Thursday, May 29, 2008

Childe Barak

My first thought was, he lied in every word,
That hoary cripple, with malicious eye
Askance to watch the working of his lie
On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford
Suppression of the glee that pursed and scored
Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby.

-- Robert Browning

**********

When does enough become too damned much? Immediately, when we're talking about any US election and this one is exceptional only in that it went over the top before it even started. The latest bit of fake outrage at the Republican "he said, she said" buffet is that Barack Obama told a whopper when he said an uncle of his helped liberate Auschwitz. The man actually participated in the liberation of Buchenwald.

No straw lacks enough buoyancy to be grasped at by the party drowning in its own deceit.

"Obama's frequent exaggerations and outright distortions raise questions about his judgment and his readiness to lead as commander in chief,"

said RNC spokesman and ethical cripple Alex Conant. No, they don't, but he wishes they did. He wishes they would raise the kind of doubts that should have prevented the coke and booze-addled serial failure, cynical liar and duty shirker George Walker Bush from being elected to public office. George, the guy who promised to keep us out of foreign conflicts and nation building and to restore honor and dignity to the Presidency.

Obama's
grandmother's brother, was a member of the US 89th infantry division that went into Buchenwald and that's a fact. It has no more or less significance than if it had been another camp, although of course Auschwitz is in Poland and was liberated by the Russians. No honest man could identify this as a lie, but then we're talking about Republicans.

No candidate's programs, promises, plans or platforms ever survive first contact with reality anyway, It's all for show, but if Obama is being dishonest by naming the wrong concentration camp and George Bush was honest by claiming he had never been arrested for drunk driving, then it's time to stop talking about honesty and begin talking about gross, offensive hyperbole and ruthless hypocrisy. It's time to get real about who's exaggerating and how it reflects on the GOP and its candidates.

Cross posted from The Reaction

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

As I listen to my wingnut friends speak, they never, ever, reference what they like about McCain's policies, or his perceived experience or leadership abilities.

They all hate Billary with a passion. They distrust Obama, since they believe he is too good to be true, a talking head so to speak.

They just trot out "supposed" issues about Obama, or just label him as a "typical" tax and spend liberal Democrat.

I would like to think that we could discuss the issues and the candidates, and then make informed decisions. Many of my friends are extremely bright, however, they make purely emotional voting decisions. In my mind, they are all cheap. They don't trust the government to spend their money wisely, so they always vote for the lowest possible taxes.

"Maybe" one or two of my friends might vote for Obama, given my passion for change and changing the status quo. They might vote for Obama, as a gesture to our friendship, but that again would be an emotional decision.

MrSleep

Capt. Fogg said...

I read an interesting article a few months ago where people were subjected to PET scans while being asked all sorts of questions. Any that required thought lit up the cognitive portions of the brain; any involving political opinion involved only emotional activity.

I've long thought that these things were based more on tribalism of some strange sort and choosing candidates has little to do with qualifications or past performance. We just excuse things when a member of our tribe does wrong and snarl and growl about anything the other tribe does.

We are apes, after all.

Anonymous said...

I may have to change my code name to Mr Slape :)