buzz twang

Great video that spells it out.

What I see… somewhere over ohio.

What I see in Omaha. foot bridge over the missouri river.

What I see in Omaha.. Hillary Clinton rally.

What I see in NYC. How we do Halloween in the city. Yorkville style.

What I see in NYC. A sculpture and two paintings by Modigliani.

With the changing economic climate and a real need for new structure and paradigms, been thinking a great deal about how we can change how the world works. And, living in a city like NYC, a lot of what I see that works (and what doesn’t work) needs to be extrapolated (and dealt with realistically) into the world at large. And, the web works in great ways (and not so great ways)… Steven Johnson talks about both and more from TED.

What I see in NYC. By Constatin Brancusi. 1910.

What I see in NYC. Sculpture of Ugolino and his sons (from Dante"s Inferno) by Carpeaux at the Met.

Historically, hatred is a powerful motivator for the conservative movement in the United States and we are finally seeing it all come to a watershed moment. (truth is, it’s always been a pathetic attempt at solidifying “the base”, and a long term suicide plan.) The years of right wing hate mongering are out of the dark corners and have gone mainstream, for a simple reason: McCain and Palin can’t win on the issues. And, they know it.

Sadly, hatred is the only tactic the McCain and Palin campaign has left. An argument can be made it’s all they ever had in the first place. And, they use hate to it’s fullest, and it works. Too well.

So, what are good American’s supposed to think when that hatred becomes public and vocal and ugly? We should be very outraged and take action, because we are witnessing eliminationist and fascist tactics and behavior right before our eyes. A few examples:

McCain is in the middle of one of his eliminationist rants, implying that Obama is a terrorist with the line: “Who’s the real Obama?” and an audience member shouts out “terrorist!” McCain says nothing. (Note that he reacts confused and annoyed to it. So, he definitely heard it.) Here’s the video:

And it gets worse. At a Sarah Palin rally, via AmericaBlog, the WashPo reports the following nearly identical moment:

“Now it turns out, one of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers,” Palin said.

“Boooo!” said the crowd.

“And, according to the New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that, quote, ‘launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol,’” she continued.
“Boooo!” the crowd repeated.

“Kill him!” proposed one man in the audience.

Palin went on to say that “Obama held one of the first meetings of his political career in Bill Ayers’s living room, and they’ve worked together on various projects in Chicago.”

A person threatens the life of a presidential candidate (on the 40th anniversary year of presidential candidate Robert Kennedy being killed no less!) and nothing is said about it. No campaign statement refuting it. Amazing.

Now, if this happened at an Obama rally, if someone at one of his rallies shouted out “kill him” in reference to McCain, it would be over. That’s a fact. Think about the hate filled behavior of the McCain and Palin crowds for a moment, and the fact that a presidential candidate and VP candidate are literally promoting hatred with threatening results, and getting away with it with nary a mention of it, or outrage, from the press. Perhaps the bar is truly that low.

Of course, Sarah Palin is a right wing extremist who hates America. No one expects too much from a dumb sportscaster I suppose.

So, who are these hate filled eliminationist fascists at the McCain / Palin rallies? Well, not to put to soft a point on it: they are not bright, angry and ill informed. Generalists with just enough facts to be dangerous. Conspiracy theorists, malcontents, extremist, anti-intellectual, knee jerk assholes.

Watch the video from Blogger Interuppted:

These are the people who still beleive that Bush is a good president, and they are McCain’s base, and rallied around Sarah Palin as the VP pick with gusto and determination, knowing nothing about her.

We are at the cusp of taking our country back from these ignorant hate filled turds.

Nuff said.

Via Jeff Newelt. Olbermann nails it.

Sarah “Winky” Palin on Barack Obama in an interview with Faux News:

Some of his comments that he has made about the war that I think may — in my world– disqualifies someone from consideration as the next commander in chief.

In my world, a grown adult who can’t speak properly – construct proper sentences maintaing the proper tense, for example – should be disqualified from consideration as the next VP. The job is, as we all know, a heartbeat away from the job of commander in chief. Someone give this C+ American a 3rd grade grammar book.

Just sayin’.

Video of the mangler:

Here’s an extended quote from the debate. The mangling is just mind boggling. Unable to construct a proper and coherent sentence. Scary. In answer to the question from Ifill about what was her Achilles Heel…

My experience as an executive will be put to good use as a mayor and business owner and oil and gas regulator and then as governor of a huge state, a huge energy producing state that is accounting for much progress towards getting our nation energy independence and that’s extremely important.

But it wasn’t just that experience tapped into, it was my connection to the heartland of America. Being a mom, one very concerned about a son in the war, about a special needs child, about kids heading off to college, how are we going to pay those tuition bills? About times and Todd and our marriage in our past where we didn’t have health insurance and we know what other Americans are going through as they sit around the kitchen table and try to figure out how are they going to pay out-of-pocket for health care? We’ve been there also so that connection was important.

But even more important is that world view that I share with John McCain. That world view that says that America is a nation of exceptionalism. And we are to be that shining city on a hill, as President Reagan so beautifully said, that we are a beacon of hope and that we are unapologetic here. We are not perfect as a nation. But together, we represent a perfect ideal. And that is democracy and tolerance and freedom and equal rights. Those things that we stand for that can be put to good use as a force for good in this world.

John McCain and I share that. You combine all that with being a team with the only track record of making a really, a difference in where we’ve been and reforming, that’s a good team, it’s a good ticket.

Jane Hamsher at Campaign Silo says Palin has no clue what “Achilles Heel” means, and I think she may be right. Holy cats.