Woody Spong deleted racist Facebook meme

By Ryan Miner 

Acting Washington County Commissioner Vincent G. “Woody” Spong, an avowed Tea Party Republican, probably got the message that we are living in the year 2016, not 1964.

It was discovered yesterday that Spong shared a racist Facebook meme on his personal Facebook page. And I’m sure after receiving widespread scrutiny, Spong deleted the racist Facebook meme from his personal page.

If you check Spong’s personal Facebook page now, the racist meme is gone. I guess that means Spong knew that said meme is probably on the list of “dumbest things to post on social media if my name is before a Senate executive nominations committee.”

I don’t get it.

ICYMI —- Here’s the meme Spong posted on his Facebook page:

Since yesterday, the story has gone viral.

In my heart of hearts, I don’t believe Spong is a racist. I’ve posted some really dumb Facebook comments, memes, and college fraternity pictures that would be considered tawdry since I first started using Facebook in my college dorm way back in 2005. The internet is indelible, however. Everything you post on social media invariably comes back to bite you. I’ve lived it. It’s not fun.

But as one Facebook observer noted yesterday,

“I’m not so offended by it as shocked he would post such a thing without realizing somebody would be upset by it. Not the brightest crayon in the box, is he?”

Yes, exactly.

Spong’s discernment is in question here. The meme itself is unquestionably racist. Can you really argue otherwise? So why would Spong post it on his personal Facebook page? Doesn’t Spong realize that he’s -still- an acting Washington County commissioner, beholden to the taxpayers of Washington County, and represents African-Americans?

I just don’t think Spong gets it. Or perhaps someone failed to give Spong a social media tutorial on what’s appropriate and inappropriate to post.

For God sakes, the meme was a picture “Buckwheat,” an African-American child character in the “Little Rascals” comedies of the 1930s and ’40s, viewed as a racial stereotype demeaning to African Americans.

I know, I know! There he goes again! Another PC-type uppity liberal Democrat living in Montgomery County, shouting about racism and political correctness in America. Ugh! Ryan Miner just doesn’t get it! What a flake! He doesn’t love America! They took our jobs! Back to the pile! He just doesn’t understand Western Maryland or its values. He should go back to Montgomery County with the rest of them limousine liberals. Miner is from the Soviet Union! Communist! Socialist! Obama-loving liberal Miner!

Yeah, right…

I could totally see some members of the Washington County Republican Central Committee, the committee responsible for hastily choosing Woody Spong to replace Bill Wivell on the Washington County BOCC, saying exactly that. A South Park episode in the making.

Only that I was born and raised in Hagerstown (Western Maryland); I’m a libertarian Republican with a vehement disdain for political correctness running amok in our country; and, I’ve taken on Maryland Democrats and the Maryland Democratic Party over and over again.

I don’t much care for Donald Trump, but we can all agree, like Trump, political correctness is causing considerable harm to our country.

But it’s not Spong’s lack of political correctness that I’m questioning.

I’m questioning Spong’s fundamental perspicacity. Why in the hell would Woody Spong share a decidedly racist Facebook meme on his personal Facebook page – which is open to the public, incidentally – while his name sits before the Maryland Senate Executive Nominations Committee?

Really, Woody? Really? Really? Why? I don’t understand? Help us understand.

Either Woody doesn’t understand how social media works and that the internet is a big deal, or he knows that his nomination is already sunk, and he’s going out with a bang. Either way, it just looks bad.

Right, go out with a bang, Woody. Cement your legacy now before it’s too late.

You fell in it -again – Woody.