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TechnoratiScare-Ya Palin Outdoes Herself
Watching Sarah Palin in action is always an exercise in astonishment, but I don't think anything she's done to date could top the speech she gave announcing her resignation as governor of Alaska.
I watched her with my jaw dropped, left nearly speechless not only by what she said but by how she said it. And, most especially, by the insanely frightening notion that tens of millions of Americans not only don't see her as some sort of Tina Fey character built for howling laughs, but in fact an object of adoration.
Hey, Jesus, do we really need so overt a reminder that the once mighty empire is now in complete free fall? Wasn't eight years of Kid Caligula enough?
I don't even know what to do or think or make of her style of public speaking, and I'm not even sure I understand why I don't. Is it that she so unambiguously violates all the rules of our already embarrassing political praxis by presenting herself as so transparently false, so unashamedly faking her way through national issues of which she is totally ignorant?
Chance the Gardener literally - literally! - had more credibility than Sarah Palin, somehow. Is it because he was completely authentic in his ignorance, and she so completely disingenuous?
Is it the singy-songy, Golly-gosh Gomer!, candy-coated old-fashioned homespun goody-goodness of her TV persona that freaks me out, a character so one-dimensional it could make porn stars seem like Oscar-winning thespians by comparison?
Is it the mangled English so grating to the ear that even George W. Bush can't bear to listen to it?
Is it the stitched together phrases that make her speeches sound like she chose all her tired slogans from the bargain bins of the local Dollar Store, and then had Taawwd jam them together for her at the last moment?
Or is it the goof-happy plastic demeanor, drenched in poured-over-the-top buckets of faux sincerity, making her come off like some stoned cheerleader telling you just how important that next first-down really, really is? "No, I mean really. Really!"
And speaking of stoned, don't you just feel like you must be high when you see her in action, like somebody must have slipped you a mickey? Don't you just find yourself thinking "I thought that mushrooms-in-applesauce dish was a weird culinary combination!"?
Like the fool that I am, I listened to that rambling, incoherent, Hieronymous Bosch painting of a speech she gave, looking for some sort of thematic thread that held the thing together in any sort of fashion (apart, that is, from it being a transparent attempt at linguistic murder through induced insanity, evidently aimed at her Wasilla Community College English professor).
Silly me, though - it sure didn't make a lot sense. At least if you go in for that whole logic thing and all. Of course, we're talking about an evangelical Christian Republican from Wasilla, Alaska here, so the joke's obviously on me for even trying.
But here, near as I can tell, is what I think she was trying to say in her rambling resignation speech:
- I can "progress" Alaska and America with or without a title.
- I'm wasting my precious time here on Earth as Governor, defending against false accusations.
- Therefore I'm not going to run for a second term.
- Therefore I'm not going to finish my first one either, like some governors do, as a "lame-duck" going off on junkets and stuff.
- (Oh, and by the way, the troops in the military are really, really great people. Not that that has a damn thing to do with anything, but if I talk a lot about them it'll score me lots of points with idiots, just like it did for Bush.)
Pretty noble, eh? She loves her job, but she's going to sacrifice it all for the people of Alaska. You know, the one's who asked her to actually serve all four years of her term when they honored her with the highest office in the state.
Palin talks incessantly about Alaska, but darned if I can figure out how she's gonna progress the state better from outside of the most powerful position in government than in it. Is she gonna be a CEO now? An editorial writer? A lobbyist? And for what? Abstinence? Are we really supposed to believe that she would have more influence on legislators from the deck of her fishing boat than she would as governor? Not to mention one with a veto pen?
The false-choice she sets up to cover her retreat is astonishingly bald, as well. It's as if she were to say "I've decided to become an alcoholic because I don't want to subject you all to genocide". As if those were the only two choices. As if one had anything to do with the other. As if the fact that some governors go off on junkets means that she had to choose between one of two lousy options - 18 months of wasted gubernatorial excess versus noble self-sacrifice in resigning the position. As if she hasn't already been on the junket and speech circuit anyhow.
