Sarah Palin's justifiably unjustified egomania

In nearly two years of posting and over 200 posts, I have written two pieces in which Sarah Palin was the primary focus. And one of those was a rather terse mocking of her reality show. Beyond these, I haven’t given Palin much thought because I assumed she would gradually fade from the spotlight. After all, resigning midway through one’s term as governor of one of the least populous states is hardly the move of a person who wishes to be considered a serious figure in American politics.

Alas, my optimism has been misplaced. Nearly two and half years after she was desperately thrust onto the national scene in a Hail Mary tossed by the tired arm of political journeyman John McCain, Palin somehow remains aloft. Much of this is her own doing, of course. She has written two books, has her own television show, is a Fox News contributor, and gives innumerable speeches to anyone willing to cough up a $100,000 speaking fee plus airfare. For that price, Palin will lecture an audience for 45 minutes about the honest and industrious nature of Real Americans, the virtues of American Exceptionalism, and the necessity of lowering corporate tax rates. She will manage to talk about these subjects and more, while managing to say hardly anything at all.

Then there is the media—both liberal and conservative—which tells us on a regular basis just how important Sarah Palin truly is. Fox News cannot get enough of their darling political dynamo, and neither can MSNBC and the Huffington Post for different reasons altogether. Truth be told, the latter outlets and their ilk have done more to keep Palin in the limelight than anyone else. Her critics are so numerous that an entire industry has been built around her ridiculousness, which provides an ample supply of malapropisms and other buffooneries to fuel its forever-burning furnaces. The thing about Palin-bashing is that it is so easy even a politically aloof person with barely a shred of common sense can partake. If I had the stomach for it, I could update this site daily using only Palin’s Facebook page and Twitter feeds as my inspiration. But there wouldn’t be much fun in that.

The same can be said for her speeches, though I imagine she bears little if any personal responsibility for their content, however superficial it may be. A case in point: this recent video is both a defense of her vague use of gun-related rhetoric and symbols, and an attack on those who suggest a relationship between that and the recent mass shooting in Arizona. Ever the victim of the “lamestream media” which she loathes but nonetheless profits handsomely by, Palin accused her accusers of engaging in a “blood libel” against her. Few contexts would provide a more inappropriate and might I add, bizarre venue for this term, which refers to the belief held by some medieval Christians that Jews murder gentiles in order to use the blood of their victims in ritual sacrifice.

Palin has encountered some harsh criticism for her use of the term, and she ought to have. But personally I doubt she even knew what the term meant, and it was probably written into her speech by someone who is paid to write her speeches. We may even see Palin eventually admit that she was not actually the one to author that line so as to deflect some of the blame.

Of course, people should not be as surprised by her “blood libel” remark as they actually are. Since bursting onto the scene Palin has been a wellspring of imaginative metaphor and dramatic rhetoric. For her, such an oratorical approach is necessary to obscure the obvious reality that there is very little substantive thought going on in her mind. This works to her advantage since, were it not for gems like, “blood libel,” “mama grizzlies,” “death panels,” “refudiate,” etc., there would hardly be any reason to pay her much attention. But every colorful new term she utters has the surely anticipated effect of keeping her in the spotlight for another week more. And if the publicity takes the form of a castigation from Keith Olbermann or Rachel Maddow, that’s just as well, because the Real Americans Palin appeases figure that if the liberals be against her, how could god-fearing people like themselves not be with her?

The natural consequence of all this is a Palin-Mainstream Media dynamic that is continuously reinforcing itself. Palin provides the gaffes. The media reports them, with the liberals doing so derisively. And in turn Palin wears these lashings like a badge of honor to show her fans how they persecute her so. It is not entirely clear whether Palin actually suffers from the sort of persecution complex suggested by her rhetoric or not. Either way, she has become very adept at portraying herself as the target of an unceasing medley of malicious mockery. She is partly right. The liberals in the media do mock her, but the mere act of doing this—especially on a such a constant basis—is an implicit declaration that she actually matters. There is one problem with this, however.

