Sara Palin vs. Rush Limbaugh

Resigned Alaskan governor and rightwing activist Sara Palin has come out strongly against those that believe tossing around the "R-word" is acceptable in public discourse and should be included into the modern lexicon. I strongly agree. Though I remain baffled as to why Sara Palin will not strongly admonish radio host Rush Limbaugh for doing exactly just that to a very large listening audience.

It all began with White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel referring to congressional liberal as "f---- retarded," as reported by the Wall Street Journal.

A stern defender of the developmentally disabled, Sara Palin came out strongly against those who would use such derogatory language that hurts not just the people the insults are aimed at, but also injures the people that care for and love with all their heart developmentally disabled children as well.

"Just as we'd be appalled if any public figure of Rahm's stature ever used the 'N-word' or other such inappropriate language, Rahm's slur on all God's children with cognitive and developmental disabilities -- and the people who love them -- is unacceptable, and it's heartbreaking," Palin wrote on her Facebook page.

While I would disagree that Rahm Emanuel should resign over his poor choice of words, I support Sara Palin in her indignation against this kind of language. It is important to note that Rahm Emanuel has apologized in public for his statement and there is no reason to believe it was anything but very poor choice of words and the expression of an honest opinion that illuminates exactly what I have long thought may be true of the White House chief of staff.

Under my observation, Rahm Emanuel is misguided in some of reasoning in so far as in my view he should be in support of the congressional liberal agenda and attempting to balance that against the presidential agenda if he were a "true blood" liberal / progressive himself. Somewhat like his boss, he is just not liberal enough for me. But I chalk it up to personal political differences between those of the "grassroots" left and the "big tent" left.

Enter conservative radio-talker Rush Limbaugh:

Limbaugh took the occasion to double-down on Emanuel's remark. On his radio show, Limbaugh made an even more derogatory comment, insisting that there can be no insult in "calling a bunch of people who are retards, retards."

The real news, Limbaugh continued, was that Emanuel had directed his "retard" comment at Obama supporters. "So now there's going to be a meeting," he said. "There's going to be a retard summit at the White House."

Not only did Limbaugh use this hurtful word repeatedly but he outright refuses to apologize to God's children for his venom spread as a public figure. What is more, Limbaugh has decided to use the words "retard summit" to embellish his point which removes the question if we are talking about Limbaugh believing others to be simply misguided in their thinking and he is slurring them in sport, or if he is talking about a group of people as "inferior" examples of humanity than himself. The question of if we are talking about persons or talking about ideas is made clear in Limbaugh's statement but Emanuel's statement could be taken either way.

This combined with the large difference in stature between a radio shock-jock and a White House chief of staff makes for a situation in which surely Sara Palin must see the need to say more about Rush's "slur on all God's children with cognitive and developmental disabilities -- and the people who love them" as there is no doubt it was and remains to be "unacceptable, and heartbreaking" that slurs and vile contempt for fellow human beings is so widely accepted in modern political lexicon.

There seems to be some confusion in the Sara Palin camp as to the seriousness of this kind of language being used by public figures in our politics. She has decided to issue an statement through a representative in regards to the offensive words of Rush Limbaugh rather than, as I believe is the proper format for a public figure of her stature, post her thoughts onto her Facebook page in regards to these onslaughts thrown at God's children from the EIB studios.

This confusion persists as Sara Palin continues to hold her true feelings in about those who use mass media and public formats to attack the developmentally disabled in regards to this, possibly intentional, slight against her child and her family by Rush Limbaugh.

As it stands it appears that either Sara Palin was simply trying to score cheap political points by chastising Rahm Emanuel when "it doesn't matter who said 'r-word'" or she has merely yet to properly address the seriousness of Limbaugh's attacks against the developmentally disabled. There is no question that EIB & Rush Limbaugh thrown down the gauntlet against the rights of the developmentally disabled to be treated will respect and dignity. What remains to be seen is if Sara Palin will continue to waffle the issue by having her spokesperson, Meg Stapleton, speak for her or if she will stand proud and tall against all those who would cast such spiteful injuries unto those who deserve our greatest compassion in this modern lexicon.

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UPDATE!

Rush Limbaugh was won, unquestionably. Sara Palin has laid prostrate before his mighty slurs.

Fox "Not-a-news-agency" News is Banned From White House Porch

(Image: Chicago Tribune's "Swamp Politics")

Is it a good idea to single out just one outlet in the manner that The Obama White House recently has in the case of removing Fox Broadcasting from the press pool?




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At first, I was in favor of the move to ignore the Fox Broadcasting Company by Barack Obama.

His efforts to clear his name on the website "Fight The Smears" stem almost entirely from Fox. He has every right to defend himself from these smear-merchants and radical right-wing propagandist supporters.

