Oh, brother. Clueless.

Sarah Palin’s ‘Blood Libel’ Charge Stirs New Controversy

by Frank James

12:53 pm

January 12, 2011

…Needless to say, she probably couldn’t have chosen a more explosive term than blood libel. That term has been used to describe false and beyond-the-pale charges throughout history that Jews committed unspeakable crimes.

The charges were used to justify atrocities against Jews over centuries…

…One irony in all this is that Rep. Gabrielle Giffords is Jewish and it’s the born-again Christian Palin who is claiming to be the victim of a blood libel.

It’s an odd tactic to respond to one controversy by starting another. But there you have it…

Is anyone surprised?

Or a dog whistle for far right wingnuts. You pick.

In the Twitterverse:

Johngcole  John Cole

I’m wondering if all the people who mindlessly repeated the blood libel crap are starting to feel stupid…4 hours ago

That would presuppose a modicum of self awareness.

tbogg  Tbogg

Reading that Pat Buchanan defended Sarah Palin over blood libel actually made God shoot milk out through His nose 4 hours ago

Win!

There’s a word for what the former half term governor of Alaska said:

Hoekstroika– A ridiculous statement that greatly minimizes the suffering of one group of people while wildly escalating the suffering of another group of people, when no such comparison exists. Usually for partisan political point scoring. Origin: a “twitter” from Rep. Peter Hoekstra comparing the violent repression of peaceful demonstrators in Iran with Republicans in congress:

Iranian twitter activity similar to what we did in House last year when Republicans were shut down in the House. 8:56 AM Jun 17th from TwitterBerry

And the Twitterverse mocks Sarah Palin:

tbogg  Tbogg

I just sneezed. It was exactly like the Black Plague #bloodlibel #ahistoricalmorans 4 hours ago

eRobin  eRobin

@johngcole Just washed the kitchen floor with ammonia. Now I know how the people of Bhopal felt. 4 hours ago

mvallonesta  Matt Vallone

@Johngcole I had to listen to Pat Buchanan on MSNBC, it’s exactly like the Holocaust #ahistoricalmorans #bloodlibel 4 hours ago

BethEastwood  Elizabeth Eastwood

@johngcole I just walked 200 yards to check my mailbox. It was exactly like the Bataan Death March. #bloodlibel 4 hours ago

EdwinTheRedwin  EdTheRed

@Johngcole My failed thesis defense was like the Spanish Inquisition, only worse. #bloodlibel #ahistoricalmorans 4 hours ago

shortstack81  terry

@Johngcole my bus was late. Totally like the Middle Passage. Exactly like it. #bloodlibel #ahistoricalmorans 4 hours ago

Johngcole  John Cole

I’m hungry. This is just like the Potato famine. #bloodlibel #ahistoricalmorans 5 hours ago

3fecta  trifecta

@Johngcole When the Mongolian BBQ closed, I knew how the defenders of the gates of Vienna felt. 5 hours ago

Johngcole  John Cole

When I ran out of gas, it was just like the trail of tears. #bloodlibel #ahistoricalmorans 5 hours ago

Johngcole  John Cole

Telling Republicans to tone down their rhetoric is just like the Hollywood blacklists. #bloodlibel #ahistoricalmorans 5 hours ago

I don’t think Evita Mosselini’s apologists will get it.

I don’t know about you, but I was raised to believe that the pen is mightier than the sword, and when I studied the French Revolution in History class, I admit freely that I was sickened by Jean-Paul Marat, and I felt a certain affinity for Charlotte Corday, the assassin who silenced with a dagger the violent rhetoric that spawned the Reign of Terror. And she did so because she was convinced — and rightly so — that the hateful, vile, poisonous rhetoric of Marat was destroying her country, was directly responsible for the September Massacres and was hurtling her country toward civil war. In short — Marat was the Sarah Palin of the French Revolution and his paper, The Friend of the People was her Faceook page.

