Andrew Sullivan
Posted on 09/01/2004 9:47:39 PM PDT by Pikamax
THE MILLER MOMENT: Zell Miller's address will, I think, go down as a critical moment in this campaign, and maybe in the history of the Republican party. I kept thinking of the contrast with the Democrats' keynote speaker, Barack Obama, a post-racial, smiling, expansive young American, speaking about national unity and uplift. Then you see Zell Miller, his face rigid with anger, his eyes blazing with years of frustration as his Dixiecrat vision became slowly eclipsed among the Democrats. Remember who this man is: once a proud supporter of racial segregation, a man who lambasted LBJ for selling his soul to the negroes. His speech tonight was in this vein, a classic Dixiecrat speech, jammed with bald lies, straw men, and hateful rhetoric. As an immigrant to this country and as someone who has been to many Southern states and enjoyed astonishing hospitality and warmth and sophistication, I long dismissed some of the Northern stereotypes about the South. But Miller did his best to revive them. The man's speech was not merely crude; it added whole universes to the word crude.
THE "OCCUPATION" CANARD: Miller first framed his support for Bush as a defense of his own family. The notion that individuals deserve respect regardless of their family is not Miller's core value. And the implication was that if the Democrats win in November, his own family would not be physically safe. How's that for subtlety? Miller's subsequent assertion was that any dissent from aspects of the war on terror is equivalent to treason. He accused all war critics of essentially attacking the very troops of the United States. He conflated the ranting of Michael Moore with the leaders of the Democrats. He said the following: Motivated more by partisan politics than by national security, today's Democratic leaders see America as an occupier, not a liberator. And nothing makes this Marine madder than someone calling American troops occupiers rather than liberators. That macho invocation of the Marines was a classic: the kind of militarist swagger that this convention endorses and uses as a bludgeon against its opponents. But the term "occupation," of course, need not mean the opposite of liberation. I have used the term myself and I deeply believe that coalition troops have indeed liberated Afghanistan and Iraq. By claiming that the Democrats were the enemies of the troops, traitors, quislings and wimps, Miller did exactly what he had the audacity to claim the Democrats were doing: making national security a partisan matter. I'm not easy to offend, but this speech was gob-smackingly vile.
OPPONENTS OR ENEMIES?: Here's another slur: No one should dare to even think about being the Commander in Chief of this country if he doesn't believe with all his heart that our soldiers are liberators abroad and defenders of freedom at home. But don't waste your breath telling that to the leaders of my party today. In their warped way of thinking America is the problem, not the solution. They don't believe there is any real danger in the world except that which America brings upon itself through our clumsy and misguided foreign policy. Yes, that describes some on the left, but it is a calumny against Democrats who voted for war in Afghanistan and Iraq and whose sincerity, as John McCain urged, should not be in question. I have never heard Kerry say that 9/11 was America's fault; if I had, it would be inconceivable to consider supporting him. And so this was, in truth, another lie, another cheap, faux-patriotic smear. Miller has absolutely every right to lambaste John Kerry's record on defense in the Senate. It's ripe for criticism, and, for my part, I disagree with almost all of it (and as a pro-Reagan, pro-Contra, pro-SDI, pro-Gulf War conservative, I find Kerry's record deeply troubling). But that doesn't mean he's a traitor or hates America's troops or believes that the U.S. is responsible for global terror. And the attempt to say so is a despicable attempt to smear someone's very patriotism.
THE FOREIGN AGENT: Another lie: "Senator Kerry has made it clear that he would use military force only if approved by the United Nations. Kerry would let Paris decide when America needs defending. I want Bush to decide." Miller might have found some shred of ancient rhetoric that will give him cover on this, but in Kerry's very acceptance speech, he declared the opposite conviction - that he would never seek permission to defend this country. Another lie: "John Kerry wants to re-fight yesterday's war." Kerry didn't want to do that. Yes, he used his military service in the campaign - but it was his opponents who decided to dredge up the divisions of the Vietnam war in order to describe Kerry as a Commie-loving traitor who faked his own medals. What's remarkable about the Republicans is their utter indifference to fairness in their own attacks. Smearing opponents as traitors to their country, as unfit to be commander-in-chief, as agents of foreign powers (France) is now fair game. Appealing to the crudest form of patriotism and the easiest smears is wrong when it is performed by the lying Michael Moore and it is wrong when it is spat out by Zell Miller. Last night was therefore a revealing night for me. I watched a Democrat at a GOP Convention convince me that I could never be a Republican. If they wheel out lying, angry old men like this as their keynote, I'll take Obama. Any day.
- 2:21:48 AM
Way to go! Can't wait to e-mail the world tomorrow and sit back and watch the fun!
Andrew Sullivan makes about as much sense as Howard Fineman, which means, none.
I still remember when Sullivan was something other then yet another Democrat shill.
