Palin ATTACKS & BERATES Own Supporters!
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Palin ATTACKS & BERATES Own Supporters!
| Mon, 10-13-2008 - 11:18pm |
Palin is coming unhinged! She's feeling the pressure of Troopergate. lol.
| Mon, 10-13-2008 - 11:18pm |
http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2008/10/13/palin_rally/
Long story, but worth your time.
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No time to cry wolf
It’s right to be afraid of Sarah Palin and the outcome of the election. But still, we have to have faith.
By Anne Lamott
http://www.salon.com/mwt/feature/2008/10/14/anne_lamott/index.html
Reuters photo (left)
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, left
Oct. 14, 2008 | My pastor once said that you can trap bees on the bottom of a jar without a lid because they won’t look up. They walk around frantically bumping into glass while, one presumes, muttering.
I’ve been feeling like that lately, in these last weeks before the election. I feel trapped on the bottom of the TV jar, frantic, buzzing, bummed. It was largely due to having to see and hear Sarah Palin every time I turned on the TV or radio. Has there ever been, at least in the last 10 years, a more thoroughly repellent American? I mean, besides Lou Dobbs? But Lou Dobbs is easy to avoid, and he’s not a moron, he’s a jerk. But Palin is as ridiculous as the competitors from Monty Python’s Upperclass Twit of the Year competition, jumping over hurdles that are nothing more than a stack of matchbooks. Yet many suggested Palin’s debate was a tie, that she had “succeeded,” apparently, because she failed to lapse into witchcraft incantations or talk about her lady parts. Camille Paglia, writing in this publication, referred to her as nothing less than the new feminist idea.
During the worst of last month, when John McCain was rising in the polls and the market was crashing and George W. Bush was popping in and out of the White House doors like a guy in a cuckoo clock, people told me that there was nothing to fear but fear itself. Hah. What about a nervous breakdown? What about the weight gain that came one pound at a time, in step with McCain’s rise in the polls? What about the specter of financial ruin? The anxiety has been purgatory — not heaven, not hell, but perma-suck. And I haven’t even gotten to my own private wolf attack yet.
But how can you dwell on your own (pitiful) encounter with a wolf when so much of the national dialogue has been about the variety of large, majestic mammals that Palin enjoys killing for sport? When I first heard about Palin, I felt as though Dick Cheney had prematurely come back from the dead — another Strangelovean Christian shooter. (When Cheney accidentally shot his best friend in the face, they were on a ranch for fancy right-wing Christian shooters. Are there undisclosed locations where, if you know the right people, you can club baby seals, or harpoon whales?) However, Palin is not smart like Cheney. In fact, I don’t even think she’s as smart as Bush. And the thought of enduring another dense and incurious leader in the White House is terrifying. The world has roared with laughter at Bush, has routinely voted him the most dangerous man on the planet — and, in some cases, has actually recoiled from him as though from hot flame. Remember the look on German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s face when Bush snuck up behind her at the dinner table and massaged her shoulders? Can you imagine, for one moment, what she would make of a Palin presidency?
But Bush is so five minutes ago. And besides, some otherwise reasonable people choose to believe a kind interpretation of Bush Jr. — that he was naive and well intentioned, convinced he heard the voice of God. He spoke to a higher father. Every so often, glimpsing the smug and gregarious ignorance of Bush, I’d be reminded of Helen Mirren playing Elizabeth II in the 2006 film “The Queen,” when she says to the newly elected Tony Blair, “Mr. Blair, you are my 10th Prime Minister. Mr. Churchill was my first. He sat right there.” In other words: Tick-tock, tick-tock.
Last week was better, and the trapped-bee feeling abated somewhat: Barack Obama’s polls were rising, and the crowds at Palin rallies became so toxic that famous Republicans like Christopher Buckley had to backpedal or jump ship, lest they be associated with her. She still has a few staunch friends. Of course, even Richard Nixon had loyal friends at the end, or at least “friend”: that nice Bebe Rebozo.
But we still have 21 of these nerve-rattling days to get through. Race is still an unknown factor; one of the savviest people I know says Obama will poll ahead by 10 points but only win by 3. On top of this, the Wall Street wolf has now arrived at the door, snarling and gnashing its teeth. (Hang on, I will tell you my wolf attack story in a moment.)
So with all of this going on so close to home, how can we hang on, take care of one another, make a difference, live lives of purpose and dignity and joy — without losing our minds?
I will tell you: Remember the bees, and look up. Don’t stare at the bottom of the jar in which you are trapped. Turn off the TV for half an hour, and look up. Don’t look at the Wall Street traders in their distressing guise as bees, trapped on the floor of the exchange. They are not prisoners, like the bees; they are volunteers. Instead, look up at your computer and find a good charity site where you can send whatever you can afford. Go to
Unfortunately, Most of Sarah and McCain's attacks are