oh, sarah...

this is an interesting clip from the rachel maddow show that examines what gov. sarah palin said during the vice presidential debate a few weeks ago -- the misquotes, the misconstrued facts, and everything inbetween.

this video piqued my interest because of a book that i'm reading right now called the dumbest generation: how the digital age stupifies young americans and jeopardizes our future -- or the alternate title, don't trust anyone under 30. on a train ride to pennsylvania last weekend with my friend, i overheard someone talking about the book. what they said was so interesting, i dropped what i was reading and headed to the nearest bookstore to find it. the author, who teaches english at emory university in my hometown of ATL, asserts that the intellectual future of this country is dying because young people -- the 18 to 24 set -- aren't reading books. actually, they have a great deal of contempt for books and learning in general. he proves it, with a smorgasbord of statistics, surveys, polls and the like.

i'm somewhere in the middle of the book and i'm starting to believe that he's right.

according to his statistics, young people don't know history. they can't see things in historical context. they are so cocooned in facebook, myspace, iPhone and whatever tweaks them at the moment that they don't know who their local politicans are. they don't understand the importance of basic civics. there is a genuine disconnect from the world and what's happening in it that's stultifying. basically, they live in their own world. instead of studying hard and taking the tests, they take tests to figure out how to take the tests.

when you think about it, it kind of makes sense. why should they be able to name 3 artists from the 18th century? whatever information they need can be googled. why should they have to know that little rhyme "i before e except after c"? whatever word is in question can be spell checked. do you really need to know that stuff to land a great job and make a lot of money or to have any degree of rank amongst your peers? or be famous? or rich beyond your wildest dreams? or be the president of the united states of america?

it's kind of like that kid in english class back in the day when i was in middle school that read the cliff notes version of wuthering heights and/or saw the movie and then wrote a paper about it. and got an A. i actually read the book and got an A, too. but i really loved to read. it wasn't a chore for me. i always whipped through whatever i was given at school, kept the school librarian pretty busy, and maintained a personal library at home. what happened to me? my mother taught me how to read when i was 3 years old.

and therein lies the rub.

it's not that everyone under 30 isn't intelligent or ambitious. it's just that they aren't big on ingesting and retaining general knowledge.

that's when i started to think about gov. sarah palin -- the colleges that she attended, the fact that she never had a passport before she became the vice presidential nominee, how painfully inarticulate she is, how little she knows about world history or even american history, how little she knows about global politics, how she refuses to be interviewed because she doesn't want to be pummeled with "gotcha" questions from the media elite -- i began to see a correlation. i know she's over 30, but let's face it: she's a bright shining example of american anti-intellectualism. she is intellectually where most of the college-educated individuals of this country will be in short order unless something changes, and soon.

let's talk about those "gotcha" questions, for example.

a phd student from philly asked gov. palin a question about "the pakistan situation" and the answer she gave was in total contradiction to senator mccain and in line with senator obama. what a massively huge gaffe that was -- and ever since, the mccain/palin ticket has pulled the plug on such free-form q & a forums, and has stuck to what gov. palin does best: put her best most folksy-est face forward, misquote historical figures and regurgitate well-rehearsed republican talking points over and over again. the thing is, life isn't rehearsed -- and neither is political strategy. answering questions spontaneously shows us how gov. palin would deal with issues that inevitably will occur spontaneously.

i have a question: if senator mccain is elected and dies in office (because he's pretty old and he's pretty sick), will gov. palin's handlers run the country?

but i digress.

haven't we heard all of this "young people are stupid" stuff before? maybe i'm saying that because i've had to hear it a lot. my 92 year old daddy thinks that everyone is an idiot. i can see him now, sitting at the end of the kitchen table, waving his hand at one of us, at the television, at the world and going on and on, saying stuff like, "you kids don't know anything." and he's right. the problem with then and now is that kids today have access to absolutely everything -- and there are some people who think that they aren't necessarily doing anything with it. that may or may be true. but when i see gov. palin waffling over simple basic questions about the policies in her own party -- she seriously had no idea what the bush doctrine was, people! come on! the bush doctrine! how can any thinking republican trust a republican politician that doesn't know what that is!-- i'm inclined to agree.

more, more, more...

more fallout about how patently clueless sarah palin is on the basics from jack cafferty's cafferty file in CNN's situation room. (in her interview with charlie gibson, she was not at all familiar with the bush doctrine.  where has this woman been since 9/11?  astonishing stuff...) what's disturbing at this point is how many neo-conservative republicans want her to step down for the good of the nation and her political party -- and how so many others insist that she's doing a great job.  like elizabeth hasselbeck on the view, for example. *sigh* 

are most republicans like ms. hasselbeck?  close-minded, unyielding and uninformed, blathering their way through any argument by talking over anyone else?  i'm not kidding when i say this: she has the intellectual maturity of a canned ham. seriously -- she is genuinely uninterested in considering anyone else's point of view, even when what she's saying (her vigorous defense of sarah palin to joy's hilarous observation) is pure idiocy.  she seems proud, that she is standing up to the liberals by spewing talking points like shrapnel. ew.

