Women and Children Last in Palin Country

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The statistics are grim.

Alaska leads the nation in reported forcible rapes per capita, according to the FBI, with a rate two and a half times the national average -- a ranking it has held for many years. Children are no safer: Public safety experts believe that the prevalence of rape and sexual assault of minors in Alaska makes the state's record one of the worst in the U.S.

She didn't just do nothing, critics say. Sarah Palin proactively stalled the effort to tackle sexual violence in Alaska. Because she was more interested in settling a personal grudge, she abused the power of her office, and put women and children at risk. Some family values.

Oh, and don't forget, Screechy Sarah expects rape victims to pay for their own rape kits.

H/t to Kagro X at dailyKos for the signpost about this ABC News report.
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The Dog Ate Sarah Palin's Homework

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In her second televised interview, with Notorious Bespectacled Impish Gibson, Sarah Palin proved that, yes, she can be coached, she can put on a performance with talking points, she can hold her hands just so to reinforce what she's saying.

And my cocker spaniels have been trained to sit, and stay, and be good guys.

But being good guy ready to lead America--and Sarah herself says she doesn't think in gender terms, she's a product of Title 9 and a strong household, she's made choices all along the way (and doncha just love that she's gotten to make choices?), and sexism doesn't enter into it for her--is more than reciting talking points and modulating sincerity into your voice and cupping your hands in embrace of what you're saying.

Because the world is full of bad guys. And yesterday, the Palin partisans say, Gibson was a bad guy. 'cause he was, you know, a reporter. A reporter whose questions brought out more than just pronouncing strange names right, more than foreign policy tourist points. He brought out how totally out of her depth Sarah Palin was...like the Wasilla Warriors high school hockey team trying to take on Gretsky in his prime.

Today, Charlie was a good guy, a GMA guy, and the soft edges were all in place.

But apparently even that is too hard for Palin, because her next interview's reported to be with Sean Hannity. And we know what a hard-edged ferreter out of truth and reality ol' Hannity is.
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Sidebar to Sarah: If, pish-posh, you had no intention of banning books, why did you keep asking about it after the first time? And why did you fire the librarian?
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We saw today the problem with the media agreeing to these folksy sit-downs. Where's the follow-up? But I guess the hurly-burly of an actual press conference is too tough for Sarah Palin. 'cause Title 9 aside, she just doesn't have the knowledge...or the judgment about tough choices...or the time to cram for all the questions...or the guts to face the press.

She and the McCain campaign prefer to put Palin up in the rarefied helicopter air of Alaska and pick off the reporters one by one. As long as they get to do the picking. Unfortunately it doesn't work that way out here in the rest of the world.
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Herr-icane

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Hurricane Ike is blasting its way toward the Texas coast this morning, and we hope everybody gets their butts out of the way...get inland, take cover, think, and be safe.

There's another her-icane, name o'Sarah Palin, and she turned out to be a fizzle last night in her first interview with Charles Gibson on ABC.

Oh, the usual suspects are tryin' to put lipstick on the pig of an idea that she was picked on by the "arrogant schm*ck" as Imus called Gibson.

But c'mon, the woman was Clueless in Alaska...the coaching showed, she didn't "blink" and....

She didn't know what the fundamental foreign policy of this administration--the Bush Doctrine--even was. Much less that the Founding Fathers would reel in horror at America making pre-emptive strikes against other countries on the whim of a President.

Clearly Palin was coached. She knew how to pronounce Ahmedinejad and Shaakashvili. She was "on message" about blinking...or not. The message was meant to show her strength and her readiness on day one.

Trouble is, if you have to rely on coachers and trainers to prep you and pimp you, you ain't ready for the show.

And there's a helluva lot more to Russia than a nice view across the straits.

You gotta ask yourself, would you want this candidate teaching your child a junior high course in basic geography, or civics, or history? Much less a heartbeat away from the ol' man?

