Sunday, July 12, 2009

What Bothers Me about Sarah Palin...

Has very little to do with the ex-governor of Alaska.
But it has a lot to do with the current senior Senator from Arizona as well as the mounted posse with whom he rides around.

Not long ago, in the company of two bloggers whose respect I dearly covet, I swore up and down with my hand on my copy of Barack Obama's Audacity of Hope, that I would never, ever post on Sarah Palin.

So, this column is really about the superannuated warmonger who headed last year's Republican ticket. I'm really only going to post a couple of excerpts from writers who really hit their nails into the pustule of what's been bothering me, going forward, through 2009 and beyond. They both make the same point, but their spot-on eloquence demands my sharing.

First, Joe Conason, in Salon, answers the question that's been roiling around in my head for these last several months:

Who cares about Palin now that it's half a year after she lost her bid to become the 1st woman Vice-President?

..... Plainly there is no reason why anyone should care, except for one small nagging concern. It is worth remembering that these are the same people who chose Palin, a manifestly unqualified and incompetent politician unable to string together a series of coherent sentences, as the potential presidential successor to a 72-year-old cancer survivor. So it would be refreshing and salubrious to see the perpetrators of that contemptuous and cynical tactic held accountable for endangering the country.

..... McCain, Schmidt, Davis and Salter chose to listen to Kristol, almost always a political mistake with consequences ranging from the merely absurd to the utterly dire. (The latter category includes the invasion of Iraq, with an astronomical cost in lives and treasure that should be charged to him and his magazine, as he used to boast.)

Enormous as Kristol's errors in judgment surely were, at least he can plausibly claim to be loyal. If anything he is too steadfast, still insisting that Palin deserves to be considered a serious candidate for the presidency and that her qualifications for that position are comparable to those of Barack Obama.

..... Rarely is anyone in Washington, from politicians to operatives to journalists, held accountable for the damage they inflict on the body politic. Those who banged the drum for disastrous war flit from one editorial page to the next; those who insisted on ruinous deregulation return as economic advisors to the president. The men who told us that Sarah Palin should be next in line of succession to the presidency may quarrel among themselves now, but they will all be back with yet more stupid advice -- and we can only blame ourselves if we listen.

Secondly, the inimical Andrew Sullivan on his Daily Dish:

..... McCain knew full well that Palin was unqualified to be commander-in-chief at this period of time; and he knew there was no way she could ever learn enough to do the job. So his decision to pick her was pure cynicism and irresponsibility. The MSM knew full well that there were very serious questions about this unknown person’s background, lies, mental stability, and secrecy - but they were so terrified of being called biased they refused to do the proper vetting.

The Republican establishment has long condescended to the pro-life, anti-gay, de facto soclialist, de iure capitalist heartland voters - and they cynically believed they had found a formula to get them to vote for McCain on ground of pure class resentment and sex appeal to older white males ..... I agree with Richard Cohen this morning:
Naming Palin to the GOP ticket — a top-down choice by McCain — was the most reckless decision any national politician has made in the longest time, and while it certainly says something about McCain, it says even more about his party. It has lost its mind.
The reason we need to get to the truth of what happened is that these people nearly took this country off a cliff. They need to be held accountable. They need to be removed from their positions of power. We cannot move on until they are. And John McCain should retire from public life. After that decision, nothing he says can be taken seriously on the national or international stage.

That's the point I have been trying to isolate and frame: it's not about Palin.

9 comments:

  1. I love it! You nailed it! Truly, It is not about Palin, much as she tries to keep herself front and center in America's political life, manipulating the media, lying her way into the headlines, and spinning every little thing into being all about her. The woman is a masterful player of the MSM, who sadly, swallow her untruths and distortions hook, line, and sinker. After all, wasn't she just "adorable" parading around in her "wadders" for the cameras?! Making news, right? Wrong. Distracting us from paying attention to the many bits and pieces of information leaking out about the treasonous activities of those holding high office these past eight years.

    The callous recklessness of McCain in anointing Mizsus Palin as his running mate was, and is, shameful. But as we see with Ensign and Sanford, the GOP has no shame when it comes to acknowledging either their hypocrisy or their hatred of government. As those "Christians" living at the C Street house like to say: Sanford and Ensign are "Chosen by God," and therefore, they are above the law. And as their cherished icon, Ronnie, liked to say: government is not the solution to our national problems, government IS itself the problem.

    That mantra, endlessly and mindlessly, repeated by the ossified Republican Party, is evident today in their refusal to participate in attempts to solve the many problems facing our country: enormous problems, created during the last eight years of Republican Rule. The Republicans' hatred and loathing of democracy's ideals knows no bounds. Acting in secret, and with utter disregard for our country's principles, they have shamelessly set about to undermine and destroy our government, to the best of their ability, so help them God. Their goal: to alter our democratic form of government, establishing in its place a unitary Theocracy rivaling that of the Mullahs in Iran.

