Hope, Change and Mace

These Obamatons just continue to bring us all together. Can't you just taste the change coming?

Two people were arrested Monday afternoon after an altercation led to five Republican campaign workers being sprayed with Mace at their headquarters in Galax.

Galax Police Chief Rick Clark said officers were dispatched shortly before 1 p.m. to the Galax Republican headquarters on East Grayson Street when a caller reported someone had sprayed office workers with Mace.

Responding officers arrested Daniel Cason Meinecke, 29, and Cara Annis Hindman, 26, both of Galax.

Meinecke was charged with one count of misdemeanor assault, Hindman was charged with five counts of misdemeanor assault.

Galax Republican Chairman Mike Stevens said he was one of the volunteers sprayed. He said a man and woman came into the office and asked for campaign yard signs for the Democratic ticket of Barack Obama and Joe Biden.

After being told the Obama-Biden campaign office was up the street, Stevens said, the man said he was aware of that, but that he thought Democratic signs were being stolen and “stashed” at the Republican office.

Stevens told him that nobody there had stolen signs, not were they “stashing” any in the building.

A confrontation escalated and, Stevens said, the man began to use some four-letter words.

Stevens said there were older women in the office and he asked the couple to leave the building.

“With the ladies in the office, I said that was enough and asked them to leave,” he said. “I told them, if they had a problem with someone stealing their signs they needed to contact the police department.”

Stevens said the couple replied that they weren’t leaving, and that they didn’t have to.

“I kind of moved them towards the door and he lashed out at me,” Stevens said. “So I lashed out at him.”

No punches were thrown, but instead the two simply held each other at bay, according to Stevens.

Once outside, Stevens said, the woman sprayed Mace on him and another volunteer before turning back to the office and spraying inside the building.

“It was surreal in the fact that I’ve had people in the past couple months come in and ask for signs. But to have an altercation like that just seems strange.”

Obama supporters acting strangely? Whodathunkit?

With the election of a new president coming in the next week, Stevens said the tension between Republican and Democrats has been elevated.

“We are more divided,” as a result, he said.

Yes, more divided than ever. And who is it doing the dividing?

Chief Clark said in a news release that Meinecke is alleged to have physically assaulted one of the Republican campaign workers; Hindman is alleged to have sprayed Pepper Mace that contaminated five Republican campaign workers.

Just getting in people's faces like Obama ordered them to do.

Unity!