Sarah Palin: The Ongoing National Embarassment

I'm going to say this very plainly: Sarah Palin is an absolute farce. Her public persona is so well shielded and crafted, that few of her supporters know how horrifically uninformed she really is. What's worse is that she has virtually no desire to learn more. Perhaps her supporters are just projecting their hopes and preferences onto her. She's been so well shielded from the press and from any sort of direct inquiry, that her overall ambiguity makes this projection fairly easy.

However, the ugly truth has been slowly leaking out. Recently, 60 Minutes featured an interview with several McCain campaign strategists concerning their choice of Palin as the GOP running mate:



Andrew Sullivan did a nice job summarizing the ignorance of Sarah Palin as revealed by her old campaign managers:

Palin had no notion of basic high school history. She barely understood what the Cold War was.
She didn't know what the Federal Reserve did. She believed that her First Amendment rights meant she was protected from press inquiries. She couldn't tell you why there's a North and a South Korea. And she had an inability to distinguish between her own view of the world - which always rationalized everything that Sarah Palin did - and reality.

While her complete lack of knowledge was appalling enough, what's worse is that she was chosen without any real consideration of her credentials or her stances on any of the major issues. When the McCain campaign realized her gross ignorance of even the most basic facts, they moved quickly to shield her from all media scrutiny. She conducted no press conferences and held only a few interviews with friendly media outlets such as FOX News. The only time the campaign managers let her speak on the record with a non-friendly interviewee was for the now infamous Katie Couric interview, where her shortcomings were laid bare for the world to see. Even after the campaign, Sarah Palin has continued her media blackout, refusing to speak with media sources that don't share her partisan views. The only time she divulges anything is through carefully controlled sources such as her book or her Facebook page.

As a result, her fans only know the crafted, fictional version of Sarah Palin. Any attempts to point out her obvious lies or gross ignorance are considered liberal smears. Palin supporters even insist the "smears" are why Palin stepped down from the governorship of Alaska, even though she never gave an actual reason. Besides, if she really wanted to escape the supposedly unfair "liberal" media, she would have dropped out of public life completely. But she hasn't. In fact, she continues to insert herself into the political dialog, holding up her Downs Syndrome child as a political prop (quite disgusting, really). But despite all evidence to the contrary, her supporters continue to believe she is "just like them" and that she would make the perfect president. I think projection is the obvious explanation for this. On most issues, Palin has remained purposely noncommittal except for the few issues that drive the Religious Right, including abortion, gay marriage, and patriotism (read, nationalism). Beyond that, no one really knows where Palin stands (it seems she has no idea either), and that makes it easy for her supporters to assume she shares their beliefs. After all, she unquestioningly loves Jesus and sticks to the party line on the major issues that Fundamental Christians care about. She must be exactly what they want, right?

Before I am accused of being a liberal, partisan hack, let me point out that a lot of liberals were guilty of the same problem with President Obama.  This is also why there's such a liberal backlash against Obama right now.  Too many projected their wishes onto him, and are now deeply disappointed he hasn't been everything they dreamed of.  However, President Obama differs from Palin in the fact that he never hid his views or his stances during the campaign.  He was always open to the press, and has largely followed his proposed agenda.  More importantly, he's knowledgeable of the issues and shows a remarkable degree of open-mindedness.  Sarah Palin is the exact opposite.

Frankly, I fear for the future of America if incompetent know-nothings like Sarah Palin can get anywhere near the presidency just because she's attractive and can convince enough people she's "just like them". It's a sign that America's infatuation with celebrity has risen to dangerous new heights.

One More Reason to Despise Hillary Clinton

I fully intended to write something completely unrelated to the Democratic nomination, but then Hillary Clinton came out yesterday and said something so mind-numbingly stupid, I couldn't just pretend like she hadn't said one of the most intellectually dishonest statements I've ever heard come from a politician's mouth (that's right, I said it).

Before we get to the stupid, let's see where Clinton stood on the issue back when the DNC decided to strip Florida and Michigan of its delegates for breaking the Party's rules concerning primary dates. This is from a campaign statement from last September that still resides on Clinton's website:

We believe Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina play a unique and special role in the nominating process.

And we believe the DNC’s rules and its calendar provide the necessary structure to respect and honor that role.

Thus, we will be signing the pledge to adhere to the DNC approved nominating calendar.

