Friday, July 3, 2009

Sarah Palin Is A Dangerous Moron

It's about two hours since I first saw the headline that Sarah Palin is resigning as governor of Alaska and I have yet to read, watch, or listen to any commentary about it so I thought I'd lay out some quick thoughts untainted by the punditocracy.

In her released statement she suggested she is quitting because she had already decided she wasn't running for reelection. Additionally, as a lame duck she would be subject to "politics as usual" which I guess means no one would agree to do what she says automatically.

I don't know much about the goings-on in the Alaska state legislature but I suspect the pioneer mavericky spirit she represents oh so well doesn't stop at her office door. That means the folks in the legislature probably don't have trouble telling her to heave ho when she starts spouting her usual inanities. I have a feeling that her incessant campaigning outside her state has made it likely that she would not be reelected if she ran since she has neglected whatever duties she has had for the past year. Finally, fearing the "politics as usual" conundrum of self-imposed lame duck status tells me she doesn't really have the chops to get things done when the going gets tough.

I admit I thought Obama was pretty brazen to run for president this last cycle. But I saw it sort of as a test run for 2012 or 2016, presuming like everyone else that Hillary had it in the bag. Regardless, he has the intellectual chops to engage in the actual issues and whether you agree with what he's done so far as president or not, he has at least demonstrated that he has actual ideas to put in place and a program for doing it.

Like George W. Bush before, Palin just wants to be president. I don't know why. She has never said a thing of actual policy substance since she first winked her skirted way onto the national scene last year. She simply wants to give voice to some mythological "real America" embodied by such imitation spokesmen like Joe the Plumber which doesn't really represent anyone who has to live a real life in the real world among real people who are really hurting and nervous right now. She panders to the worst in what for lack of another demographic descripter I'll cite as white America. It is exclusionary and divisive at best and potentially dangerous fear mongering at worst.

Sarah Palin looks great on TV and can deliver a line. She can talk within a very narrow band of superficial beliefs that do not stand up to the mildest serious scrutiny. The media indulges her existence because she looks good and makes a great story with most of the absurdities that spill from her lipsticked piehole. The GOP is having all sorts of problems trying to find its way in a new world created by its own generation of national political and economic destruction. I would support Newt Gingrich a thousand times before I would give a shred of value to anything sourced from the Godzilla from Wasilla. I need this particular show to end. Hopefully soon some other voices from the right will be more attractive in real terms but my optimism is waning at the moment.

Republicans please, don't do this. To yourselves and certainly not to the rest of us. Learn the lesson of George W. Bush. We can disagree about policy and how to go about governing, but please already, find someone to represent the opposition who is actually interested in governing under the US Constitution instead of not at all or through some bastardized flag waving pseudo-patriotic swill passing as geunine Americanism. Don't support someone who wants to be president just because it's the next step in her job development.

Sarah Palin is a dangerous moron. She is suited for nothing more than to be a breed mare. A capacity she has fulfilled competently and has clearly passed along to the next generation. I hope her resignation is the last official political act she ever takes. Return to the tundra and don't come back. You betcha!

4 comments:

jawrat said...

such vitriol! I love it! keep it up!

Michelle Haberland said...

Well said, my friend, well said.

Although I was one of the few voices in my crowd to lament the commencement of the war in Afghanistan in 2001, I understand now that we can't back down. So many of the left believe that withdrawal is the answer. I'm not so sure. The one thing that we learned early on in Iraq is that the surest way to create enemies (especially of the suicide-bombing kind) is to bomb a neighborhood to the stone age and then leave it alone. The same thing is (more or less) true in Afghanistan. We owe it to the people of Afghanistan to help them bild their nation back up. Aid, food, and infrastructure will win us friends in Afghanistan, just as it has (albeit to a limited degree) in Iraq.

As Lincoln once said, "The man does not live who is more devoted to peace than I am, but it may be necessary to put the foot down." Let's put the foot down and do our best to right this nation.

Hopefully, Obama will create a reasonable action plan and time table to guide us to withdrawal from Afghanistan. But in the meantime, we gotta hang in there.

I say ths with a heavy heart, knowing that a dear friend is over there flying helicopters. Godspeed to all the soldiers. We want to bring you home. Soon.

Peace,
Michelle

Anonymous said...

Too bad the countrymen we're surrounde by are too zombified to think much less act.

Anonymous said...

You cain't polish a turd.
You can flush it though.