John McCain’s Hail Mary Pass running mate announcement – coming practically on top of the triumphant Democratic party convention’s endorsement of Barack Obama and his VP choice Joe Biden – was one of the swiftest and most divisive political buzz kills of the summer.
I’m not sure what was more disturbing about Republican vice president hopeful Sarah Palin, her freaky, right-wing evangelical Christian politics or the winking, smirking ease with which she was able to pass off appalling insults and outrageous lies about her democratic opponents.
I definitely hated her bitchy put downs, like her big fat dig at Obama during her first televised debate: “I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a community organizer, except that you have actual responsibilities,” laying it on thick in a snarky, corn-pone twang.
Her anti-feminist appeal was also disturbing – viscerally so. She seemed factory-made to symbolize everything women have worked so hard to change, only to find nothing’s really changed at all.
The only thing that made it all remotely bearable was reading the smart, opinionated, and sensible coverage of the disingenuous Alaskan governor in the blog, Mudflats.
Just reading the open thread comments and the well-researched and timely posts of the author went a very long way in reminding the rest of the world, Canadians included, that a very large number of Americans – the heretofore silent majority – are all right and not crazy or mean or stupid.
The site tirelessly countered the pro-Palin propaganda, setting the world straight on the her political dealings while holding office, first as mayor of the tiny burg of Wasilla then as the 49th state’s governor.
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