{"id":1469,"date":"2008-09-04T13:33:40","date_gmt":"2008-09-04T13:33:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/2008\/09\/04\/ok-im-starting\/"},"modified":"2008-09-04T13:33:40","modified_gmt":"2008-09-04T13:33:40","slug":"ok-im-starting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/2008\/09\/04\/ok-im-starting\/","title":{"rendered":"IS THIS THE COUNTRY WE WANT? SARAH PALIN’S CRUEL ADDRESS"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/object><\/p>\n

Before I say anything else, I want to show you this great response to Gov. Palin.  Take the time to watch it.<\/p>\n

\nI started this post last night but waited to post it until I cooled off and now I’m glad, because there are so many thoughtful responses from people who have gone beyond the rage I have been feeling.  The first is the above video response from Nerdette<\/a>.  For some reason the mocking of community organizers was particularly painful to me.  Of course since I’ve been listening to The People<\/a> Have the Power <\/a>  <\/a>for days now I guess that’s not a surprise.<\/p>\n

I also recommend. thanks to a tweet from Pundit Mom<\/a>, the ever-wise Gloria Steinem’s response<\/a> in the Los Angeles Times, which includes this: It
\nwon’t work. This isn’t the first time a boss has picked an unqualified
\nwoman just because she agrees with him and opposes everything most
\nother women want and need. Feminism has never been about getting a job
\nfor one woman. It’s about making life more fair for women everywhere.
\nIt’s not about a piece of the existing pie; there are too many of us
\nfor that. It’s about baking a new pie. <\/p>\n

Selecting Sarah Palin, who was touted all summer
\nby Rush Limbaugh, is no way to attract most women, including die-hard
\nClinton supporters. Palin shares nothing but a chromosome with Clinton.
\nHer down-home, divisive and deceptive speech did nothing to cosmeticize
\na Republican convention that has more than twice as many male delegates
\nas female, a presidential candidate who is owned and operated by the
\nright wing and a platform that opposes pretty much everything Clinton’s
\ncandidacy stood for — and that Barack Obama’s still does. To vote in
\nprotest for McCain\/Palin would be like saying, "Somebody stole my
\nshoes, so I’ll amputate my legs." <\/em><\/p>\n

My good friend Mocha Momma offers some very personal yet universal and policy-based observations<\/a> – YES you can be personal – as SP was – and still think about policy — as Mocha did.  Here’s a sample but go read the whole thing.  She’s a wonderful person and educator whose commitment to schools in underserved neighborhoods is profound. She scoffed at Obama\u2019s community organizing and pushed for her own
\nsmall town agenda. You know what I heard in that thinly veiled line?
\nHer lack of experience with people of color and the power of community
\norganization. She doesn\u2019t know cities or poverty that way or even what
\nthat does for education. She is keeping that dividing line bold and
\nprominent by letting me see what she thinks about that: small town =
\nhard-working white farming families vs. city\/community = blacks and
\nlatinos and asians and other people she knows nothing about.<\/em> She so wasn\u2019t talking to me.<\/em><\/p>\n

More from a Daily Kos-ite<\/a>, noted by Soapbox Mom<\/a> or try this one<\/a> if you just want a laugh.\n<\/p>\n

OK I can’t hide any longer.  Here’s me talking.  I’ve been around a lot of political campaigns and presidencies.  I remember Spiro Agnew<\/a> and his vicious attacks on the press<\/a> — many other Republican "red meat" speeches and Democratic ones too.  But I don’t remember anything like this (except Pat Buchanan in 1992 but that was different.)  Cruelty, sarcasm, disguised bigotry, language so beyond the appropriate, in my view, that it was breathtaking.  Literally.  <\/p>\n

In Mocha Momma’s post there’s a link to a New York Times piece on Palin’s time as mayor of Wasilla<\/a>.   Here’s a taste:<\/p>\n

Shortly
\nafter becoming mayor, former city officials and Wasilla residents said,
\nMs. Palin approached the town librarian about the possibility of
\nbanning some books, though she never followed through and it was
\nunclear which books or passages were in question.<\/em><\/p>\n

Ann Kilkenny, a
\nDemocrat who said she attended every City Council meeting in Ms.
\nPalin\u2019s first year in office, said Ms. Palin brought up the idea of
\nbanning some books at one meeting.<\/strong> \u201cThey were somehow morally or
\nsocially objectionable to her,\u201d Ms. Kilkenny said.<\/em><\/p>\n

The librarian,
\nMary Ellen Emmons, pledged to \u201cresist all efforts at censorship,\u201d Ms.
\nKilkenny recalled. Ms. Palin fired Ms. Emmons shortly after taking
\noffice but changed course after residents made a strong show of
\nsupport.<\/strong> Ms. Emmons, who left her job and Wasilla a couple of years
\nlater, declined to comment for this article.<\/em><\/p>\n

If you have read Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale<\/a>, you’ve seen a society in which these values  were completely in control.  <\/em>Not only government control of women’s bodies but a government of rage,  male-domination and the absence of liberty.  Of course not even these folks can take us that far but every time we get into one of these periods it’s all I can think about.<\/p>\n

Someone on Twitter last night wrote:  When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross."<\/em> Sinclair Lewis<\/a><\/p>\n

OK.  So that’s why this song says so much.  It has to. <\/object><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Before I say anything else, I want to show you this great response to Gov. Palin.  Take the time to watch it. I started this post last night but waited to post it until I cooled off and now I’m glad, because there are so many thoughtful responses from people who have gone beyond the … Continue reading IS THIS THE COUNTRY WE WANT? SARAH PALIN’S CRUEL ADDRESS<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[27,7,9,29],"tags":[1255,1262,1261,189,1254,1258,202,1027,1256,1260,21,200,1257,1259],"class_list":["post-1469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs","category-life","category-politics","category-women","tag-acceptance-speech","tag-ban-books","tag-ban-libarary-books","tag-bruce-springsteen","tag-convention","tag-margaret-atwood","tag-mocha-momma","tag-palin","tag-palin-acceptance-speech","tag-people-have-the-power","tag-politics-2","tag-punditmom","tag-sinclair-lewis","tag-vote-for-change"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4gBq8-nH","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1469"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1469\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cynthiasamuels.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}