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 ...
I’ve listened to her speak several times and she sounds like she’s smart enough to be President. The POTUS has hundreds of experts available for advice in the Executive Branch and doesn’t need to be a genuis. It’s more important to have good judgment and character and strong leadership ability. Carter and Clinton both had excellent grades in college and high IQ scores but they didn’t have good judgment and good leadership ability in many cases. Carter and Clinton would both have outscored Reagan on an IQ test, but Reagan was the better President because he had better judgment, character, and leadership ability. I think Sarah Palin has that same kind of sound judgment, solid character, courage, and leadership ability.
Dear God, we lift up another victim of severe PDS, please in Your infinite mercy heal them! Amen!
I agree with your assessment of Palin’s response. By making reference to the media attacks, however warranted, Sarah portrayed herself as a victim. By using the phrase “blood libel” she, intended or not, portrayed herself as a victim on the same level as the most persecuted ethnic group in history.
While it clearly made a great many people in the Conservative movement happy to hear, and has played to resounding cheers here on FR, I don’t think it was the right thing to do if she has presidential ambitions.
I am not one of those who doubt her intelligence. I believe that she knew what she was saying and meant what she said. I believe that this is the first clear signal we’re getting that Sarah Palin is not going to run for President in 2012. I believe she’s decided that she can be more effective in her role as Conservative champion without the constraints that being a politician places on someone.
She can sit back and play the role of “Kingmaker” handing her blessing (and twenty million devoted voters) to the candidate she feels most likely to a) win and b) represent her views in Washington.
It may sadden a great many on FR, and no doubt there will be much gnashing of teeth and bloodletting amongst conservatives, but I don’t think she’s wrong in her assessment of her own power and potential.
I know. Melas was essentially saying the same thing as Clyburn.
The term blood libel comes from long before the Nazi party. It’s much more closely related to attacks upon the Jews coming from various Christian churches and groups. The reason it’s called blood libel is because it was alleged that the Jews killed young Christian boys in ritual sacrifices and used their blood to make matzo for Passover.
I disagree with Alan Dershowitz.
I don’t think that Palin should be lynched or anything; I just think that it was a poor choice of words and an attempt to make more of the situation than what really is.
Like I said, with just one speech... the media is no longer able to focus on their message of the ‘TEA party and Palin caused the shooting’.
It’s now all about Palin’s message. The media is now focused on what she wanted them to be focused on, the notion of the media’s actions and whether the term ‘blood libel’ is appropriate.
The job of the Left’s collaborators here is never done, and has been going on quite a while.
Whenever the MSM/DNC war room kicks up a “controversy”, real or imagined....it is the duty of their consorts on FR push the meme, push the propaganda and the spin.
They did it with GWB, Cheney, Delay, Libby, George Allen (maccaca), with Rush, anyone and everyone the in the left’s bulls-eye.
It is all documented in their posting history.
You know, that’s a perfectly valid viewpoint. I tend to side with Dershowitz, as my comments should indicate. I of course mean no disrespect of any kind.
It’s a highly emotional issue, as I’m sure you’ll agree. I think you might also agree with me when I say that had the left not raised the issue in the first place you and I would not be having this discussion.
I guess I just don’t have a problem with her usage. Clearly you do and I respect that.
And I find myself agreeing with him.
Didn't Andrew Sullivan use the term to decribe persecution against gays? Oh, yes, and I remember all the outrage then.
Wait a minute ... I guess I don't.
Thank you, and I agree that she made herself a victim. In a way she is, but she doesn't need to point that out. Others were doing a fine job of pointing it out for her, and the public relations battle was largely won.
I don't know if she's running for president or not. A part of me wishes she would not, and a part of me wishes she would so I can see how things play out in the debates later this year.
Oh? Did JimRob change FR's mission from that of a conservative news and information website to a "Sarah Palin for President" website? If so, I missed it.
There is a time and a place for such scrums, and they have been freely happening for months. But this is not the time for ankle biting.
Yes, which is why it's best to let people who are uncomfortable with Palin's statement today have their say. Just let them have their say and move on. What you see as "ankle biting," others see as their sincerely held beliefs about the situation.
Take me, for instance. If you haven't already, please consider reading my post #518 on this thread. I agree with every word Palin said in her statement today, including the blood libel reference. However, I think her timing and delivery were poor. Does saying so make me any less of a conservative than you? Of course not!
Excellent point. These MSM punks just decided by decree that this shooting is “a defining moment for Sarah Palin.” I read that yesterday in Yahoo news and I was really angered by the arrogance and audacity of the MSM writer who put that in his article with no factual basis behind that statement. He just decided himself that this is a “defining moment” for Palin and went off editorializing in a “news” article by putting that statement into his article. That statement is pure opinion intended to make this shooting about Palin and to smear her in the process. This, you MSM punks, is why you’re rapidly losing your audience...because you’re so deceptive and unprofessional, you’re so incredibly arrogant that you think your worthless opinions are facts, and and you politicize everything in your news reporting.
As a member of the Tea Party, *I* have been accused of MURDERING innocent people in Arizona.
Palin’s “Reaganesque Refudiation” of the attacks against herself and the Tea Party spoke her defense not only for herself, but for millions of people like *me*.
I have lost count of the posts of mine that have been deleted today. Because I critique Sarah, I'm called leftist and a media parrot. This would be in spite of all my other postings to the contrary. Trying to bring rationality to a discussion of Palin is just too hot to handle for some.
The “when did you stop beating your wife” form of argument isn’t really an argument so much as a lack of one.
Did you ASK me what I would do? I didn’t see a question.
There are a LOT of things I didn’t say. If you could give me a list of what topics you actually want to see me write about, it might narrow things down a bit.
Seriously. I made my argument. If you don’t want to argue my point, feel free to ignore it. But don’t think you can simply raise a hypothetical straw man in it’s place and pretend you are making a point.
Kind of like Lindsay Graham who helps to make much of the Leftist agenda in the US Senate “bipartisan.”
I am sure she will regret the use of that term - she obviously does not know the connotation of that phrase.
They came first for the Communists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist.Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist.Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew.Then they came for me
and by that time no one was left to speak up.--Martin Niemöller--
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" - George Santayana
Today one might say "Those who want to hold the past in memory as if it were theirs and theirs alone are condemned to be complicit in its recurrence."
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