Is Sarah Palin dangerous to your mental health?
I ask because the madness she has inspired in the Left is extraordinary and apparently unstoppable. Already, a week or so into the Sarah Saga, we have been treated to all manner of extravagant ravings about the Governor of Alaska. But level of vituperation, not to say insanity, just keeps going up. The worst to date? Difficult to say, but Glenn Reynolds points to a particularly alarming outburst posted at Salon. When John McCain announced that his pick for Vice-President was Sarah Palin, writes Salonista Cintra Wilson ,
I thought, “Damn, a hyperconservative, fuckable, Type A, antiabortion, Christian Stepford wife in a ’sexy librarian’ costume — as a vice president? That’s a brilliant stroke of horrifyingly cynical pandering to the Christian right. Karl Rove must be behind it.”
Nice stuff, eh? The sad thing is, I suspect Ms. Wilson really does believe Karl Rove is behind it all. Pathetic, really.
Ms. Wilson’s effusion is worth reading–not, I hasten to note, for its substance, which is nugatory, but rather as a specimen in the archive of political hysteria. The combination of crudity, paranoia, and delusion is breathtaking. My favorite line: “She is not just pro-life, she’s anti-life.” Parse that one, Virginia, and let me know when the patient emerges from the ether.
pajamasmedia.com
Comparing Sarah Palin to… Osama Bin Laden?
Welcome to the new populist "progressivism," brought to you by Juan Cole.
These are strained times for the political left. Despite the historic rise of Barack Obama, the Democratic Party has for quite some time been struggling to re-imagine itself beyond Clintonism, beyond identity politics, and beyond the shallow ravings of MoveOn.org. Thus far, Obama has mainly succeeded at the last of these when he made a scolding reference to the “General Betray Us” ads, noting that, “a general providing his best counsel on how to move forward in Iraq was accused of betrayal.” But efforts to articulate a reasonable leftist polity aren’t getting any easier. No matter how much poise or good judgment Senator Obama has shown with regard to the media attacks on Sarah Palin, Juan Cole’s most recent piece for Salon magazine suggests that some of Obama’s most damaging foes may in fact lie to his left.
The title pretty much sums it up: “What’s the Difference Between Palin and Muslim Fundamentalists? Lipstick.” For the last eight years, as far as some on the left have been concerned, George W. Bush has been Hitler. Now Sarah Palin is bin Laden. Welcome to the new populist “progressivism,” brought to you by Noam Chomsky, Michael Moore, Keith Olbermann, and Juan Cole. Don’t like someone on the right? Just draw analogies between that person and some mass murdering tyrant (who yesterday you probably bent over backwards to defend as an agent of resistance to U.S hegemony)...
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