She doesn’t.

- Max

max.canning@gmail.com

Palin Inks Multimillion Dollar TV Deal

Sarah Palin is close to striking a deal with Discovery Communications for her Alaska travel reality show—even with her asking price reportedly close to $1.2 million per episode...

…It is still undecided which Discovery Communications channel the show would go on. It could fit with mom-friendly TLC (the “L” is meant to stand for learning) or on the Discovery Channel.

NBC Philadelphia

Sarah Palin on The Learning Channel?

Dfsil4ugfdkf98y6lkjkjgzz!

Sorry, but I didn’t know how else to convert a cerebral aneurysm into onomatopoeia.

Since last summer when Palin quit the governorship of Alaska and oddly declared, “With this decision, now, I will be able to fight even harder for you,” she’s demonstrated just how full of shit she was and still is. How can a governor “fight harder” for her constituents by quitting? It’s the highest office in the state! What the fuck?

Anyway, since then Palin has been fighting harder for Alaskans by signing a multimillion dollar book deal, getting Fox News to pay her to promote herself, collecting $100,000 speaking fees, and now by inking a reality television deal that will pay her Seinfeld money.

You’re welcome, Alaska.

- Max

Conservative Professor Wants GOP Bullshit Taken More Seriously

Last week, Professor Gerard Alexander from the University of Virginia wrote the most whiney and self-pitying Op-Ed piece I’ve ever read in the Washington Post. Titled, “Why are liberals so condescending?” Alexander launches into the standard woe-is-us conservative cant about how liberals are a bunch of meanies because they don’t give conservatives their due respect, saying at one point,

This condescension is part of a liberal tradition that for generations has impoverished American debates over the economy, society and the functions of government – and threatens to do so again today, when dialogue would be more valuable than ever.

Of course, conservatives never do stuff like this, right Professor Alexander?

Of course, plenty of conservatives are hardly above feeling superior. But the closest they come to portraying liberals as systematically mistaken in their worldview is when they try to identify ideological dogmatism in a narrow slice of the left (say, among Ivy League faculty members), in a particular moment (during the health-care debate, for instance) or in specific individuals (such as Obama or House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, whom some conservatives accuse of being stealth ideologues). A few conservative voices may say that all liberals are always wrong, but these tend to be relatively marginal figures or media gadflies such as Glenn Beck.

Remember back in the Bush days when anybody who criticized the president or his idiotic war in Iraq was labeled “anti-American” or was accused of giving aid and comfort to the terrorists by Vice President Dick Cheney no less? Remember when Cheney said that a John Kerry victory in the 2004 presidential election could lead to another terrorist attack? Remember last summer when former Republican Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin, and several GOP members of Congress such as Chuck Grassley claimed that Obama’s health care plan would establish “death panels” to decide the fate of the nation’s elderly? Remember when Republican congresswoman Michele Bachmann called for a House Committee on Un-American Activities redux? Remember how numerous mainstream media conservatives called (and are still calling) Obama a socialist who is seeking to destroy the country? These aren’t “marginal figures,” as Alexander claims. These are very mainstream conservatives within the Republican Party. And time and again American conservatives have shown themselves to be quite willing to steer public debate down a road that leads nowhere. That’s the GOP’s modus operandi. Calling war opponents un-American and saying health care reform proponents advocate death panels is designed to stifle debate, not spark it. How do you argue with someone who believes that the current administration wants to kill old people? How do you argue with the tea party folks who think Obama is the second coming of Hitler or Mao? Such people cannot be engaged in a rational discussion and indeed are often the target of derision from liberals. So yes, liberals can be condescending sometimes, but Alexander should take a look at what the target of that condescension is. And if anything “has impoverished American debates over the economy, society, and the functions of government,” it’s the conservatives’ absurd narrative that they, and not the “godless,” “socialist,” liberals, make up the “real America” (Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck) who are in favor “family values,” as if liberals could not possibly claim likewise.

