Congratulations to Governor Sarah Palin for proving last night that she came honestly by her high school nickname "Barracuda.". She certainly carried forward the McCain strategy of mockery, ridicule, sarcasm and disrespect. Sarah Palin showed that there is at least one aspect of the Vice President role on the campaign trail she can do well, and that is play the role of attack dog. McCain's campaign spokesperson Rick Davis said yesterday that this campaign isn't going to be about issues. They intend this to be about personality, not the issues. And that's what she did. Aimed primary at Barack Obama. Palin delivered the red meat for the audience at the RNC convention last night.
No policy however. Plenty of punches, however.
Did you catch when Palin brought up the character issue? She said that John McCain says the same thing about people whether they're listening or whether they're not listening, unlike Obama, she suggested, expressed when out of their earshot that some white working class people cling bitterly to guns and religion. I guess Palin was out hunting moose and doesn't know or doesn't care about McCain's own character issue when it comes to what he had to say to a woman even while reporters were listening. (Retraction. McCain didn't insult all women, just his wife.) Perhaps John McCain calling his wife Cindy McCain a "c*nt" is just fine with Palin. After all, she finds it funny when men call women b***ch and belittle them
By the way, Palin probably didn't notice, and probably didn't care if she did notice, the campaign pin on folks' lapel there in the convention center that read "Hoosiers for Hot Chicks" written above the pictures of McCain/Palin. Character issues were on display right there before her eyes if she cared to notice.
With the singing of the national anthem framing the opening and closing of last night's convention session, I guess we shouldn't be surprised that Palin would take a swipe at Michelle Obama with that "always proud of America" quip. The notion that you can't find fault in the country and yet still fiercely love it riles me. This belief that America can never be wrong and it's unpatriotic to admit America has faults is tied to the belief that America is God's chosen nation. Could it be that there are those who believe that to challenge country is to challenge God?
Finally, there's the "community organizer" zinger by Palin, the punch that was supposed to be the knock-out. "I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a 'community organizer,' except that you have actual responsibilities," Palin said. There are people who are actually making real change happen in communities and are more accountable to people than any elected official would hope to be. These are the people, many of whom with degrees like those of Obama, that are coming up with innovative programs and policy solutions on the local level that lawmakers are actually using to create pubic policy. Of course, many people, especially those from small towns, don't know what a community organizer even though they think they have an idea what a mayor does or what a governor does.
While Palin's speech played very well there before convention delegates, it remains to be seen how it will be received among the rank and file around the country. Women and men from the conservative right usually don't like punchy, tough talking women. (Think Hillary Clinton.) No matter how pretty they are.
One last thing: there was something surreal about watching a Party made up of plenty of folks who belong to churches that teach that a woman can't/shouldn't pastor a church trot out a female candidate to run as VP. Women can run the country, but they can't pastor a church is what many conservative Christians are saying who hail Sarah Palin as the "just what was needed" addition to the McCain ticket. Which is only proof that, for the chance to win, even core values can be auctioned.
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"One last thing: there was something surreal about watching a Party made up of plenty of folks who belong to churches that teach that a woman can't/shouldn't pastor a church . . ."
Compared to progressives that do not believe much of the Bible is worth anything at all? You progressives have nothing to bring this debate but humanism.
Buzz off.
Renita Weems: "Women and men from the conservative right usually don't like punchy, tough talking women. (Think Hillary Clinton.) No matter how pretty they are."
You obviously don't know a thing about "the conservative right" or you wouldn't have made this ridiculous statement.
As for which political party has greater difficulty accepting a "punchy, tough talking women" I would remind you that is the Democratic Party that did NOT nominate US Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton last week for the Vice Presidency let alone the Presidency.
The "conservative right" has always been about ideas since its founding in the 1950s (under the leadership of "National Review" editor-in-chief W.F. Buckley, Jr.). We don't engage in the "identity politics" of the left and have been more faithful than the left to Dr. King's admonition in his historic speech 45 years and a week ago to "judge a person by the content of their character and not by the color of their skin" [and, by extension, the X or Y chromosomes in their genes].
