While we have all been distracted by Hurricane Gustav and Hurricane Smear Palin, there have been some fascinating (and sometimes chilling) bits of news escaping our attention:
Sen Biden received 5 deferments from the draft before being declared “medically ineligible” to serve in Vietnam: Hey, I frankly don’t care. But if “it mattered” about Cheney, then “it matters” about Biden. The left has to figure out - once and for all - when “it matters” (did with Bush) and when “it does,” (didn’t with Clinton). Also, please decide whether this sort of stuff is condescending to women, once and for all. If Clinton was entitled to “one free grab” and Biden is entitled to “one free pat on the head” and Obama is entitled to a “sweetie” (which doesn’t actually seem that awful to me) then let us finally be clear about it?
That Chill Wind called “The Fairness Doctrine”: this made the hair on my arms stand up.
The Other Chill Wind: Change we ain’t never seen the likes of!
A very big deal you’re hearing nothing about: US hands over Anbar to Iraqi control. Yes, that Imperialist US.
A month of No Sun Spots: It means colder weather. Interesting factoid: The sun is largely responsible for climate change.
Casualties in Iraq, way down: Not compelling enough.
And because I can: Sarah Palin vs Barack Obama
These are not good people: I rare make a judgement on whether someone is good or not - because I’m not very good, myself - but these people are throwing bags of sand and cement off of bridges and at cars and buses headed to the RNC convention. Those are not good people. Correct me if I am wrong, but no such thing occured, I think, last week in Denver?
More later, when I catch my breath!
September 1st, 2008 at 8:10 pm
Anchoress you are posting faster than I can keep up with, and I have been knocked offline for one reason or another, so I hope you’ll forgive me if I bundle a few issues together.
It certainly matters to me that John McCain unequivocally reiterated a day or two ago that “waterboarding” is torture. And it matters to me that, unfortunately, his military service made him a hands on expert on torture courtesy of someone elses’ hands. It matters to me because he just might be our next President, and I want our next President to know the difference. Even if I don’t happen to have voted for him.
Whether someone served or didn’t is no reason to presume a lack of love in their country or an unfitness for public office. But how they respond to someone else’s military service matters a great deal. Does it matter to you how Barack Obama and Joe Biden have responded to John McCain’s military service? It matters to me.
Consider the following veterans: George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole, Daniel Inouye, Max Cleland, John Murtha, John McCain, and John Kerry. Can you tell me which of these men have not had their patriotism, their courage under fire, their honesty, or their honor attacked over the last eight years? I can. Do you think that it is coincidence that the three who haven’t are Republicans? I don’t. Have you ever heard any one of those men attack the patriotism, the courage, the honesty, or the honor of any of the others? I haven’t.
And that’s why it matters.
That any Democrat who serves is fair game for such attacks by people who presume the American Flag to be their own private suit of clothes, whether they personally have served or not, is one of the major reasons why the hatred that so distresses you exists and has reached such shrill levels.
It distresses me, too. It is horrible, as is all hatred, but it is not arbitrary or occult; it came from somewhere. So did the rough tactics of “rapid response teams” against further attacks, whether either the tactics or the attacks are justified or not. They both came from the same place.
The worst thing about where it came from is that the attacks on Democratic veterans because they are Democrats is not driven by hatred. It is orchestrated by important men in important offices and has been cold, calculating, deliberate, and cynical. And whether by coincidence or cause and effect, most of these important men have not served.
These men have sown the wind.
In the frenzied and hating themselves, the real dynamic is one of fear, as you have noted, leading to projective fantasy. One of the reasons I come to visit here is to keep from fearing you. For, yes Anchoress, even you, even Sarah Palin, and even Sarah Palin’s teenage daughter, can be feared; for much of what has been done by the important men in the important offices has been done in your name. And at least a little of it has been done with your cooperation. Your own archives testify to this if you read them closely.
And if you look at those same archives you can find instances where you also have succumbed to exactly this same projective fear. You are lucky, however. Your faith, your hope, and your charity has kept it from turning into hatred.
And for this I am very grateful, for I like you very much.
