Bloodless Coup

Except Ayers. Don't forget AYERS!!!

well, see, there's totally good bombers and then there's not so good bombers. the american bombers who bomb the less american bombers because they're less american, well they're just good americans.

i'm going to throw up. i'm so sick of this. i think it was sullivan, today, who said they've "nuked" the shark. it was in connection with the whole, most of the $150K wardrobe is in the belly of the plane thing, which i gather is somehow supposed to make it okay that palin's basically claiming that a professional woman has to buy a respectable middle american mccmansion worth of upscale clothing to present an appropriate appearance.

then there's the $22K on two weeks of makeup, and another $11K on hair.

tell you what: i'm surrounded by very well turned-out female attorneys and other professionals in my day to day life, and they're all doing it on wardrobes that run, at most, into the shallow five digits. indeed, while they probably have more stuff, most of their suits, one by one, cost less than mine, and i'm not buying anything over the top.

real-world professionals make eight or ten primary outfits go far with creative combinations and accessories. and who buys designer things to wear only once? celebrities.

it's amazing no woman has just completely gone off the deep end at a palin event about this stuff, especially as she touts herself as the very soul of middle class americanness. it's really hard to see how palin isn't, in fact, a huge setback to female equality.

Makes you wonder why nobody ever asks Obama if he'd allow Ayers to do his fundraising if Ayers had bombed an abortion clinic.

No, actually, it doesn't.

Right, I forget that as was proved this past weekend, when Biden or Obama get tough questions, they push that media outlet outside their bubble.

No, it means your question is a worthless hypothetical. Contrast that with the facts that Palin is married to a man who was a proud member of an unequivocally secessionist organization; that Palin herself recorded a video carefully tailored to convey that she really sort of thought said organization was pretty okay (rather than, say, refusing to provide such a video at all); and that Palin refuses to come out and identify as terrorists people who, basically because others don't agree with them and because the law of the land doesn't reflect their preferences, actively kill and maim people in furtherance not only of the lawless killing of people behaving in accord with the law of the land, but also, clearly, in an effort to terrorize the citizenry from exercising rights the law of the land says they have, or rather, refuses to identify them as terrorists when to do so might cost her a few votes among these self-same terrorists, whose votes, apparently, she covets, rather than finding them repugnant, as she would claim to find, I'm sure, the votes of members of the Weather Underground, al Qaeda, or . . . well, given her stances on existing federal law and terrorist acts by people who disapprove of it, I guess we can't really say how she feels about folks like McVeigh, now can we?

Bottom line: despite having never in any way married a terrorist, supported a terrorist organization, or otherwise condoned violent behavior as an answer to a disfavored policy, whether specifically designed to intimidate those who disagree or otherwise, has been made to jump through ten times more hoops to prove what is obvious to anyone surveying the objective evidence rather than beholden to paranoid fantasies wholly concocted by interstitial confabulations than Palin will be made to jump through for refusing to call murderous terrorization terrorism outright. She hasn't had to apologize for, or disapprove of, her husband's membership in an organization hell-bent on dissolving the union from which it derives the underpinnings of what is the most socialist economy of any of the United States, nor has she had to explain why she put her Gubernatorial imprimatur on the organization by recording a smiley video clearly designed to provide deniable approval of its agenda.

In light of these facts, Morris, I decline to muse about what might have happened had Obama done something he hasn't done, when you, like so many of your line-toeing Republican pals, are unwilling to acknowledge those loathsome things that Sarah Palin has, in fact, done.

No one has materially tied Obama to more than co-board membership with Ayers in an arch conservative-funded organization. And if the mere fact that he once stood in Ayers' living room is sufficient to amount to guilt of whatever Ayers ever did or said in his entire life, then we might as well throw all of the bums out, because -- and if you're at all politically active in the real world, rather than just trolling here, you know this -- everyone looking for votes stands in lots of living rooms, and no one has the resources to vet said hosts' millions of collective acts and comments.