Most bizarre of all is her repeated invocation of the silly tough guy image she and her handlers have created for her, including her Sarah Barracuda point-guard mantra, "I am a fighter, I thrive on challenge." Challenge, huh? Does she mean the challenge of finding something more fun to do with the next year and a half than her actual job? Only in the bizarro universe of Regressiveland does war equal peace, family values equal cheating on your wife and paying off mistresses, and quitting your job equal being a tough, Barracuda-like fighter.
Nobody with bigger aspirations (or even without) ever resigns a job like this midway through the first term unless they've been elected to a higher position, have a lethal disease about to take them out, or are facing serious scandal. I'd say you can bet your left testicle that Palin falls neatly into category three. And, even if you can't find one in your particular pair of pants to wager, borrow one from your brother, boyfriend or husband. It ain't goin' anywhere, I can tell you that. Indeed, the real question isn't what you could lose, but rather what you could win. What to bet against that? Who - besides Barack Obama and nearly every Democrat in Washington - needs three balls, anyhow?
Palin likes to claim that all the scandal investigations launched against her have come to nothing. Believe it or not, that actually is true, provided of course you don't count the other ones that have. The Alaska (Republican-controlled) legislature, for example, determined that she had abused her office by having state employees fire her former brother-in-law from his job. Which of course is not to be confused with the current very public battle she's engaged in with her former-almost-but-not-quite-son-in-law, Levi, who resides in the next trailer over. Then there's the small matter of the back taxes she's had to repay on travel expenses she charged the state, for staying in her own home in Wasilla, no less. Nice gig if you can get it, eh?
Of course, the real mystery of the Palin Phenomenon is in the second word in the term, not the first.
There will always be morons who - themselves privately startled beyond belief that anyone, let alone a good portion of an entire country, takes them seriously - will don the mask of super-confidence and gleefully carpe the snot out of the freakin' diem as long as the ride lasts. American history is littered with the damage done by Palins of every size and shape. Heck, we just lived through eight years of that very thing. Boy Bush didn't have Palin's chest, but he was nevertheless every bit the boob she is. The only difference was that his daddy's name played the role of the deus ex machina who plucked him from drunken obscurity and into the leadership ranks of the world's only superpower, whereas for Lady Sarah it was a desperate John McCain.
To be sure, idiotic politicians are a dime a dozen. But what in the world accounts for the massive crowds who follow these absolute and complete nothingburgers, let alone rabidly? I trust there are a thousand graduate students completing psychology dissertations on this subject as we speak, for surely that is the only domain wherein the answer can be found. It can't possibly be logic, since quitting on the job has only enhanced Palin's status for these kooks, not diminished it. Indeed, it's become hard to imagine what she could do to lose their affections. My best guess is that her mangled syntax, low-rent personal soap opera of a family, and her faux feistiness against "them" speaks to the loosely-targeted but powerful rage coursing through the veins of America's disenfranchised. Especially the white male subspecies, who may not know much about much, but nevertheless have a vague sense that, like their daddies before them, they're entitled to have more status than other folks in this society (excepting, of course, the nice oligarchs who feed them heaping helpings of racism, sexism, Jesusism, xenophobia, homophobia and nationalism to keep them off the scent of class consciousness).
It all works well enough to suggest - if you had to guess right now - that Palin would fairly readily win the nomination of her party for president in 2012. The kinda folks who are activists and GOP primary voters adore her completely, and it's therefore harder to not see that happening than it is to imagine her winning. And, in a way, it would be worth it, just for the laughs in watching her eviscerate the plastic droid currently DBA Mitt Romney, along with Newt Gingrich, the verbal bully who is spending his entire adulthood making up for all the beatings he got from the other kids all through primary and secondary school. Oh, and college and grad school too.
Hardy-har-har, eh? Lots of fun watching that show, huh? What the heck. Palin guarantees high entertainment value, and the Republican Party could never possibly win the presidency in 2012, right? So who cares who gets the nomination? I mean, voters remember the Bush disaster. And the GOP is losing young people, women, Hispanics and all manner of other sentient beings in droves, right? Right?
Yeah, well, right indeed. Except for one minor detail.