The right-wing lobby called "Fox News" (as in the cable pseudo-news) and "Fox News Talk" (as in the radio pseudo-news) is still "not a news organization" in my opinion. But I think this label should include everyone from COMEDY CENTRAL to HLN to CNN to MSNBC, everyone except PBS and C-SPAN.

It's been televised tabloidism in place of televised journalism for far too long. In my view.

Any White House that would send a clear signal that The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, Countdown, The O'Reilly Factor, and The Glenn Beck Show are all the same thing would be nothing but a benefit in this age of media-hate & mass misinformation.

These programs are not news, they are purely entertainment-television.

Each of these programs has an agenda, as does the network behind each.

There is nothing wrong with doing agenized-news. But it is dishonest and unethical to claim objectivity if you are playing toward a specific political wing, or any specific agenda. This is the greatest offense of the so-called "Fair & Balanced" Fox Broadcasting. As a network they cater to right-wing political agendas and refuse to declare themselves as a format that promotes conservative ideology. In that case I see it as a function of false advertising on behalf of the network.

All these programs, it‘s important to point out, are television-propaganda toward that agenda. Which might be only the agenda to make you laugh.

The broadcasting produced by this political lobby / news agency / entertainment format in only the viewing of it is not dangerous. It is taking these kinds of broadcasts as serious news formats that is problematic in a democratic society.

The informed viewing of propaganda is merely educational. However, to those who refuse to see the difference between opinions and facts the viewing of the propaganda of reckless liars, there is a dangerous situation produced.

Mine is a somewhat complex argument in regards to The News Wars between The Obama White House and Fox Broadcasting Company:

It is a good move that Obama is standing up to bad journalism mixed with bad business practices, but a bad move that he singled out FOX alone when all the news agencies screw something up.

FOX is just the biggest offender of the smears.

I believe radio and satellite should remain untouched by sweeping regulations, but televised broadcasting of race baiting and McCarthyism is just too much tabloidism for me to handle.

This sensationalist-reporting on politics that has been going almost entirely due to FOX NEWS is not exclusive to them, so I think it would be wise to pick out a few other agencies, perhaps CLEARCHANNEL and COMEDY CENTRAL, to also declare as non-news formats.

It is clear to me when a news group is run by an agenda, thus becoming more like a political lobby than a news group, but it is not clear to everyone.

A President who stands for educating the public should seek to educate people on what exactly "bias" is, and hopefully shed some light on the issue.

The specific near-criminal acts of failure to disclose vital information of a story committed by FOX NEWS should be spoken of plainly and openly if not handled more severely. This tactic of isolation is my only qualm with Obama's approach to dealing with fake news.

If it is the desire of this White House to tackle the specific crimes against society that Fox has committed, then I would hope the case was made in specifics.

It is my personal view that a news group, of any sort, can lose it's status as “press” if they fail to uphold the journalistic truth as a matter of course.

I only believe Obama did not go far enough to fight unethical journalism and false reporting.

But I certainly agree with the point that FOX has become something other than a news agency when they promote bad journalism that is not related to their opinion-makers.

Speech-less: Tales of a White House Survivor

Former speech writer for the Bush White House, Matt Latimer, appeared on Alan Colmes Radio to give an interview regarding his new tell-all book "Speech-less: Tales of a White House Survivor" and talk a little about his experiences in the White House.

The following is an unofficial summary-transcript provided by value of a premium podcast subscriber and is not connected in any way to FOX News Talk or the staff of The Alan Colmes Show:

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LATIMER: I was a conservative son of two liberal parents from a union family in Flynt, Michigan. I wanted to talk about my personal journey through Washington. Which, as you know Alan, is a circus. I saw Capitol Hill, the Pentagon and the White House from high levels and it's a rare, unique perspective of Washington.

COLMES: But you knew you'd upset people.

LATIMER: Sometimes there were people who I saw in Washington who sort of forgot why they were sent there, and I didn't hesitate to have ancedotes that revealed that. I knew those people weren't going to like the way they came across.

COLMES: You think Lara Bush was a Democrat, right?

LATIMER: The prevailing wisdom in the White House--before she married him she was a Democrat and most people in the White believed that was certainly her sentiment.

COLMES: Some of the other things that have come out. The president's statements about Hillary Clinton's keister.

LATIMER: The media has kind of picked up the juiciest [parts of this book.] Yes, he did say something like that.

***

LATIMER: I found an appeal in Barack Obama. What I liked about him was he promised to be different from the usual Washington crowd. He spoke to people in a real language and, you know, once you get to Washington you kind of forget how to talk to people.

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Find a copy @ Amazon.com

Tea Party Folks Did Not Vote In ‘08

“I was actually black before the election.”

