Riposte to Gloria

This exact same emotional appeal, and I hate emotional appeals, can be made for African Americans and Obama. I hate going down this road, the whole "my identity right or wrong." It's exactly what I criticize my fellow African Americans for doing, and I could not in good conscience give a thumbs up to this appeal, while giving a thumbs down to the other.

Can any good come out of the election in terms of this two respective identity groups? Sure, but what is lost by taking a step foward if the person we elect takes us many more steps backwards?

Furthermore, the riposte makes an assumption that keeps being made without any proof: that McCain picked Palin because he was postively receptive to disenfranchised women. He either picked Palin to primarily and cynically go after disaffected women voters for his own gain, or he was going primarily after his base. Neither of those put you/us in control of the situation. And on the former, we're simply being used and thus psychologically abused.

This may be a riposte, but an overly emotional, and thus, poor one.

You know, I don't mind one bit disaffected Democrats voting McCain/Palin as a protest, but I do really take issue with trying to pathologically rationalize ones' vote on ideological or cultural grounds, because you simply can't. Palin simply isn't worth the cost for anything other than a protest vote.

If I, as an African-American, am not supposed to vote for Obama because of his inattention to progressive issues that would help AA's in the long run, and because he allowed his surrogates to sexistly insult and racially bait the base within his own party, well, then, why should I vote for someone more provincial, more groomed by the GOP and presented with the same skin-deep cynical appeal to *end* progress for the non-white-male group she represents?

If both are stalking horses, and both refuse to commit to substantive progressive issues involving my race or my gender, what good are they, for Pete's sake?

Skin doesn't matter.
Issues do.

i agree with most of what Damon said except voting for McAwful as a "protest vote".

imo, that would be extremely counter-productive and even destructive.

consider voting Green, especially if you live in a blue state - this sort of 'protest voting' is both positive (compared to voting for McCain) and proactive (compared to sitting the elections out or writing in Hillary) and sends a message that we are ready for a true progressive party and for a woman/minority ticket.

Instead of saying "I don't mind one bit", I probably should have said "I understand" or that "I wouldn't lose any sleep over" someone choosing to vote for McCain out of pure protest. I can't imagine any scenario in which I'd give McCain or the Republican Party a vote for president. Even if the Dems don't deserve my vote, the GOP deserves it even less, and the GOP convention solidified that, for me.

At the moment, I will either be voting third party of simply voting down ticket. A progressive or liberal giving their vote to McCain/Palin simply isn't the antedote, and proper response to, misogyny and sexism. In fact, they couldn't ever be, IMO.

Long's case is an effective, and truly feminist, rebuttal to Steinem's faux-feminist argument that was merely your typical partisan Democratic rant.

Basically, Long isn't saying "vote McCain/Palin because Palin is a woman", she's providing a rational (and not emotional) case for supporting women candidates who can act as role models for their daughters -- and it is the same case that makes "indentity politics" for African Americans acceptable.

Most telling in the piece is Obama's dismissive attitude toward the idea of gender equality in the cabinet.... it might be easier to retreat to the same old male dominated networks for cabinet positions, but it would not be all that difficult to find highly qualified women who could fill half of Obama's cabinet positions. But Obama treats that very idea with contempt.

of our overwhelmingly homogenous politicans, most of whom are Pale Males. This is true of both parties--Democrats really shouldn't pat themselves on the back too vigorously--they should recruit and groom more women and men of all ethnic backgrounds so that the party can truly represent America. But, because we've been given only two women candidates to choose from in our entire roster during the primary season and the general, we're getting bogged down in artificially restricted conversations about whether or not Sarah Palin is "bad" or "good" for women.

The answer to that question is another question: why is she our only choice? Is she truly the Last Woman Politician in America? Whose interests are served by restricting our choices this way?

As a feminist who truly believes that having women represented in government is important, whatever their politics, I won't be voting for McCain/Palin. However, I understand and respect the decisions of other feminists if they vote R this time around.

ready -- maybe it's the Village that isn't, and is so scared of what might result that they're poisoning the well as hard as they can in the cases where people outside their palisaded communities might derive some benefit (a Clinton presidency once restored the country's economy after a Reagan/Bush run had not just our pocketbooks but our spirits on their knees).

But if the hicks and rednecks and yahoos and po'folks and Katrina refugees won ... migod, how would the Village continue to be seen as relevant and important?

Well, the simple brutal truth is, the Village's image would suffer, and its self-importance take a hit.

Can't have that.

I'm trying to understand this. Dr. Lynette Long seemingly appointed herself as representative of a group of Clinton supporters first to contact and lobby John McCain, then to contact and lobby an unnamed member of Barack Obama's "Finance Committee", whatever that is exactly. The description of the meeting with McCain tells us that Long made certain demands (a female vice president and gender parity in the Cabinet)and McCain "listened respectfully." (Note that Long at no point states that McCain actually agreed to anything.) The description of the phone calls with the Obama Finance Committee member tells us that Long made the same demands and was dissatisfied with the response. Long then goes on to relate anecdotally (again providing no names) an incident in which she delivered the same demands to some "DNC canvassers" and was upset at their responses as well. Finally, Long tells us that she delivered the same demands to an unnamed Obama policy advisor, and was upset about the response.

