I missed blogging during my seven-month absence, but one reason I didn’t miss it as much as I otherwise might have is because of a sentiment perfectly summed up yesterday by an Andrew Sullivan reader:
During the months that have passed since John McCain “tapped” Sarah Palin to be his running mate, I’ve had more and more trouble reconciling the obsessive adoration of Palin by so many in the GOP, including a lot of my relatives, (some of whom are very smart and successful people) with the obvious dangers of having someone like her as president. The bizarre behavior. The vapid thinking. How do they not recoil at the smug way in which she wears her ignorance like a badge of honor? It’s just amazing to me how every word out of her mouth is taken as gospel, and when she can’t even answer a softball question without struggling to form a semblance of coherent opinion, they set off against the liberal media.
Never mind the implications of her “word salad” responses. It’s quite sad actually, especially for me to see how my own family has changed. There’s been this kind of de-evolution from a thinking, reasoned, disinterested opinion, into an irrational, crusading, narrow banded thinking process that has really made me step away from the words Republican and Conservative as labels that apply to me.
Amen. I never applied the “Republican” and “Conservative” labels to myself, but there were times when many others did (like 2002-2006), and I was certainly tiptoeing slowly in that direction, largely because I was so turned off by the Angry Left in all its irrationality and over-the-top hyperbole and intellectual laziness during that period. Then Barack Obama appeared on the scene, and things started to change. Suddenly the Left, with some exceptions of course, got its s**t together, while the Right, well, lost its.
Which brings us to today: instead of the Angry, Blame-America Left marginalizing itself into obscurity and near-oblivion, we have the Angry, Know-Nothing Right, doing the same. And this isn’t just about Sarah Palin. As I think Sullivan’s reader would agree, she is but a symptom (albeit a very prominent and important one) of a much broader trend toward disdain for knowledge and expertise; contempt for reason and logic that contradicts one’s preconceived notions; a total, willful blindness to self-contradiction, hypocrisy and deceit from one’s own side of any given debate; a belief that everything — everything — is black-and-white, and nuance simply does not exist; a deep, unrecognized cynicism masquerading as shallow patriotism; and a redefinition of the very notion of “truth” to mean “whatever is the opposite of what’s in the liberal media.”
Alas, I take little joy in blogging about this, for a number of reasons.
One is that it’s simply depressing. It’s terrible for the country to have the main opposition party/movement go off a cliff like the Republicans and (by and large) conservatives have, to where their only hope of recovery is some combination of declining popularity by the party in power (check!) and a public willingness to disregard the total, front-and-center intellectual vapidity of the alternative (we’re not there yet, but I don’t put it past us).
I felt the same way about the Angry Left back in the day, and I was right: amid all the bulls**t, the Left had some very important things to tell us back in those heady post-9/11 days, about Iraq and torture and whatnot, but we — myself included — weren’t listening, primarily because the movement had so thoroughly damaged its own credibility with over-the-top nonsense that it was nigh impossible to look past the crazy messenger and hear the sanity of certain parts of the message.
Today, I fear the Right has some very important things to tell us about deficit spending, overly intrusive government, and so forth. But again, the messenger is so deranged that the message gets distorted, and is consequently discarded by many thinking people who might otherwise be receptive to it. As I said, this is terrible for the country. But when I express my genuine angst about this, I sound like a concern troll. I know this. And there’s not a damn thing I can do about it. So that’s another reason it’s no fun to blog about the GOP’s severe case of Palinitis.
Then there’s this: the decline of American conservative thought seems so sudden that I can’t help but ponder two alternative possibilities: one, I’m completely off my rocker right now, conservatives are totally rational and sane, and I have a very bad case of Palin Deragement Syndrome; or two, I was completely off my rocker previously, and conservatives have always been irrational and insane. But ultimately, I don’t think either of these conclusions is accurate. I think my perception of what’s happened to the Right is accurate. In fact, when I really stop and analyze the evidence, this is pretty darn clear to me.
Which brings me to yet another reason I don’t like blogging about the decline of the Right: it makes me sound like one of those “If You Aren’t Outraged, You Aren’t Paying Attention” people. I hate those people! People who are so confident in their beliefs, they dismiss all opposing beliefs out of hand. People who say things like this:
As a candidate for national office, Sarah Palin is, was, and always has been a joke. A terrifying joke, but a joke nonetheless. The dividing line between conservatives who can perceive reality and conservatives who are blinded by their own biases is the ability to recognize this obvious and immutable fact.
