Conservative Conniptions

This is beautiful. Some on the far-right didn't get the memo that the election is over. Senator McCain has had a sit down with "that one," the "socialist terrorist celebrity." Sarah Palin is even gracious now, "Barack Obama has been elected president. Let him be able to kind of savor this moment ... and God bless Barack Obama and his beautiful family." Can't compete with The Complete Book of the Collected Wisdom of Sarah Palin: In Her Own Words, or latest gruesome hilarity of her Turkey pardon as other fowl are slaughtered in the background, but a telling moment on her post-election media blitz.

Compare that abrupt magnanimity from the Governor of Alaska with this from Rep. Paul Broun of Georgia:

"We can't be lulled into complacency," Broun said. "You have to remember that Adolf Hitler was elected in a democratic Germany. I'm not comparing him to Adolf Hitler. What I'm saying is there is the potential of going down that road."

Way to go off the deep-end on the paranoia scale. I feel sorry for Athenians. How can you give us the B-52's, REM, etc. and be represented by this ass? Blame the Augustans, I presume. Did Ayman al-Zawahiri not listen to these nut-jobs? Why was he critizing Obama? Doesn't al-Qaeda know Barack Hussein Obama is a closet Muslim with terrorist sympathies?!

Speaking of paranoia, how about the black helicopter crowd buying guns like it's the oncoming Tribulation. After all, how many of these same people believe Obama is the Antichrist? God bless gun shop owners. If I were one I'd always vote Democrat. Sure, it would probably go against my deeply held political philosophy on Second Amendment rights, but damn, it's good for business (the same pattern occurred with Clinton). Own a gun or two? fine. Collect? fine. But hoard? you're a militia nut or compensating for something.

From the paranoid to the traditionalists, possible 2012 Republican candidate Newt Gingrich said the following on Bill O'Reilly's Factor:

Look, I think there is a gay and secular fascism in this country that wants to impose its will on the rest of us, is prepared to use violence, to use harassment. I think it is prepared to use the government if it can get control of it. I think that it is a very dangerous threat to anybody who believes in traditional religion. And I think if you believe in historic Christianity, you have to confront the fact. And, frank -- for that matter, if you believe in the historic version of Islam or the historic version of Judaism, you have to confront the reality that these secular extremists are determined to impose on you acceptance of a series of values that are antithetical, they're the opposite, of what you're taught in Sunday school.

Fascist irony aside, at least he includes Jews and Muslims. He's actually correct in that observation. And yet, when I criticized the Prop 8 commercials for being overtly Christian to the exclusion of values held by other traditionalist religions on a comment in YouTube, I was ridiculed and proselytized. Yes, while being sarcastic, I had actually proffered advice they would be wise to take under advisement. And yet I was merely met with what might be called a certain Christian Supremacist Fascism. I woudn't go so far as to compare them to historical groups such as the Iron Guard or Austrofascists, but exchange the old anti-Semitic paradigm with Islamophobia in conjunction with the same homophobia that sent gays to Nazi gas chambers, and I can make an equally outrageous, albeit more tenable, comparison too. The fact that Congressman Barney Frank was mentioned to hissing crowds at Palin rallies with Pelosi and Reed had nothing to do with him being Chair of the House Financial Services Commitee. Still, American right-wing nuts could still amp it up further by taking a few pointers on cartoonish fanatical populism from Hindu Nationalists like Lal Krishna Advani.

So, there's the paranoid, the anachronistic, and then there's those who have apparently been living in an alternate dimension the last eight years. Case in point from a conservative blog by John Hinderaker:

Obama thinks he is a good talker, but he is often undisciplined when he speaks. He needs to understand that as President, his words will be scrutinized and will have impact whether he intends it or not. In this regard, President Bush is an excellent model; Obama should take a lesson from his example. Bush never gets sloppy when he is speaking publicly.

He chooses his words with care and precision, which is why his style sometimes seems halting. In the eight years he has been President, it is remarkable how few gaffes or verbal blunders he has committed. If Obama doesn't raise his standards, he will exceed Bush's total before he is inaugurated.

I can only assume in John Hinderaker's world, Bush also has a goatee.

