The Great Palin Purge of Aught-Eight

At this point, I've really started to feel sorry for the poor chumps at RedState. If anyone's been duped, burned, roped, and drained by the Republican Party, it's these guys. Because at a certain level, I believe them. They might not know what they're talking about, but at least they're earnest. And sure, on a day-to-day basis they engage in a huge amount of shameless deception, but at heart it's always self-deception. They're only proponents of the conservative system because they're such strong believers.

And holy shit were these guys used by the Bush Administration for the past eight years. Just shamelessly so. They bought every line, pimped the propaganda, attacked every foe; and what do they have to show for it? A huge huge embarrassment that they're forced to cover-up by blaming everyone else. And then along comes a new election with the hope of a "real" conservative at the helm, and what do they get? Fricking John McCain, a traitor they hated.

But then McCain pulled a rabbit out of the hat. He picked Sarah Palin, a conservative goddess from the toughest of all states. And sure, reality tells us that Alaska sucks at the government's teat harder than anyone else, but dammit, what good has reality done these people? Not a lick of good. But right when they thought they were settling into the greatest presidency since Ronald Reagan, BLAMMO! something horrible happens: It turns out that many of the conservative Republicans who only pretend to drink the Koolaid just couldn't get on-board the Palin Express. And thus begins The Great Purge.

Propaganda Nonsense

In just one of many posts on the subject, RedStater Mark Kilmer pretends to laugh at conservatives who are crapping on his parade. And for as much as Mark insists that he's "entertained" by these conservatives, it's quite obvious from the incomprehensible rambling quality of his writing that he's clearly shaken by all this. Not that I think he gives a hoot about what these conservative pundits say, but it's what they're doing by undermining his belief system that's really hurting him.

I quote:
"It is amusing that certain people with a misplaced sense of elitism can verbally attack a conservative Vice Presidential candidate in the middle of what could be a very close election, essentially because they do not like the cut of her jib."

Excuse me? So is it only people with a proper sense of elitism that can verbally attack Palin? Is it only conservative Vice Presidential candidates being attacked that make this amusing? And most absurd, is it not enough to dislike her jib? Do we need another reason? And perhaps there were also verbal attacks, but I believe these were written attacks he's speaking of, by National Reviews' Kathleen Parker and NY Times' David Brooks.

And so, while I understand exactly what he's getting at, it really just seems like this paragraph is a patchwork of rhetorical phrases used as substitute for an actual point. Because the translation is: Republican pundits shouldn't criticize Palin even if they don't like her, because it might cause us to lose. So why the "amusing" "elitism" "verbally attack" stuff? It's like he's so upset that he's just digging into a very limited bag of rhetorical tricks in order to not make this sound like he's upset because these pundits aren't propaganda machines. Because that's all he really wants: Conservative pundits who praise Palin.

Meaningless Language for Oafs

But that one was nothing, check out the next paragraph:
"Are these people seeking meaningless language which the speaker uses to fool the unsuspecting oaf into believing that a high-minded principle is being discussed? The politics of meaning, by jove, it takes a village? Does that suffice in the place of sanity? Obama/Biden?"

What the fuck does that mean? I'm telling you, I haven't left out any context here. This is it. What the hell is he talking about? The only sense I can even make out of it is that the first sentence applies to what he's doing, and then he does it in the other two sentences. He's using meaningless language to fool his readers into believing he's discussing a high-minded principle, when he's really only trying to pimp pro-Palin propaganda. And then he throws out what I guess is a Hillary reference with the "village" line, and then questions someone's sanity...I think.

And geez, I could go on to quote just about everything the dude says and marvel at it. He goes on to quote an odd rambling defense of Palin by McCain, in which he posits that Governors are always more experienced than Senators. And then there's some weird stuff about Reagan, who "always kept his eyes on the prize, reflected in conservatism." And then something about how Americans in the 80's knew what they were doing, where they were going, and why; and asserts that Obama and Biden don't. Huh? And then there was something about how he's "never heard a sophism escape [Palins] lips."