In the short term, Marat became a martyr, but history has been far kinder to Corday and held the contemptible little man to proper account.

I do not want history to repeat itself and I certainly do not want Sarah Palin to be a martyr.

I want her to be forgotten.

Unfortunately, I don’t think that is going to happen.

Not with so many on the right doubling down and circling the wagons around their Mean Girl leader. Indeed, Bloody Bill Kristol is accusing me of “McCarthyism” for criticizing her for her role in lowering the discourse of this country.  

But damnit, she is culpable.

And Bill Kristol damn well knows it. And so does Sarah Palin. That is why her first instinct upon hearing that the shooting had happened, before the names of the victims were even known, she was scrubbing her website and her facebook page. But the violent imagery and rhetoric is so pervasive that short of taking the sites down completely, there is simply no way to eradicate it.

Fox News knows she bears some responsibility, too. That is why, as soon as her name was mentioned by an attendee of a candlelight vigil that the network was covering, they cut the feed, proving once and for all that they are not a news organization, but a propaganda organ for the hard-right radicals and would-be fascists in this country. They don’t want to risk reality and awareness encroaching on the minds of the least-informed, most-misinformed, news consumers on the planet.

And Ross Douthat does, too. That is why he contorted himself like a pretzel in his column today trying to put responsibility for political violence on the shoulders of the left — as if this country even had a “left.” Douthat harkens back to the 60s to make his case — Oswalt was a ‘Marxist of sorts’ and George Wallace was shot and paralyzed by someone who wasn’t all that interested in politics at all, he just wanted to shoot someone prominent and he couldn’t get close enough to Nixon. But he actually inadvertently bolsters the opposite case, and that is that words matter.

Not so much to you and me and other rational, thinking people. We can put the rhetoric in context. But we know that there are irrational and disturbed people out there, and political opponents seem to have forgotten that when prominent people — like the new Speaker of the House — say things like “he may be a dead man” about a member of the opposite party, like Boehner did about Rep. Driehaus after he voted for the healthttp://blogs.pitch.com/plog/2010/03/emanuel_cleaver_spit_on_–_now_with_video.phphcare bill, some of the less-stable will take your words to heart. A right wing blog posted directions to his house, and the death threats started. Here in Missouri, anti-healthcare reform zealots took a coffin to Representative Carnahan’s home and burned him in effigy. And don’t forget that my Congressman was spit on.

Given all that, this doubling-down on the part of the right wing is at the same time expected, yet unbelievable.

Only someone with a pathological level of cognitive dissonance could argue that the discourse on the right has no responsibility, even though we just had an election season that saw a Senate candidate in Nevada talking about “Second Amendment remedies”. Before that we had a Congresswomen from Minnesota look into television cameras and say, sincerely, that she wanted her constituents “armed and dangerous” in opposition to climate change legislation.

This all matters, and what happened Saturday was a symptom of the cancer that is destroying our society.

See, here is the thing everyone forgets about dog-whistles — it isn’t just your dog that hears it when you blow one. Other dogs in the vicinity hear it too, and if one of them is already quite mad, the results can be what we saw Saturday.

So unless — pardon the pun — that is what the media and the right wing noise machine are shooting for, then they need to shut the fuck up.

The last Twitter post yesterday morning from Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D):

Rep_Giffords  Gabrielle Giffords

My 1st Congress on Your Corner starts now. Please stop by to let me know what is on your mind or tweet me later. 21 hours ago

Early last August:

Arizona: the good, the bad, and the ugly

…There’s still a lot of good in Arizona. Like Raul Grijalva (D) and Gabrielle Giffords (D). And it’s a toss-up whether Missouri or Arizona has the most egregious eye roll inducing right wingnuts. If pressed I’d have to give a slight edge to Arizona…

President Obama at the White House yesterday afternoon:

Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D): …things, for example, we’re on Sarah Palin’s targeted list. But, the thing is, the way that she has it depicted has the crosshairs of a gunsight over our district. When people do that they’ve got to realize there’s consequences to that action…

FLASHBACK: Gabby Giffords Faced Threats Over Heath Care Vote

….Giffords’s father Spencer Gifford, 75, told the New York Post that her enemies were “the whole Tea Party….”