If the Democrats are given four years to govern and they adopt half-measure after Milquetoast point-four-three-rounded-up-to-half-measure - all to little or no effect - then there will be a little surprise in November of 2012. If they fail to produce a robust economy, or if they end the recession but produce a jobless recovery, it's not gonna go the way it looked after last November. If they fail to use the bully pulpit to sell good ideas and aggressively discredit the disastrously failed ones, there's gonna be a different script three years from now, no matter how good a speech Obama gives.
Normally, I'd put Sarah Palin down as an easy shot for the nomination but a long shot for winning the general election. But if the Democrats do all the stupid things listed above, then the battle for the Republican nomination will wind up being be the actual contest, with the victor in that race easily beating the incumbent president who failed to produce a recovery or vanquish the bankrupt ideas of those who made the mess in the first place.
But who could be stupid enough to allow them to do that?
Can you say "Barack Obama"?
44 Comments so far
Show AllGood points, true ... but still, fails to identify the fact that no matter who is in charge, it is the SYSTEM that is corrupt! Are we really going to hinge our hopes for change on who may or may not be speaking for the system in four years?
And, while I mostly agree with Green's analysis, it is hardly productive to mirror the strategy of divide-and-rule leadership - in other words, to invite us liberals to all "laugh together" at the ridiculous conservatives. People need to be reminded of their similarities, especially in times like this, not of their differences.
I felt particulary disturbed by Dyson's dismantling of Palin's persona, like the rocks were never going to stop pounding. What does that get us? Thanks for a little wisdom 'whatnow'. This is hardly analysis and more, reverse racism/culturalism. Because in essence that is what Palin is doing: pandering to a massive cohort of American culture; the voters that make states cherry "red" on the voting maps.
The irony here is that the culture that Palin speaks to, is the 'non-culture' that the "blue" americans try so hard to deny. It is the identity that 'liberals' run from. It is the family they are ashamed of and put up with on those dreaded Thanksgiving dinners. An identity that was denied by painting it with a bucket of invisibility, non-identity, non-culture and "backwardness."
Obama, on the other hand or any black black person, latino, east indian, asian, could have never spoken in cultural tones and colors (what Palin has been given permission to do so brashly). The identity would have been much too obvious, much too "authentic", much too easily identified. Obama can probably "ghetto speak" just as well as SnoopDogg, but could not have done this on the campaign trail because he would have culturally alienated many white AND people of color. Yet, Obama, with his command of "proper English" combined with his MLK-preaching/orating style, may be the embodiment of what the "blue" voters wish for: someone who can represent their values and retain his own black culture. But not too much of it.
@esme July 20th, 2009 2:11 am: You have some valid points here, but the line of demarcation, no matter what cultural patois one speaks in, is whether they make any sense and know what they are talking about. Here's where Palin's speeches break down as they are chock-full of talking points with little coherent thread of logic or grasp of the subject matter. Like Junior Bush, when she speaks of the Constitution you doubt she has ever actually read it.
You may not care for Jesse Jackson Sr.'s style, but when he gives a speech in 'Ebonics' (for lack of a better term) his message is comprised of logical points that arrive at a comprehensible conclusion, rhyming and all; Palin, Joe the Plumber and some of the other GOP stars indulge in pandering to the audience by yelling sure-fire crowd-pleasers such as "Let's have a big hand for freedom and our troops" without any follow-up as to why we should applaud freedom or our troops, or what that has to do with anything other than 'feel-good' happy talk to fill the time. It's all as empty and devoid of real content as an American Idol audition.
IMO, the problem with Palin is not her stilted monosyllabic 'Real America' language, it's that, to paraphrase John Cage, she has nothing to say and she's saying it.
That's fine for an experimental artist such as Cage; disastrous in someone who wants hold a position of authority that affects the lives of others.
Great article, and one of the few to take Sarah P. as seriously as she (unfortunately) deserves to be taken.
One political twist or scandal last fall, and this woman could be VP right now. If the economy doesn't pick up in a big way by 2012 (and with the corporations still calling the tune, why should it?), she may be POTUS still.