Is our kids learning? Is we?
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Puttering..."Tough but Fair"

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Life’s laid back in the tall timber…even the snow is more stubborn about melting. Crystallized and crusty drifts linger under the pine trees and in hollows and on the shadow sides of cabins.

In the morning, the thermometer dial under the eave says “27” and the mug of hot coffee billows steam into the air even as the sun warms the ground.

This is the season of puttering along. The ground still too frozen to work, but the “gifts that keep on giving”—from the dogs…and neighboring deer, and maybe fox, or coyote or wolf, or, hey, why not a cougar? “Some say” they’ve been seen up by Itasca—form hot spots absorbing the sun. Little flashpoint poops of form but not-usable substance.

We saw too much of that form but damned little useful substance from a slice of the media again this week.

TBF “Tough but fair” Stephanopoulos and ACE “arrogant condescending elitist” Gibson gave us another round of preening It’s-all-about-me “journalism.”

Plenty’s already been written about the “Fiasco in Philly”—you may have written a comment or two yourself. I understand a few people have….

So I won’t rehash that, except to note:

• Hey, ACE: He’s right—stop doing Stewart’s job. He’s a helluva lot better at it. Oh, and while you’re at it, stop doing Charlie Black and the RNC’s jobs, too. Do your own. And if you can’t figure out what that job is, have a chat with Moyers. He’s got it.
• And TBF? We’ll believe that whole tough but fair business when we see it equally dispensed—like the next time you sit down for a wee chat with McCain. I could offer some questions, but I bet if you really, really think about it, you could come up with those on your own. Go ahead, we know you can….
  

In the meantime, TBF and ACE, you stop the posturing and faux framing, guys—and I won’t try tellin’ you that plain ol’ dog poop is good fertilizer.

* * *

Oh, and as for flag pins on lapels. Hmmmm, I won’t look for ’em next time my house is on fire. Just for the people who know how to do their jobs and put out the fires instead of fanning destructive flames.

The Morning After

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Stephanopoulos on Imus this morning saying: "It's our job to ask the tough questions."

Okay, George, that's the benchmark. We'll look forward to hearing "the tough questions" of Bush authorizing and his Principals micromanaging torture. Bush lying us into a war that has now cost over 4000 lives and driven our economy into a tailspin. McCain pushing a "gas tax" holiday instead of going after the profiteers who are gouging us at the gas pump. Did Cokie have a nice ride with Bushie to meet the.... oh, wait, how did that one get in there?

Tough is in the eye of the beholder, and we'll be holding Stephanopoulos to that standard. Gibson, who 'way back told us where he was coming from when he said his "news" show wouldn't cover the Libby trial because it was too complicated and gave him a header, is so totally self-absorbed in his greatness and totally UNself-aware in his incompetence that we will henceforth ignore.

Meanwhile, Imus and Snuffalufagous totally ignoring the turd in the punchbowl--which in this case is the firestorm of outrage about their ghastly, slanted trivializing of the vital issues of these times into a reenactment of The Gong Show. With no insult meant to gongs.

How odd.

Oh, wait. Imus is simulcast on RFD-TV and WABC Radio. 'nuff said.

UPDATE: And then Jeff Greenfield, in a later morning appearance on Imus at RFD-TV added that he didn't understand what all the fuss was about because "ACE*" "news" man Charles Gibson was just asking the questions that the Republicans would be pushing in months ahead.

Here's a tough question for all these guys, but especially ACE*: Since when is it the job of debate moderators/"news"people to become partisan hitmen for the corrupt Republican campaign committee?

* ACE = arrogant, condescending, elitist

Repairing the Brand?

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George Dubya Bush tells Martha Raddatz in a soft-focus interview on ABC Nightly News that he plans to go back to Crawford and write a book... How 'bout you read one first, George?

All's just soft and soothing and so very, very.... ah, b.s. The crap detector alarm is blaring off the scale these days when it comes to anything connected to George Dubya Bush. Unless, of course, you're Fox News' Ministry of Propaganda oh-so-ably deconstructed by the little Brit from The Daily Show. Michael Moore must be beaming.