Wait, I said that! And I believe every word of it! But that makes me one of those ideological scolds I can’t stand! And thus I am forced to choose between two unsavory possibilities: either I’m wrong about this (which, again, I have considered repeatedly, but ultimately strongly rejected), or else the ideological scolds are sometimes right (which means I’ve been wrong to dismiss them all these years).
All of this ideological angst is even less fun to work through on my blog due to the nature of my audience. Because, let’s be honest: the audience I built up, through all those Instalanches and other links from prominent bloggers over the years, was a largely right-leaning audience. Not exclusively, and therein lies one of the things I always loved about my old blog: its ideological diversity. But still, it was certainly more conservative than liberal. It’s easy to see why: my period of greatest blogospheric prominence coincided almost precisely with my above-mentioned period of drift to the Right (2002-2006). So it was mostly righty bloggers linking to me, and righty bloggers are read primarily by righty readers.
My old audience has yet to reconstitute itself fully here on the new blog — not even close, in fact. I’m getting something like 300 non-Google-search (i.e, non-Megan-Fox-boob-related) hits right now. But excluding my personal friends who comment here regularly, my active audience seems to still be pretty conservative. Some of them still like Sarah Palin. Many of them — many of you — don’t buy my arguments about the decline of the Right. And so here I sit, denouncing some of my most loyal readers as ideologically blinded fools who can’t see the obvious unseriousness of their movement and party at present. That’s not a comfortable position to be in! It’s so much more fun to bash Ray Nagin or John Kerry or Ned Lamont and get an Instalanche for it. 🙂
But alas, if I’m to be worth anything at all as a blogger, I have to be true to myself and my beliefs. And so here I sit, wondering why on earth I thought better of the September 7, 2008 blog post titled “Do we want an ‘average’ president?,” which I published for several hours and then converted to a draft because I was afraid it would feel like Palin Derangement Syndrome in the morning. And I suppose it does, but only because PDS is synonymous with sanity — all thinking people should have it. Anyway, I think the post stands up pretty well 10 months later, so I figured it might be fun to reproduce it here:
[WARNING: Extreme ranting ahead. This post is Andrew Sullivan-esque. And perhaps I’ll end up regretting half of what I say. But y’all keep telling me I should be honest in expressing my political views, and this is, honestly, where I’m coming from right now.]
Sam Harris on Sarah Palin:
Americans have an unhealthy desire to see average people promoted to positions of great authority. No one wants an average neurosurgeon or even an average carpenter, but when it comes time to vest a man or woman with more power and responsibility than any person has held in human history, Americans say they want a regular guy, someone just like themselves. President Bush kept his edge on the “Who would you like to have a beer with?” poll question in 2004, and won reelection.
This is one of the many points at which narcissism becomes indistinguishable from masochism. Let me put it plainly: If you want someone just like you to be president of the United States, or even vice president, you deserve whatever dysfunctional society you get.
(Hat tip: Andrew Sullivan.)
Of course, to point out that Palin’s “averageness” is not a qualification for the presidency is to be labeled an “elitist.” If I were to say that I do not want an “average person” to be the leader of the free world, I might as well announce my intention to go buy some arugula and eat it while wind-surfing. Such is the discourse in America today.
Likewise, it is “elitist” — and dismissive of small-town America! — to make the simple point that being a small-town councilwoman and mayor is not a presidential credential, and that being, briefly, a small-state governor, is a presidential credential of only limited utility.
And it is, I suppose, “sexist,” or a manifestation of liberal bias, or something, to argue (as that noted liberal David Frum has) that the American people simply do not have enough information about Palin to conclude that she is qualified to be the most powerful person in the world.
The most telling line in John McCain’s acceptance speech, for me, was this: “I’m not in the habit of breaking promises to my country and neither is Governor Palin.” It was telling because Governor Palin has never made a promise to her country. Her country had never heard of her nine days ago, for chrissakes! And now, in the near-total absence of real information about her, we’re being asked to take it essentially on faith that she could be president on January 21.
By contrast, Obama — say what you will about his level of “experience” vis a vis Palin’s — has been on the national scene for 4 years, and in the presidential spotlight for 18 months. We know a lot about him. He’s participated in countless debates, given countless interviews, made countless speeches, and been given countless opportunities to make revealing gaffes (and he has seized those opportunities on several occasions). There’s ample information about Obama to make a judgment about him. Your judgment might be different than mine, and that’s fine. But we have the facts necessary to reach a conclusion.