Consider how this blinkered woman might handle a serious crisis. Had she been in charge during the Cuban missile crisis,or the 1973 Arab/Israeli war, I would suggest that we would not be here right now to read or write this.
At the very least, she could be easily led by neocon True Believers into an Iraq-type adventure, murdering thousands of human beings for no reason at all. At most... armageddon by proud, insular stupidity.
So I would suggest that Sarah deserves the closest continued investigation and reportage. If you don't think she's electable, please remember W's win in 2004.
Our lives may depend upon it.
By all means, you and your stalwart crew keep pursuing the Great White Palin until you finally sink that fatal harpoon into her flesh!
Meanwhile, the orcas you regard as eminently respectable and qualified continue to eat through the hull and turn your vessel into the Titanic.
IIRC, Captain Ahab didn't live happily ever after.
· Yr Obd't Servant
Not stupid? Forty percent of our fellow citizens are functionally or totally illiterate, about half believe in miracles and most have no solidarity at all with their fellow working folk. Perhaps I should have said, "lumpenproletariat" but it has a lot of syllables and many, perhaps yourself, do not know what it means. T.V.
Sarah is the darling of the MSM. Sarah might talk funny but she is no dummy. She is totally aware of the key issues so dear to the hearts of the diehard Bushites. She has a good grip on the methods of fanning the flames of hate, bigotry, and intollerance to keep those people who, we know because she pulled that off in a few interviews. She pours gasoline on a burning building to facilitate its demise. She plays to her audience, she tells them what they want to hear and she does it with her hokey delivery. Sarah probably has an agenda to follow through her 'handlers. And, who knows, look what happened to the paperhanger Hitler. He was probably less qualified than Sarah, but that didn't stop him from telling the people what they wanted to hear and making them believe they were on his team. It would not surprise me if she were to be elected and that is why I am keeping my passport updated.
OMG, Palin went off her meds and babbled a bunch of word-salad at a press conference several weeks ago! Let's obsessively continue discussing it! Thank you DM Green for bringing it up again! :D :D
"Boy Bush didn't have Palin's chest, but he was nevertheless every bit the boob she is. The only difference was that his daddy's name played the role of the deus ex machina who plucked him from drunken obscurity and into the leadership ranks of the world's only superpower,"
and nixon yanked Geo HW Bush from certain political extinction to be GOP party chair during the height of watergate... before that... he was rep house member from tx... lost in the senate... then amb to china... from there he got the cia job... ran against ronnie... and was picked for vp to bring in the ne upper crust establishment vote...
just think if squeeky fromme had aimed a 1/4" to the right...
@squidd July 18th, 2009 8:56 pm: If Squeaky Fromme had aimed a quarter-inch to the right, she would have assassinated Gerald Ford, perhaps, but Poppy Bush would have continued to be alive and well and Reagan's VP in 1980.
This article was entertaining, but the comments are better. Just when I thought I had read way more than enough about this nincompoop, here comes another perspective. Now, I have definitely heard (and had) enough of that right wing bass-turd Palin...(I hope).
Those questioning Palin's imminent ascendency to political power know not of this: The GOP is woozy, who is their star? No one, well they have a Plan...Maria Shriver will leave A.S. to sing backup with Three Doors Down. Sarah Palin's husband will fall through some ice, and, Shwarzenneger and Palin will be the 1st couple of the GOP, working late nights in the Oval Office to help us.
Their combined star power dazzles,
please, can I vote now?
Choosing between D's and R's
is like choosing between syphilis and aids.
One is the lesser of the two evils,
but you're a fool for choosing it.
A DEMOCRACY that is true will have true choices.
We're being scammed.
Like choosing to follow the "Cult of the Gourd" versus the "Cult of the Shoe" (from "Life of Brian")
It's mainly Dem centrists vs. mostly far-right Repubs, but there are exceptions like Dennis Kuchinich, Louise Slaughter, and Rush Holt, et al, in the House and, in the Senate, Russ Finegold, Barbara Boxer and Bernie Sanders. (Sanders is an independent who caucuses with the Dems.)
