Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
That's an interesting speech for a lot of reasons. SP delivers the standard "Are You As Ignorant As We've Trained You To Be?" cues to the crowd. The response is predictable (New York Times - boooo! USA - yaay!).
Is it all right for a Christian mother to be dishonest? To agree to betray the trust of people who desperately want to believe in her? Less importantly, is it a good idea to risk the credibility of her ticket, not to mention Republican control of the country for the next four years, on stuff that a fifth-grader can look up and debunk?* Evidently SP and the McCain camp say yes to all these.
This was a black-and-white crowd - yay picket fences! boo blowing up the Capitol! The ideal reflection of the black-and-white world SP presents. What's especially funny - or cruel - is to proclaim "America is a nation of exceptionalism" to a crowd which defines itself as unexceptional. They fear and resent the exceptional. They dont want to know from exceptional. And that's what Karl Rove's right counts on, and encourages and develops, and they've been successful - so far.
She implies Obama will raise taxes across the board. She implies that Obama, Ayers and a Halloween pantheon of terrorists all "pal around" together up there in Chicago there.
She counts on the crowd to not apprehend that poor old Ayers's radical days were 40 years ago - farther back even than McCain's Cinderella-adultery days. Her words reject examination of what created resentment against the Vietnam War and the powers that were, in the 60s (and by implication examination of any and all US war decisions). The incurious crowd applauds and cheers - "USA! USA!" "Yeah, USA! My kids! Your kids! Ronald Reagan!" "YAAAY!" That's the purpose of every Sarah Palin speech - to push those nationalist buttons and keep the sheep in line.
As always with the recent right, this speech's value is rooted in the negative. Its success hinges on the crowd's agreement to remain dull and uninterested. NOT to learn, NOT to question, but simply to Obey. This worked for the last seven years and 51 weeks. But insulting and discounting the independence and self-respect of the American people ultimately will be the Rovian right's undoing. They're hoping against hope that their base is the same gaggle of easily herded sheep that they were in 2000 and 2004.
Sarah Palin may be an incurious person, and she and her ilk expect you to be so too, to prove that you're good patriotic Americans. But in the end Americans will prefer to learn on their own, thanks, and will question and will turn against those who would manipulate and use them.
The content of this speech will be debunked probably today and will be in the trash with the Whitey tape by, I'll pick Tuesday. Along with SP's credibility and her followers' pride. Will it have been worth it?
Apparently we have a whole month of this to look forward to.
* Hope there are lots of classrooms doing this with all these speeches.
For some reason my link-tool isnt working so I have to fit this down here. When Palin talks about "exceptionalism," I wonder if she knows what she's saying (doubt it), and if her speechwriters arent being tongue-in-cheek (hope so). American exceptionalism - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I really don' think they should start this "guilt by association" tactic. McCain has been involved in some dubious organizations in the recent past, including right-wing, racist stuff. Of course some of you would probably applaud this association. Does he really want to go down this path?
At a campaign stop in Carson, CA, Governor Sarah Palin kicked of a calculated smear campaign against Sen. Barack Obama’s saying that his few encounters with controversial figure Bill Ayers, one of the founders of the group the Weather Underground, means that Obama is anti-American — and unfit to be president.
Video
Twenty year close friendship is hardly a 'few encounters'.
Remember when President Cheney turned up the vote for a democrat and there will be another 9-11 rhetoric ... well, now we have bizarro cheney doing the same thing.
And, the New York Times article concluded that he was not associated with Ayers. Read the whole article. Of course, I have now found out that John McCain is the true Manchurian candidate from reading these blogs and forums. Can't we just forget all of the accusations and inuendo and deal with facts and issues?
Obama in his own words admitted an association with Ayers. People in this country have been successfully dumbed down to accept any 15 min sound bite that will dispute his prior statement. If you want Obama then vote for him. I am sure he will be the next President and I will be voting for him or staying home. I am not happy about the choices we have. But let us be somewhat realistic, the smear campaign stated with te Obama camp and the popular media attacks agains Palin. Very unfair.
But let us be somewhat realistic, the smear campaign stated with te Obama camp and the popular media attacks agains Palin. Very unfair.
Are you joking? The right has been smearing Obama on a national level for two years. Sarah Palin was reciting an old favorite, a smear that was old before she was even pregnant with baby Trig. Before she was even Governor!
Why on earth do you say "the smear campaign started with the Obama camp"?
Are you joking? The right has been smearing Obama for two years. Sarah Palin was reciting an old favorite, a smear that was old before she was even pregnant with baby Trig.
Why on earth do you say "the smear campaign started with the Obama camp"?
"Yeah, yeah, Keating 5, cheating on the wife, that was all so long agoooo...get over it....can't you move onnnn...."
According to these people Bill Ayers was blowing up buildings - then skipping around the corner to meet Obama and have a good snicker - just last week.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
