would dare to contradict her. Arthur mouthed a silent "thank you," and Elizaveta responded by flashing him a glance that clearly said, "you owe me." To offset any tensions that had arisen, Francis cleared his throat.

"So... how about that tea party, no?"

September 12, 2009

If Alfred thought that the town hall meetings had been packed, they had nothing on the sheer number of people crammed on the National Mall that Saturday, and that was nothing compared the rest of the people spread out all over D.C. People of all different walks of life were gathered to protest the Obama administration's policies. Some people were taking things way out of proportion, however, and attacking the person instead of the policies. If Alfred had a quarter for every sign that was dripping with thinly veiled racism, he'd be able to buy the entire McDonald's corporation. And if he had a penny for every sign that mentioned socialism, he'd have enough money to pay off the national debt... AND buy Microsoft. Seriously, that word was everywhere.

"Hey, mister!" a voice called. "Do you want a free hat?" Alfred turned around to see a rather friendly-looking guy with a bunch of hats, all emblazoned with the phrase "The 9-12 Project."

"Um, sure," the nation replied, taking one. "Thank you."

"No problem," the guy said, a faint Southern accent coloring his words. "Where are you from?"

"A lot of places," Alfred replied, not exactly sure how to explain to someone that he was his country. But figuring that he might as well do the thing properly, he added: "But I live here in Washington D.C. Now. I came out today to see what was going on." The hat man nodded.

"So you live here, huh? What's it like, living so close to the center of all this corruption?"

"Traffic-y," Alfred deadpanned. The man burst into laughter.

"So it's not just me, then!" he exclaimed. "I thought the traffic here was awful, but where I'm from the roads aren't very busy. I thought that maybe I just wasn't used to it." Alfred had to ask. The D.C. area was notorious for its traffic problems.

"No, the traffic here is particularly bad," he said. "I live here and it's hard to deal with!" The two of them joked about the terrible traffic for a while, before Alfred decided to ask his new friend a question. "So what is it exactly that you're protesting for? What brought you out here today?" The man sighed heavily.

"I'm worried that with all of this health-care reform that my taxes are going to skyrocket. I can barely afford to pay them now. If this passes, then my taxes are going to be so high that I don't know how I'll pay them, and I might even lose my house!" Alfred nodded.

"I understand," he said simply.

"Also, what about the quality of the care?" the man asked. "Right now I can't afford particularly good medical care but if doctors get paid less than they do now because of this, what are they going to do about that? What if they decide to slack off on the health-care because they're not getting paid as well as they are now?" Alfred could tell that these things were really plaguing the man. He obviously wasn't from the richest tiers of society, and probably didn't have the best health-care now anyway. He was afraid that his already poor-quality care would get worse if the bill passed.

"I don't think that decent doctors would cut their work quality because of this," Alfred replied. "If they would, then they were a crappy doctor in the first place." The man seemed to ponder this for a bit, then suddenly seemed to think of something.

"Hey, what's your name, anyway?" he asked. "What organization are you with?"

"Alfred F. Jones, and I'm not with any organization... just interested in what Americans think. It's kind of important to me, see?"

"I'm Joel Snapp," the man replied, a pensive expression coming over his face. "Why does your name sound so familiar..." Alfred grimaced. It wasn't exactly a secret that he was the embodiment of the nation (after all, he went on television and radio shows all the time), but it was always awkward when people realized who exactly he was. "Oh my god!" Joel suddenly exclaimed. "You're America! It's an honor to meet you, sir!"

"You don't need to call me sir," Alfred replied, embarrassed. "Just Alfred is fine."

"I can't believe that I got to meet the country!" Joel cried happily. "I never thought that anything like this would happen when I decided to come today!"

"No, I should be the one thanking you," Alfred replied. "I really appreciate being about to hear what the citizens have to say. It was nice to meet you, Joel."

To Be Continued

Author's Comments:

On 9.12.2009, and the tea party people were everywhere in D.C.. I met quite a few of them, and while I wish I could say that they were all like Joel here, I honestly can't.

I put Joel's segment first for a reason. He represents the calm, rational part of the tea partiers that you don't really see on television. They have legitimate concerns, and do not feel that the Democrats nor the Republicans are representing them well enough, so they took to this movement to express their discontent. They don't get much airtime, because people don't watch the news expecting to see sane, rational people, they watch the news expecting to see batshit insane lunatics! While some of the people I met were like Joel, others were some of the most nasty, badly-behaved, bigoted people I've met in my life.. Not all of them, mind you, but a few of them were real pieces of work. One particularly horrid woman caused a huge disturbance in the Metro station by holding up an escalator so she could yell at people about how Obama was anti-Christian. Now, stuff like this isn't too uncommon, but the worst part was that there were a lot of people who agreed with her, and that led to a huge pileup.

Please don't take this as hating on the entire tea party movement. Some of them were very nice people, and they're welcome to come back any time they want. But people like Crazy-Ass Metro Lady, please, stay in your own home town, OK? Some of us actually kind of need to live our lives and don't need more bonkerosity than we already get.

-Kaboom