Posted on 01/12/2011 5:42:46 AM PST by reaganaut1
Sarah Palin, who had been silent for days, on Wednesday issued a forceful denunciation of her critics in a video statement that accused pundits and journalists of “blood libel” in their rush to blame heated political rhetoric for the shootings in Arizona.
“Acts of monstrous criminality stand on their own,” she said in a video posted to her Facebook page. “Especially within hours of a tragedy unfolding, journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence that they purport to condemn. That is reprehensible.”
Ms. Palin’s use last year of a map with crosshairs hovering over a number of swing districts, including that of Gabrielle Giffords, had increasingly become the symbol of that overheated rhetoric. In and interview with The Caucus on Monday, potential 2012 rival Tim Pawlenty, the former Republican governor of Minnesota, said he would not have produced such a map.
But in the video, Ms. Palin rejected criticism of the map, casting it as a broader indictment of the basic political rights of free speech exercised by people of all political persuasions.
She said that acts like the shootings in Arizona “begin and end with the criminals who commit them, not collectively with all the citizens of a state.”
“Not with those who listen to talk radio,” she added. “Not with maps of swing districts used by both sides of the aisle. Not with law abiding citizens who respectfully exercise their first amendment rights at campaign rallies. Not with those who proudly voted in the last election.”
(Excerpt) Read more at thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com ...
“let me perfectly clear”....
“on one hand”....”and on the other hand....”
Yeah - I know what you mean.
Watch much MSM? This whole thread is about how the MSM reports and you are backing them up at every turn. WTF?
She "should have waited a 'respectable time' after the shootings so as not to take focus from the shootings"The leftists didn't even wait for the smell of gunpowder to leave the air at the site of the massacre before starting their barrage of psychotic rantings.
Starting with that deranged Sherrif setting up a defense for one of his counties employee's son.
That was blatant croynism, his excuse for not reigning this deviant guy in.
It's been plenty long enough for Palin to go on the offensive.
Perfect timing in this news cycle.
It's going to put a crick in Obama's writers necks too.
Seems to me that you're the one who is doing all the head scratching, Charles. Apparently a great number of people understand exactly what she meant when she used that particular term, just as they understood "refudiate" even though it couldn't be found in any dictionary.
Has Romney made any comment regarding the leftist media and politicians trying to lay the blame for the shooting upon the Tea Party, Rush Limbaugh, or Sarah Palin?
Same question re the other people who might be GOP Pres. candidates?
For her usage of the phrase, they'll crucify her?
Ooops. I shouldn't have used the word "crucify".
Come on, how silly.
Would you like me to continue?
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/01/proving-animus.html
From This article:
Since this plays on the oldest blood libel against gays, it certainly implies that the Proposition was motivated by prejudice. Imagine a Proposition that argued that Jews should be denied, say, being school-teachers because of the threat to the kids. No one would dispute that that’s a vile, “blood libel” motive for a constitutional amendment. But when exactly the same bigotry fuels a Proposition to deny gays the core right to marry, a right deeper in the constitution than the right to vote, it’s all apparently motivated by high-minded concern for family life.
.................
This, to the extent I can see one through the clouds of verbiage, seems to be the heart of your argument. You think the phrase “blood libel” was over the top and will be widely perceived as such by many people who might be persuaded to vote for Republicans. What evidence is there to support this view? Accusing people of responsibility for infamous crimes including the murder of a nine-year-old girl is not a benign activity. It invites violent reprisals in exactly the way blood libels have invited reprisals against Jews and others for centuries. No sane person believes that the contemporary American left is incapable of violent reprisals. I very much doubt that anybody, apart from the editorial board of the New York Times, will find Palin’s use of the term blood libel to describe a blood libel offensive. If we are indeed winning the war for public opinion it is because people see the left’s shameless exploitation of the Arizona outrage for what it is. Nobody who can do that will consider Palin’s choice of words inappropriate. Anybody who finds those words offensive is a lost cause.
It's possible the left can hang the phrase “blood libel” around Sarah's neck instead of their own, but I very much doubt it. The more they whine about it the more the charge is likely to stick (cf. “death panels,” “palling around with terrorists.”) When you suffer an outrage you have to be outraged. Sarah, in my judgment was pitch perfect.
Once again, time will tell. But if I were Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty or any other of the guys who think they might be President come 2013, I'd be making alternate plans. Maybe what really has you in a knot here is that Sarah's star is rising which means that someone else will be eclipsed.
Interesting as I am reading through the thread... it begins with 3 PDS’ers and now I see a few more entering the fray. All attesting to Sarah’s lack of intelligence and lack of qualifications for POTUS. This isn’t about the use of “blood libel” in the correctly worded (IMHO) statement she courageously gave. This for these detractors is more about destroying Sarah and making absolutely sure that we all understand, as they so wisely do, how stupid Sarah actually is. (sarcasm on) AND... how the MSM has her correctly pegged.
Romney would not dare defend normal Americans who make up the Tea Party.
Because he knows what the MSM thinks of them.
Palin did it because she is a normal American, and is entirely comfortable in that position...defending good American citizens from charges of murder.
I agree about Pawlenty.
Don’t these guys know about the Republican rule never to say anything bad about another Republican?
If he didn’t have the guts to defend common sense and the First Amendment, he should have just kept his mouth shut.
Haley Barbour, in a discussion last week on FR, had those IDing him as a rino with either pro-choice or pro-gay items that will haunt him. Don’t remember which.
Michelle Bachman is a congresswoman, and, as marlowe points out, the last (and only) person to go from the House to the White House was James Garfield. Different story if she runs for governor or senator, but even then, she wouldn’t be ripe for 2012.
I don’t have a line on Mitch Daniels.
Gov Palin has a huge base (and database) now, and if money and organization are the lubricants of victory, then she can win.
My money, though, is on Rick Perry. He’s solid social and fiscal conservative, he’ll have 38 electoral votes in his pocket from his own state, has a base, an organization, experience both nationally and internationally, and will pull the entire south and most of the southwest with him.
If those states + the few red-leaning go with him, he’s an automatic 300 electoral votes = victory.
Why don’t you start making the point of the right instead of the left? I think you are unable to do so as it goes against your inherent beliefs.
Your math sounds good to me.
Thanks for posting Newt’s comments on how the leftist media and politicians are libeling conservatives.
I have noticed Pawlenty has been wishy-washy.
Saw Pawlenty this morning...he’s just lame to me ... Gingrich is running all out, balls to the wall this time for President...he’s not going to hold back anything looks like...magritte
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