Politics Gone Nuts

During the Holiday Season we’re all likely to be subjected to social intercourse involving people with whom we have little, if anything, in common, and had even less contact throughout the past year (or ever).

During the Holiday Season we’re all likely to be subjected to social intercourse involving people with whom we have little, if anything, in common, and had even less contact throughout the past year (or ever).

For instance, there’s that numbers-cruncher from accounting who rarely slinks out of his office between 9AM and 5PM; or, the neighbor with a Pekingese that yaps incessantly during the wee small hours of the morning, making it impossible for anyone within a five-house radius to get any sleep; or, that niece of your son’s Little League coach who’s visiting during semester break from State U., and shows up at the block party looking like Teri Garr in her “Young Frankenstein” days (“Anyone for a roll in the hay?”).

Whatever your own personal variation on or experience with human intercommunion at parties which you would rather not attend yet feel compelled to, I believe that I’ve happened upon a great conversation starter (or ender, depending upon the polarized tendencies of those within earshot).

Expound upon the metaphorical symbolism of nuts as applied to political parties.

The “mixed nuts” can be explained as “Democrats.”

In one canister are found subspecies of many shapes, colors and textures.  Most plentiful are peanuts, “goober peas,” which aren’t really nuts at all but legumes.  These commoners, small and ovate, are somewhat pale in pallor, overall the lowest priced.

They are “others,” and not like the rest.

Subservient to the commonplace goober is the Spanish peanut, replete with a dark red skin and light brown shading.  Like the Mexicans and other Hispanics, these are smaller and rounder than their off-white cousins.  Once the Spanish peanuts get mixed in, it’s virtually impossible to reach in and not grab a few along with the others.

The brainiac of the mixed nuts might very well be the almond.  Slender yet firm, with a definite brown tinge, the very shape (rounded at one end, pointed at the other) is reminiscent of the eye of the Asian – and we all know they’re nothing but a bunch of socialist overachievers intent upon world domination through whatever nefarious means.

The Brazil nut, largest within the mix, fat and oily with brown outer coverings, yet light ecru underneath, was pegged for what it stood for generations ago by its nickname, “N(egro) toe.”

A favorite among Europeans, the Hazelnut resembles a combination of Mediterranean types (brown-skinned) with whitish (Anglo-Saxony) meat, maintaining a Germanic rotund shape.

The brownish, misshapened pecan is the soft nut, allowed into the mix because it would be wrong to ostracize any one subspecie based upon appearance, strength, or any perceived disability.

The usual alternative to mixed nuts is the cashew.

Now, cashews are readily found alongside the hoi polloi that make up mixed nuts, but these few are the cashews that don’t quite make the grade.  They are substandard, and cheapen themselves by associating with the mixed crowd – even losing flavor by the sheer intermingling of subspecies.

But, of course, the cashews, like Republicans, when kept apart from the others all look identical and taste the same.

The cashew is light-skinned and Aryan-looking.  When packed alone with other cashews, each retains its own inherent blandness (cashews require salt to actually taste like anything).

It is virtually impossible to distinguish one cashew from another.

Not only that, but they, like Republicans, are valued more (monetarily) than other nuts.

Just as the Bible indicates a woman’s worth to be about 60% of a man’s, the same holds true for the mixed nuts-to-cashews ratio.

And, we all know how strongly Republicans adhere to biblical teachings…

There I go, adding the fuel of religion to an otherwise already heating political debate. Before things get way out of hand, and Holiday Violence crashes the party, I’d better cut myself off here.

Happy Christmas and Merry Hanukkah!

Shalom.