Guilt by association as a surrogate for reasoned debate about policies would leave everyone standing silent in the shattered remainders of their glass houses. I prefer to talk about what we're going to do about the problems we're in, and they are legion.

Also, you've got to be joking, talking about the campaign that actually engages the press, even to the extent of talking to the comically journalism-impaired FOX News, as being resistant to talking to media outlets, when your VP only speaks publicly in highly scripted situations or when she "goes rogue," and the head of your ticket has turned attacking the questioner in lieu of answering the question into his primary mode of interacting with the mainstream media.

In order to push the media out of your bubble, they have to be in there to begin with, something McCain/Palin hasn't permitted since the latter joined the ticket.

"and that Palin refuses to come out and identify as terrorists people who, basically because others don't agree with them and because the law of the land doesn't reflect their preferences, actively kill and maim people in furtherance not only of the lawless killing of people behaving in accord with the law of the land"

Is that kind of like saying someone who actually bombed (as opposed to hypothetically bombing) the Pentagon is just a professor, a guy who lives in his neighborhood? This is the sham of asking this question of Palin and not Obama. This is the sham of someone saying he's a unifier, then refusing to answer questions from a point of view he doesn't agree with. Mao Tse Tung was a unifier. The Emperor Chin was a unifier. Josef Stalin was a unifier, all because they did not acknowledge or tolerate anyone to disagree with them.

What ten times more hoops has Obama "had to" (I love your painting him as the victim rather than, you know, the actually victims of the Weather Underground) jump through? Has he provided papers related to his work with William Ayers for the Woods foundation? No. Has he explained how Ayers came to know of him or what made Obama appear like someone the domestic terrorist William Ayers should want to raise money for? No. Has he even said who connected them to begin with? No. Barack's the victim, though, right, because someone asked him a tough question that he has yet to fully explain.

And I love you Obamanade drinkers' double standard. Obama came out and said he didn't mean it when he called Pennsylvanians bitter clingers to religion and guns, so that must be what he means, wink wink, nudge nudge. But Palin actually records a full video to separate herself from separatists, so she must be lying if she's willing to go to that much trouble. Obama was caught on tape in his remarks, and you're willing to overlook (wink wink, nudge nudge) them. You're willing to overlook Obama's connection to members of the weather underground who actually bombed places, and hurt real people, but not to overlook Palin's husband's weak link to some Alaskan group nobody's even heard of.

Tell me, when did spouses become fair game, because Barack the Unifier told us that we couldn't talk about his wife, how she says things that are unamerican, that we can't question patriotism of Democrats who want defeat in Iraq, and you're violating BO's assumptions by questioning Palin's husband's patriotism. I hope you're not looking to interview him, because you're out.

I'm sorry, when did Palin's CBS and Katie Couric interviews become "highly scripted"? Even CNN tried to bamboozle her with a false quote from the National Review. That's just more of BO's BS.

In no particular order:

Obama has come out against everything Ayers did in connection with the Weather Underground. And as for this -- "Has he provided papers related to his work with William Ayers for the Woods foundation?" -- Obama provided a complete, accurate picture of his history of loose associations with Ayers in the third debate. At that point, the burden shifted to the smearers to produce one iota of meaningful evidence that Ayers has been anything more to Obama than Obama claims. No one can, except in the nature of throwing a few random comments from questionable individuals together and seeing whether people can be fooled into believing that they stick together. And, of course, once again, you're not coupling all of this to a demand that we throw out every conservative would-be "terrorist" who ever associated with Ayers, including in particular the Annenberg folks and the other conservatives who served on the board. Until you do, you're being nakedly hypocritical.

Which is more than I can say for the murderers Palin was asked point blank about. If she's running under the banner of a "war on terror," I think it's fair to ask whether she has a clear sense of what terrorism is, and what counts. When she strongly implies that terrorism is something that white folks killing in Christ's name literally can't be guilty of, she raises serious doubts about her sense of the object of the amorphous "war" she's veritably salivating to perpetuate.