Does it really matter if Obama or Palin is in the WH in 2012? The same people pulling the strings for Bush & now Obama would be behind Palin, pulling her strings. The same people pulling the strings for decades.
It would 'seem' that the powers that be would not allow this person to become president(as in, starting January 2012, she would be wisked off the stage much as kucinch and paul and some others were at the dictate of the ministry of truth, the MSM).
Right now, I am trying to follow those who would be 3rd party candidates to see who may actually have a chance of ending this democrat republican democrat republican string of presidents but also my representatives to congress where the real changes should happen, there are a few keepers but not many.
So it boils down to which way to go and I say 3rd parties and keep in mind the power of change in either houses of congress.
I agree but don't forget: As Nader, Zinn, Chomsky and many others have pointed out: the winner-takes-all, two-party Duopoly, corporate media, big money, fraudulent electoral system is rigged against anyone who is not selected by the two party duopoly.
There are alternatives, as Nader's VP Matt Gonzalez pointed out, like instant run-off voting.
But this would democratically eliminate the lesser of two evils situation, which the two parties adore.
Did I say two parties? Right and left pockets of the same pair of pants. One party.
Yes, a quick and partial fix would be to abandon winner takes all and go with STV/IRV which would give more of a choice, but this is only one small step in fixing the corrupt system. Corporate legal bribery of our legislators and the stranglehold they have on debates and "deliberative democracy" must also be broken. We have seen time and again, very few are even aware of alternatives as they are censored and smeared by the corporate media.
A good reference is "10 Steps to Repair American Democracy" by Stephen Hill. Sorry, this is an actual published book not a website. Sometimes cracking a book open is a good idea.
I am sorry to be so crude Mr. Green but: who freakin cares about Sarah the airhead? This article is garbage. If we want this sort of journalism, we can watch the CNN/Fox Duopoly news. Or better yet, watch David Letterman.
Pretty sad that if the only pre-engineered "democratic" choice is between Palin and Obama there is no choice.
Here is the outcome of the national "democratic process" in the USA, your choice: Neo-Fascism Lite (TM) or Neo-Fascism.
"But if the Democrats do all the stupid things listed above, then the battle for the Republican nomination will wind up being be the actual contest,"
And David Michael Green will once again be urging us to vote democrat...
If Sarah Palin were to become President of the USA, it would make the Bush error look like a golden age.
Palin is just one of the many dead bodies fighting the war at Fort Zinderneuf.
In 2012 she along with "Joe the Plumber", who isn't Joe and isn't a plumber, and the statue of Ronald Reagan, will be the GOPs best hope.
They got us into this mess. They are trying their best to make us fail, at getting out.
In spite of them we will and things will really turn around. We need to make as much of everything we use here and level the tarif system so it is the same one both sides, ours are less.
We won't if Sara Palin gets voted in as the "American Idol President". She is not a "silk purse".
The problem with you, Mr. Green, is that you are not a dead fish going with the flow. The United States, however, is.
"But what in the world accounts for the massive crowds who follow these absolute and complete nothingburgers, let alone rabidly?"
______________________________________
In the spirit of the Fairness Doctrine, herewith my thoughts on the OPPOSITE question that's been gnawing at ME: "But what in the world accounts for the mob that compulsively pursues this absolute and complete nothingburger, let alone rabidly?":
I must be the only Amerikan who finds the grotesque, obsessive stoning of Sarah Palin to be far more significant than Palin herself.
When the Republican Party pulled her out from under her Alaskan rock, I thought of Katherine Harris-- another ditsy, ambitious Republican wingnut serving the reactionary cause.
Still, over the campaign period, and even into the present, I was shocked by the absolute brutal animosity that arose in the Democratic ranks toward this "surprise" candidate.
Even after the Maverick McCain/Calamity Sarah Palin ticket lost, the compulsion to mock and deride the woman persists at a level that can't be fully explained by the conviction that she's an incompetent dingbat without redeeming qualities.
Please note that I don't particularly dispute this opinion. I just don't think it's as important as the anaphylactic shock she induces in her detractors.
