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It seems like a lot longer (to me, anyways) but it was just one year ago that vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin said this of the man who is now President of the United States: "This is not a man who sees America as you see America and I see America. Our opponent is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect that he’s palling around with terrorists who would target their own country. Americans need to know this."
Palin’s outrageous slander has, I guess, been consigned to the dustbin of history. In some ways, that is appropriate. Her disgusting slur managed to blend racial fears (look, he’s different than us!) and terrorist fantasies into a poisonous cocktail that dishonored Palin, the man at the top (at least in theory) of the ticket, and their party. Palin suggested that Obama might do harm to the country; President Obama is running a government that is (not that it’s a surprise to anyone sane) snuffing out terrorist plots.
The traditional media failed to expose Palin and McCain’s tactics last year just as they are now failing to call out right wing crazies and the elected Republicans who love them. In fact, during the campaign, they took the bait, obsessing over Rev. Wright and making Bill Ayers a campaign "issue". (Right wing media is still obsessing over these figures.)
You can draw a straight line from Palin and McCain’s despicable tactics to what we’re seeing now: extremists comparing Obama to Hitler, questioning his legitimacy, claiming health care reform is a socialist plot to off grandma. (Palin’s directly helping out the crazies on that last delusion, of course.) And, in a repeat of last year’s failure to do anything other than solemnly and stenographically repeat Palin’s smear of Obama, the traditional media is failing to call attention to the links between right wing extremists and elected Republicans officials.
If I were a cable news type who was silent when Sarah Palin descended into the sewers to smear Obama as a friend to terrorists, I might see an opportunity for redemption. By taking fantasies about Rev. Wright and Bill Ayers seriously, the traditional media helped pave the way for even crazier fantasies about Obama the Nazi, Obama the Socialist, Obama the evil dictator plotting to off the elderly. I’m not sure if the genie can be put in the bottle, but it’s never too late to try. I don’t expect any of this to happen, but a functioning media might concede that the charges against candidate Obama are just as bogus as the claims about President Obama. At the very least, they might pledge never to take Sarah Palin seriously again.
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Last fall Pissed off Patricia over at Crooks and Liars said it best “every time Sarah speaks we all feel smarter” I add “and many men get harder
Can you imagine a not so attractive woman spewing what she spews. She would have been gonged and swept off the stage.
If McCain would have selected someone like Kay Baily Hutchison he would have stood up to the Obama machine much better. He knew that the minute he heard her open her mouth. It was written all over McCain’s face. Bill Kristol and the team who picked Sarah blew it for McCain. Who knows maybe that is exactly what they wanted
certainly, Rich Lowry is a candidate who may well fit your addendum to Patricia’s statement.
I’m think (or, at least, I want to hope) that Palin can’t be explained simply in terms of her looks…Palin is extreme and brazen, but so is Sen. Grassley, so are all the Republicans who are lying about death panels, standing side by side with wackos, and “joking” about lynching. So is Rush Limbaugh, so is Glenn Beck, and neither is getting by on looks (at least, I don’t think so!). There certainly are some people who respond to her looks–as I mentioned, Rich Lowry is an excellent example of this: http://www.boomantribune.com/s…..0332/29321 I’ve also heard men who I know cite this as a reason why they are interested in her. But Palin has a lot of company in the Republican party and right wing when it comes to smears, lies, and extremism.
I just hope this is the last we’ve seen of Palin as a national candidate
different rules for the men. They can get away with saying stupid shit and be ugly
different rules
I don’t disagree that there are different standards for men…I just think it may not capture the whole story to explain Palin purely in terms of her looks. But I agree that people view men and women differently and evaluate them based on different standards–looks apply to women in a way that they do not for men.
“I’m think (or, at least, I want to hope) that Palin can’t be explained simply in terms of her looks…Palin is extreme and brazen, . . . There certainly are some people who respond to her looks–as I mentioned, Rich Lowry is an excellent example of this: http://www.boomantribune.com/s…..0332/29321 I’ve also heard men who I know cite this as a reason why they are interested in her.”
Tell me, if B. Hussein Obama looked like Sonny Liston do you think he would be POTUS?
I don’t know what Sonny Liston looks like and have no idea if that would make a difference to voters. I hope it wouldn’t.
You think the media gives/gave Sarah Palin a pass on ANYTHING?? You are totally out of touch with reality! I mean Letterman jokes about her underage daughter getting knocked up and where is the media outrage? Of course given the way they are covering the Roman Polanski story I guess the lack of concern for underage girls getting raped by grown men is rampant in the main stream media.
Sarah Palin is not to blame for ANYTHING! You guys on the left see the world through rose colored glasses. You talk about all the violent, hate filled groups on the right yet what happened during the teaparty in Washington when tens of thousands of these “extremists” got together? How many arrests? Zero. How many riots? Zero. How much tear gas was used? Zero
Yet what was the tally for the G20 summit? Where was your “outrage” then? How many arrests were there? Would you like a link to the footage?