-- President Barack Obama

I well aware of how vastly arrogant my headline for this post is.

I’m not a TEA Party ("Taxed Enough Already") person, nor a right-winger, nor a libertarian, nor a fringe radical. But I actually pay attention to both sides of the political spectrum, in fact all sides of the political spectrum, and I do it on my own without relying on the work of others to decipher it all for me.

I am stepping outside of my ‘box’ here, but what I’m telling you is based off of real comments of real people who didn’t get paid more if they screamed louder or lied harder.

And these people enraged with everything Obama does or says did not vote. Period.

They all sat home and decided that it was all a wash. Or the vast majority of them did at least. Maybe a few voted for the anti-American psychopath Alan Keyes.

Now Obama came out to say, in a very clever way, that the animosity against him is political and not racial.

I think very likely this is, for the most part, completely accurate.

A lot of these people are so angry because they didn’t vote. And that’s really it. There isn’t a lot more to understand.

Sure they are ‘anti-government‘, but not really. They are only anti-government when the government is run by mainly Democrats and their hatred for the government dissolves as soon as the Republicans are in power. It’s laughable and complete partisanship, but also not racist in any form.

The issue of this modern strain of racism is far more subtle and far more disguised than something so simple as overt anti-black statements.

This is part of why the rightwing cannot process the words of Jimmy Carter.

His courageous words involved looking at the world in more than a black-and-white, on-and-off, bumper sticker mentality. One must dabble in nuance and undercurrents to come to this conclusion.

It’s rather simple:

Some white people in this country are not willing to share power with non-whites.

If you actually read Carter’s comments, that is exactly what he said.

And it would be deplorable and insane if President Barack Obama was going to back up the words of Jimmy Carter. That would be completely wrong-headed and bad for the country.

So this whole issue has been a-swing-and-a-miss in terms of the conservative response to these charges. They constantly imply that Carter said that all rejection of Obama is based on race and everyone political knows that such a statement is completely false.

This example here of the TEA Party people and how they in fact placed no trust in democracy whatsoever during the election and then want to place faith in democracy through protest at this stage is just one of many examples that shows that it‘s not all racial motives.

Basically they came late to table and that’s part of their extreme bitterness. They are quite angry with themselves for the nonsense they were spouting, that I was listening to, that voting was completely pointless. Now they really wish they had gotten out there.

The big point a lot of people on the left fail to make about all this is that it is the failure to reject racialists like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh and the failure to reject McCarthyist claims, that started long before Glenn Beck started repeating them, is the best example of racism in The Republican Party.

The howling silence from major ticket Republicans in regards to race-baiting and McCarthyism running wild in their party is pretty much the best evidence that exists that not only was Carter right, he understated the problem.

But I’m no brazen fool, I know exactly what I’m asking the GOP to do. I want them to throw away the Southern White Racists and throw away the White Nationalists, both of which really do vote Republican. So my request is for them to throw away votes.

And they won’t do that. Especially not now that they are wounded, limping party relying on media hounds to do CPR to their wrinkled husk.

But it’s about doing what is right for the country even when that might not be what is best for the party.

And this complete unwillingness to even admit that a boil of festering racism exists upon the fringe of the rightwing, makes me think that perhaps this veiled racism against any non-white leadership is actually present in a vast majority of cases.

Something Carter never said. Something I’ve never heard anyone say whatsoever.

But when many people won’t even explain why they believe Carter was mistaken and all they do is engage in bigoted insults against him, misrepresent what he said and just plain arrogantly insult anyone who backs Carter up; it truly does the beg the question if they just view the matters from a different lens or if they actually are so enraged because they know these statements are true and cannot abide by it being discussed openly in public.

Should Cheney Be Investigated?

"I agree with the president. We should move forward."

-- Sen. John McCain - Meet The Press - July 11th 2009

I disagree with both Senator McCain and President Obama in regards to complete investigations into any violations of US Law during the previous administration.

In a country of laws and values there must be consequences for violating those standards set forth by this nation. If we will not so much as investigate any illegalities that may, or may not, have been committed by former Vice-President Richard Cheney while in office then we as a nation stand for nothing but protecting the powerful at the cost to the whole.

It is clear to me that Republicans want to avoid the pursuit of justice. If there was no illegal actions done, then I would think Cheney and those who support him would enjoy having their day in court to exonerate the claims that violations of the law took place. The investigations would serve as a chance to rebuff the claim that all their actions were within the bounds of the law during their terms.

The fact that these individuals are so vehemently opposed to any investigations seems to denote that they in fact may believe that something might arise from said investigations.

I believe, in justice for all. There is no position in our society that is beyond reproach of the law. If the Bush White House, or any person in the government services, broke the standards of law they should be punished for this violation.

To state otherwise, is to stand against justice.