The same simply cannot be said of Palin. Absolutely cannot, period, full stop, end of discussion. She has been on the national scene for nine days. We do not yet have the information necessary to evaluate her. Does not compute.
Yet she — this woman who could be president in January! — is, incredibly, unbelievably, being placed in a media-free bubble for the foreseeable future… and anyone who objects to that simply doesn’t understand that Old Media is so last century. Who needs journalists asking tough questions when we have conservative propagandists shoving an alternate version of reality down our throats? They tell us Palin is qualified, they tell us she’s a maverick reformer, and that’s enough, dammit! How dare the liberal media demand facts to back up these assertions, or point out inconvenient truths that contradict them?
[UPDATE/CORRECTION: Since I first drafted this post this morning, the news has broken that Palin has deigned to grant ABC’s Charlie Gibson an interview. That’s an improvement, though it is not necessarily in conflict with Jonathan Alter’s prediction:
I’d imagine that Palin will dodge press conferences in favor of interviews with people like Sean Hannity, Larry King and Ellen DeGeneres. Then, when the media complain that she is being kept away, the McCain campaign will cite the half dozen or so interviews she has granted as proof that the campaign press is just bellyaching. Brief press “avails” on the plane will be useless, unless reporters ask open-ended queries designed to elicit proof of real knowledge.
That should get Palin through the next three weeks. By the end of the month, the McCain camp can say she has to go to ground to prepare for the Oct. 2 vice presidential debate, where expectations will be so low for Palin that she will likely emerge intact. It will be up to the press and public to raise enough of a stink about this, that Palin is forced to submit to real interviews with real questions that show whether her real-life experience is any preparation for assuming high office. In that sense, the Palin nomination is as much of a test of us as it is of her.
Hopefully the Gibson interview is a sign that McCain & co. are “blinking” in response to journalistic pushback against their detestable don’t-meet-the-press strategy.]
Anyway, truth is irrelevant; it is “biased” to shine a light on the multi-faceted disingenuousness of “the case for Palin” as it’s been made thus far. For instance: we’re told, repeatedly, that she “told Congress thanks but no thanks” on the Bridge to Nowhere, even though that statement is categorically a lie. More broadly, we’re told she’s a “maverick” and an earmark reformer, even though the most basic research into her record contradicts this, or at least muddies the picture substantially.
We’re told she has a record of lowering taxes, when in fact her record is mixed at best. We’re told she “balanced a budget” in Alaska, which, given Alaska’s massive federal subsidies, is about as much of an accomplishment as Bill Gates’s accountant bragging that he kept Gates out of debt.
We’re told she is clearly qualified to be vice president, and thus potentially president, after being told by the very same people that Obama is clearly unqualified. (At best — at best — you can argue that Palin’s experience is equal to, or slightly better than, Obama’s, depending on what type of “experience” you value. But in no way can you argue that his inexperience is so problematic as to be disqualifying, while hers is no problem at all. This argument cannot be made honestly and sanely. It is facially absurd. If you have made it, you should wash your mouth out with soap immediately.)
Further, we’re told she’s ready to take over the presidency of the United States, but can’t deal with the media right now because they’re being mean to her. (As McCain’s campaign manager put it, “Why would we want to throw Sarah Palin into a cycle of piranhas called the news media that have nothing better to ask questions about than her personal life and her children?” Piranhas? How would she fare against Putin and Ahmadinejad if she can’t handle Nagourney and Olbermann? Good lord.)
We’re told that her credentials are enhanced because Alaska is a “large state,” as if geographic scope, rather than population, is what really matters in such an analysis. We’re told that various forms of criticism of Palin are “sexist,” by the same people who have decried such overzealous politically-correct victimhood nonsense for the last three decades. We’re told she got more votes running for mayor than Joe Biden did running for president, which is simply false. We’re told she has foreign-policy experience because her state borders Russia and Canada, and because she’s the commander-in-chief of the Alaska National Guard; the absurdity of these arguments requires no elaboration. And on and on.