My 2¢ pop-psychology opinion is that at least some of this unremitting animus and rancor originated in the superheated mushroom cloud of anger and rage emitted by Hillary supporters who felt cheated and betrayed. It was as if the Republicans choosing an obscure woman as Veep was considered the dirtiest of tricks-- an attempt to steal the identity-politics game that Democrats had owned for decades.
Hillary, floating in from the Senate like Glinda the Good Witch, was SUPPOSED to be the first woman president (or at least vice-president)! And when that prospect went by the board, those loathsome Goopers added insult to injury by summoning the Moronic Witch of the Northwest to usurp Hillary and the Democratic Party's Place in History!
For instance, Salon.com, to this day pounces on every possible twist and turn of Palin's peculiar life to publish articles with sensational tabloid headlines, detailing her latest supposed outrageous conduct or stupidity. Strictly speaking, I don't know that the mushy moderate liberal Joan Walsh, Salon's editor, oversees this almost daily scourge. But Google for yourself to see the avalanche of Palin-sneering and criticism published there. Despite the vast differences between Palin and Al Gore, they both have been victims of corporate media's penchant for choosing certain individuals as endless fodder for sophomoric cheap shots and supercilious gossip.
Last summer, I mentioned to an Obama-supporter of my acquaintance that I was horrified by the anti-Palin overkill arising from both political opponents and the moderate-liberal blogosphere. He retorted heatedly that it certainly WAS contemptible and outrageous that the Republicans would resort to picking a provincial nitwit as a "Hail Mary" strategy to gain political traction. What was WRONG with me?
This Obama supporter, otherwise intelligent and perceptive, treated my observation as if I were "supporting" or commending Palin. I tried to explain that even if Palin is pathetic and unfit for high office, the hostility and rancor was many orders of magnitude greater than that elicited by other trashy opportunists. I maintained, and still maintain, that the anti-Palin hostility was, and remains, far deeper and more insidious than mere resentment at her unfitness for high(er) political office.
Finally (at long last!): while I don't endorse obnoxious cretins as model candidates, consider all of the Serious, Experienced, Impeccably Credentialed, and Highly Qualified Misrepresentatives we keep electing on every level.
Don't they, by and large, turn out to govern as plutocrats, dictators, and war criminals? I'm in no way "pro"-Palin, but the Fine and Upstanding "bona fide" players with sparkling curriculum vitae are as bad in their own way-- or worse.
· Yr Obd't Servant
I think also the know-nothingness she embodies and represented also terrified anyone remotely intelligent, who knew how retarded and ignorant Bush was, and could not imagine someone like that in power again.
Oregoncharles
Excellent! Obd't Servant, you have written the best analysis of the Sarah Palin phenomenon I have seen. To be honest, I don't usually follow the gossip, finding much of it a side issue of little importance compared to other, far more pressing, issues ... you get my drift, I'm sure.
David Michael Green's piece was egregiously elitist and shallow. This kind of shabby journalism, seemingly against a class of people - who went to Community Colleges, have lived in trailors, are not as articulate as our sharp college professor, DMG - only detracts from the crisis we're in. The way to gain support for our progressive agenda is to appeal to the very same people DMG pokes fun of.
Remember how DMG sycophanted all over Barack Obama, how he wrote of becoming kinda fond of the charismatic politician? Why was I so fearful of an Obama presidency and, at the same time, DMG was falling in love?
David Michael Green wrote:
healthcare falls under that category, but I think Obama has promised that enough now that he could not really walk away from it." (oh yeah? didn't ya notice his record?)
and this: "But the truth is that he’s actually used some pretty tough language on a number of issues, including the two I care about most – the war and economic justice." (hmmm? again he didn't check the record?)
If DMG wasn't so enthralled by the appearances of things, maybe he'd be able to look deeper into those personalities our empire puts up for our consent - like do some research, look at the donor lists, AND STUFF like that.
Agreed...
On all points made by YOS & OC...
Well said you two...
I don't think I could have said it any better myself...!