    Sarah Palin's sloganeering and fakery fit their objectives perfectly: give 'em bread and circuses and the citizenry would be seduced and never notice that they were being spied upon, lied to, and led down that proverbial garden path to the destruction of their cherished Constitution and the death of their democratic form of government.

    Nope! It's most certainly not about Palin. She's nothing more than a vacuous distraction. It's all about seizing control of the reins of power and inflicting their distorted and deadly ideology upon our beloved country.

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  2. I've believed for some time that a lot of posts about Sara Palin is misplaced. Some bloggers and pundits are reluctant to go after McCain, because he is a veteran and a so-called war hero. Well, not only is his war hero status questionable. So is the stability of his mind. He makes compulsive, reckless decisions all the time. Super right winger Kristol may have helped him, but it was his call...

    I believe that this was not only about class and white males. It was also an attempt to steal votes from Barack Obama by getting white women democrats and independents to vote for the McCain/Palin ticket.

    People should leave Palin alone and get Sen. McCain out of office. He's not a disgrace to the Republican party, because the Republican party itself is a disgrace. But he is a disgrace to this country.

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  3. I completely agree that the Republican Party lost its mind. But I believe it did so with the ascendacy of George W. Bush to the White House (notice I never said "election" or "re-election of", as Bush stole bothe the 2000 and 2004 elections). They have descended to the depths of depravity with their non-stop lies, distortions, and twisted attack ad methodology and also by the types of candidates they endorse and support for high office. A not-that-bright 72 year old paired with a not-that-bright unread and poorly educated narcissistic and impulsive motormouth are the latest perfect examples. So are racists like Jeff Sessions. So are corporate toadies like John Kyl and Mitch McConnell. So were crooks like Tom DeLay and Dick Cheney. So are cultural Pharisees like Larry Craig, John Ensign, David Vitter, Mark Foley, and Mark Sanford. These people do not serve the public's best interests. They serve big monied interests and serve themselves generously at the public trough. Such is the sorry state of the GOP today, and why, barring a radical turnabout in ideology and methodology, it must never again gain control of the White House or Congress.

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  4. Great post, MacDaddy! And, very responsive to Vig's post.

    Given that the Republicans are so shameless and irresponsible, how do we go about getting McCain to resign?

    And, how do we demand that our newspapers return to the thoughtful and honest investigative journalist that dared to print Truthful and Informative News, as did Katherine Graham's Post..

    We need journalists who can see through the constant dissembling and seductive "spun" infotainment crap that is increasingly passed off as "The News", just because it "SELLS".

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  5. "... McCain, Schmidt, Davis and Salter chose to listen to Kristol, almost always a political mistake ..."

    It's amazing anyone listens to Kristol.

    As for McCain, you and Andrew Sullivan and Joe Conason are of course right that the selection of Caribou Barbie speaks volumes about him. It was irresponsible and unforgivable.

    I'll point out now that McCain signalled his willingness to compromise his principles in awful ways long before the Palin selection, when (among other things) he sucked up to the highly conservative religious nutjob Liberty University and the highly reactionary racist religious nutjob Bob Jones University (or BJU, as its students so cluelessly call it).

    McCain's friendly demeanor seems to fool a lot of otherwise smart and sensible people into thinking he's OK. Never fooled me.

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  6. Great post Vigil and great comments from everyone!

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  7. This post is not purely about The Palin, at least not to the extent that my posts are about The Palin, regardless the technical core is the incompetence of The Palin coupled with McCain's reckless disregard for the safety of the nation by selecting her as his "heartbeat away" running mate.

    I disagree that we need to be working to get rid of McCain because it is an exercise in futility. He is the Right wing lion in the Senate. As pointed out he is a war hero, lifelong service to the country, blah, blah, blah....Barring some unforeseen gaffe or sexual peccadillo, no amount of blogging is going to force him out.

    The Palin, on the other hand is a different story. She is protected only by a handful of Right-Wing loonies and irresponsible journalists. The vast majority of Americans know her to be an idiot. The people, however, can be fickle and they need to be reminded of her idiocy on a regular basis. As a result I will never stop posting The Palin. The people need to know that the Killa from Wasilla is potentially dangerous to this nation.

    That being said this was an outstanding read.

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  8. This was a very interesting read. Although I am in total agreement that Sarah Palin (or The Palin as some of you call her - LOL!), I never thought to place the blame on McCain. Very interesting.....

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  9. sorry, I got sidetracked. I meant to say that "Although I am in total agreement that Sarah Palin is a complete idiot......"

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