The House of Bush Cards is tumbling down and the propaganda efforts to reinvent his history via the cocktail wienie media isn't going to put it back up again.

The ditch is far too deep and wide that he has driven US into. Truth will out.

Lessons in Framing: Sin of Omission

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How a seed is planted...today's lesson. ABC led its Nightly News with a report on Hillary Clinton and the debunked story of the woman dying because she didn't have $100 for the fee, a story told to Clinton by a deputy in Ohio. Jake Tapper reported and segued into Obama's statement about not taking money from oil company pacs when he did take money from individuals who work in the oil industry.

Tapper's Framing Message? They both do it. Tall tales....

So we'd certainly expect equal fact-checking treatment of John McCain, right? After all, there are now three major candidates in the running for president. Except there's no mention at all. Hmmmm. I guess St. John must be a perfect candidate, eh? Tapper and ABC certainly imply that with the sin of omission.... nothing to see there, move along.

We'll be watching for those fact checks of McCain. Right along with those fact checks of things like the latest reports out of Iraq. And the testimony of Mukasey. Or Petraeus. Or.... We'll be watching. But we won't be holding our breath.

Today, Jake Tapper further burnishes his bona fides as a Republican. ABC slants its reporting against Democrats.

My lesson in framing for today. /s

The Power of One...and Many

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Ever since ABC News named our family—well, okay, our entire state of North Dakota—their Persons of the Week earlier this winter, I’ve been paying closer attention to their other weekly choices.

North Dakota got the honors because as a multitude we rose up to protest National Geographic’s depiction of the state in its January issue…bleak, empty, pretty much dying out. Wrong-o! And a lot of people learned it’s not acceptable to insult a whole state like that.

This week, ABC named one 20-year-old kid, a college student, as their Person of the Week, and some person he is. When Josh Sommer learned he had a rare form of cancer, he didn’t accept the status quo, he didn’t say nothing can be done, he didn’t say well the doctors aren’t giving me any hope. Nope. He organized his own foundation. He set up a conference attracting global experts. He does his own research.

He’s been told he has a seven year survival window, but he didn’t let that slow him down. If anything, it made him all the more determined. Fate has lent a hand. The University he chose for study before he had any idea of the cancer he would face is Duke University, renowned for its cancer research. We wish him the best.

The power of one is sometimes beyond the ability of us ordinary ol’ folk to imagine.

There seems to be a lot of that going around the political world as well. Where the power of one to move multitudes is something people are still coming to grips with.

For his opponents, that power to inspire, to lead, is a thorn in their sides that they choose to mock and ridicule. The status quo of small thinking and old ways permeates their campaign body like a cancer, eating away. Talk of “honor, I honor” becomes action of dishonor…fearmongering, petulance.

The media’s body of work is being eaten at, too, by a cancer, as they egg on the one to diminish himself, betray his principles, become just like the rest of us…. Look at Dukakis, they say, or Kerry, or McGovern, or….

I prefer he look at those who seem to be inspiring him now. Not holier-than-thou Very Important Pundits. Not his political opponents. Not losers of the past. But leaders who have transcended small thinking and small acts.

Some would say Jesus is their most trusted advisor and then go and dance with the devil, while America and Iraq are overtaken by the cancers of greed and hubris and real people die, and suffer grievous injuries, and lose their homes and their livelihoods and their hope.

One says hope is still out there, but it will take all of us working together committed to change, unwavering no matter how big the challenges. There’s a multitude of people listening to that. Responding to that.

Whether it’s one college kid who inspires far beyond his narrow slice of a medical circumstance. Or one U.S. Senator who inspires a multitude of college kids and far beyond to multitudes of every demographic group you can name, the determination not to accept the status quo is unmistakable.

Because we see the body politic today, and it is riddled with cancers of corruption, and cronyism and ideology, hubris, greed, and stubbornness, and too much tap-dancin’… and we cannot, will not accept that it must be so.

“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you,

then they fight you, then you win.”

Mahatma Gandhi