As for "punchy, tough-talking women" conservatives, I guess you overlooked former British P.M. Margaret Thatcher; German Chancellor Angela Merkel; Mother Angelica (founder of EWTN); Secretary of State Dr. Condi Rice; Eagle Forum founder Dr. Phyllis Schafly; former UN Ambassador Dr. Jeanne Kirkpatrick; Senator Elizabeth Dole; Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison; WSJ columnist Peggy Noonan; former Congresswoman Clare Boothe Luce; Hawaii Governor Linda Lingle ... and, now, soon to be elected 2009-2017 US Vice President Sarah Palin.
Thank you Weems for stating my quesiton. Why is it woman are not allowed to lead in church, sit on church leaderdshp boards, or teach men in many conservative evangelical churches, but a woman can be elected by these same people to lead the free world. It is a crazy double standard and a contradiction that can't be shrugged away.
As a Christian and as a human I believe a woman can lead because in Christ there is no male nor female, but scratch the surface of most of Palin's Christian Right base and just a few weeks ago they were saying that a woman's place was in the home snd submissive to her husband.
Clearly Gov. Palin is adept at belittling people, making smug zingers, and laughing at her opponents in front of her party. Great behavior for this so-called Christian. In my mind, that was just as classless a performance as those reporters who have been hounding her family over private matters all week. But let's see how she does fielding questions in a real debate with a neutral audience, where she has to deal with matters of real substance and not just witty jabs at "liberals."
What I keep going back to is the current state of things, and how undeniably the Republicans got us here (remember all those years of Rebublican Presidency, Congress and House?) My gasoline bill this month was over $200, and that's with a small, economical car. My electricity bill this month was $200, even though I live in a very small townhouse. I use Green Mountain Energy, too, which is 100% renewable energy. Why am I not getting some kind of tax break for this instead of paying more than I would for coal-burning electricity? My crappy health insurance policy that I had to buy on my own since I'm a full time student, just informed me that they are raising my premiums for the 3rd time in a single year, even though I haven't made one single claim during that time, or actually - ever. Why are my grocery bills up 25% from what they were just one year ago? These are all things that directly affect me and my quality of living, and I hold the Republican leadership directly responsible for each of them.
The thing that was most upsetting about Gov. Palin's speech was that in addition to her various ad hominem attacks, the entire night (including her speech) was full of lies, distortions and sophistry. If you don't believe me, read the following AP story that came out today:
-----------------------------------
Attacks, praise stretch truth at GOP convention
By JIM KUHNHENN, Associated Press Writer
Wed Sep 3, 11:48 PM ET
ST. PAUL, Minn. - Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and her Republican supporters held back little Wednesday as they issued dismissive attacks on Barack Obama and flattering praise on her credentials to be vice president. In some cases, the reproach and the praise stretched the truth.
Some examples:
PALIN: "I have protected the taxpayers by vetoing wasteful spending ... and championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by Congress. I told the Congress 'thanks but no thanks' for that Bridge to Nowhere."
THE FACTS: As mayor of Wasilla, Palin hired a lobbyist and traveled to Washington annually to support earmarks for the town totaling $27 million. In her two years as governor, Alaska has requested nearly $750 million in special federal spending, by far the largest per-capita request in the nation. While Palin notes she rejected plans to build a $398 million bridge from Ketchikan to an island with 50 residents and an airport, that opposition came only after the plan was ridiculed nationally as a "bridge to nowhere."
PALIN: "There is much to like and admire about our opponent. But listening to him speak, it's easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform — not even in the state senate."
THE FACTS: Compared to McCain and his two decades in the Senate, Obama does have a more meager record. But he has worked with Republicans to pass legislation that expanded efforts to intercept illegal shipments of weapons of mass destruction and to help destroy conventional weapons stockpiles. The legislation became law last year. To demean that accomplishment would be to also demean the work of Republican Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, a respected foreign policy voice in the Senate. In Illinois, he was the leader on two big, contentious measures in Illinois: studying racial profiling by police and requiring recordings of interrogations in potential death penalty cases. He also successfully co-sponsored major ethics reform legislation.
PALIN: "The Democratic nominee for president supports plans to raise income taxes, raise payroll taxes, raise investment income taxes, raise the death tax, raise business taxes, and increase the tax burden on the American people by hundreds of billions of dollars."
THE FACTS: The Tax Policy Center, a think tank run jointly by the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute, concluded that Obama's plan would increase after-tax income for middle-income taxpayers by about 5 percent by 2012, or nearly $2,200 annually. McCain's plan, which cuts taxes across all income levels, would raise after tax-income for middle-income taxpayers by 3 percent, the center concluded.