[Well, Joseph, I like you, too. And I'm not afraid of you. But I didn't post the info on Biden because I wanted to judge him. I frankly don't CARE about this issue, and I never implied that Biden doesn't love his country. What I care about - and if you read my archives, you know it, is the unending double standard. And yes, they exist on both sides, but since the left has been the dominant party these last 40 years of social change, and they've had the power of the press on their side, what we've seen again and again is that the double standards on the left move goalposts with astonishing speed. It's hard to keep up. So, Joe Biden's situation is almost IDENTICAL to Cheney's, and yet the Cheney deferments were hammered and hammered, and the Biden one will be shrugged off and tossed into the memory hole. It's the double standard that says "Al Gore's kid got arrested for driving 100 mph and with weed on him? No problem, this says nothing about his parenting or his ability to lead and down the memory hole (where I agree it belongs) Sarah Palin's daughter is pregnant? Why, she is a bad mother who needs to go home and tend to her children! Unfit for such a high office!"
That sort of double standard enrages me. And if you notice, I am not the sort of right wing blogger who carries on about whether "Obama is a muslim." Or "Obama's birth certificate." I criticized Hillary for playing that game, and right wing bloggers who went nutty over the certificate. I may occasionally dip a big toe into the extreme (less and less frequently, I think, as I read my older stuff; I do seem to be evolving) but I think you know I would never, not in a MILLION years, subscribe to the sort of extremely insane, unbelievable stuff they're throwing at Palin right now, even against Hillary, who I never liked but actually managed to defend a few times. My sense of fairness is probably flawed, but I lately see NO SENSE OF FAIRNESS AT ALL coming from the left - just an electric and viral need to go forward and forward, moving goalposts and saying anything they want, over and over, because they know that a lie repeated enough is all it takes. Is the right flawed and imperfect? Yes. Has its share of loons? Unquestionably. But you and I both know that what we are seeing here is unlike anything we've seen come down the pike in the last 20 years. As I said above, the Bush haters and the Clinton haters took a little time to get to "hate." The people who did not know Palin 3 days ago were able to fall into instant-lockstep of extraordinary and deep hate of her, and they went to the farthest extreme of that hate almost instantly. It is unnatural. It is almost supernatural. - admin]
September 1st, 2008 at 8:52 pm
“The people who did not know Palin 3 days ago were able to fall into instant-lockstep of extraordinary and deep hate of her, and they went to the farthest extreme of that hate almost instantly. It is unnatural. It is almost supernatural”
Two points -
1) that is one of the beauties of the internet
2) Your “supernatural” adjective just made me think of this: “He prowls around like a roaring lion …”
September 1st, 2008 at 9:54 pm
Working around the radio industry, I can say that the attitude among most in the business regarding the Fairness Doctrine is “never gonna happen.” Obama has said he wouldn’t support the return of the policy, which is not, of course, the same as McCain’s vow to veto it if it comes to his desk. (Not that McCain has been a great friend to the First Amendment, of course.)
Some in the radio industry say the Democrats would not support “fairness” legislation because it would take Air America and other liberal radio off the air. But others say politiicians would happily throw left-wing radio, which is, generally speaking, only marginally successful in terms of both ratings and revenue, under the bus to silence conservative talkers.
Still, the National Association of Broadcasters, whose job it is to lobby against these sorts of things, is not going to war over the Fairness Doctrine threat as yet. They may be waiting for legislation to be introduced, or they simply may not see it as a realistic possibility right now. I am not sure I agree, but they’re supposed to be the experts.
It may be worth keeping in mind that the old Fairness Doctrine was FCC policy, not a law passed by Congress, and was simply dropped in 1986 with no congressional involvement. If it comes back — under some other, less loaded name having to do with “access to media” — it will be through legislation. And if it passes the inevitable Supreme Court challenge, it will have teeth the old FCC policy never did, and it will be a lot harder to get rid of. (Also, remember that politicians — and this is not just Dems — have a terror of influential political speech by private citizens. And that’s almost the definition of the blogosphere.)
Also, as to whether this is about silencing political speech or just “balancing” opinions on the airwaves: Well, I can tell you how the project to bring back the Fairness Doctrine is being referred to in Washington: They’re calling it “Hush Rush.”