The current flap over the Obama administration’s handling of the underwear bomber is a perfect example. He’s been treated no differently than the shoe-bomber Richard Reid was by the Bush administration. And yet, conservatives in the House, Senate, and media have been eviscerating Obama for doing exactly what his predecessor did, which these same conservatives voiced no concerned about then. It does not matter to them that the mirandized Abdulmutallab is talking to the FBI and providing them with information about his contacts in Yemen and Nigeria. All that matters is that the GOP sees an opportunity to spout the predictable platitudes about how Obama and liberals in general are weak on terrorism.

But whenever conservatives are called on their bullshit, they play the indignation card and accuse liberals of being condescending. It’s a neat rhetorical trick: warp the debate by making outlandish or hypocritical claims, and then when the opposition points out how ridiculous those statements are, accuse the opposition of being condescending. Conservatives have perfected this debate tactic, and as a result are almost always on the offensive.

The Sarah Palin phenomenon is a typical example. Liberals have subjected her to a never-ending onslaught of criticism and mockery. Why? While conservatives think it’s because liberals are mean and condescending, the fact is, Palin is so obviously unqualified and ill-prepared, that they consider it an insult that John McCain tried to force this woman on us as a viable Vice Presidential candidate. As Christopher Hitchens asked after this dubious VP selection, “What do you take me for?”

But conservatives don’t see it this way. They see liberals attacking Palin—who keeps inserting herself in places where she knows she will garner lots of national attention—and assume that it’s the liberals who have the problem. Forget the fact that Palin has never articulated what it is that she stands for. Forget the fact that Palin clearly has no ability to discuss important national problems in a substantive manner. No, the problem is with the liberals who resent the fact that John McCain picked the hottest MILF at the local high school hockey game to be his Vice Presidential running mate. How dare these liberals demand that our candidates for high office be more qualified than their next door neighbors.

I suppose Alexander and his fellow conservative whiners would chalk up this post to more “liberal condescension.” Fine. But if you’ve been following this site, my condescension comes in proportion to the ridiculousness and stupidity of the things I’m attacking. My level of respect toward an idea or person is generally correlative to the level of seriousness of that idea or person. I have no patience for, “Obama is Hitler” (teabaggers), “This health care plan will kill your grandmother,” (Palin, Grassley), “Gay marriage is a threat to family values” (any anti-gay conservative) or any other garbage that Republicans try to pass off as serious dialogue. If conservatives want liberals to stop being so condescending, they can start by forming some reality-based opinions on the pressing issues of the day.

- Max Canning

In America, Israel Always Gets Free Pass

The first rule of the American media’s Middle East “reporting.”

During her recent interview with Barbara Walters, Sarah Palin said this about the illegal Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories:

“I disagree with the Obama administration on that,” Palin told Walters. “I believe that the Jewish settlements should be allowed to be expanded upon, because that population of Israel is, is going to grow. More and more Jewish people will be flocking to Israel in the days and weeks and months ahead. And I don't think that the Obama administration has any right to tell Israel that the Jewish settlements cannot expand.”

In other words, if you’re a Palestinian who’s been evicted or whose home has been razed by Israeli bulldozers in violation of international law to make way for some Jewish settlers, too fucking bad for you. The population of Israel is going to grow, and after all, they’re people. Palin’s answer is very disturbing, and its rabid, pro-settler rhetoric goes beyond even the usual Israel-friendly shtick from American conservatives. But while Palin’s rhetoric is unusual in that it seems to give blanket approval to all Israeli settlements, the fact is, her answer basically reflects the actual policy of the United States government on this issue. Unsurprisingly, nobody in the American media has batted an eyelash at this statement, or even reported on it, for that matter.

When it comes to reporting Israel-Palestine issues, the American press is absolutely atrocious. Thus, it is not surprising that most Americans have no substantive understanding of the issues at hand, Sarah Palin included.