The case for Palin is based on a pack of lies, a combination of deception and self-deception, with a dash of hypocrisy thrown in for good measure. But to point out the facts that demonstrate these things makes one “biased,” or “sexist,” or some other such slur. (Apropos of which, a question for Glenn Reynolds, who has said, “perhaps the best reason to vote against Obama is to spare the country an administration that reflexively characterizes any criticism as racist.” Does that same reasoning not now apply to voting against McCain-Palin, as it seems clear that criticisms of Palin will be reflexively characterized as sexist?)
The utter cynicism of this whole charade has completely disgusted me, and caused me to lose a lot of respect for McCain and the Republicans. Yes, I once respected them. I once leaned toward McCain, even. But I now regard the McCain-Palin campaign as the rough equivalent of Hillaryland in terms of its sheer, audacious, over-the-top dishonesty and ridiculousness.
It comes down to this. As far as I can tell, the only rationales offered thus far in support of Sarah Palin for vice president are her “averageness,” her “toughness,” her femaleness, and a pack of lies relating to her alleged credentials. Oh yeah, and her ultra-right-wing conservatism, which you’d think would not have enough mass appeal to carry a national ticket to victory. Hence its being de-emphasized in favor of the first three “credentials” and the supporting cast of deceptive statements and outright lies about her record.
This is too much. I’m not “leaning” anymore. I’m voting for Obama. And I think I might just see if I can scrounge up $25 to send to his campaign. Just like Hillary did, McCain and Palin have turned me into an enthusiastic supporter of a candidate I have grave doubts about. Obama is not the perfect candidate by any means, but McCain-Palin must be defeated. This sort of dangerous nonsense cannot, must not, be rewarded.
[/rant]
That’s not a rant, that’s a well reasoned, if a little exasperated, critique of what was going on at the time. As one that tends to rant on occasion, I can tell you when you look back you don’t see a very good argument in a rant.
In regards to the phenomenon of people moving away from the right or left, or stepping away from the label of Democrat/Republican or conservative/liberal: I don’t understand this at all (well, half of it at least, I’ll get to that).
You should believe what you believe politically regardless of who is the political star or political villain supposedly representing your viewpoints at the time. If you are a conservative and you can’t stand Palin, how does that change what should have been your well-reasoned road to becoming a conservative in the first place? When Bush turned out to be a big spender, does that necessarily change whether fiscally conservative values have merit? No, just because someone claims to represent you and then does a poor job, it shouldn’t reflect poorly on your values. The same holds true for liberalism. I’m proud that I never abandoned the label liberal in those dark years.
Which brings me to the fact that people shouldn’t be so attached to being a Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Green, etc. The Democrats under the Bush administration were barely Democrats. Immediately after 9/11 they didn’t stand for much of anything at all. In Kerry as a presidential candidate they certainly didn’t stand for my values. Obama did, in a big way. Things change, parties are in flux. Any honest Libertarian would tell you Bob Barr is a pretty crappy Libertarian. The party elite aren’t always going to represent your values. It’s not the end of the world.
Staying true to your own values and standing up for them regardless of where this brings you down on a single issue is what’s really important.
See, now *that* was incoherent rant. 🙂
I understand how you feel perplexed by people who support Gov. Palin. (for the record, I am not a Palin supporter, but I really don’t see how she is any less capable or intelligent than almost every other governor and most politicians out there)
The reason I understand is that I found it difficult to understand why otherwise intelligent people could support Pres. Obama as a candidate. The man is at best an empty suit who has done nothing in his life but get elected.
But I would never treat Pres. Obama or his family in the shameful manner that Gov. Palin and her family were treated.
I really don’t see how she is any less capable or intelligent than almost every other governor and most politicians out there
I found it difficult to understand why otherwise intelligent people could support Pres. Obama as a candidate. The man is at best an empty suit who has done nothing in his life but get elected.
Examine what you’ve said for just a moment. I’m tempted to not even refute anything you’ve said, knowing that you know that what you’ve said is ridiculous on its face.
You’ve essentially tried to equate Palin and Obama here. And while Brendan has alluded to why that’s ridiculous, perhaps it’s not clear.
Let’s pretend for a moment that the fact that the fact that Palin bounced around majors and colleges like pin ball doesn’t indicate that she was a less than stellar student, let’s pretend that she was a good student. She was still, in this hypothetical world, a good student at crappy colleges. Obama, on the other hand, graduated in the top 10% of his class from Harvard Law. It’s my understanding that Palin did not graduate with honors. And note he’s not some goofball who got into a prestigious school and did terribly like Bush or Kerry. He was the real deal.