September 1st, 2008 at 10:13 pm
Well, I’m not sure about the supernatural, but I would agree with you that much of it is not fair. I have no problem admitting that very few people in the news business are right of center, while many are left of center. This does not inherently result in bias, but everyone has a tendency to assume “fair and balanced” bears a reasonable approximation to their own private judgment, and if everyone around you shares your politics, there is nothing to disturb your complacency in that regard.
I also agree that there is more than a little disingenuous refusal by left of center newscasters and newswriters to recognize this problem. I am not wholly sure what to do about this because modern “in depth” news reporting done in good faith–as opposed to op-ed opinion or analysis–requires the wisdom of Soloman to practice properly. A hot potato like this Palin story has no obvious boundary between reporting the news and making the news continue to happen. Is what a “high placed source” thinks the impact on the campaign will be news, or is it a manipulative attempt to create a self-fulfilling prophecy, or both together? If so, what do you do with it? If the blogosphere goes bananas in an orgy of misinformation and hateful rumor-spreading over the issue will reporting that fact make the situation worse? Or will ignoring it make it worse?
This is why I personally have gone to rss wire feeds for news, stopped reading newspapers, and confined my TV viewing to shows like Lou Dobbs or Keith Oberman which are self-evidently opinion varnished with a little news coverage for brighter sheen.
Thinking more about Palin, I think Maxed Out Mama may have tapped into something important. Palin herself is almost an archetype of everything that is emotionally attractive to Christian conservatives and emotionally repelling to secular liberals: white, rural, extremely assimilated and “non-ethnic” [what used to be called "a real American" before this became impolite], “self-reliant” in that Alaskan wilderness way, overtly Christian, forcefully anti-abortion, feminine in almost exactly the way that “strong grown-up women” are portrayed as television characters, and highly articulate on her own ground [and maybe off it, too, but we haven't had a chance to see this yet].
By the way, I haven’t run across her particular Christian denomination. Do you know it?
It seems to me that she is a near-perfect embodiment of what we love to love, or love to hate in our politics and that may be why emotions about her are running so high, so soon. I wonder what Dick Meyer will write about her?
September 1st, 2008 at 10:55 pm
“non-ethnic”
Of course, her husband is 1/4 Native Alaskan. That would be grounds for sainthood if she were a Democrat.
September 2nd, 2008 at 12:00 am
I have to say something here, and since it’s about those I love, it will be hard.
The members of my family aren’t as bad as anything that has been going on regarding Palin by a long shot, but I have felt for some time that graciousness is needed in discourse in this country. This is why I come here, to this site. Graciousness. I cannot find it in my own family, and so I must look for it elsewhere.
Thank you, Anchoress, for giving a model for everyone to follow.
September 2nd, 2008 at 7:04 am
WOW!!! The retreat came at the right time - kind of providential. Not only did your spirit get renewed but your thoughts (as reflected in your posts)have become clear and inspirational. God bless you and please provide a suitable prayer for the mom and her child.
September 2nd, 2008 at 8:34 am
“Non-ethnic” has to do with the appearance she gives and how she presents herself and her own identity. Every one of us are “ethnic” in our background sooner or later. Do you expect John McCain to eat haggis or wear kilts? I doubt that Sarah Palin attends drummming circles, sweat lodges, or regularly purifies her house with burning sage and sweetgrass. Now either of these people might do any or all of these, but if they do I have never run across it. I don’t intend to vote for or against either of them because of it, but if they do such things I certainly would find it quirky and interesting. Just as I would if Hillary Clinton had a hobby of flying model airplanes or doing Civil War reinactments.
And it is just the sort of quirky and interesting thing that so seldom gets written into the characters of those “strong grown-up women” on the TV shows, which are so often the fantasy “role models” we wish for our daughters. Do such women ever take time off in television dramas from being top flight lawyers or doctors, and caring wives and mothers, to dress up in Medieval garb as members of the Society For Creative Anacronism? Such quirky things, which perfectly ordinary people do routinely, seldom appear in the public persona of people in politics or the news business, either.
We read its absence as a marker of “assimilation” into our American “melting pot” and a narrative that the newsperson or politician shares “our” American values. Most politicans never quite fit this bland ideal in person, but every once in a while you get such a perfect fit. I suspect Sarah Palin may be one of these.