Possibly. Or maybe it's just another in the long list of politically programmed made-for-the-media public distractions. Gawd knows the Dems especially really do need as many it-could-be-worse diversions from the ongoing realities as they can find or invent.
I think the explanation is that Palin's pursuers were scared to death that she got as close as she did to the presidency, and they're terrified that the massive crowds of her adorers might sweep her into office in 2012. They want to thrust a knife into the heart of this monster before it gets completely out of control.
She needs money and she gets it from the lecture circuit. You can do it on the radical right ot left, both small groups are fanatics that will pay to hear someone regurgitate their favorite fantasies.
Alaska is the better for it and so is our country. She will fade away into a well earned obscurity.
There are no more than, maybe, 20 percent of the voting public that really thinks Sarah Palin would be a good president. I used to do some polling work -- 1 or 2 out of every 10 Americans chosen at random are Jaywalking-All-Star cretins who 'don't know much about geography,' history, nor anything else. They are 'Authoritarian Followers' who want someone to feed them their opinions and to make everything 2nd -grade simple for them to understand. There is no gray area in any idea -- it's all 'black hat, white hat' thinking -- and they aren't good at considering the consequences of their actions. Phony cowboy Junior Bush and his 'with us or ag'in us' bluster was perfect for them. They tend to belong to fundamentalist religious sects because those groups have all the answers for the mysteries of the universe provided in short fairy tales and a strong Father Figure in the pulpit to peddle the pious poop when he isn't taming drugged snakes in the name of the Lawd. "How do you know the universe is only 6,000 years old?" "The Bible says so." "What about scientific evidence it's billions of years old?" "That's planted by God to test your faith!" Sarah Palin, the inchoate, ignorant Christopublican quitter who never quits, is also perfect for them.
They are eternally wedded to their force-fed opinions, so they strongly support politicians like Nixon, Reagan and Junior Bush no matter how many times they are proven wrong. These are the 'teabaggers' who hate taxes and gub'mint 'socialism' (they really can't define the word), but never turn down a Social Security or VA check, or a Medicare-paid trip to the hospital, and are first in line for the free government cheese. They also want the biggest military in history and border walls thousands of miles long, but never want to pay for any of it. This minority of logic-starved morons and uninformed cranks will always be with us and even dropping all the way to the bottom won't change them -- they'll demand the government's help when they need it and then turn around and applaud Limbaugh's latest rant against 'socialism.' They are living proof of the truth of John Stuart Mill's comment: "Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives."
Fortunately, they have lost much of their influence, as has the GOP, following the Bush/Cheney eight-year-long train wreck, but they are probably a strong enough force within the Republican Party to nominate Princess Caribou in 2012. And that, I think, will be the end of the GOP as they split into two factions: The Colin Powell/Susan Collins Conservatives and the Sarah Palin/Joe the Plumber Blockheads, with the Blockheads going the way of the Whigs.
She will fade away into a well earned obscurity.
Palin is the true Republican successor to George Wanker Bush. She is the apotheosis of bone grinding stupidity married to narcissism and the urge to commit homicide. This is what the reactionaries and fascists called Republicans truly adore. They're all standing behind her right now as she postures in front of the mirror, lifting her skirt to show she's not wearing panties while the males behind her quickly drop their pants and unashamedly whack off.
You should get together with a political cartoonist.
He doesn't need to, his words are plenty illustrative enough :-)
Barack Obama ins't stupid, but if his brains are providing us the solutions that he is, stupidity might have some appeal...
Republicans?
Democrats?
Are they different? Yeah, a little. Is one better, "less evil," than the other? Yeah, maybe. Check this: Arguing about the detalia and minutiae of this distracts from WHAT IS IMPORTANT.
The systemic nature of the throttling, the garrotting we are eperiencing.
Is rope LESS EVIL than piano wire? Yeah a little, does that matter. No!
It is the Scaffold we call The System that is our enemy. Not the hangman's color or Politics.
I remember well arguing on CD the party thing. We were ALL duped! Party this party that, every vote we cast is JUST FINE with the 400 richest Americans. Why would it not be-they picked the candidates-then we get sanctimonious over our, "pick."