i don't want republicans to become democrats. i don't want to convert anyone to a particular way of thinking. i just want everyone to stop clinging to their ideology and listen to another point of view. ms. hasselbeck is a wierd case to me because she's on a show that's all about considering that other perspective -- and she doesn't do it.  if she's typical of what a republican is like -- because frankly, i don't know any -- we are going down like a freight train, a la freddy king.  but i digress.

i said all that to say this.

as we stand on the verge of tomorrow's vice presidential debate, i thought it would be a good idea to zip through these clips to get a glimpse of what the rest of the country is thinking. because like i said, i don't know any republicans.  

the sarah palin interview

"when fascism comes to america, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross."  -- sinclair lewis

if you haven't seen cbs news/katie couric's interview with vice presidential candidate sarah palin, you should take a moment to watch this. it is, without question, an absolute flaming bombshell of a trainwreck. 

okay, here's my top three complaints/gripes/observations: 

1. i'm really grateful that ms. palin was interviewed by a woman so that no one could accuse the interviewer of sexism -- although i 'm sure they will, simply because she is female.  ms. couric asked the questions politely and respectfully and ms. palin was her usual friendly, attractive, evasive, misinformed, jingoistic, entitled, priveleged nasaly self. 

2. repeating your half-baked answer (which was really only a memorized soundbite in the first place!) to a valid question doesn't give it more substance or embue it with meaning, even when you say it slower and with more feeling and authority -- like ms. couric (and the rest of us) didn't hear it the first time.  ms. palin has a really bad habit of doing this.  her handlers/media wranglers/speech coaches should tell her that it makes her sound like an idiot. either that or they should put some other authoritative-sounding misinformation in her matrix.  

3. an interview on a nationally syndicated news program is not a take-home test.  you are supposed to answer the question fully and completely, when it is asked of you -- especially when it's something that you should already know. 

what are they calling her now -- dan quayle with a ponytail? hitler in high heels? i can't keep up. what's obvious is that this woman is getting a lot of scrutiny because  if john mccain wins this election, it's quite likely that she would have to take over as president sooner rather than later. let's face it -- he is old and he is NOT healthy at all.  that's why i want every media outlet everywhere to grill her like a cheese sandwich.  if she were anywhere near as competent as her republican fan base wants to believe that she is, that wouldn't be a problem -- so why did she fall apart with these easy, simple questions from "america's sweetheart"? 

simply put -- sarah palin doesn't know how to think critically and she doesn't know what she's talking about.  don't you go to a decent liberal arts college to learn how to think critically?  where did she get her degree -- a gumball machine?

 no wonder the rest of the world thinks that americans are idiots.

junogate!

i am NOT a vagina american!

i admire any woman in this day and age that has accomplished anything at all, irregardless of her political stance. but this vice presidential choice is flat-out ridiculous.

think about it: if mc cain wanted a woman on the ticket, he had many accomplished intelligent educated candidates to choose from -- candidates who have put years (and in come cases, decades) into their political careers, and have proven themselves on a national and international platform. any thinking republican knows who they are. elizabeth dole, for example -- BA Duke University, post-grad work at Oxford, MA from Harvard in education, Harvard Law graduate, worked under johnson and nixon. she's the only woman in washington, dc that's worked as a cabinet secretary for two federal departments (transportation and labor) under two presidents (reagan and bush). mrs. dole would have been a smart choice, someone that could realistically be vice president.

he could have picked secretary of state dr. condoleeza rice, put a black woman on the ticket and trumped them all! i will argue that there is no female in politics today with (the exception of madeliene albright) that is more educated or accomplished than she is -- BA political science Phi Beta Kappa, U of Denver, Masters in political science from the U of Notre Dame and then a PhD in political science from graduate school of international studies in denver at the ripe old age of 26 (!!!). nevermind the fact that she was/is a professor at stanford, or that she's an accomplished classical pianist or that she speaks spanish, french, russian and german. she was the first female, first african american, and the youngest ever to be appointed provost at stanford. and that ain't all.

now, that's vice presidential material.

who did mccain choose? the newly elected governor of alaska (only 20 months on the job), a state that's density in population ranks it as the 17th largest city in america (the school district in new york city handles more kids than the entire population of alaska); a former mayor of wasilla, a town with a population that's not as big as most college campuses; a self-described hockey mom of five, a former sportcaster and a failed beauty queen who by her own admission has no idea what a vice president does all day. no one seems to be paying attention to the fact that she is pro-life, that she believes in teaching creationism in schools, and that she has zip foreign policy experience (has she ever been to a foreign country? and please don't say canada -- that parallels bush the younger with only mexico under his belt as the newly nonelected president). She is also a lifetime member of the NRA. (protecting yourself with a handgun is one thing, but why should civilians own uzis?) remember: at 72, mccain is the oldest candidate for presidency, ever. if something happens to him -- and yes, he has health issues -- she'll be the leader of the free world. if that doesn't scare you, nothing will.

she's a force to be reckoned with like thunder curdles milk. clearly, it's going to take a lot more than a patriotic, gun-toting working mom to get us out of this mess.

i'm a lot of things but what i am not is a vagina american. i've never voted with my gender and i'm not about to start now. but i will tell you this: anyone who is all for this ticket deserves exactly what mccain and palin will turn this country into if they are elected: an arctic region covered with ice. and if they are elected, i will be more than happy to suffer through their four years in office, just to watch the people who voted for them get exactly what they deserve.