I see Andrew must have received the Democrat talking points. He's the third one I've heard about tonight intimating that Zell is a racist.
You know, I think Zell Miller deserves an honorary Viking Kitty of his very own. His speech was the best dang ZOT I have ever seen! I smelled ozone right through the tv screen!
It SHOULD have called him a traitor. He met with MY enemies the NVA, and Viet Cong. Nam' 67-68 THEY WERE MY ENEMIES....
Oh the venom.
Zell hit the democrats where it hurts, with the undeniable truth.
that donkey on hia web page has turned into an elephant; it must be a convention decoration.
"I kept thinking of the contrast with the Democrats' keynote speaker, Barack Obama, a post-racial, smiling, expansive young American, speaking about national unity and uplift."
Yes, indeed Andy-boy. Obama is such an epitome of moderation and reasonableness that he voted against a law to protect infants who survive a botched abortion attempt. All the reason, moderation, and moral compass of Osama bin Laden.
Sullivan is a sadly confused man. He liked the first night's speeches by Giuliani and McCain, a lot. He claims to have agreed with them. And now he trashes Miller for saying the same things in stronger terms.
Of course, because Sullivan is so stupid as to fall for Obama's lies instead of looking at his record, which is dangerously liberal. According to one of Obama's proposed bills, convicted murderers who did not confess could NEVER be executed. Think of the utter illogic and stupidity of that proposal for a start, and then seethe as you reveal the ultra left-wing activist within Obama.
In contrast, Miller spoke the TRUTH--one which most Americans are coming to realize every day--that John Kerry is a serial pacifist and dangerous appeaser who would put this nation at risk if President. Sullivan reveals his immaturity at focusing ont he messenger instead of the message, and in falling for rhetoric and illusion over a forceful telling of the truth.
Really, he wants to marry his boyfried?
Doesn't he live in Massachusetts where HE CAN MARRY his boyfriend?
For Sullivan homosexuality trumps war and peace, all his martial, patriotic statements post-911 notwithstanding. Over the years I've spied on occasion a deeply flawed character beneath Sullvan's formidable intellect. This whole thing about gay marriage has just brought those flaws to the surface like never before.
I'll never read him again, and I'm quite content. I know who he is now, and I'm not interested any longer in what he thinks.
I agree completely with all of this.
Sullivan should be too smart to make gay marriage the
centerpiece of his political thinking, but unfortunately
he seems to do exactly that. And I do think there is a flawed character there. Sullivan understands intellectually the pre-eminence of the war on terror and Bush's superiority on the issue. But he won't let it trump gay rights.
LMAO! Rats are getting desperate. I'm not a member of the Zig Zag fan club here on FR but I will say that if there's one thing Zell is NOT, it's a Fritz Hollings-type Dixiecrat.
I hate to break the news to the RATs but any segregationist RAT who abandoned the party did so in the 60s and 70s when the civil rights movement was still going on. (actually most of them couldn't stomach ANYONE in the "party of Lincoln" and just ran around in third parties for a while and then returned to the Dem plantation in the 80s, see George Wallace, et. al.) Second, any conservative Dem who actually CROSSED OVER to support the GOP left their racist views at the door. Storm Thurmond voted against civil rights legislation as a Dem, but never as a pubbie.
Identify the Dixiecrat:
DemocRAT SENATOR A: 
-- Supported Harry Truman-type moderate Dem, pro-civil rights agenda --Believes in equal rights for all --Never joined any racist organization --While still a Dem, renounced any racist remarks decades ago --In 1993, pushed to have the Confederate emblem removed from the state flag --Pushed to confirm all of the President's judges, regardless of race, color, or creed, said the President nominated judges that "looked like America" --Off the sothern Dem plantation, endorsed Bush for President --Recent quote: "Never in the history of the world has any soldier sacrificed more for the freedom and liberty of total strangers than the American soldier. And, our soldiers don't just give freedom abroad, they preserve it for us here at home."
DemocRAT SENATOR B: 
-- Opposed Harry Truman-type moderates pro-civil rights Dem, accused them of betraying the party at the time and causing a "throwback to race mongels" --Believes in special rights for certain individuals --Grand Klegal (Official Klan Recruiter), KKK, 1941-1943 --While still a Dem, and after he "left" the KKK, spent most of the 1960s continuing to praise the KKK and against civil rights --In 2002, achived his lifelong dream of getting a cameo as a civil war era slave owning general in a "historic epic" made by Ted Turner --Only Senator in history to vote against BOTH blacks ever nominated to the Supreme Court-- one a liberal Dem and the other a conservative Republican --On the sothern Dem plantation, stands behind the old slick talking white southern Dem establishment as personified by John Edwards --Recent quote: "There are white niggers. I'm going to use that word. I've seen a lot of white niggers in my time."
about all of eFing's trips to Paris in 1971...
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