And they are in hysterics over caviar and champagne as we point fingers at one another. Mission accomplished: their real enemy, the people, divided, divided again, minced.
Well said...!
GoldenMean,
SO nice you join us, darn, it is interesting how the single payer thing is shaping up. If I get this right, BO is taking a shot at the insurance companies? I'm not quite believing but wonder, would he dare?
Though just a tool of the corporations, Obama's mom died I recall, screwed by these bloodsuckers...It's enough to make me wonder if they'd a denied her claims if they knew her son would become President....
May the Lines & Shadows shimmer and glow with Life for you GM.
Au revoir Terrific Pacific, ola Frantic Atlantic,
Go East young Man, Go East.
Follow the wind to where it comes from.
I can easily imagine Sarah Palin being used by the corporate party duopoly (called Republicans and Democrats) to oppose Obama in the next election. She would be the Bible-belt threat that would make our present President, whose policies have not been that much different than Bush, acceptable to your average easily panicked urban "liberal". After all, who would you rather have for President? It worked last time and it works every time, the old good cop, bad cop game. By the way, Mr. Green, there IS a large percentage of our fellow citizens that are exactly that stupid.
Tony Vodvarka
Oregoncharles
When polled, most Americans favor a progressive agenda. They aren't as stupid as you think they are, they just haven't had a clear view (like we have, HA!) what with all the bashing back and forth.
Progressives want to appeal to the people, not make fun of them, as DMG does in this piece.
You want to be an example of good progressive politics? Go out and start doing for the people, rather than calling them stupid and making fun of their lot in life. Sometimes I think people are put up to this, just to keep progressives marginalized. It's counter-productive. You don't see Nader or McKinney or Chomsky writing shallow gossip columns like this. It's Rush Limbaughistic.
Most of you 'good cop, bad cop' people probably think if Nader or McKinney had somehow gotten the majority of the popular vote last election, they would be president. No, that's not the case. (Ask Al Gore.) The Electoral College determines the winner or the Congress (or, illegally, the Supreme Court). All three of those bodies are made up of Republicans and Democrats, for the most part. The majority of the EC electors in this nation are not bound to vote for the candidate with the highest popular vote, so Nader and McKinney didn't have a chance. (Aside from that, had they somehow been magically elected, they would have had no chance of getting such things as single-payer universal health care or campaign finance reform passed by Congress -- they would have had few friends up on The Hill.)
If you want to really change things via a third party, you're going to have to forget about the presidency and work from the bottom up, electing school board members, mayors, city councils, state representatives, governors, congressional reps and US senators to office. It would take years of grueling work, but then you'd have a shot at appointing electors, or eliminating the electoral college system; getting rid of the ballot access laws that favor the two major parties, and passing real campaign finance reform legislation. The Big Media would also be forced to cover your candidates, which they don't now.
Better, you can take over one of the two major parties -- the Democrats would be the easiest -- and run progressive candidates against the entrenched knuckleheads bribed by the corprocracy like Max Baucus, Ben Nelson, Evan Bayh and the other 'Blue Dog' Dems. I believe this is what MoveOn.org and True Majority are currently doing. (Remember, it was only due to the GOP abandoning its own candidate and name recognition that Joe Lieberman won as an independent in CT in 2006 --otherwise Ned Lamont would have won handily.)
Your constant whining about Obama only makes you sound like Glenn Beck or Sean Hannity, and doesn't change a thing. Run good candidates for local and state offices, or run yourself, get your fingers dirty in politics, and then you have a chance at true change. Anything short of this is just a waste of your time.
Yeah,
Crazy like a fox, BHO. Take the short trip to the top of the heap after one Senate term; healthcare, security detail and office space for life and get it all done while you're young enough to have at least 2 more careers before you retire on a government pension. Yeah he's stupid alright.
David Michael Green, don't carry water for the other side of the Repukelican coin. The Demo Rats are the friendly good cop shill for us lil folks to the Republican bad cop. But to expect anything like a fair shake for progressive populists from either Corporatist Party is to have drunk the proverbial KOOL-Aid.