You are such a hypocrite Edelson. The “violence” is on the left not the right.
You’re right, I’m just thumbing through my stack of news stories pointing out how Palin is lying about death panels and grotesquely smeared Obama as a friend to terrorists bent on harming this country. Of course, I jest. There is no such stack of news stories. The media does not call Palin out on her lies, any more than it calls out Sen. Grassley or other Republicans who lie about death panels. (David Letterman, by the way, was forced to apologize for his tasteless “jokes” about Palin’s daughter. He was widely criticized in the mainstream media and received a lot of pressure to apologize–I remember the Morning Joe crew, for one, taking up this cause. The same is true of the Roman Polanski story–the Morning Joe crew has discussed it three days in a row and made clear their distaste for Polanski. I have seen similar outrage against Polanski expressed by commentators on cable news.)
The teaparty in Dc was a brimming cauldron of hate, as I documented. http://seminal.firedoglake.com/diary/8092 I’m glad there was no violence at this recent Wacka-palooza, but there were signs warning that “this time I didn’t bring my gun” and there were ugly slurs against President Obama, some explicitly racial, others falsely branding him as a Nazi. I discussed all this in the link I included, above.
The “violence” I refer to is very real and doesn’t deserve phony quotation marks. Dr. Tiller was murdered in Kansas by a an anti-abortion extremist who acted on the twisted “logic” underlying right wing rhetoric that calls doctors murderers and compared Tiller and other doctors with Nazis. Another right wing extremist, a white supremacist, murdered a guard at the Holocaust Museum in DC. A third murderer, a fan of Glenn Beck who believed right wing claims that Obama was coming for his guns, murdered three police officers in Pittsburgh.
Against this backdrop of violence, when right wingers, including elected Republicans, lend credibility to the nutty claims that Obama is another Hitler and Nazism is descending on the United States in the guise of incremental health care reform, they are acting irresponsibly. When the media fails to note this, they aren’t doing their job.
Okay, mayne there’s something I’m missing, but I have never thought that Barbie Youbetcha was hot!
So I see you did not mention the violence at the G20 summit. The New York Times talked about how peaceful it was despite the teargas, rubber bullets and vandalism by its participants. The title of the article talks about how peaceful it was.
Now look at their coverage of the tea party in Washington. They talk about people using profane words about Obama, calling him a liar and described the crows as “rowdy” at times. Yet no condemnation of the G20 (liberals mainly) protestors. Hmmmm
Letterman was not “forced” to do anything. His apology (the 2nd or 3rd one depending on how you want to count it) was anything but full and sincere. Most of the media’s reaction to it was that he is a comedian and can say what he wants. God forbid someone criticize Obama though. Then they are automatically a racist.
The same NY Times repudiates the death panel comment here. The Washington Post does so here. The LA Times does so here.
I gues you must have missed those. Shall I go on and find more?
The media has been doing quite a job on conservatives for decades. Look at the Pew Research Center’s analysis of the coverage of McCain and Obama during the election. Obama got only half as much unfavorable coverage from the media you claim is so unlikely to report negative stories about conservatives namely McCain-Palin. They flat out disagree with you yet you cling to this notion. Dont let your emotion get in the way of the facts. The MSM loves liberals, hates conservatives and have no problem telling the American public about it.
the difference between the G20 summit and the wacka-palooza is that no mainstream Democratic politicians endorse protesters at the G20 summit, but Sen. DeMint spoke at the DC event and praised the protesters who were waving signs calling Obama a Nazi. Several other elected Republican members of Congress also spoke to the crowd of extremists. Same thing happened at the equally crazy How to Take Back America conference in St. Louis conference last week, which featured panel discussions about how to recognize when the U.S. is taken over by the Nazi Obama administration. again, several elected Republicans endorsed and appeared at the wildly extremist conference. Republicans have made extremism mainstream by standing shoulder to shoulder with the wackos and fanning the flames of fear by lying about death panels and euthaniasia.
The liberal media myth is very tired. I can’t waste time dealing with all of your distracting points, but I will briefly note some counterpoints to this fallacy about conservatives being shut out of the media: The Wall Street Journal, Fox News, Pat Buchanan, Joe Scarborough, Michelle Malkin, Ann Coulter, Lou Dobbs, Michael Savage, Rush Limbaugh, Michael Gerson, David Brooks, the Christian Broadcasting Network, the Weekly Standard, Glenn Beck. Right wingers are well represented on cable news, in print journalism, and on the internet. It’s time to stop complaining about the mythical liberal domination of the media–it’s simply not true. as for Obama getting favorable media coverage, the mainstream media obsessed over Rev. Wright and Bill Ayers and paid very little attention to McCain’s connections with Revs. Parsley and Hagee, as well as G. Gordon Liddy. I have discussed this at length elsewhere.
sorry, that was unfair of me to say I can’t “waste time” responding. I’m busy at the moment, but that was an obnoxious statement and I apologize. I don’t have time to respond to everything you said, but I will quickly try to respond to your point that several media sources repudiated the death panels lie. The Times “repudiation” is mild. It refers to the “death panel trope”. Not very damning, but I’m glad they noted the death panel assertion isn’t true. The Post headline rightly calls the death panels claim a “myth”, and the article is good one, if muted (it refers to the lie about death panels as a “controversy” a couple of times–the media is reluctant to use the word “lie”–the Times avoids this as well). The LA Times op-ed mentions death panels in the headline but is really an argument as to why Roe v. Wade should be overruled.
