Originally Posted By ecdc <a href="http://www.newsweek.com/id/160080" target="_blank">http://www.newsweek.com/id/160080</a> While I take issue with a few of Harris' characterizations, overall I think he's spot on. It sums up quite well why some of us find Sarah Palin so disturbing as a VP choice. A couple of selections: >>The problem, as far as our political process is concerned, is that half the electorate revels in Palin's lack of intellectual qualifications. When it comes to politics, there is a mad love of mediocrity in this country. "They think they're better than you!" is the refrain that (highly competent and cynical) Republican strategists have set loose among the crowd, and the crowd has grown drunk on it once again. "Sarah Palin is an ordinary person!" Yes, all too ordinary....<< >>What is so unnerving about the candidacy of Sarah Palin is the degree to which she represents-—and her supporters celebrate—-the joyful marriage of confidence and ignorance. Watching her deny to Gibson that she had ever harbored the slightest doubt about her readiness to take command of the world's only superpower, one got the feeling that Palin would gladly assume any responsibility on earth....<< And my favorite paragraph: >>Ask yourself: how has "elitism" become a bad word in American politics? There is simply no other walk of life in which extraordinary talent and rigorous training are denigrated. We want elite pilots to fly our planes, elite troops to undertake our most critical missions, elite athletes to represent us in competition and elite scientists to devote the most productive years of their lives to curing our diseases. And yet, when it comes time to vest people with even greater responsibilities, we consider it a virtue to shun any and all standards of excellence. When it comes to choosing the people whose thoughts and actions will decide the fates of millions, then we suddenly want someone just like us, someone fit to have a beer with, someone down-to-earth—in fact, almost anyone, provided that he or she doesn't seem too intelligent or well educated.<< More at the link.
Originally Posted By Mr X ***"They think they're better than you!" is the refrain that (highly competent and cynical) Republican strategists have set loose among the crowd*** Ain't that the truth? When did being smart, thoughtful, and well-informed become such a liability in America?
Originally Posted By Mr X ***Watching her deny to Gibson that she had ever harbored the slightest doubt about her readiness to take command of the world's only superpower, one got the feeling that Palin would gladly assume any responsibility on earth....*** It's a task from god, you see.
Originally Posted By vbdad55 <When did being smart, thoughtful, and well-informed become such a liability in America?< a while ago- most things are dumbed down today , from museums - to theme parks - to TV shows...and the classroom push little johnny too hard in school and he might get totally stressed you know, let's goto pass-fail instead and let's allow kids to take a total combo of 3 years of math/science in HS and graduate while the rest of the world hands us our ass on a plate....let play sports and not keep score, also let's cut physical ed classes from curriculum because someonemight not get chosen and might end up in a clock tower, any museum without a lot of push buttons basically doomed..
Originally Posted By chickendumpling I think vbdad is dead on with his post #4. And I bristle at the reality of it. It is also why I dislike the "elitist" criticisms I hear being made in this election.
Originally Posted By planodisney The term elitist doesn't have anything to do with being highly educated.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 "Elite" used to be a good thing to be. But it has long been a dirty word among populists. To be fair, populism has both a good side and a bad side, and it has been used and manipulated by both Republicans and Democrats at various points in our history. New Deal Democrats used it successfully to gain the support of the middle and working class. Then the elites were primarily seen as the economic elites, i.e. the people who got fat in the 20's and made everyone pay for their excesses with the financial crash and resulting Great Depression. But in the past 40 years, the charge of being an "elitist" has mostly been leveled by Republicans. The watershed was in the 60's when they discovered that working class whites would often vote on "cultural" issues rather than economic ones - at first it was hardcore racists that they got to desert from the Democratic party after the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Acts were passed (LBJ correctly predicted that within a generation the south would morph from solidly Democrat to solidly Republican.) Later it became more subtle, and sometimes included appeals that were anti-gay, anti-feminist, as well as anti-black (with various degrees of subtlety), but often were just tied up in "cultural issues" that said essentially "we're like you and they're not." It wasn't long before they discovered that non-college educated people voted more heavily Republican, and college-educated people voted more heavily Democratic (with plenty of overlap, obviously). This led to the blatant populist appeal of putting down "elitists" as "people who think they're better than you." There's no evidence that someone like Al Gore, say, felt he was better than anyone else. But if they could portray him as such, they could stoke those resentments and cost him votes. As long as it works, they're bound to go back to that well.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 < The terms Elite and Elitist imply very different things.> Yes. The first means better or smarter or more able at a particular thing. The latter is a vague charge designed to stoke resentment among "average Joes" that the person being called elitist isn't "one of you" or thinks he's "better than you."
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan Funny line from comedian Will Durst: "McCain should trade in 4 of his houses for a hotel. That's how I always play the game."
Originally Posted By mele Here's something kinda funny: <a href="http://personal-space.com/embed/script.php" target="_blank">http://personal-space.com/embe...ript.php</a> My name: Snowshoe Man Palin