….Giffords was also one of the members of Congress “targeted” by Sarah Palin for their vote on health care. An image posted on Palin’s Facebook page featured crosshairs over the geographical districts of 20 members of Congress.

On Twitter, Palin linked to the page with this message: “Commonsense Conservatives & lovers of America: “Don’t Retreat, Instead – RELOAD!” Pls see my Facebook page.”

Since the incident today, Palin’s staff removed Gifford’s name from the list on her “Take Back The 20” site, which has since gone down….

[emphasis added]

ddayen  David Dayen

I’ll say this, if your first instinct after hearing about a tragedy is to scrub your websites, you have a problem as a political movement 13 hours ago

And at what cost?

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D) was shot point blank during a constituent meeting at a Safeway grocery store in Tucson, Arizona today. 40 year-old Giffords is Arizona’s first Jewish Congresswomen, and reports have been unclear as to whether she has expired, or is still undergoing surgery. This is a national tragedy and unprecedented as there has only been one member of Congress killed in the line of duty, Rep. Leo Ryan during the Jonestown mass-suicide and massacre in 1978.

As the details emerge from what was clearly a horrific scene in Tucson with many wounded, some interesting aspects regarding her most recent political opponent have surfaced.

Jane Hamsher, of FireDogLake blog wrote:

Giffords’ 2010 Congressional opponent Jesse Kelly held a June 12 gun event that was billed as follows on the Pima County Republican website:

“Get on Target for Victory in November Help remove Gabrielle Giffords from office, Shoot a fully automatic M16 with Jesse Kelly”

Like some other staunch tea party activists (Sarah Palin put a bulls-eye “logo” right on Giffords during the 2010 campaign), candidate Kelly utilized colorful political metaphors, like, “Get on Target…remove Gabrielle Giffords…shoot a fully automatic M16” — many cognitive linguists will tell you that connecting these words with the emotional intent to defeat, ruin, or destroy a political opponent can result in effectively communicating a violent call to arms.

As Drew Westen explains in his seminal work, “The Political Brain”,

“…when data clashed with desire, the political brain would somehow “reason” its way to the desired conclusions…Our hunch was that what passes for reasoning in politics is more often rationalization, motivated by efforts to reason to emotionally satisfying conclusions.”

In other words, people will morph, mangle, and manipulate sound data or facts right in front of their eyes, in order to reach the emotional high of “being right”.

With a fervor whipped up in a particular borderline individual, they might just as well transform candidate Jesse Kelly’s “M16 target shooting” message into something far more macabre.

This is why it is absolutely essential for candidates, elected officials, corporate officers — anyone in positions of leadership — to be absolutely resolute in communicating responsibly, and not playing upon the potentially fragile emotions of certain people in their audience.

My prayers are with Gabrielle, her NASA astronaut husband, Mark Kelly, and the rest of her family and friends.

Yeah, we barely dodged that one, didn’t we?

The cult of the lost cause endures:

Because grifters can’t always get their cons to work on everyone:

Economic Crisis, The Audit – November 8, 2010 09:25 PM

Sarah Palin, Media Critic

The former veep candidate (and journalism major) misleads readers on the WSJ with selective quotes

By Ryan Chittum

….So, Palin is hammering the Journal and Reddy for pointing out that she’s flat wrong about grocery prices going up significantly in the past year. What does she do? She quotes a separate Journal story that confirms what Reddy is saying-and cuts out that part with three dots. Nice!