The man has done a lot more than simply get elected, from being a community organizer, President of the Harvard Law Review, a lecturer at University of Chicago, and serving on the board of several organizations. Not to mention writing two books.
What can Palin point to? Beauty queen and sports reporter?
So you were saying?
gahrie, I think that most people who are being honest could read an interview with Obama and an interview with Palin and immediately decide, simply based on the coherency of their answers, who they would rather have lead the country. Some people value complete sentences and logic. Other people apparently don’t.
I agree that the Left’s response to Palin was ugly and unfortunate, but I also thought that it provided one of the most human and ultimately brilliant moments of the campaign when a reporter asked Obama about Bristol Palin and he pointed out that his mother was a single teen mom as well. It was classy and even in her attacks on Lettermen, Palin went back to that moment and said we should follow Obama’s example and leadership.
I honestly can’t think of an example of Palin’s leadership that I would point to and say, “everyone should be inspired by that.” Can you?
“The man has done a lot more than simply get elected, from being a community organizer,”
Please remind me of what he accomplished as a community organizer. Many of those he worked with at the time claim that what few successes he did have were the work of others.
“President of the Harvard Law Review”
Again, what did he do? He wrote exactly one article, that he didn’t even sign, supporting abortion rights.
“a lecturer at University of Chicago”
Which means that he simply taught, and made no effort to do scholarly research or produce new knowledge like professors do.
“and serving on the board of several organizations.”
Come on….. You’re not going to pretend this was anything more than rent seeking? One of those boards was the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, an attempt at school reform which produced no improvement but spent millions of dollars and the others were boards that dispersed grants. (hmm..spending money with no effect and handing out money to special interests….I am beginning to sense a pattern)
“Not to mention writing two books.”
Tell me honestly how you would have reacted to a conservative politician who wrote two memoirs at his age with his degree of accomplishments.
At least you didn’t cite his stay in the Illinois legislature where he earned the reputation of voting “present” on the tough bills, and it is generally acknowledged that his few legislative succes were accomplished by a political machine.
Also you didn’t mention his two year term in the U.S. Senate, which was marked by his almost total absence while he ran for president.
I really don’t want to get into a defence of Gov. Palin. I am not a Palin-ite.
However….
“I honestly can’t think of an example of Palin’s leadership that I would point to and say, “everyone should be inspired by that.” Can you?”
Well, as mayor of Wasilla she reduced property taxes by 75%, I certainly think politicians at all levels should be inspired by that.
When she was appointed as the ethics supervisor to the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission ( the Comission is a very big deal in Alaska) she eventuually resigned in protest over ethics violations committed by members of her own political party. I definitely think people should be inspired by that. I wish our politicians had the courage to confront the wrongs of their fellow party members. (Can you say Dodd and rangel? I knew you could)
As governor, Palin refused a proposed 20% pay raise. I certainly wish more of our politicians would be inspired by that.
“President of the Harvard Law Review”
“Again, what did he do? He wrote exactly one article, that he didn’t even sign, supporting abortion rights.”
I know! It’s like he just bluffed his way into a position requiring incredible academic ability, hard work and the management of an insanely intelligent group of people. I’m sure it had nothing to do with fellow classmates saying that the guy was “on another level” in terms of ability.
“a lecturer at University of Chicago”
“Which means that he simply taught, and made no effort to do scholarly research or produce new knowledge like professors do.”
Yes, he merely taught at a world-class university and was well-regarded by his peers, most of whom were conservative. He was simultaneously a state legislator. It’s almost like he was opting to do real world work and make things happen instead of writing journal articles all the time. Empty suit.
With your standards, I wouldn’t want to defend Sarah Palin either.
Please remind me of what he accomplished as a community organizer. Many of those he worked with at the time claim that what few successes he did have were the work of others.
That’s the very point of being a community organizer. You organize people to do things for themselves. What you are saying is the equivalent of saying a football coach didn’t do anything special, that super bowl was really the work of others. Obama helped get a new jobs center in a place it was needed and helped get Asbestos removed from apartment buildings. Those are real accomplishments.
Again, what did he do? He wrote exactly one article, that he didn’t even sign, supporting abortion rights.
Yeah, the President of my company is an empty suit too. I write the programs all day, he hasn’t written any code since becoming President! Because the only thing the President of an organization can do is participate actively in the production of the primary interest of the company.