Obama's not a victim for having to answer hard question. Palin's a coward for allowing things to be orchestrated around her so that she never has to do the same, and a charlatan for pretending that her most outrageous answers under such limited questioning as she permitted were somehow the fault of a rabidly biased media, rather than her own ill preparation, and probable lack of the intellectual and moral tools to run on a presidential ticket.

As for Palin's video "separat[ing] herself from the separatists," oh please do show me. Unless you're referring to the video that played at their convention, because while that lacked a full-fledged endorsement, it clearly was tailored to give them all a big warm fuzzy. A dignified chief executive who believed in American democracy would cede them the room they need to speak their minds, but would never condescend to lend one's office to their proceedings by any sort of video.

Obama explained, rather than denied, his bitter comments, and I'm not overlooking them at all. They were unfortunate comments, but then John McCain never makes those, like, for example, saying he "couldn't agree more" with John Murtha's comments about racist Western Pennsylvanians. You don't hear me touting that as representative of McCain's view, because unlike Drudge, and his other sensation-seeking, substance-avoiding ilk, and folks like you who lack the creativity to make up their own paranoid fantasies, instead adopting those of others wholesale, I'm sensitive to context as to all candidates. Obama's explanation revealed what any sophisticated listener knew from hearing the comments in context in the first instance: that he was trying to explain how the right hoodwinks middle class folks into voting "wedge issues" that have a dubious effect on their life, and reaches into their pockets and robs them blind while they're busy looking the other way, redistributing their hard-earned money to the affluent classes.

As far as wives go, I don't care about Todd Palin. I defend his right to join secessionist organizations. I don't defend his wife's right to claim values she can't even sustain at home. Michelle Obama has done nothing to call into question Obama's judgment as a man and a spouse. She's a woman anyone would be lucky to call a companion, and, unlike Cindy McCain, is not a rich trophy wife with little to say for herself. Rather, like Obama, she is a successful professional to whom no one has given anything, and who has worked in the real world her whole life.

As for the Couric interview, it's not so much that it was scripted as it is that Palin, rather than standing on her answers, tries to excuse them by claiming that they were anything other than fair questions to ask of a would-be leader of the free world. I'm pretty sure it's not gotcha journalism to ask such a candidate where she gets her information. But apparently Palin wanted to talk about the Great White North, Putin rearing his head, and other incoherent irrelevancies rather than something as simple as: who, aside from Jesus, do you think is bright enough to listen to and learn from. And if you hate the "liberal" MSM so much, where did you get your information before you were entitled to national security briefings? I mean, Jesus, the lowest-level CIA cadet wouldn't be allowed in the door until he'd given far more information about himself than she has.

"Obama provided a complete, accurate picture of his history of loose associations with Ayers in the third debate."

Really? Really? I must have watched something else, because you'd laugh if someone gave you Obama's answer in court. There was nothing complete, no presentation of evidence to shift the burden, and that's exactly the point. The people asking the questions don't have the burden to trust in BO the Unifier, as you suggest here. If someone applies for a job, like say some job with a whole lot less power than the leader of the for now free world, they have to provide references and contacts.

I can walk into a job interview and at the time I tell someone I used to be a CIA agent and a brain surgeon, the burden doesn't fall on my employer to discredit my resume. The burden is on me to prove it by providing people who will explain my connection, and neither Obama nor Ayers has done that. I wonder why that's still so difficult to jump through one hoop after the years he's been running for President.

"And, of course, once again, you're not coupling all of this to a demand that we throw out every conservative would-be "terrorist" who ever associated with Ayers, including in particular the Annenberg folks and the other conservatives who served on the board."

Look, if Barack was serving with conservative terrorists on the Annenberg board, I think we need to know that too. That's the whole point, Ayers has painted himself as something other than a Timothy McVeigh terrorist because he cloaks his violence in the civil rights movement, and the media's giving him cover, something they didn't do for McVeigh's justification of defending people from a government that massacred dozens at Waco. But coming from people who don't believe we should wiretap "would-be" terrorists, only actual terrorists, I find it a little bit of a double standard that you equate the two in this circumstance but not when we could prevent people from becoming actual terrorists.

