Andrew's Tiki Lounge

Scapegoating Sarah Palin

It is sad -- no, make that painful -- to witness the Republicans devouring one of their own. But it is happening right now. Sarah Palin is getting her rear end kicked something fierce. In certain GOP circles, Palin has become what Ralph Nader was to the Al Gore campaign back in 2000: a convenient excuse. 

The logic goes something like this: John McCain lost because of Palin; because she blew it so badly in those Katie Couric interviews; because she was so over-the-top that she was almost self-parodying (Tina Fey wasn't far off at all); because she spent $150,000 on clothes even as she claimed to be an advocate for Joe the Plumber (one McCain aide described the shopping spree as the "Wasilla hillbillies looting Neiman Marcus from coast to coast"); because she never held press conferences and she shouted from a podium that Obama "palled" with "terrorists"; because moderates never really warmed up to her; because she didn't know Africa was a continent or which countries were part of NAFTA. She didn't even know what to say when asked her what publications she read. She gave an interview to Canadian radio DJs pretending to be French president Nicolas Sarkozy. 

And now comes the news that Palin probably spent significantly more than $150,000 on clothes. 

Hard to believe that when McCain picked Palin (the day after Obama delivered his stirring keynote address at the Democratic National Convention), the conventional wisdom was that Obama -- not McCain -- made a mistake in selecting a vice presidential candidate. 

But Palin has since become an easy out for the Republicans, just like Nader was an easy out for the Democrats eight years ago. The Palin bashers don't have to be reflective. They don't have to explore the deeper reasons for McCain's failure. They can point to an easy scapegoat.

Interestingly, there are also a significant number of Republicans who still adore Palin and see her as the party's last, best hope in 2012. They urge her to keep her options open and consider a run for the presidency. Without McCain anchoring her down, they believe, she will triumph in a bid for the White House. They envision a day when Governor Palin becomes President Palin. 

Both views -- Palin as a scapegoat and Palin as a savior of the GOP -- are problematic. Without question, Palin's weaknesses as a candidate contributed to the staggering defeat of the McCain/Palin campaign. But there were countless other reasons -- too numerous to list here -- for the outcome of last Tuesday's election. 

It should come as no surprise that Sarah Palin is being ridiculed by McCain loyalists and Fox News. The larger truth is much more difficult to face: Americans did not simply reject the McCain/Palin Campaign. In record numbers, voters turned away from the agenda of the Far Right. Had Sarah Palin been a stronger candidate -- an Elizabeth Dole or a Kay Bailey Hutchinson -- the outcome of the election probably wouldn't have been much different. 

The latest Obama assassination fears

 

From the Associated Press today:

"Law enforcement agents have broken up a plot by two neo-Nazi skinheads to assassinate Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama and shoot or decapitate 88 black people, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms and Explosives said Monday."

According to the U.S. Attorney's office in Tennessee, two white supremacists, Daniel Cowart, 20, and Paul Schlesselman, 18, used the Internet to hatch this insidious racist scheme.

This is the latest of several Obama assassination scares. Because Obama is very similar in style to John F. Kennedy and in temperament and morals to Abraham Lincoln, these fears have been around since he first launched his campaign in February 2007.

Such anxieties arise from a long legacy of assassinations in American history. When a leader of strong integrity and principles such as Barack Obama appears on the American political scene, a number of people fear that he is too good to be true and isn't going to last. 

It has been a long time since a politician has inspired Americans to the extent that Obama has. Indeed, only a handful of presidents in American history -- George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan -- have been able to restore the American public's hope for a better future. 

But if history is any indicator, people have good reason to be worried. Of course, Lincoln and Kennedy were assassinated; Roosevelt and Reagan were almost assassinated. 

Thankfully, since JFK was assassinated 45 years ago, intelligence gathering has improved a great deal. It is encouraging that this particular plot to assassinate Obama has been thwarted. But it should come as no surprise that such a plot existed -- and there are probably many others like it developing on the fringes. When you spread the kind of hate that the McCain/Palin Campaign is spewing to huge audiences on a daily basis, audiences that scream -- in a rabid frenzy -- that Obama is a "terrorist," a "traitor," a "socialist" and "Obama Bin Laden," then, yes, Virginia, fuel has been added to the fire and the danger to Obama's health and well-being will escalate. 

Most of the blame rests with these maniacal white supremacist haters who are so twisted by their own nasty, apocalyptic fantasies that they can no longer reason properly. But the McCain/Palin Campaign shares part of the blame, too, for their relentless smear campaigns. Shame on them.