Which means that he simply taught, and made no effort to do scholarly research or produce new knowledge like professors do.
Oh noes! He didn’t do things like professors… because guess what… he wasn’t a professor! He was a lecturer. It’s still a huge accomplishment, and implies he has a much deeper understanding of the constitution than your average politician.
Come on….. You’re not going to pretend this was anything more than rent seeking? One of those boards was the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, an attempt at school reform which produced no improvement but spent millions of dollars and the others were boards that dispersed grants. (hmm..spending money with no effect and handing out money to special interests….I am beginning to sense a pattern)
Actually Break-through schools did do better than average. And god forbid that people spend money to attempt to improve schools. It’s not like they just threw money at a school either, this was a structured attempt to try new methodologies. That’s how research works. You try things, and they either work or they don’t. You learn from it. As to dispersing grants, what’s wrong with that? Are grants an evil thing to you or something?
Tell me honestly how you would have reacted to a conservative politician who wrote two memoirs at his age with his degree of accomplishments.
The books weren’t about his life’s accomplishments. I see no problem with younger politicians writing books. If Jindal wanted to write a book, I wouldn’t think that strange. I think he’d have an inspiring and interesting story to tell, with his background and becoming Governor in a state where you wouldn’t expect a non-white guy to win.
At least you didn’t cite his stay in the Illinois legislature where he earned the reputation of voting “present” on the tough bills, and it is generally acknowledged that his few legislative succes were accomplished by a political machine.
Actually he didn’t earn that reputation. The vast majority of his votes were yea or nays, and of the present votes, a plurality of the time he was voting present with a huge block of other state senators.
Also you didn’t mention his two year term in the U.S. Senate, which was marked by his almost total absence while he ran for president.
I don’t really like playing the “well at least he was better than” game, but he was there much more than McCain.
Well, as mayor of Wasilla she reduced property taxes by 75%, I certainly think politicians at all levels should be inspired by that.
Can you find a source for that 75% claim? It’s repeated everywhere but it looks like everyone links back to Wikipedia, which links to one article that says she cut property taxes, and another which is a dead link. Some goofball on Newsmax says it, and links to another newsmax article which actually says 40%. At any rate, I don’t buy it. Consider for a moment what it would mean to cut property taxes by 75%.
As to her pressing others on ethics violations, well, looks like it’s come back around on her.
If you are impressed by people who aren’t in it for the money, I guess you like Obama who could be earning a lot more in private practice than he even is now.
gahrie, I also couldn’t find any source material for cutting property taxes 75%. And moreover, I’m not sure I would count that as an accomplishment if it meant a concurrent cut in essential services like fire, police etc. So at best, that’s dicey.
As for refusing a pay raise, I think that if you search the halls of the Senate, you’d find many accomplished people who could be making a lot of money doing something else–doctors and lawyers who refused private practice for government work. I don’t see that as a badge of any particular honor for Palin.
And I’m not sure that I see the glory in resigning a position because she was unable to effectively lead in it to actually push significant ethics reform. It seems to me that she quit more to draw attention to herself than to actually reform graft in the system. And the sheer number of ethics complaints she’s had leveled against her makes me wonder about her own principles.
Try again, though. I’ve been searching for something to like about Palin’s leadership, but I’ve been disappointed.
I will simply go back to my original comment: It is not my job to defend Gov. Palin; and many of us on the right feel exactly the same way about those of you who supported Pres. Obama in the election as you feel about people who supported Gov. Palin.
Brendan, you fell for the conservative trap. You actually bought in to the idea of PDS (or BDS) as a legitimate widespread phenomenon rather than the cop-out excuse that it actually was. Admittedly there are some hard core lefties who hated everything Bush and/or Palin did or said because they were Bush and Palin, but the majority, i’d argue the vast majority of people in this country didn’t follow that same train of thought. As I tried, unsuccesfully, to teach Alasdair on your previous blog incarnations, there is a significant difference between these two arguments:
I am against X because its what person Y wants to do/did/does
I dissaprove of person Y because of the things (X1, X2, X3) that they have done/are doing/want to do.
I didn’t dislike Sarah Palin’s ideas because they came from her, I disliked Sarah Palin as a candidate because of the ideas she put forth.
BDS/PDS simply became an easy way for loyalists of each to dismiss any and all criticisms of their candidate they didn’t want to spend the time trying to defend, and frankly that was a lot.
