Monday, May 19, 2008

Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth


(Video by Robert Greenwald at Brave New Films)

There are some folks we call dead-enders. They will follow The Party no matter what. If they saw GWBush, John W. McCain, Dick Cheney, and Grover Norquist gang-raping their child on TV, they would still vote for anyone with an "R" after their name, including the aforementioned McCain.

It always cracks me up when a supposed 'thoughtful' Right-wing pundit criticizes a Democratic candidate, thoughtfully, as if they would ever vote for said candidate, or even consider him anything but a traitor willing to sell us all down the river into Islamofascist slavery:
The fact that everyone knows who Bush was referring to and the fact that the substance contained in the remark reflects the widely held belief of a very large percentage of voters should have given Obama an opening to retract the remark and share his thoughts on engaging Iran, Syria, and other terrorist supporting nations in a useful dialogue.

Instead, Obama and the Democrats hit the ceiling, calling Bush every name in the book and whining about their hurt feelings. Their reaction reminded me of a line from the movie All The Presidents Men where the Washington Post has published an article accusing the White House of wrongdoing and the reaction to that article from the Nixonites. Ben Bradleee observes “They doubt our ancestry, but they don’t say the story isn’t accurate.”

Obama called Bush’s words “an appalling attack,” “dishonest,” divisive, “fear-peddling,” fear-mongering,” but for some reason, never got around to responding to the substance of Bush’s charge; that Obama and the Democrats cannot be trusted with running American foreign policy because their outlook on the world is is based on false assumptions about, our friends, our allies, our role in the world, and most of all our deadly enemies.

Bush actually did Obama a favor. He gave him a golden opportunity to lay out his “realistic” ideas on American foreign policy so that it would get the widest possible hearing. The problem, as Obama and the Democrats well know, is one of perception – a perception they try their best to finesse rather than tackling head on. It’s not about talking tough and making threats. It is about calling our enemies, well, enemies . They could try that for starters.

Right. Problem is, any idea Obama lays out as realistic will be ridiculed by this guy and his crowd. Yet he seems so reasonable. But often so do most sycophants and supporters of totalitarian regimes.

In another post by the same guy, he mocks Obama for his popular appeal, as if appealing to, well, the populace was something to be avoided:
What could possibly be wrong with 75,000 people attending a political rally?

Admittedly, not much on the surface. And perhaps if the times weren’t so perilous and the candidate who was the beneficiary of that huge crowd wasn’t so problematic, we could really celebrate such an outpouring of support, free from the nagging doubts that plague many of us about Barack Obama and his past associations and present ideological beliefs.

Except my republican soul (note the small “r”) is a little frightened at this mob scene. Politicians should be plebeian in their appeal – being one of us and not standing above us, Caesar-like in their beguilement of the masses. Truman and Eisenhower were plebes; modest in their habits and with no illusions regarding their own failings. There is something to be said for such solid republican values in a presidential candidate and when someone such as a Kennedy or Obama rises above the masses, presenting themselves as perhaps something more than a servant of the people, we are bound to look in askance at such a phenomenon.

The anti-populist elitism, the sniff of "dirty masses" from an ivory tower conservative psuedo-intellectual is almost enough to make the spirit of Bill Buckley smile up from Hell. The fear of the people revolting, trying to further their own best interests, has been a touchstone in conservative politics since long before the Cold War.

And in case he forgot, there's never been a more anti-plebian President than GWBush, with the possible exception of Poppy Bush, who really took his elitism as a life style, and didn't try to hid it with a phony rancho in Texas.

Moran finishes his anti-Obama whine thusly:
But dangerous he is – for his beliefs, not for his personality or the character of this mass movement he has inspired. So when I see 75,000 people screaming his name with the kind of abandon reserved for rock stars or religious figures, I worry more that the candidate won’t be able to live up to the lofty expectations he has engendered in his legions than he would use such a movement for nefarious purposes.

And given his incredible lack of experience and zero track record in getting anything done, I would guess that if he is elected he would generate more disappointment among his followers than any other president in memory.

Dude, that's rich in unintended irony. He worries, poor concern troll he is, that Obama won't live up to the Left's expectations, that he has an "incredible lack of experience and zero track record in getting anything done", and will "generate more disappointment" blah blah blah.

Like, you know, George W. "28%" Bush has done.

The real reason for all this pearl-clutching and hand-wringing is in the video at the top, and rests on the heads of the Republican collective, the "dirty unwashed masses" who voted for McCain, once a pariah in Republican top circles, now their candidate. Weak as Wally Cox with the flu, ethically challenged as Ferdinand Marcos, anti-intellectual as GWBush, and flip-flopping more than a trout in the bottom of a boat, McCain's star is the one they have hitched their wagons to. So Moran instead carps and whines about Obama's mis-perceived problems, and pronounces him a bad candidate.

Yeah, because your guy is Teh Hot™.

Bastard.

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