Dr. Long feels dissed by the responses she got from the various unnamed Democrats, and calls upon her anger to help justify her intention to vote for McCain/Palin.

Dr. Long's vote is hers and she doesn't owe it to anyone. However, she has made a very public statement about exactly how she intends to vote and justified her choice by describing how she felt insulted and disrespected by various individuals. Surely Dr. Long can tell us the names of the various people who so angered her--even if not the DNC canvassers, then at least the Obama Finance Committee member and the Obama policy advisor.

How is it that these unnamed advisors are so powerful as to turn the PUMA's Lukasiak toward McCain, yet she feels the need to keep their anonymity, as if she's afraid of their disdain?

What the hell good are all these 'advisors' Long (or CD or goldberry, for that matter) keep digging up and relying on, if we have to pretend we're journalists and give them the cover of an unnamed source?

Didn't we despise these games, during the Plame affair? That if a source burns you or gives you information that's non-confidential, then they should come out in the open?

I'm really really *really* tired of all the people who tell me to do something because an anonymous friend tells *them* to do something, either by fiat or rumor or reaction to fiat or rumor. I thought democracy was supposed to be better than this?

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/article...
-- A Feminist's Argument for McCain's VP

"... There is a point where all of our issues, including abortion rights, are made safer not only if the people we vote for agree with us - but when those people and our society embrace a respect for women and promote policies that increase our personal wealth, power and political influence.

..."

Fortunately, my candidate of choice has the policies. Unfortunately, she didn't have the brute force to beat the competition.

I love this job!

Let me demonstrate for you, Amberglow, what kind of a feminist Ms. Bruce is.

Here is a column she did for NewsMax in 2005; it's title: The Increasingly Ugly Left, and as you'll discover, she does mean "ugly."

It's always shocking when the left unmasks itself — it's usually very brief but when it happens not only can't you turn away, it's actually important that you don't. While it would seem impossible, the left has found a new low, this time courtesy of both the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times.

On the same day, both newspapers published bizarre attacks on the most basic values of personal appearance and physical health of the president and those he supports. It's the newest indication of how frustrated and frenzied the left has grown in the face of an America which refuses to join them in their drowning pool.

In a piece for the Los Angeles Times on July 22, 2005, titled "The (over)exercise of Power," Jonathan Chait notes he finds the president's interest in exercise "disturbing." He bleats, "What I mean is the fact that Bush has an obsession with exercise that borders on the creepy." As opposed to a president's obsession with Big Macs and a certain intern?

Chait finds the fact that the president makes time to exercise "astonishing." He then notes: "My guess is that Bush associates exercise with discipline. ... The notion of a connection between physical and mental potency is, of course, silly. ..."

Really? Not according to the medical establishment and the surgeon general's office, which notes the benefits of exercise. Such as? Better sleep, reduced tension and stress, reduction of high blood pressure, reduction of anxiety and depression, reduced risk of colon and breast cancer, healthy bones, muscles and joints, improved self-image, and generally improved physical health.

For the most powerful man on earth, the man on whose shoulders the fate of the free world rests, the president clearly recognizes exercise is an imperative component to his being able to do the job.

I hope by this time you will have noticed the subtlety of Ms. Bruce's prose style. In fact, it's almost impossible to figure out what Jonathan Chait may have been trying to get at in his column, so densely incomprehensible is Bruce's rendering of his argument. It's primary role in her column is to allow her to get to what is always her basic subject; having been a been a member of the left, she has both a special ability and a special responsibility to lay bare the horrifying truth about the American left - that it is made up of icky people who hate America and Americans, people you would never want to invite for dinner, or live next to - because they are icky, icky, icky.

For example, from this particular installment:

It would be easy to dismiss Chait as just another "journalist" who makes a living hating the president, but there's more to it than that. You see, leftists harbor a personal jealousy of people unlike them.

And who would that be? People considered "on the right" or "conservative," those who have a healthier, happier, more positive view of life. When you view the future with optimism, when you feel you are in charge of your destiny, you're going to be kinder to and take better care of yourself.

The pettiness of Chait's argument reaches its pinnacle of envy with an insistent but unconvincing shout of I-Have-Self-Esteem-Too! in his last gasp. Chait closes by accusing the president's encouragement of exercise among Americans as a further indication of how "out of touch he is. It's nice for Bush that he can take an hour or two out of every day to run, bike, or pump iron. Unfortunately, most of us have more demanding jobs than he does."

Wow, that says it all, doesn't it? Chait is smarter, more clever, is much busier and certainly more important than the president. And he doesn't even need to lift his keester out of his chair! Make no mistake here — the Left is obsessed with one thing: mainstreaming their nihilistic, empty lives. Within their narcissism and desire to be ‘normal,' society must be made to look like them, and let's be honest here — their world of victimhood, depression and hate is not a pretty one.

Consider their political and public leadership — those who are supposed to be the cream of the crop, meant to attract others to their camp, the Role Models. Teddy Kennedy. The Clintons. Lynne Stewart. Barbra Streisand. Whoopi Goldberg. Rosie O'Donnell. Michael Moore. Alec Baldwin. Al Franken. Need I say more?