Palin has a journalism degree, so I’m guessing she knows what an ethical no-no it is to misquote somebody like that. It ought to be awfully hard for her to get on her pedestal and condemn the media when she can’t even quote somebody honestly. How about to make it up to Reddy, Palin lets a real reporter like him fly out to Wasilla to interview her for once instead of going to her house folks at Fox News?

Maybe they can talk about the possible wave of food inflation coming our way.

It looks like the Wall Street Journal and the Columbia Journalism Review won’t be able to sit at the lunch table with all the other kewl kidz for a long while.

Also, too.

Via the Turner Report, from the Federal Election Commission:

FORM 6

CONTRIBUTIONS

FILING FEC-502962

Committee: VICKY HARTZLER FOR CONGRESS

SarahPAC

PO Box 7711

Arlington, Virginia 22207

Date Contributed = 10/16/2010

Amount Contributed = [$]5000.00

[emphasis added]

This says it all, don’t it?

Like a grifter pulling a long con…

In Vanity Fair, describing an event in Independence, Missouri on May 1, 2010 where Sarah Palin (r – half term governor) was the featured speaker:

Sarah Palin the Sound and the Fury

….The Winning America Back conference was organized by a Missouri political-action committee called Preserving American Liberty (PAL-PAC). The group’s Web site states that “Members of Preserving American Liberty are from the Kansas City metropolitan area and are all unpaid volunteers who want to make a positive difference in the community.” Yet when I asked local politicians (including state representatives, a Senate candidate, and a congressional candidate) and local journalists about who had organized the event, I found that they knew nothing about the sponsors….

….PAL-PAC seems to have been created for a single purpose: to pay Sarah Palin to give a speech. PAL-PAC announced the Palin event at the same time that it announced its own formation. After the Palin event was over, most of the information on PAL-PAC’s Web site disappeared. In effect, PAL-PAC was a disposable entertainment company, set up to put on a one-day show that collected the contact information of thousands of people who came to see Palin in the flesh, and to give her their money. The organization has not been mentioned again anywhere online or in local newspapers. The group’s financial statements are curious….

[discussion of Missouri Ethics Commission reports]

[emphasis added]

Okay, we’ll take a look at what’s what at the Missouri Ethics Commission.

POLITICAL ACTION   Date Established:11/12/2009

Date Terminated:

COMMITTEE: MECID:C091277

PRESERVING AMERICAN LIBERTY

PARKVILLE MO 64152

[emphasis added]

The Committee Quarterly Report filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission on January 14, 2010:

Committe: PRESERVING AMERICAN LIBERTY

1. TOTAL RECEIPTS FOR THIS ELECTION PREVIOUSLY REPORTED $0.00

2. ALL MONETARY CONTRIBUTIONS RECEIVED THIS PERIOD $1,000.00

15. TOTAL EXPENDITURES THIS ELECTION (SUM 10B + 14A) $0.00

28. MONEY ON HAND AT THE CLOSE OF THIS REPORTING PERIOD (SUM 25 + 26 – 27) $1,953.50

[emphasis added]

Not much there.

The Committee Quarterly Report filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission on April 15, 2010:

Committe: PRESERVING AMERICAN LIBERTY

1. TOTAL RECEIPTS FOR THIS ELECTION PREVIOUSLY REPORTED $1,953.50

2. ALL MONETARY CONTRIBUTIONS RECEIVED THIS PERIOD $1,907.00

15. TOTAL EXPENDITURES THIS ELECTION (SUM 10B + 14A) $2,273.00

28. MONEY ON HAND AT THE CLOSE OF THIS REPORTING PERIOD (SUM 25 + 26 – 27) $3,202.00

[emphasis added]

Not much there, either.