For example, a vast majority of Americans have no idea that in its assault on Gaza late last year and early this year, Israel used chemical warfare in the form of white phosphorus bombs. Officially, the conflict was called the Gaza War, but the casualty figures indicate that “war” might not be an appropriate term. The following statistics are from B’Tselem, an Israeli human rights group. Their findings were consistent with other organizations such as Amnesty International.

Gaza “War” casualties

Israelis: 13 (3 civilians)

Gazans: 1,387 (773 civilians)

These numbers don’t suggest a war. They indicate a mass slaughter. In this massacre, Israeli soldiers killed almost as many Israeli soldiers (four), as their enemy did (six). The pretext for the Israeli assault was a regular culprit: Hezbollah rocket attacks into Israeli territory. The official story of the American mainstream media outlets was that these were completely unprovoked violations of a ceasefire reached between Hamas and Israel on June 19^th 2008, and that Hamas bore responsibility for the subsequent exchange of fire over the next several months. But in fact it was the Israeli Defense Forces who broke the six-month truce on no less than seven occasions back between June 20^th and June 26^th alone, according to a United Nations report. (CNN also, in a brief moment of actual reporting, confirmed this at the time.) That report was recently condemned by the U.S. House of Representatives by a vote of 344-36, which means that 344 representatives would rather stick their fingers in their ears than hear what an independent commission had to say on the subject. Take a look at what Republican representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who wrote the resolution, said about Israeli actions:

“Even in the fog of war, it is clear that Israel took every reasonable measure to minimize the risk of civilian casualties. It is clear that Israel had every right and duty to defend its citizens from the onslaught of rocket and mortar attacks from Hamas and other militants in Gaza.”

How far is Ros-Lehtinen’s head up her ass that she can look at the official figures and conclude that “it is clear that Israel took every reasonable measure to minimize the risk of civilian casualties”? Let’s just say I think she’s in a pretty good position to give herself a very thorough colonoscopy.

Even if Hamas had in fact violated the ceasefire, would hapless rocket attacks warrant the killing of nearly 800 Palestinian civilians to Israel’s three in response? Israel certainly has a right to defend itself, but holy shit. That’s literally overkill. Sadly, this is par for the course. In any given conflict involving Israel and the Occupied Territories, we can always count on way higher casualty figures on the Palestinian side, guaranteed. And whatever short-term security Israel was able to obtain by the destruction of several Hamas outposts and a few hundred fighters, this will surely be offset by long lasting feelings of animosity by the thousands of Palestinians who were directly affected by actions of the Israeli Defense Forces. Alas, the shit-cycle will continue well into the future.

Of course, you rarely hear anything that even approaches a condemnation of Israeli crimes in the American media. Reports on Palestinian crimes are aplenty, that’s for sure, and with good reason. But to open a newspaper or to turn on cable news for reports about the ongoing conflict, is to be incessantly reminded that the Palestinians are basically a bunch of terrorists hell-bent on destroying the Jewish state, while Israel is unfailingly portrayed as a beacon for democracy in the Middle East simply defending itself against a crazed Palestinian menace. You know, one of the good guys.

Here’s a quick trivia question for you:

Which Middle Eastern country is presently in violation of multiple United Nations Security Council resolutions, rebuffs any calls for it to disclose the extent of its nuclear program, and outright refuses to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty which has been agreed to by 189 countries?

If you guessed Iran, you are wrong. The country described above is Israel.

Iran has been receiving a great deal of media attention for its fledgling nuclear program, which the country’s leadership claims is for civilian energy purposes only. This is undoubtedly a lie, but in terms of disclosure of nuclear activity, Israel’s record on this front is far worse than Iran’s. But again, you’d never know it if you get all of your foreign affairs information from the U.S. corporate media. News story after news story derides Iran for its lack of transparency about its nuclear program, questions whether it’s living up to its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, etc. Of course, the concern is warranted because it would not be in the world’s best interests if Iran were to acquire nuclear weapons. However, the double standard here is amazing, yet nonetheless routine. Officially, Israel’s position on its alleged nuclear weapons is one of opacity, which means that they might have nukes, and they might not. Well, everyone knows that they do in fact have a couple of hundred nuclear weapons, but the Israeli leadership is not going to acknowledge this fact. As for inspections of suspected nuclear facilities and arsenals in the country, that prospect is not discussed by anyone in the West because it is literally an impossibility. It cannot even be mentioned in the mainstream media.

