Hazy Shade of Winter

And so, I listen to Governor Sarah Palin’s speech, and try to live-blog this one, such as it is. We’re starting to hear about the family… Track, Bristol, Willow, Piper… Track on his way to Iraq, let’s not talk about the girls, and young Trig the baby boy. No, let’s not talk about the girls. No. Let’s not.
Well, I guess there’s the bio-part. Soon, policy and attack, from the candidate for national office with the least quantitative experience in a serious position of any candidate for high national office that anyone I know can remember (Edwards and Dubya each had six years). It’s just that after inflicting Dubya on us, haven’t we had enough sick jokes from this party? Still more bio-stuff… soon, the policy, and the hit-pieces… Ah… Yes… hockey-mom who signed up for the PTA!!! YES! With a shocking resemblance to Bat Girl’s secret identity
Ah… the attacks on Barack’s “community organizing” from the mayor of Wasilla, AK, and mocking Barack’s “clinging to religion and guns” line. Jeez, Sarah, keep this up and we might forget he’s Black.
Ah. Battling the “entrenched special interests” up in Alaska (doubtless such as her husband’s employer, BP). Ah. She put the luxury jet on e-bay; we’ll see if Air Force Two gets auctioned off. Ah… abuses of earmarks. And the great natural gas pipeline… because we can drill our way out of all most of our problems… doesn’t everyone know that?
[Liveblogging… I don’t know…] Ah… back to attacking Barack… a man who authored two memoirs but not a single major law. Check. Mocking the stadium. Check. What is our opponent’s plan… after turning back the waters and healing the planet… to make gov’t bigger, reduce the strength of America in a dangerous world… ALASKA FIRST! Sorry… victory in Iraq in site he wants to fortune; terrorists seeking nuclear weapons… ALASKA FIRST! Sorry… terrorists won’t have their rights read. (Those of us who went to law school tend to be sticklers on this… why is stupid so popular in the Republican party? Does former POW McCain really want to campaign on our military violating the laws of war? Charming, no?)
Big government; tax and spend…blah blah blah. Raise taxes… blah blah blah… Consistency makes this party… on message. It never gets old, even as poor people pay payroll taxes for the benefit of Blackwater and KBR…
Oh what’s the point… I give up. I’ll read about the rest in the Times or the Post!!!
Look: we were all hoping for a “fresh face”… this looked an awful like the good old Karl Rove attacks, delivered by “the hockey mom”… While her little joke (What’s the difference between a hockey mom and a pig pit bull? Lipstick.) Standard stuff; some might call it “juvenile”. And the appeal is at the most awful, superficial level. If her job was to psyche up the base, she did so. If it’s to secure crossover Democrats, independents, Hillary-folks, she has not changed the basic dynamic, and the fact is, a nice speech from her (and it was a small, mean-spirited speech of the kind we expect from her small, mean-spirited party) doesn’t give her the necessary basic qualification… and the GOP is doing it to us again.
The basic dynamic remains the same: Barack is still Black, isn’t he? THAT, boys and girls, is what this election is about. The Republican brand is sullied beyond the base; and Barack… is Black. How will this (greatest ever!) election campaign play out? We’ll just have to see…

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