The Committee Quarterly Report filed with the Missouri Ethics Commission on July 14, 2010:

Committe: PRESERVING AMERICAN LIBERTY

1. TOTAL RECEIPTS FOR THIS ELECTION PREVIOUSLY REPORTED $0.00

2. ALL MONETARY CONTRIBUTIONS RECEIVED THIS PERIOD $6,920.00

4. MISCELLANEOUS RECEIPTS THIS PERIOD $135,309.57

9. TOTAL ALL RECEIPTS THIS ELECTION(SUM 1B + 7A – 8A) $142,229.57

15. TOTAL EXPENDITURES THIS ELECTION (SUM 10B + 14A) $137,844.91

28. MONEY ON HAND AT THE CLOSE OF THIS REPORTING PERIOD (SUM 25 + 26 – 27) $7,586.66

[emphasis added]

Whoa, Nellie!

Okay, let’s look at the details which are bound to be very interesting:

Detailed Summary of Contributions And Loans Received

Committee: PRESERVING AMERICAN LIBERTY

Report Date: 7/14/2010

David E Wilson Kansas City, MO Physician, MD 04/13/2010 $300.00

Elizabeth Anderson Parkville, MO Homemaker 04/19/2010 $1,500.00

C Phillip Pattison Weston,MO Westglen GI, Physician 04/30/2010 $5,000.00

Dennison Lightner 617 Avondale Lane Raymore, MO EMC Corp, auditor 05/09/2010 $120.00

That’s it. But, wait, there’s another document:

Detailed Summary of Fund-Raising Statement

Committe:

ReportDate: 05/01/2010

1. NAME AND ADDRESS OF CANDIDATE OR COMMITTEE FOR WHOM FUNDS WERE RAISED Preserving American Liberty c/o Elizabeth Anderson, Treasurer Parkville, MO

2. LOCATION OF ACTIVITY OR EVENT:  NAME AND ADDRESS Independence Events Center 19100E Valley View Parkway Independence, MO 64055

3. DESCRIPTION OF ACTIVITY OR EVENT AND FUND-RAISING METHODS USED Winning America Back–sold tickets, booths, and books

4. DATE OF ACTIVITY OR EVENT 05/01/2010

5. NUMBER OF PARTICIPANTS 4000

6. NAME AND ADDRESS OF PERSON CONDUCTING ACTIVITY OR EVENT Preserving American Liberty 6295 Edgewater Dr Parkville, MO 64152

RECEIPTS FROM ACTIVITY OR EVENT Total

8. TOTAL CONTRIBUTIONS ($100 OR LESS PER PERSON) FROM PERSONS WHOSE NAMES AND ADDRESSES COULD NOT BE OBTAINED $144,186.57

9. TOTAL CONTRIBUTIONS FROM PERSONS WHOSE NAME AND ADDRESSES ARE CONTAINED IN COMMITTEE RECORDS $0.00

10. GROSS RECEIPTS FROM ACTIVITY OR EVENT (SUM 8 AND 9) $144,186.57

11. EXPLAIN WHY NAMES AND ADDRESSES OF PERSONS CONTRIBUTING $25 OR LESS COULD NOT BE OBTAINED

Tickets were sold for the event to cover expenses of the event. Donations were not received. Booths were rented and that totaled $1,200 of the above amount. Also sold books and raffle tickets which amounted to $8800.10 of the above amount.

12. INDIVIDUAL EXPENDITURES MADE FOR ACTIVITY OR EVENT 13. AMOUNT

Independence Events Center $10,080.00

(14. TOTAL EXPENDITURES MADE FOR ACTIVITY OR EVENT: $10,080.00 )

Okay, it cost them $10,080.00 to rent the space. An inquisitive person might ask, “Where did the rest of the money go?” It went here:

Detailed Summary of Expenditures And Contributions Made

Committe: PRESERVING AMERICAN LIBERTY

ReportDate: 7/14/2010

A. EXPENDITURES OF $100 OR LESS BY CATEGORY

Occupation and sales taxes $136.07

Pocket Constitutions $22.50

Essay Contest Prizes $400.00

Reimburse meals $30.00

Booth Rental for Event $75.00

B. ITEMIZED EXPENDITURES ALL OVER $100 AND ALL PAYMENTS TO CAMPAIGN WORKERS

Alphagraphics Kansas City MO 04/19/2010 Printed Materials $1,334.11

Bally Hoo Banners Overland Park, MO 05/01/2010 Event Banner $245.69

Alphagraphics Kansas City MO 64106 05/05/2010 Printed Materials $1,243.99

Elizabeth Anderson Parkville, MO 04/19/2010 Reimburse for Books $192.69

Elizabeth Anderson Parkville, MO 5/5/2010 Reimburse for Books $1,763.39

Lockton Companies Kansas City, MO 04/14/2010 Event Insurance $2,887.50

Kelsey Bohlender Overland Park, KS 04/28/2010 Reimburse Flag Rental $470.00

Shealah Craighead Photo Washington, DC 06/07/2010 Event Photography $2,002.05

Kelsey Bohlender Overland Park, KS 06/23/2010 Event meals for Volunteers $380.00

Wayne Graves Kansas City, MO 06/23/2010 Reimburse Speaker Travel $15,134.83

Wayne Graves Kansas City, MO 06/23/2010 Reimburse Web Marketing $7,715.51

Wayne Graves Kansas City, MO 06/23/2010 Reimburse Speaker Expense $103,149.66

Platte Valley Bank Platte City, MO 05/03/2010 Banking fees $440.38

Platte Valley Bank Platte City, MO 06/02/2010 Banking fees $221.54

[emphasis added]

Banners, books, flag rental! What, no t-shirts?

So, it appears that speaker travel ran to $15,134.83 and speaking fee(s) ran to $103,149.66.

Does anyone remember if there were other paid speakers at this teabagger festival?

From the event press release:

Liz Cheney, Fred Thompson to join Sarah Palin for ‘Winning America Back’ at Independence arena

For Immediate Release

Preserving American Liberty Announces Additional Speakers for

“Winning America Back” Featuring Sarah Palin

INDEPENDENCE, MISSOURI (March 31, 2010) – Preserving American Liberty announced today Fred and Jeri Thompson and Liz Cheney will join Sarah Palin at the Independence Events Center, Saturday, May 1, 2010. Fred Thompson is a former Presidential Candidate, U.S. Senator and is a well-known Actor, Jeri Thompson is married to Fred Thompson and is a political commentator, and Liz Cheney is with Keep America Safe and the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney.

About “Winning America Back”

“Winning America Back” will be an action packed one-day event promoting conservative values with some of the biggest names in politics – including keynote remarks from Sarah Palin. This event will equip conservatives with resources to take action on the grassroots level to make a positive impact for our future. Like a lot of Americans, members of Preserving American Liberty are worried about the current state of our country and the lack of leadership from our state houses to Washington, D.C. Instead of standing on the sidelines, we ask that members of the community join us as we hear from conservatives from across the country on how to be apart of the solution and to see what we can do to make a positive difference.

Tickets for “Winning America Back” featuring Sarah Palin, Fred and Jeri Thompson, and Liz Cheney on May 1 are available at the Independence Events Center box office (open Monday through Friday 10 a.m. to 6 p.m…..) There will be two separate tickets – general admission and priority seating. General admission tickets to the one-day 1 p.m. to 7 p.m. conference are $50 and priority seating tickets are $75. Both prices include ticket fees and taxes at the box office, additional service fees will apply to tickets bought online or over the phone. Parking is free!…

The usual right wingnut suspects. Do you think Fred and Jeri and Liz were in the neighborhood and just decided to drop by?

Free parking! Do you think anyone rode their bike?

From KCUR radio:

Sarah Palin To Missouri Conservatives: Keep It Up

INDEPENDENCE, MISSOURI (kcur) – Former Vice Presidential candidate and Alaska Governor Sarah Palin brought her rock-star status to Independence last night. She told some 3 thousand supporters at the Winning America Back convention…

Three thousand? I thought the report to the Missouri Ethics Commission stated that four thousand attended. Yep:

4. DATE OF ACTIVITY OR EVENT 05/01/2010

5. NUMBER OF PARTICIPANTS 4000

[emphasis added]

There’s an old saying in politics – real numbers never end with a zero.

