Friday, August 7, 2009

Listening to Ann Coulter

Before my Democratic friends get too excited about the crazies who seem to be taking over the Republican party, consider Ann Coulter's column of Wednesday. She points out that it's not the Republican party that contains 99 percent of the people who believe that:

--Bush knew about the 9/11 attacks in advance
--The Bush family clandestinely spirited the bin Laden family out of the U.S. after the 9/11 attacks
--Bush went to war in Afghanistan to help the Unocal Corporation to obtain a natural gas pipeline there
--Sarah Palin's infant son Trig is actually her daughter's child

Fair enough, the Democrats have their share of crazy conspiracy-believers, but that's not the worst thing: the worst thing is that respectable politicians on both sides feed these ugly stories for political gains.

Where are Reinhoold Niebuhr and Jim Leach now, when we need them?

1 comment:

Judith Ellis said...

Yes, I would agree that there are crazies in all political parties. But there are those who are in a particular category all by themselves, of these I would list Coulter, Beck and Limbaugh. The spewing lies and hatred are palpable.

The big difference appears to be that typically the Democratic leadership is not passively sanctioning and stoking such lies and hatred. Some might say that the names above are not leaders in the Republican party. But who are the leaders of this party? I very much appreciate Olympia Snowe and some of the ideas of Darrell Lissa of California. Both are thoughtful Republicans.

Where there is no condemnation of such outrages lies and misconceptions there is a tacit acceptance and agreement of such. This is what has been the most shameful for me in this health care debate. The tactics of the Republican party for getting elected have been very shameful. Stoking the worse fears seems to be their modus operandi.