I’m glad you didn’t spend too much time being sidetracked by worries about PDS, because frankly it would have been a waste of your time. She demonstrated in her words and actions that she was woefully unprepared and unqualified for the position. The same would have been true if she was a Senator from Virginia or a Governor from Alaska. Her latest move further solidifies those judgements. Who else would try to claim to not be a quitter right after doing just that?
gahrie, if you can’t objectively see the difference between Palin and Obama, I question your ability to objectively view anything.
David, amen to that. I think that equating Obama and Palin is like equating my cell phone and Optimus Prime. One is vastly cooler than the other. 😛
I have to disagree about PDS, though. I think it’s a legit phenomenon. There were people who wanted blood, people who assumed that her motherhood was a barrier to her capacity to function as a politician and people who villified her because she’s hot. People still say horrible things about her kids and while Bristol is 18 and has independently stepped into the spotlight, I think the rest should be entirely off limits. I think Palin has shown some of our nation’s worst political tendencies, both Left and Right.
I acknowledge that there are people who have treated Palin and her family absolutely terribly and there ARE people who hate Palin because she’s Palin, but the constant use of BDS and PDS to avoid the actually issues overstates it to a significant degree and is a cop-out used by people who are in love with Palin because she’s Palin and are therefore incapable of refuting the arguments against her.
She’s out of office now… can we please stop talking about her until she does something – like publish a book – to step back into the spotlight? Can’t we let her go the way of Dan Quayle and fade into the recesses of our collective memory?
I think the right will be fine in America. Obama has yoked himself to the stimulus, which while well-intentioned, is increasingly a source of suspicious diversion of funds toward other state priorities, as several commenters have pointed out. That vaunted pledge of “no more than 8% unemployment with the stimulus” – how’s that going?
The right’s strength has always been that they were the movement of the Corleones, led by folks like Vito or Michael, unafraid to do what is “best” for America, unlike their bleeding-heart “librul” counterparts. The right has been extremely unlucky in the following regard: the last three Presidential cycles, they’ve had candidates from Corleone-quality families. Problem is the candidate has been Fredo each time.
Clark Clifford made it into history by labelling President Reagan “an amiable dunce”. Most historians, and most of us, consider Reagan to be the best President of our lifetimes and one of the four or five best in history. But few people openly combat Clifford’s description. After all, Reagan did eat tv dinners in front of Wheel of Fortune (think Martin Short as Ed Grimley). Lack of big intelligence didn’t stop Reagan, and it didn’t have to stop Palin either.
I suspect that part of the problem with Palin as an “effective dunce” is that she broke national under Fredo McCain. Its understandable that the right wing would play up McCain’s heroic captivity during the election cycle – people want to win after all – but the rest of his narrative is terribly unimpressive. McCain is a guy who was sitting in the cockpit of a plane accidentally hit by a missile on the USS Forrestal, causing the greatest single loss of Naval men since WWII. As McCain’s burning plane set off a chain reaction of bombs and explosions, his fellows bravely fought the conflagration and several lost their lives. McCain ran away.
It will get better for the Republicans. Just a bit of bad luck – they got the wrong Corleones. Their luck has to change.
Brendan, I’ve followed the same political path as you over the last two years. I regularly mocked those on the left who appeared to suffer from BDS. I realize now that while the Kos Kidz were indeed pretty nuts, many of bloggers who I disregarded were actually completely reasonable and on stronger logical ground than my positions were. I supported the Iraq war prettly blindly from the get-go, using the logic that even if know WMDs were ever found, the war was still justified on the basis of removing a brutal dictator and helping spread democracy. I ignored the whole “democracy doesn’t come from the barrel of a gun” argument, and I shouldn’t have. I ignored the early charges of torture and lack of due process, and I shouldn’t have. Though far, far less grevious, the experience made me understand, just a little bit, the road the German public must have been going down in the late 30’s. How easy it is to choose which arguments to listen to and which to ignore. How you can paint a palatable world view inside your own head that doesn’t match reality. 9/11 shook up all our brains, and I am not surprised many otherwise intelligent people allowed ourselves to go down that path as long as we did.
But it is important to be honest about that now, and more importantly to look at what is left of the right and figure out who is holding on to that alternate reality and who has let go of it and is trying to help conservatives build a new foundation of fiscal prudency, accountability, and national security without aggressive warmongering.