I’m glad to see the NY Times and Wash Post pieces, but I don’t think this is proof that the media is doing its job when it comes to the death panel lie. For one thing, they studiously avoid using that word, as I note above. For another thing, cable news channels have been very careful in discussing the death panels lie–several times, I have heard anchors say that “most independent sources” reject the claim. That’s sort of like saying “most independent sources” say the earth revolves around the sun. again, the media is afraid to look biased by calling a lie a lie, especially when it comes from the right.
The right wing media, of course, has utterly failed. Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and the rest have been pushing the death panel lie as a reasonable concern. The result is that nearly half of Americans believe the death panel lie. http://theplumline.whorunsgov&…..falsehood/ It’s not just Fox viewers who have been misled–most respondents to the poll I link to get their news from broadcast networks or CNN. The media has failed to debunk the death panels lie, the two pieces you point to notwithstanding.
no one claims that every criticism of Obama is racist–that’s not fair. I don’t think everyone who disagrees with Obama is a racist. I do think that people waving racist signs at the DC rally, Republican operatives and groups who have made racists statements (calling Obama “boy”, putting Obama’s face on food stamps with watermelon and fried chicken behind him, a SC Republican comparing Michelle Obama to a gorilla) remind us that some of the opposition to Obama is certainly based on race. In addition, the birthers, who claim Obama isn’t a real American, are “subtly” or perhaps not so subtly marking Obama as “other” someone not like “the rest of us”. Given that Obama is the nation’s first black president, that’s hardly a coincidence. It’s true that not all opposition to Obama is racist. Again, I’m not claiming that. Some of the opposition to Obama is openly racist and some exploits racial fears, as the birthers do.
So you claim the MSM has not debunked the “death panels” myth, I give you examples of MSM and then claim its not good enough. Would you only be satisified if ALL of them debunked it? How about 85%? 75%? This is the problem with liberals in America today. You just cannot accept facts such as you completely ignoring the Pew study showing the amount of favorable/unfavorable coverage of McCain/Obama last Fall.
There are tons of scholarly sources showing their to be bias in media coverage. Conservatives get less favorable coverage and liberals get more favorable coverage. I can give links to those if you really want them but I encourage you to read on your own Edelson. Reporters and journalists are overwhelmingly liberal in their political ideology as are editors as well.
You point to a poll about the death panels stating many Americans still believe it. Many Americans also believe the Democrats are the party of “the people.” That Republicans are the party of racism, the rich, big business, etc. Does this mean that Democrats do not accept money from big business (they do), are not rich (they are) and none of them are racists(Gasp!! racism in the Democratic party…shocking)? Where is your indignation over that?
Where is your indignation over the Main stream media’s repeated statement (coming from the Democratic party I might add) that the GOP “has no health care plan”? Anyone with 5 minutes to kill and access to a computer can debunk that myth. I have not heard you get upset about that.
Where is your indignation over the hypocrisy of the Democrats in Congress (especially Reid and Pelosi) calling town hall protestors “unAmerican” and part of the mob when those same leaders applauded the protests of anti-war protestors during the Bush adminstration?
Where is your indignation over the boos and jeers Bush received during his State of the Union addresses? Did you blog about how Sen Reid called Bush a “loser” to a bunch of school kids?
Where is your indignation over all the signs about Bush protraying him as Hitler, hanging him in effigy, calling him a nazi?
I see nothing about how upset you are with the MSM for failing to cover the hypocrisy of the Democrats on all of these issues. If you want to take the MSM to task then you should do it for both sides or is it only appropriate when its your ideology that is under attack?
For the record, I do not support all the things said about Obama at the teaparties either. Comparisons to Hitler are silly and though I disagree with virtually all of Obama’s politics, I still have enough respect for the office of the president to not resort to such tactics. I certainly did not approve of ANYONE bringing guns to ANY event the president or any elected official is going to be at and I blogged as much when it happened. Speaking of that you should research the incident with the man in Arizona bringing the automatic rifle to an event Obama was going to be at. MSNBC’s Contessa Brewer and a panel of commentators were appalled at the right wing extremists who were coming to these events and mentioned that there had to be a racial element to such people’s actions. What you DIDNT see if you watched MSNBC was that the man holding that weapon was BLACK!!! MSNBC very carefully cropped the footage to keep your from seeing who he was and all you saw was the gun slung over his shoulder. It just reinforces how much in the tank MSNBC is for the Democrats and this administration.