This is all just nonsense. And again, when you boil down what he's saying it just means: Republican pundits need to repeat propaganda. That's it. There are no facts given. No arguments made. Merely a recitation of what Kilmer would like to hear from all Republican pundits. And at the end, the only real defense of Palin he can muster is to say that, if anything happened to McCain, she'd be surrounded by good advisers who'd help her through it. And yeah, that worked great with the last dope this guy helped push on us. It's like they've erased Bush from their memories completely. I sure wish they'd teach me that trick.

Commenters Comment

But of course, the real fun begins in the comments section. Now it's time for them to hash out which Republicans are real conservatives and which are "Georgetown elitists."

Commenter dbecraft gets the ball rolling by attacking everyone from the "National Republic" (I believe he meant National Review) to Peggy Noonan and suggests that they all be thrown out of the "Republican Conservative party." But Kilmer comes back and suggests that Noonan is really a conservative, but still thinks she should be reciting the Palin propaganda. And finally, Ezekiel ends that discussion by saying that Kathleen Parker is a conservative, but Brooks is a "PBS conservative" they trot out to make conservatives look weak.

Later on, despite a glowing rave of Brooks by a commenter who just thinks that Brooks is too "inside the Beltway" on this one, another commenter insists that neither Brooks or Bill Krystol are conservatives. As he says of Brooks "Lord, this boy wouldn't know conservative if someone smacked him," which seemed particularly odd until I remembered that getting smacked is a leading cause of conservativism. Kilmer than shows how out of touch he is by wrongly stating that Krystol doesn't write for the NY Times. Having read a few of his boring columns, I wish I didn't know that either.

After that, you can read a thread on how "Obama and the liberal left have no tolerance for the Sarah Palins of the world," as evidenced by the fact that they've attacked Palin. That discussion devolves into an absurdly anti-intellectual rant about how "Academic performance and real accomplishment are mutually exclusive." Another commenter acknowledges that Obama is smart, but suggests that "much of what he knows just isn't so" which leads us to a very odd definition of the word smart. Later on, we find a debate as to whether or not Palin is anti-intellectual, with one commenter insisting that this is what makes her endearing, and the other saying that she's just anti-snob and connects with the people, like Clinton did (damn, I'm old enough to remember when that'd be considered an insult by these people).

Purge Purge

And then we can get back to the purge, where General Colin Powell is a "sophisticated, liberal Republican" who is "beholden-to-the-cocktail-party-crowd snobs." Jesus christ, why do these people hate the military so much? Lone Beagle goes as far as to suggest that Powell be "run out of town on a rail," along with Brooks, Noonan, and the person he was responding to.

And two more tratiors I found: Eisenhower's Granddaughter and Chris Buckley. As one commenter says of them, "the fruit fell far from the tree." Another commenter suggests they add "David Gergen, George Will, Tucker Carlson and the rest of the left of center Bow Tie Republicrats." PURGED! PURGED! PURGED!

And another target: "Country Club Republicans," as if that isn't the entire core of the party. And getting back to the point at the beginning, I understand why these conservatives would want to hate these people for what they did, but it's their fucking party! And if the RedState conservatives don't like what the Country Club Republicans keep doing, then they need to find their own party. Republicans are invite only.

Oh, and towards the end there is a HILARIOUS discussion with a moderate Republican trying to explain to them why these purges are a bad idea, and all they can do is keep insulting the guy and tell him that he's going to be "blammed" (banned from the site) for dissenting. And no, the irony didn't seem to occur to any of these people. Too funny.

And I'll end this with another comment by Lone Beagle:
"It seems that people who like Sarah Palin are thoughtful, well informed and intelligent. Just like Sarah Palin herself!"

And that just about says it all. Sarah Palin is now our new Good v. Evil litmus test.