So not surprisingly, when Sarah Palin or anyone says outrageous things about how Israel should keep building illegal settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, no one in the U.S. media really gives a fuck.

“Yesterday the Jerusalem municipality razed two Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem, one in Isawiyah and one in Silwan. In both cases, local residents battled security forces.” (Haaretz, 11/19/09)

Nine hundred more units are planned for the East Jerusalem settlement of Gilo, which is regarded as illegal by the United Nations, the European Union, basically everyone except Israel and the U.S.

Like Palin said, the population of Israel is going to grow, and it’s becoming clearer by the day that the country is looking for more and more Lebensraum for its people, Arabs be damned. Just about every presidential administration since the 1970s has expressed concern over Israel settlement expansions into Palestinian territory, but none have done a whole lot to stop it. Like his predecessors, Obama has mildly condemned the land-grabs while giving a wink and a nudge to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israeli government. Essentially, Obama has continued America’s official Israel/Palestine policy of enablement.

Change we can believe in my ass.

- Max

Sarah And Carrie's Excellent Adventure

The future of the GOP? Be my guest.

Last night on Larry King Live, numbskull beauty queen Carrie Prejean made a total ass of herself. See it with your own eyes:

I won’t really remark on the obvious, other than to say that clearly Prejean is incapable of deflecting even softball questions from Larry King. I mean, Larry King for crying out loud! “Why did you settle?” is a very easy question to answer and can be done without breaching the terms of the settlement itself. A typical answer would go something like this: “Well, Larry, I had just been through a lot, and I felt that the best thing to do was to move on as soon as possible. The whole ordeal was weighing heavily on my family and me, and I just needed to get on with my life.” End of answer. Instead, she turned an extremely innocuous question into a personal affront designed to provoke her into violating the settlement. King was clearly in genuine shock that someone would accuse him of asking tough or inappropriate questions because that’s not what he does.

During the interview Prejean said that her “personal hero,” is Sarah Palin, which is actually very appropriate, and not just because Palin was also a beauty pageant contestant. In each case, we are dealing a woman who was basically thrust upon the national scene, given an inordinate amount of attention by the media, and lionized by the right wing as an upstanding representative of the conservative cause despite the lack of any depth whatsoever.

Take Palin. Unconscionably, last August this woman was selected by John McCain to be his running mate. And what were her notable qualifications? Six years as Mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, which has a population that could be squeezed into the bleachers at Fenway Park; and two and a half years as the governor of said state—one of the least populous in the Union. Having said that, this relatively weak political résumé did not have to be cause for concern, since Palin would have plenty of time to convince the American people that she was ready, willing, and able to be Vice President, and President if necessary.

Of course, this did not happen. In fact, the exact opposite of this happened. Rather than prove herself to be ready, willing, able, Palin engineered a two month-long media train-wreck, and the only thing she ended up proving was that McCain had a very lax vetting process for VP hopefuls. Virtually every interview was an utter disaster, with Palin showing that she didn’t know anything at all about anything at all. Perhaps this lack of depth and knowledge had something to do with the whirlwind college tour she took in the 1980s. Little reported by the media was the fact that Palin went to no less than four colleges in five and a half years.

Palin’s collegiate career began in the one state younger than Alaska, where she attended Hawaii Pacific University in the business administration program. She started in the fall of 1982. Next she headed to North Idaho College, a two-year institution, where she was a general studies major for two more semesters, spring and fall of 1983. Although she never received a degree there, she received the school's Distinguished Alumni of the Year Award this past June.

