[Peace-discuss] Sarah laughed to herself

[John W.]

I don't see why the reaction to Palin is such a profound mystery.  My
problem with her is this:

1) She's unbelievably ignorant and uninformed, and almost seems to revel in
her ignorance in the finest traditions of American anti-intellectualism.  At
the same time, she's not really a populist, but only pretends to be one.
You're probably more of a populist than she is, Carl.

2) By extension, anyone who would vote for her or take her candidacy for the
highest office in the land even remotely seriously is unbelievably stupid,
and/or unbelievably unconcerned about the future of our nation.

3) Since so many people seem to take Palin seriously, one is discouragingly
reminded of how many truly stupid people there are in the United States.

Trust me, Carl....it doesn't have to be any more complicated than that.




On Sun, Feb 7, 2010 at 11:28 PM, C. G. Estabrook <galliher at illinois.edu>wrote:



> [My political opinions are anarchist - or if you prefer libertarian
> socialist - in the tradition of Rudolf Rocker and Noam Chomsky. They're
> related to the sort of thing Lenin attacked in "'Left-Wing' Communism: An
> Infantile Disorder" (1920). (For an account of the position in relation to
> 20th-century authoritarian socialism, google "The Soviet Union versus
> Socialism.") So I'm not much impressed by Roger Kimball's politics.  But
> he's on to something here, viz. why it is that liberals are driven so nuts
> by Sarah Palin, a point I continue to find interesting and even significant.
> It can't be Palin's political ideas in themselves, such as they are; so he's
> right to look for something else. --CGE]
>
>
>        Roger's Rules - http://pajamasmedia.com/rogerkimball -
>        Small earthquake in la-la land, or, Why is Sarah Palin Smiling?
>        Posted By Roger Kimball On February 7, 2010
>
> There is a great story about the journalist (and Communist) Claud Cockburn
> [FATHER OF ALEX & BROS. --CGE] that while working at The Times in the 1920s,
> he won a competition for devising the most boring headline that actually
> made it into the paper. His winning entry: “Small Earthquake in Chile, Not
> Many Dead.” According to Wikipedia [1], the story is apocryphal, but I long
> ago placed it in the sacred category of “too good to check.” Besides, when I
> first heard it, Cockburn won the competition while at The Observer, even
> though (as far as I know) he never worked there.
>
> Anyway, notwithstanding the veracity of the story, I find myself often
> reminded of it. Just today, for example, when a friend sent me a piece on
> Sarah Palin from the Huffing and Puffing Post, sometimes known as the
> Huffington Post. It’s by Stefan Sirucek, “independent journalist and foreign
> correspondent,” and bears the arresting title “EXCLUSIVE (Update): Palin’s
> Tea Party Crib Notes [2].”
>
> So what startling revelation does Stefan Sirucek, International Man of
> Mystery, impart?  Why, that Sarah Palin, when she delivered her speech [3]
> to the National Tea Party Conference last night had actually scribbled a few
> words on her left palm.
>
> Stop the presses!  What a scandal. According to HufPo’s  intrepid reporter,
> Palin’s notes to herself are ominous, ominous:
>
>    Closer inspection of a photo of Sarah Palin, during a speech in which
> she mocked President Obama for his use of a teleprompter, reveals several
> notes written on her left hand. The words “Energy”, “Tax” and “Lift American
> Spirits” are clearly visible. There’s also what appears to read as “Budget
> cuts” with the word Budget crossed out.
>
> “Budget cuts”?  Crossed out? Tell me it isn’t so. If HufPo’s answer to Carl
> Bernstein is to believed,
>
>    This would mean:
>
>    A) That she knew the questions beforehand and the whole thing was a
> farce. (Likely.)
>
>    and
>
>    B) That she still couldn’t answer the previously agreed-upon questions
> without a little extra help.
>
> Where do we start?  First of all, President Obama’s addiction to the
> teleprompter is eminently worth mocking. The teleprompter breaks down, so
> does the President [4]. He apparently can’t even address sixth-grade school
> children [5]without the device. (Even Jon Stewart [6] made fun of that.)
>  Second, pace our ace reporter, the fact that Palin jotted some notes on her
> hand does not mean that  “she knew the questions beforehand” or that “the
> whole thing was a farce.” Nor, since we don’t know whether the questions
> were agreed upon beforehand or not (and what if  they were? So what?),  does
> it mean that she “still couldn’t answer them . . .  without a little extra
> help.”  What the notes do mean is that she prepared for the session and
> thought to remind herself of something. In other words, good for you, Sarah.
>
> The hatred and contempt lavished upon Sarah Plain, from certain
> conservatives as well as from the Left, presents a dispiriting and, to me,
> hard-to-fathom spectacle. That is, I understand that the Left would regard
> her as a political threat and would therefore dislike her. But why the
> contempt? And why the contempt (and hatred) from the Right? I have several
> times explained why I admire Sarah Palin [7]. Please note that I did not say
> I want her to run for the Presidency. But what (a locution that comes up
> often among her admirers) a breath of fresh air she is! Here you have a
> woman from a working-class background who, by dint of her own energy and
>  ambition, becomes Governor of her state—a good Governor, too, by all
> account not tainted by The New York Times. She espouses good conservative
> principles: self-reliance, fiscal responsibility, a strong national defense.
> And, on top of all that, she is a courageous and loving mother to a passel
> of children.
>
> What’s not to like?  That she chose to keep and love a Down Syndrome child?
> That sets the teeth of many on edge, I know, though they are loathe to come
> right out and admit it. Granted: She’s not a lawyer. She’s not from the Ivy
> League. She’s not part of the Washington Establishment. Heavy liabilities,
> what? I acknowledge that her performance in front of Katie Couric and other
> barracuda-like interviewers was poor, embarrassing even. But put that and
> all the other charges in the scale on one side, then put her virtues on the
> other: which side wins out? Stefan Sirucek thinks he can simply indite the
> name “Sarah Palin” and all right-thinking (that is, left-leaning) people
> will scoff and hold their noses. Maybe they will. But the aroma of
> rancidness and decay you sense is not emanating from Sarah Palin’s side of
> the aisle. The question is, when will the left-wing commentariat notice that
> the winds of opinion, to say nothing of the winds of political energy, have
> changed decisively against them? Scott Brown should have told them
> something. But Scott Brown was an impossibility. Or so they told themselves.
>
>        ###
>

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