"Obama explained, rather than denied, his bitter comments, and I'm not overlooking them at all. They were unfortunate comments, but then John McCain never makes those, like, for example, saying he "couldn't agree more" with John Murtha's comments about racist Western Pennsylvanians."

Actually, what I hear you touting is that BO is the grand, articulate genius who is so cool he never gets flustered. That you're willing to concede the fact that the annointed one is just as capable as John McCain of making oratorical mistakes is news to me. BO has himself conceded this point, after the big failure to launch White House meeting on the housing crisis when he admitted that he doesn't do his best work in person, he's better at making contacts over the phone. I guess he's better at dealing with would-be people than actual ones.

"Obama's explanation revealed what any sophisticated listener knew from hearing the comments in context in the first instance: that he was trying to explain how the right hoodwinks middle class folks into voting "wedge issues" that have a dubious effect on their life, and reaches into their pockets and robs them blind while they're busy looking the other way, redistributing their hard-earned money to the affluent classes."

As my brother would say, Puh-leaze. Your party injected race into this election, just as they have into every other election in memory. Your candidate is the one whose preacher divides people against "rich...white...(wait for it)...people!" Your candidate does the math and says if he can tell the lower 95% that they'll be able to vote themselves money, he'll be the one that gains, knowing he'll still be able to keep their money come 2010 when the Bush tax cuts expire. Wealth doesn't naturally redistribute itself from wage earners to political favorites, it takes a politician who benefits to do that.

"She's a woman anyone would be lucky to call a companion, and, unlike Cindy McCain, is not a rich trophy wife with little to say for herself."

OMG. Someone who dedicates her life to working with Downs Syndrome children rather than earning hundreds of thousands of dollars and then bitching about having to pay back student loans, that makes her a trophy wife. Someone who founded a medical services mission that went to places like Bangladesh, Iraq, and Vietnam, leading 55 of these missions herself, is a trophy wife? Maybe she would be better if she'd been, I don't know, never proud of her country? But we can't call her bitter, that's BO's rule.

I think you raise a great point. A leader of the free world should be asked where they get their information. Who is it that BO (again, actual candidate for President as opposed to would-be) trusts to advise him? He's never been asked it, but we know it, unless we watch the MSM. It's the Fannie Mae former executives, advisors on economics and selecting his would be leader of the free world. They're better advisors than Jesus Christ, right?

" It's the Fannie Mae former executives, "

Yeah, except the one still on the FM tit who's running your candidate's campaign.

"There was nothing complete, no presentation of evidence to shift the burden, and that's exactly the point. The people asking the questions don't have the burden to trust in BO the Unifier, as you suggest here."

If this were about whether he'd served ably in the Senate, or about his votes, his record, his express policy recommendations, I'd agree with you that he carries the burden. If this is about slurs and innuendo, then I submit that the burden is on the accuser. So where was that evidence that Obama's in cahoots with Ayers? That Ayers is in tight with the campaign? That they're anything more than people who run in the same circles, and share goals in improving education?

Beyond that, vote for whoever the f*&k you want. You bore me. And since you still haven't provided a single word to explain why Palin can't come out and call murderous thugs, who perpetuate their terror in real-time all over the country, who present clear and present dangers to this nation and its freedoms that Ayers is too busy trying to improve things for children to worry about, the terrorists they are, or why I should believe, on this basis, that this woman isn't every bit as enthralled to superstitition, witch doctors, and a dispensationalism that calls into question her ability to lead a nation that needs to be run as though Judgment isn't right around the corner, as her videos make her out to be (I put her somewhere between Falwell and a racing street preacher), I'm done with this discussion.

Oh, and that video repudiating the AIP? Yeah, thought so.