In the fall of 1984, she transferred to the University of Idaho, where she majored in journalism with an emphasis in broadcast news. She stayed until the spring 1985.

The next fall, Palin headed back to Alaska to attend Matanuska-Susitna College, just 14 miles from her hometown, Wasilla.

After one semester, she returned to the University of Idaho, which she attended for three more semesters—spring 1986, fall 1986, and spring 1987. She (at last!) graduated with a degree in journalism…

There are also some reports that she attended the University of Hawaii at Hilo for a couple of weeks just after her high school graduation, but there seems to be no record of her enrollment.

Now, I really don’t care where political candidates go to college, as long as it’s an accredited university and not some two-bit, shit-kicking Bible college in the Midwest. But why so many transfers? This is something that the mainstream media—for all the allegations against it of being anti-Palin—never pressed her on. This needs to be addressed. It is not normal to bounce from college to college as she did. What could possibly account for all this moving around? I honestly have no idea. Did she have issues adjusting? Were they psychological in nature? Was it something different entirely? I’m not saying the reasons are dubious by any means, but Palin needs to explain why she went from college to college. And mind you, we’re not talking about one transfer, not two, but four transfers here. Why?

Despite losing the election, Palin has not gone away. In fact, she gets more media attention than John McCain, who unlike Palin, has stayed in office. By resigning the governorship in the middle of her term this summer, Palin continued her history of quitting. In addition to four colleges, and the governorship, Palin also quit the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission in 2004 after less than a year on the board.

This is not the résumé or behavior of a future President of the United States. And yet, the Right has anointed this woman as the frontrunner for the GOP presidential nomination in 2012. The plain fact that no Republican wants to acknowledge, is that if Sarah Palin were ugly or even average-looking, she’d still be wallowing in obscurity in Alaska somewhere, overlooked by John McCain, by the media, and by extension the American public. I don’t blame Palin for not knowing anything. Ignorance is her prerogative. However, she has been railing against the very media which heaps upon her the unwarranted attention that she’s all too happy to bask in. She’s even “written” a book, Going Rogue, which will undoubtedly be a horrid, milquetoast piece of crap containing little that is insightful or interesting.

And so, this is the woman Carrie Prejean says is her “personal hero.” Makes sense. Because like Palin, Prejean was also thrust onto the national scene as a result of happenstance and not accomplishment. Take a look at the pageant answer Prejean gave that made her famous—a villain to the left and a heroine to the right:

Pageant judge Perez Hilton: Vermont recently became the fourth state to legalize same-sex marriage. Do you think every state should follow suit? Why or why not?

Prejean: I think it’s great that Americans are able to choose one or the other. We live in a land that you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite marriage and, you know what, in my country and my family I think that I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anyone out there but that's how I was raised and that’s how I think it should be between a man and a woman.

A confusing answer? Yes. Worth discussing on the next day’s news? No. But since this went down, all kinds of shit has hit the fan. A Prejean sex tape, a Prejean boob-job, and a Prejean book due out this month. And the American public has eaten it up.

Both Palin and Prejean will be the focus of loads of media attention in the coming months and years. However, Prejean has one thing going for her that Palin does not: the lack of any real expectations. Having been the VP nominee of the Republican Party, the perception among many right wingers (and incredulous left wingers) is that the next stop on the Palin Express is the presidential nomination. That expectation is of course ridiculous. Like Prejean, Palin seems void of any depth or worldliness. And while the conservatives of America are not above electing such an obviously under-qualified candidate president (see, George W. Bush), Palin’s star is way too bright at the moment. Like actual massive stars across the universe, Palin is burning up fuel far too quickly to last very long as a shining light for the Republicans. Indeed, it’s only a matter of time before she collapses under the weight of her own stardom, culminating in a fantastic supernova, and, if we’re lucky, maybe even a black hole that will swallow up a doomed Republican Party. Watch out for that event horizon.

- Max