Civility 'Left' off menu at Maxine Waters' cafe

What does an alleged "white supremacist" like Candace Owens -- who is a black conservative -- eat for breakfast while being attacked by angry white leftists at a diner?

Salted caramel banana French toast? Quinoa porridge?

Or perhaps just an English muffin and coffee, to go, before the crazy white lefties throw more stuff?

It happened to Owens, spokeswoman for the conservative pro-Trump organization Turning Point USA, and the group's founder, Charlie Kirk, when they sat down to breakfast the other day at the Green Eggs Cafe in Philadelphia.

Green Eggs restaurant manager Malik Joe told the Washington Post that at first, he thought the angry mob was a bunch of vegans. But given their diet, most vegans tend to be peace-loving, though the militant ones can go crazy if you provoke them with mentions of veal.

Joe quickly realized the people in his restaurant who were throwing things and screaming at Owens and Kirk were politically motivated. Someone dumped a cup of water on Kirk.

"The protesters were screaming 'White Supremacist' and something about immigrants," Joe was quoted as saying.

As the son and grandson of immigrants who made a living in the food business, serving customers regardless of their politics, this story horrifies me.

My grandfather, Papou Pete Kefalas, a physically strong and wily man, ran restaurants. He believed that hospitality required him to protect his customers.

If rude customers attacked others, he had a habit of hanging their jackets from the coat hooks on the wall -- with the rude customers in the jackets. There they would be safe, unharmed, left to kick with their feet off the floor, until police arrived.

But you can't do that nowadays. You'll get sued.

What happened the other day to Owens and Kirk at the Green Eggs restaurant is so wrong on so many levels.

But American politics apparently won't be happy until it ruins everyone's meal and we eat breakfast like the Venezuelans, in complete fear, if at all.

And is it idiotic that a conservative black woman can be called a "white supremacist" by white lefties? Yes, but then much of American politics has become unhinged.

At Green Eggs, police arrived, and given this was a modern mob scene, people whipped out their phones and took video that went viral, and they also got their Twitter thumbs working.

Owens tweeted: "Charlie Kirk and I just got ATTACKED and protested by ANTIFA for eating breakfast. They are currently following us through Philly. ALL BLACK AND HISPANIC police force protecting us as they scream."

It's all become quite a story, and the protesters' comments captured on video are too vulgar for me to reprint.

It all comes just few weeks after Democratic U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters of California exhorted a crowd of supporters to rout those who support President Donald Trump.

"If you see anybody from that Cabinet in a restaurant, in a department store, at a gasoline station, you get out and you create a crowd and you push back on them, and you tell them they're not welcome anymore, anywhere," Waters said.

Owens and Kirk are not members of Trump's Cabinet, but they do support him, and they were forced to leave Green Eggs with a police escort, and without breakfast.

Apparently Auntie Maxine's menu is being followed to the letter.

"This is ... Maxine Waters' America," Kirk tweeted. "She called for these sort of attacks. ..."

He said that ANTIFA threatened them with "death."

"This is the face of the Democrats," he tweeted. "Conservatives aren't safe."

Democrats don't like this story for obvious reasons, although some went on TV to suggest it was all made up, but Owens put them in their place.

It's all quite stupid and brutal, but it does give America a taste for what's coming when the left takes over. And if they don't take over it could be worse.

Conservatives might not be able to have a meal at an American lunch counter.

Democrats and Republicans, and Socialists too, should be allowed to eat in a restaurant without people with bullhorns screaming and throwing biscuits.

As I said earlier, my family are immigrants, and they went into the food business to make a living. They paid taxes, and legend has it that they even fed the families of the city food inspectors, who always carried bags full of steaks out the door.

One evening at Papou Pete's place in Guelph, Ontario, called "The Zenith," a group of drunks made a terrible scene.

Papou's brother, Uncle Bill, was in the kitchen, frying up some fish and chips.

The unruly crowd weren't politically motivated. They were motivated by rye whiskey.

One was a drunken Canadian woman, and she started it. One of the men with her said something extremely vulgar to my grandmother.

Another shouted at Papou Pete to show some respect, saying he fought in the war and wasn't going to take any (guff) from "a (deleted) DP."

This angered Papou Pete, who had fought in two wars, World War I and World War II, for Canada.

When the police came they found a couple of drunks on the ground and others on coat hooks, unharmed, sheepishly kicking their feet.

But the drunken woman was screaming in the back room.

"What's that?" shouted a policeman.

It was crazy Uncle Bill, sticking her head in the toilet.

Don't worry, she lived.

It was the talk of the town for a while. And from then on, customers could eat in peace.

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John Kass is a columnist for the Chicago Tribune who also hosts a radio show on WLS-AM.