During my time with the National Organization for Women, one of the (many) things that disturbed me during national board meetings was the fact that many of the women seemed to be allergic to bathing, and especially frightened of the concept of ‘grooming.'

The simplest things reveal that you are in a room full of unhappy people — many were significantly overweight, and by grooming I mean engaging in the simple act of running a brush though your hair, brushing one's teeth, visiting a dentist if need be (at least on occasion), and simply caring enough about yourself to at least attempt to appear healthy.

When I would dare to bring up the issue of appearance (as gently as one could imagine), that notion, of course, was rejected as "surrendering to the male-dominated view of female beauty." Hey, how about surrendering to not being repulsive? That helps every cause, whatever it may be.

Yeah, now there's an anecdote no one could doubt actually happened. Eh, Amberglow? And don't you love the dialogue she sticks into the mouths of those NOW women, about not wishing to surrender to the "male-dominated view of female beauty," which run through the magic lantern of Tammy Bruce's hate machine, comes out "Hey, how about surrendering to not being repulsive."

You do understand, Amberglow, that Tammy's talking about other women - repulsive women, ugly women, fat women, smelly woman, who don't bath and don't brush their teeth. Well, just in case you didn't get that, let me let Tammy continue:

Of course, on the Left, one gets lost in groupthink. Personal health, exercise and being aware of one's own body in itself is an indication that you're conscious of yourself. Yet it is personal unconsciousness which is encouraged and fostered in leftist activist and leadership circles.

Being Unhealthy and celebrating the Ungroomed is an art form on the Left. And ultimately, as evidenced by Chait's opinion piece, those who do take care of themselves, and dare to remind society of how things should be, are demonized. Why? Because they serve as a counterpoint to what the Left is not.

You see, it now cannot be ignored that one side of the political spectrum even looks unwell. And how does the Left strive to make that irrelevant? By marginalizing those who are unlike them — the physically healthy, those who actually take care of themselves, are to be mocked and shunned.

Think I'm being too extreme? Consider Robin Givhan's coverage of John Roberts' family at the president's press conference announcing Judge Roberts as his nominee for the Supreme Court. In her Washington Post story, also on July 22, 2005, titled "An Image a Little Too Carefully Crafted," Givhan eclipsed Chait with an astounding pettiness thought only in existence on the elementary school playground. Givhan actually attacks Judge Roberts' wife and children for being groomed and well-dressed.

"His wife and children stood before the cameras, groomed and glossy in pastel hues — like a trio of Easter eggs, a handful of Jelly Bellies, three little Necco wafers. ... Separate the child from the clothes, which do not acknowledge trends, popular culture or the passing of time. They are not classic; they are old-fashioned. These clothes are Old World, old money. ..."

In other words, the Roberts children should have been dressed in GAP clothes, preferably with a piercing of one body part or another.

Yeah, Ellie Smeal was famous for her piercings. Also please note that it is impossible to know from Bruce's rendering of it, what in hell Givhan's point might actually have been, not that I'm all that hot on that kind of politics as fashion kind of analysis. But let's get back to Tammy:

President and Mrs. Bush and the Roberts family make the mistake of not pledging allegiance to the decline of culture. They insult the Left by reminding intellectually lazy Slaves to Decay like Chait and Givhan that class, decorum and respect still exist. Tradition, caring for one's family and caring for oneself are still values that prevail.

Is Lynne Stewart to be the new American beauty standard? Is Michael Moore, and the slow suicide of morbid obesity, to be sought after? Is Ward Churchill to be the New Ideal Man? Is the discipline brought by exercise and self-restraint so frightening that we would prefer to have a quadruple-bypass like Bill Clinton?

After all, if you care enough about yourself to resist a Big Mac and Krispy Kreme, you would also have the discipline to resist an intern. Unless, of course, your world is one where there are no standards, exercise is "creepy," and looking good is "old fashioned." Theirs is a world, as Bill Clinton mused, where you do what you want ‘because you can.'

Thank goodness Americans are deciding they deserve better.

And as for the company Tammy keeps:

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If you don't know who Lynne Stewart is, look it up.

What you can be sure of, Amerberglow is this; you will never see Tammy Bruce taking on this kind of attack against these kind of women, although her home page is filled with denunciations of the Feminist left for the hideous way they have been beating up on poor Sarah Palin.

Yeah, Amberglow, Tammy Bruce is the very picture of a real feminist.

"such angry heavy sarcasm"

wasn't what I got out of that reply at all. I got out of that reply a healthy defense against a bucketful of swill slung at random.

No, it wasn't 'reasonably obvious' that Amberglow would have avoided linking to Tammy Bruce had more of Bruce's background been revealed.

It's not reasonably obvious to me that you understood Leah's point at all. This is Media Critique 101, Gyrfalcon: as lambert says above, know your sources.

And a FORMER president of the LA chapter of NOW presents me with a mental picture that's a cross between Nancy Reagan and Susan Powter. Pass me the bucket, lambert.