And it is important to call out the old guard for what they are, and to see them thoroughly defeated. It is the best way to give our future conservative leaders a chance to step forward without being squashed by a brigade of Rush Limbaughs, Dick Cheneys, Karl Roves, Sarah Palins and the rest of them.
So yes, political blogging for conservatives is no fun right now. There are still too many left with their heads in Bush-era delusional cloud, and they will bite your head off in the comment section every time you speak the truth. But they are wrong, their numbers are dwindling, and by sticking to your guns you’ll wake up one day and find you aren’t in the minority anymore, and politicql blogging will be joyful again!
To Matthew’s argument above: seems like the reality of electoral politics may prevent the types of candidates you desire coming from the Republican party. Here’s why –
– We’re 11 Presidential cycles since Goldwater took the confederate south from the Democrats. In those 11 elections the Republicans are a solid 7-4. Three of the losses were to popular hillbilly governors from the confederate south. The fourth is McCain, who famously questioned the integrity of evangelicals in the confederate south – an idiocy almost better for his Democrat opponents than a hillbilly southern governor on their own ticket.
Since Goldwater, easy conversion of the Republican L (Mountain West, Plains and Confederate states) is critical to Republican Presidential success. People like to talk about the importance of swing voters, but when you can win the 200+ electoral votes in the Republican L – before you’ve spent your first dollar – you’re at a huge advantage to overrun with resources the remaining necessary swing states.
This would suggest that the most attractive Republican candidate is the one who can get the 200+ EV from the Republican L for free. What does such a candidate look like? In the West, s/he is independent with an anti-establishment streak. In the Confederate south, s/he is an evangelical Christian, probably also suspicious of book learning.
For all his many talents, its impossible to imagine a highly experienced and successful executive like Mitt Romney winning the confederate south without having to fight like hell for those electoral votes. He just doesn’t have the right profile.
And for all she apparently lacks, its easy to see that Palin has the potentially magic combination of independent streak, evangelical Christianity and dubious intelligence that could win the Republican L for free.
Its terrible to say, but its hard to imagine a Republican Party any time soon preferring a Romney-type to a Palin-type based on these considerations.
You know the whole “Republicans are dumb” meme is getting really tired.
Fine gahrie, stop ignoring science you don’t like and trotting out candidates like Palin, then we’ll talk.
Gahrie, Romney’s executive accomplishments and leadership skills eclipse those of any other national candidate of the last several years. There’s no doubt that he, and many other Republicans, are very very smart.
Its the residents of Alabama that we wonder about.
Jazz, I think you are correct – there isn’t a recipe for a Republican victory that I know about that doesn’t include the core Republican states. And I agree that candidates who speak clearly about their Christian faith are far more likely to win those states. But is the “dubious intelligence” part really required? George Bush Sr was clearly an intelligent man and he pulled it off. I think we could have a candidate who was a Christian who also respected logic and science, human rights and history. Just because it isn’t happening now doesn’t mean it can’t happen.
Matthew, I agree with you that Bush 41’s intelligence and accomplishments are both impressive. I also share your hope that another like him can succeed in winning the Republican L without wasting a lot of effort.
If its true that “inexpensive” wins of the Republican L require some combination of anti-establishment/independence/paranoia (for the west) and/or Christian evangelicalism + anti-intellectualism (for the confederate south), consider those other 6 (ex-Bush 41) Republican winners since Goldwater.
You’ve got two for an anti-establishment paranoid guy (Nixon), two for a not-particularly-intellectual “amiable dunce” (Reagan), and two for a guy who threw in some Christian evangelicalism to go with his anti-intellectual equity (Bush 43). Unfortunately, Bush 41’s record of accomplishment and intelligence seems more the exception than the rule in that group.
Worse, Bush 41’s second campaign resulted in one of the most difficult-to-explain losses in modern Presidential history. But as bad as losing to the back-from-the-dead Clinton was, Bush 41 came thisclose to losing to Dukakis, a candidate who was not only awful but had nothing to offer that was remotely threatening to the states in the Republican L. That Bush 41 almost lost to Dukakis as well is not encouraging in the hope for folks like him to be the future of Republican electoral success.
This thread is pretty ironic at this point considering the following story:
http://article.nationalreview.com/print/?q=NzdiYTliN2MwYmJiNWY4OWVlZTA4ZmIwYzJkMjFjOGI=