“…In effect, PAL-PAC was a disposable entertainment company, set up to put on a one-day show that collected the contact information of thousands of people who came to see Palin in the flesh, and to give her their money…”

Like a grifter pulling a long con.

Steve Benen, in an excellent analysis of the sloganeering that characterized Glenn Beck’s Besmirch MLK Rally yesterday, exposes the lack of substance behind the boiling Tea Party paranoia. Benen’s post, definitely worth reading in it its entirety, concludes:

The folks who gathered in D.C. today were awfully excited about something. The fact that it’s not altogether obvious what that might be probably isn’t a good sign.

According to Bill Lambrecht at the St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s “Political Fix,” St. Louisians who traveled to Washington D.C. to bask in the light of Beck, the self-anointed prophet, and his acolyte, Saint Palin, are equally worked up and just as vague about what it is that’s got them twitching.

One gentleman whom Lambrecht quotes melodramatically declares that “This is to wake up the people. The politicians don’t listen.” We should doubtless overlook the tang of sour grapes in this cri d’coeur – the outraged tone of those who thought that the Bush years, with their indulgence of the full range of right wing fanasy, would truly go on forever. That particular speaker though does seem to have awakened – albeit a few years too late.  He is concerned, Lambrecht reports, because he has “never seen the economy so bad”:

It’s time to stop Congress from all this overspending and these frivolous earmarks. I think we’re headed for a collapse of the economy if it doesn’t stop

Similarly, an equally clueless St. Louisian is quoted as saying:

I’m scared that where we’re going is not a good place,” … There is no good ending to this story unless we make a U-turn,” he added.

The fact that the economy collapsed some time ago – two years ago to be exact – due to the ministrations of those applying just the panacea of deregulation and tax cuts that folks like these gentlemen advocate, doesn’t seem to have much penetration among this segment of the population. Instead they seem to derive intense, almost palpable satisfaction out of railing against the very measures that have kept us from the deepest and darkest of economic pits. How could any thinking person want to make a U-turn right back to the Bush policies that put us in the very bad place we were in at the end of 2008?

What is really going on when you have a wildly energized group whose raison d’etre dissolves when examined closely? Several observers noted that the tone of the Beck rally was essentially religious. However, the St. Louis  attendees who were quoted in the Lambrecht article almost all seemed to locate their worries in the political sphere, And, although they might justify themselves by reference to religious beliefs, I strongly suspect that most of those attending expect to find solutions to their complaints in retrograde political action.

Am I the only person who finds this blending worrisome? On the one hand, you have easily led, poorly informed people, seething with discontent, expressing real fear and anxiety about something that doesn’t ever seem to quite materialize in an intellectually viable form. On the other hand, you have numerous interested parties feeding the group’s sense of self-importance with visions of super-patriotism, heroic defiance, and now, with the Glenn Beck crusade, a sense of religious mission. Am I the only one reminded of Father Coughlin’s incendiary radio broadcasts and his depression era Christian Front brown shirt wannabes?  

We are not worthy.

Sunday, May 02, 2010

A quizzical about the political chats this morning…

…CBS Sunday Morning had very solid coverage of the spill and the impact it is already having on local businesses.  But, as I watched This Week on ABC, I couldn’t help but wonder why producers didn’t take this opportunity to invite Sarah Palin on…

…I’d like to ask Palin what her solution to this drama in the Gulf is…if her Drill baby, Drill policy would mandate remote shut off technology…what she has to say in defense of off shore drilling to the folks in the Gulf who, based on 2008 election results, voted for her ass and McCain.

But the rogue has gone silent.

Sigh….

Very good question.

Go. Read the whole thing.