However, while campaigning in Florida yesterday, Clinton compared the DNC's decision to denying women's sufferage and civil rights. Then the real jaw-dropper came when she compared it to Zimbabwe's political woes:

“We’re seeing that right now in Zimbabwe," Clinton explained. "Tragically, an election was held, the president lost, they refused to abide by the will of the people,”

My first question is: where was all this outrage about voter disenfanchisement when she blessed off on the DNC's decision? If nothing else, these are outrageously hypocritical statements from a politician whose desperation for power has reached sickening heights. Second...I'm not even going to waste time pointing out how this is nothing like any of the instances Clinton referred to. The voters of Michigan and Florida knew going in that their votes would not count, which undoubtedly altered the results. If the voters of the states want to hold someone responsible, the fault lies with the members of their respective state Democratic parties who decided to break the rules int he first place. However, if the DNC is at any fault here, then just as much fault lies at Clinton's feet because she agreed to it at the time.

Besides, what about the poor voters in Michigan who wanted to vote for the Democrat candidates besides Clinton, but couldn't because Clinton's name was the only one on the ballot? If Clinton is such a great champion for voter rights, then when is she going to start fighting them?

And just to think, there was a time when I thought a Hillary Clinton presidency would be a good thing. Now I don't think she's even fit to serve in public office.

Hillary Clinton's Continued Descent Towards Insanity

You know, there was once a time when I would have happily supported Hillary Clinton as a presidential candidate. Sure, she was never my first choice, but I certainly agreed with her on virtually all of her policy stances. Then she became a sore loser and started acting like a Republican. Whether it was throwing out the idea that white people won't vote for Obama (even though he has trounced Clinton in the mostly white Midwest) or threatening to obliterate Iran, she has amazed me with her growing disconnect from reality and reason.

The simple fact remains that Hillary Clinton is losing by every possible metric, delegates, superdelegates, states won, and the popular vote. However, she now claims to lead in the last one, saying Kentucky's results put her ahead in the popular vote total. There's only one small problem. It's a lie. First off, she includes Michigan and Florida, which were disqualified in the first place. Whether it was right or wrong is irrelevant. Those were the rules all the candidates agreed to adhere to going into the contest. Then there's one other fudging to Clinton's math. She doesn't include the caucus states of Iowa, Nevada, Maine, and Washington because they never released vote totals (thanks to Markos for pointing this out). With those states included, Obama still leads, even with Michigan and Florida's results (via RealClearPolitics).

More than anything, this reveals Clinton's shameless hypocricy and her willingness to say anything for power. She decries the injustice of not counting Michigan and Florida while ignoring other because they use a different primary system and it's convenient to do so. It's downright disgusting. I know it shouldn't surprise me coming from a politician, but I want a leader who can face reality instead of mindlessly continuing with a lost cause. We've had more than enough of that with our current president, thank you very much.

Where I Stand on the Presidential Primaries

Since I'll probably devote a large number of keystrokes in the coming months to the presidential election, I figured I'd share my thoughts so you know where I'm coming from.

First, I've become a huge supporter of Barack Obama. Early on, I was pulling for John Edwards...until I heard Obama speak the night he lost the New Hampshire primary. The whole thing was and incredible speech, but one line in particular has stuck in my mind:

"In the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope."

I'll admit, after watching the Republican Party systematically destroy our nation domestically and on the world stage while the American people battled over trivial shit like abortion and gay marriage, I felt like an outsider in an increasingly backwards nation. This country felt less and less like home. But the nation's response to the Obama campaign has been amazing. It has shown that there are vast numbers of people who desperately want to but our country back on the right path.

However, I'm still skeptical that anything can be done. Far too many Americans insist America can do no wrong, and anything is justified if we do it. And far too many Americans simply don't care or don't pay attention.

Nevertheless, as Obama has said, there is nothing wrong with hoping for a better future because it compels us to do the work necessary to realize that future. That's the attitude we need to turn this nation around. Furthermore, the fact that Obama has focused on the issues that truly matter has been incredibly refreshing. He's the first candidate who has ever inspired me to donate to a campaign, and I'm clearly not the first as Obama's online fundraising has shown. I don't know if he'll be able to overcome the ignoramuses, but I have hope, and it seems huge swaths of the American people feel the same way.

As for Hillary Clinton, I was pretty much neutral towards her, but I intended to vote for her if she won the nomination. Never again will I vote for a Republican. However, she showed an appalling sense of entitlement to the presidency and proved she was no better than Bush in the way she surrounded herself with ideologues and sycophants. I probably still would have voted for her, but I would have been torn by the decision. Luckily, the delegate math makes it impossible for her to win at this point, and the superdelegates won't go against the votes of the people.

As for John McCain, I'm sure he would be an improvement over Bush, but he strikes me as hopelessly out of touch with the general mood in the country. Besides, after the sheer criminality of the Bush Administration, I don't think I can will myself to vote for a Republican ever again. Regrettably, I cast my first vote for president for Bush in 2004. I learned firsthand the perils of not paying enough attention, and I won't ever make that mistake again.

Anyway, I just wanted to establish my position on the whole thing since I sat out blogging during the interesting part of the primaries, alas.