More thoughtful conservatives are wishing Obama well, saying that while they didn't vote for him, he's now president, and they want America to succeed. Fine sentiment, if it weren't implicit in their declarations that un-American liberals like me have been beating up on Bush. Bullshit. When Gov. Bush became President-elect Bush, and Bush v. Gore was still a fresh wound, I had hope. Hope that this enigma from Texas, touted as a new compassionate kind of conservative and a uniter who would work across party lines, could be a decent president like his father was. Rather, he lost the popular vote, but ruled like he had a 10% mandate. And we all know the rest. Nice try conservatives, but there's a difference between criticism from paranoia and criticism of performance. Senator Chuck Hagel had some zingers on that note:

"We are educated by the great entertainers like Rush Limbaugh," said Hagel, sarcastically referencing the talk radio host who once called him "Senator Betrayus." "You know, I wish Rush Limbaugh and others like that would run for office. They have so much to contribute and so much leadership and they have an answer for everything. And they would be elected overwhelmingly," he offered. "[The truth is] they try to rip everyone down and make fools of everybody but they don't have any answers."

Similarly, they've been decrying the big bad media for coronating Obama and skewing coverage. Truth is, the media was skewed. But then again, how much good news did McCain give them? They may have held back punches from Obama and gone overboard pounding Palin, but on the points that counted, she deserved much of it.

In 2000 Bush came to Washington D.C. riding on a white steed, like St. George, after slaying the Democratic dragon that had "stained" the Oval Office. The media was in love with him. Gore was boring, and lambasted for claiming he'd invented the internet -- though he'd never actually said that. Liberal media bias my ass. Do they mean the same "liberal media" who was MIA in the run-up to the Iraq War? It's about capitalism. It's about the story that sells, not ideology.

Journalists, being highly educated are prone to be liberal (not a judgment of conservatives or those without higher education being inherently stupid, just a demographic fact, much like creative people and paleo-evangelicals being on opposite sides of the political spectrum), and that will seep through. And if it subtly does, so what? The frightful specter which right-wing radio is setting up as a straw man is that congressional Democrats might reintroduce the Fairness Doctrine. They excoriate Air America for struggling, because it isn't as entertaining as demagogues like Rush Limbaugh. 'Capitalism!' is the cry. Fair enough, you can make fun of Air America and NPR, then bitch and moan about the MSM; but not at the same time. Capitalism, bitches. Sucks for you. And fine with me, because we now have Keith Olbermann, who consistently wins the age demographic without one foot in the grave. You can have your silly 20th century talk radio and aging FOX News viewers. However; the cheetah brigade has our blogs, MSNBC on digital cable... and the future. We have a president in touch with technology, whom is already giving weekly addresses on YouTube, and is preparing to go cold turkey off his BlackBerry. We will also have a president who cares about our past, about preserving the soul of America, and not just ancillary wedge issues and jingoistic rhetoric. After recently watching the film "Taxi to the Dark Side," it will be cathartic and cleansing to hear our new president stand up and say in front of the world that no more will America torture!

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On unrelated notes I couldn't fit into the main body of the post:

-- Sen. Lieberman (and the reckless neo-con foreign policy he represents) was bailed out in the Democratic fold, but we did pick up Ted Stevens' seat in Alaska (on his birthday no less!). With the Minnesota seat still in question and the Georgia runoff heating up, incumbent Georgian senator Saxby Chambliss, and his GOP surrogates are staking it all on rhetoric warning of one-party rule. 'We can't let the Democrats get filibuster-proof rule, it's not good for Democracy,' they say. Really? Reeeaaallly? Oh, how the tables have turned since threatening the nuclear option in 2005! Do you ever listen to yourselves talk?

-- Remember the ICE leak of Obama's aunt and her immigration status days before the election? Julie Myers has been quietly relinquished of her position by Chertoff without reason. Curious...

-- Gov. Huckabee and Romney have revived their mutual disdain from the Republican primary. Huckabee wrote in his new book that Romney was “anything but conservative until he changed the light bulbs in his chandelier in time to run for president.” Let the Republican Civil War commence! That's still not as good as the palpable contempt the Republican Governors Association held for Sarah Palin at their latest meeting, but it's all very entertaining nonetheless.

-- In world news I wanted to offer my condolences to expatriates living in New Zealand, and the Kiwi Labour Party on Helen Clark's loss. I also wanted to congratulate the Indian Navy on taking out pirates off Somalia. Way to show initiative that the US and Russian navies have yet to do! शं नो वरुणः !