Obama would provide $80 billion in tax breaks, mainly for poor workers and the elderly, including tripling the Earned Income Tax Credit for minimum-wage workers and higher credits for larger families.
He also would raise income taxes, capital gains and dividend taxes on the wealthiest. He would raise payroll taxes on taxpayers with incomes above $250,000, and he would raise corporate taxes. Small businesses that make more than $250,000 a year would see taxes rise.
MCCAIN: "She's been governor of our largest state, in charge of 20 percent of America's energy supply ... She's responsible for 20 percent of the nation's energy supply. I'm entertained by the comparison and I hope we can keep making that comparison that running a political campaign is somehow comparable to being the executive of the largest state in America," he said in an interview with ABC News' Charles Gibson.
THE FACTS: McCain's phrasing exaggerates both claims. Palin is governor of a state that ranks second nationally in crude oil production, but she's no more "responsible" for that resource than President Bush was when he was governor of Texas, another oil-producing state. In fact, her primary power is the ability to tax oil, which she did in concert with the Alaska Legislature. And where Alaska is the largest state in America, McCain could as easily have called it the 47th largest state — by population.
MCCAIN: "She's the commander of the Alaska National Guard. ... She has been in charge, and she has had national security as one of her primary responsibilities," he said on ABC.
THE FACTS: While governors are in charge of their state guard units, that authority ends whenever those units are called to actual military service. When guard units are deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan, for example, they assume those duties under "federal status," which means they report to the Defense Department, not their governors. Alaska's national guard units have a total of about 4,200 personnel, among the smallest of state guard organizations.
FORMER ARKANSAS GOV. MIKE HUCKABEE: Palin "got more votes running for mayor of Wasilla, Alaska than Joe Biden got running for president of the United States."
THE FACTS: A whopper. Palin got 616 votes in the 1996 mayor's election, and got 909 in her 1999 re-election race, for a total of 1,525. Biden dropped out of the race after the Iowa caucuses, but he still got 76,165 votes in 23 states and the District of Columbia where he was on the ballot during the 2008 presidential primaries.
FORMER MASSACHUSETTS GOV. MITT ROMNEY: "We need change, all right — change from a liberal Washington to a conservative Washington! We have a prescription for every American who wants change in Washington — throw out the big-government liberals, and elect John McCain and Sarah Palin."
THE FACTS: A Back-to-the-Future moment. George W. Bush, a conservative Republican, has been president for nearly eight years. And until last year, Republicans controlled Congress. Only since January 2007 have Democrats have been in charge of the House and Senate.
___
Associated Press Writer Jim Drinkard in Washington contributed to this report.
Non-Democrat's post has sadly shown how easy it is to generalize and demonize one's adversaries rather than to deal with issues -- much like most of what I've seen of the RNC this week.
On the contrary, I find that Progressive Christians believe very much in the Bible, we simply interpret it in a different way. While many hew to an earlier paradigm of accepting all of the Bible literally, we progressives study it from a "more-than-literal" view, to use Marcus Borg's phrase.
I cannot speak for Progressives of other faiths, but I am grateful for the instruction of an extremely erudite rabbi who taught my college class on Jewish mysticism. He explained that many Jews use what is known as the Pardes method of scriptural interpretation, or exegesis. Wikipedia gives this explanation:
"The Pardes typology describes four different approaches to Biblical exegesis in rabbinic Judaism (or - simpler - interpretation of text in Torah study). The term, sometimes also spelled PaRDeS, is an acronym formed from the name initials of these four approaches, which are:
"Peshat (פְּשָׁט) — "plain" ("simple") or the direct meaning[1].
"Remez (רֶמֶז) — "hints" or the deep (allegoric) meaning beyond just the literal sense.
"Derash (דְּרַשׁ) — from Hebrew darash: "inquire" ("seek") — the comparative (midrashic) meaning, as given through similar occurrences.
"Sod (סוֹד) — "secret" ("mystery") or the mystical meaning, as given through inspiration or revelation."
My instructor said that interpreting scripture by Peshat was a blessing, but he added that employing all of the methods brought even deeper blessing and understanding. In fact, the term Pardes is the root of our word Paradise.
All of us, in other words, could benefit from Capt. Picard's command on the Starship Enterprise: "Engage!"
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