Your political hoo-ha for today

 Got a flier in the mail the other day touting the virtues of a local political candidate, and, I know, I know. No intelligent person takes these things seriously. No intelligent person assigns any more credibility to them than they would to any other child's fairy tale -- which is essentially what these fliers are, other than an excellent vehicle for jamming up your mailbox.

However ...

"However, you are NOT an intelligent person, Mr. Blob?" you're saying now.

Well, maybe.

No, however, this one I got the other day was all about BOYS COMPETING IN GIRLS SPORTS, which might be the most egregiously manufactured "issue" to come down the pike in a long time. It features the Local Political Candidate standing next to Riley Gaines, butt-hurt college swimmer turned activist. Riley's been on a tear against transgender athletes ever since trans swimmer Lia Thomas beat her out for, I don't know, fifth or something in the nationals a few years back.

Thomas has since been banned from further competition by the NCAA, so I guess Riley's campaign to save girls sports (or, SAVE GIRLS SPORTS to give it the proper voice) at least achieved that. That'll learn ya for beating Riley, vile creature!

Anyway ...

Anyway, even though I knew I shouldn't, I read on. It didn't take long -- one sentence -- to yelp "What??" and pitch the thing in the trash.

Here was the sentence: (Candidate's name here) stands with Riley Gaines and Trump's America First agenda to protect girls' sports ...

Oh, please.

"Protect girls sports"? From what, exactly?

Because a month or so ago, girls in Indiana played their high school basketball tournament, and I don't recall a glut of news stories -- and the accompanying ginned-up political outrage -- about all the trans athletes who were competing. That's because there weren't any.

So, obviously, "boys taking over girls' sports" clearly is a massive issue here in the Hoosier state. Right?

"Well, what about college sports?" you're saying now. "How many Lia Thomases are lurking out there to unfairly deprive Riley Gaines of fifth place?"

Glad you asked.

A little over a year ago, see, NCAA chief Charlie Baker was asked that very question. And what he said was ... um, what he said was ...

He said that as far as he knows there are fewer than 10 college student-athletes in the NCAA. Among, um, 510,000 total.

Now, I'm not a math guy. But even I can figure that means trans athletes in college sports amount to a tick under 0.02 percent of the total.

Zero point zero-two percent. That's what this whole "issue" is about.

Or, rather, what it's not about.

What it's really about, of course, is the whole idea of transgender humans to begin with. Some folks regard them as offensive and a biological outrage. Therefore they elect representatives to pass anti-trans laws disguised as "protecting" both trans humans and those of us who are allegedly being victimized by them.

Bald-faced bigotry has rarely been expressed so right-out-loud in the political arena. And with little fear of backlash, because A) being offensive has been re-cast in the Trumpian era as admirable and brave, and B) those trangenders are just creepy as hell, aren't they?

Me?

I present this merely as your election-year hoo-ha for today, in this golden age of hoo-ha.