The food sucks anyway

Now I have another reason to avoid McDonald’s like a cat avoids a bath.

A McDonald’s in Follansbee, West Virginia, decided to fly the American flag upside down – the international signal for distress – recently to protest President Obama’s victory on Election Day. (The franchise owner later tried to blame everything on an equipment malfunction but methinks she became concerned about the bottom line.)

McDonald’s is in dire need of assistance because its food tastes like sh*t, not because the POTUS won another term fair and square.

Want to know why I’m not doing Applebee’s, Red Lobster, Papa John’s or Olive Garden anymore either? Each of these businesses – and a few others – has also publicly lamented Obama’s re-election and/or threatened to lay off workers, discontinue hiring or only employ part-timers in order to get around providing health insurance for its employees. (Under the Affordable Care Act, businesses of 50 people or more must provide a health care option for their employees by 2014.)

As a former member of their ranks, I feel sorry for restaurant employees who are caught between a rock and a hard place. Many of them don’t qualify for Medicaid because they make too much but can’t afford private insurance because they make too little.

I’m also avoiding these places because much of their food is tasteless and laden with sodium, fat and sugar, but mainly it's because these guys have decided to throw their paper hats into the political arena where they don’t belong and align themselves with one segment of the population over another.

I will miss the spicy buffalo wings at Applebee’s. Damn you to hell, Applebee’s!

I’m no business expert but it seems to me that one is more likely to enjoy a healthy bottom line if one appeals to as many consumers as possible. Why these establishments want to risk alienating the 62,085,892 Americans who voted last week to keep Barack Obama in the White House is a mystery to me.

There’s something to be said for standing behind your principals and lying in the bed you've made because you believe you must. But are these restaurant owners really such diehard Romney supporters that they feel obligated to thumb their noses at paying customers who thought the dude who rescued us from economic collapse, killed bin Laden and provided health care for millions of uninsured Americans was the better choice?

A meme making the rounds in Facebook takes pizza magnate John Schnatter, aka “Papa John,” to task for his greed and short-sightedness:

John Schnatter (“Papa John”) lives in a 40,000-square-foot castle with a 22-car garage, private golf course and private lake with a drawbridge. Immediately after the election, he said the Affordable Care Act will increase his business costs and possibly result in employees’ hours being cut...because he can’t afford an additional 14 cents per pizza to cover employee health care costs.

A boycott is clearly in order here.

I’m not the best boycotter because a) I’m not good at keeping track of all the unscrupulous or right-wing businesses I’m supposed to be boycotting for one reason or another, and b) I've been known to temporarily lift a particular boycott if a craving becomes overwhelming or a suitable alternative is unattainable. But I’m not the worst, either, so businesses which disrespect the duly elected President of the United States just might have to get by without my money or that of my large group of family and friends.

I don’t remember any businesses protesting the theft of the presidency back in 2000 or flying their flags at half-staff after Dubya finagled another term in 2004.

I was prepared to remain in the United States even if Romney had won a week ago. (I wouldn't have been the happiest guy in my neighborhood but I wouldn't have thrown a temper tantrum.) I intended to stay here and raise my family, pay taxes and abide by our laws regardless of the election results. It never occurred to me to turn my flag upside down or make my workforce pay for my political views (my “workforce” is quite small but you get my point) in the event that my candidate didn't pull it out.

Is Obama really that bad, or are these businesses just trying to make him a scapegoat for a changing marketplace and/or their own greed and incompetence?

It’s interesting that some of the same folks who questioned Obama’s allegiance to this country are now revealing a lack of it themselves.