Anti-Union bastard Dana Loesch: "'Union Thugs' destroyed Clint Tarver's hot dog stand."

On yesterday's edition of KFTK's The Dana Show, Loesch had on Clint Tarver, whose hot dog stand got demolished in the protests on Tuesday. Predictably, she and the other right-wingers are trying to make this into another Kenneth Gladney non-scandal.


From the 12.12.2012 edition of KFTK's The Dana Show:



Loesch, of course, was blaming the unions for his hot dog stand being destroyed.

Nobody is safe. Apparently union protesters targeted anything that had a white tent yesterday, even reportedly taking out the hot dog stand of Lansing fixture Clint Tarver.

MLive.com:

LANSING, MI – A fixture on the local food scene was in the wrong place at the wrong time Tuesday: under the Americans for Prosperity tent on the lawn of the state Capitol when it collapsed, allegedly at the hands of pro-union protesters.
Clinton Tarver operates a popular hot dog stand at the corner of Michigan Avenue and Capitol Avenue, across from the state Capitol, from March to November each year.
In the offseason, he takes on catering work. 

Tarver was set up under the Americans for Prosperity tent, his wife, Linda Lee Tarver, said Wednesday.

When the tent came down, allegedly at the hands of pro-union protesters, Tarver and his catering equipment were caught inside.
His cart was not on-site, Linda said. 

She estimates the equipment losses totaled at least $500; other losses include supplies, condiments, coolers and food. He crawled out of the tent.
Tarver, who is black, was also the victim of racially-charged verbal attacks, his wife, Linda, said. 

On her Facebook page, she wrote that union protesters called her husband "an Uncle Tom [n-word]" when he attempted to retrieve his equipment from the collapsed tent.
"When he came back to get his stuff, people called him the n-word," she said. "They said he deserved what he got and he was on the wrong side. I think they thought he was part of [Americans for Prosperity]."
But Clint is not a political man, she said; she herself is, and has been involved with Americans for Prosperity.

There was no excuse for Tarver to be racially insulted by a few protestors; however, this is no excuse for right-wing nuts to blame everything on "union thugs."


Eclectablog has all the facts on how the anti-union right-wing media is blowing this story out of proportion:

This is a far cry from the all-caps-can-you-believe-what-these-union-thugs-did freak out by conservatives who would have you believe that Tarver lost his entire livelihood at the hands of union goons. Tarver was set up on some tables under the tent and did not even have his cart. He must have had a very slow day. Anyone who was at the rally and wandered by the two giant AFP tents will tell you that they were essentially empty all day. There were a few AFP folks standing out front, taunting union members and provoking confrontations, but there was not a lot of activity inside the tent where Tarver was. 

Nonetheless, much like, Kenneth Gladney, the St. Louis guy who faked getting injured at the hands of union members then solicited funds for his hospital bills even though he had health insurance, a collection has been taken up on Tarver’s behalf. According the article, they have raised over $10,000 for him (UPDATE: MIRS News reports that it’s now over $16,000.) The total value of what he lost in the scuffle? $500. 

I wonder what they’ll do with the thousands of extra dollars not needed to buy more buns, hot dogs, ketchup, mustard and a couple of folding tables and coolers?
Certainly Clint Tarver didn’t deserve to be treated as shabbily as he was by the union folks there. His wife claims he was called a “nigger” and jeered for working for the enemy. If true, that’s reprehensible and inexcusable. But the off-the-charts poutrage from the right on this is an absolute joke. Some of the same people decrying the verbal taunts that Tarver experiencde are here on this very website calling union members all sorts of hideous names. So let’s keep it real, shall we?

Adding… Let’s not kid ourselves about what “Tentgate” and “Hot Doggate” are all about:distracting the country from noticing that corporatist ideologues have turned the birthplace of American organized labor into a Right to Work for Less state. It’s a smokescreen, chaff to make sure the conversation is not about screwing union members and is, instead, about the AFP losing a couple of tents.