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Why does the Elite Media love a liar and hate the one telling the truth? (Reagan/Palin vs. Obama)
The Beaufort Observer ^ | November 6, 2013 | The Editors

Posted on 11/07/2013 12:57:17 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet

Of all American scholars/writers we know today, Dr. Thomas Sowell ranks at or near the top of any list of the most brilliant observers and commentators of American politics and life. So we were delighted when he took on one of the intriguing subjects we've been pondering for several years now. Four years to be exact.

The subject of our pondering is how the Elite Media picks and chooses who they are going to promote and who they are going to attempt to destroy. Our pondering first began when we observed how the Elites attacked Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan. We've been intrigued to watch how, over time both men have come to be viewed as much superior to the picture the Elites tried to pain of them.

But none epitomizes the phenomenon more than does Sarah Palin. We've studied Palin and have found here to be rock solid in her principles and beliefs. And she is usually correct in her analysis and perceptions. She was one of the first to suggest that Barack Obama was a liar. On that she has been proven infinitely correct. Of course, she was correct about ObamaCare when many would not even entertain agreeing with her. Remember the reaction to the "Death Panels." Now we know that the ObamaCare advocate not only in fact included the mechanism within ObamaCare that results in government bureaucrats picking and choosing who will live and who will die, but we even know now that one of the chief architects of the ACA, Ezekiel Emanuel, intentionally included the mechanism and knew Palin was right when she identified it. But Palin was ridiculed…until recently that is.

Over the last five years it has turned out that Palin has been dead on with most of what she has said and Barack Obama has now been exposed as a pathological liar.

So we were intrigued at how Dr. Sowell would assess this phenomenon we have been pondering—about which we will have more to say later. Here is his observation: If Barack Obama has been the most remarkable phenomenon of the recent political scene, Sarah Palin must be second. The emotional responses to each-- especially by the media and the intelligentsia -- go beyond anything that can be explained by the usual political differences of opinion on issues of the day.

That liberals would be thrilled by another liberal is not surprising. But there are conservative Republicans who voted for Barack Obama, and other conservatives who may not have voted for him, but who are quick to see in various pragmatic moves of his since taking office an indication that he is not an extremist.

Anyone familiar with history knows that Hitler and Stalin were pragmatic. After years of denouncing each other, they signed the Nazi-Soviet pact under which they became allies for a couple of years before going to war against one another.

Pragmatism tells you nothing about extremism. But the conservative intellectuals who seize upon President Obama's pragmatism to give him the benefit of the doubt are obviously bending over backward for some reason.

With Governor Palin, it is just the opposite. The conservative intelligentsia who react against her have remarkably little to say that will stand up to scrutiny. People who actually dealt with her, before she became a national figure, have expressed how much they were impressed by her intelligence.

Governor Palin's "inexperience" is a talking point that might have some plausibility if it were not for the fact that Barack Obama has far less experience in actually making policies than Sarah Palin has. Joe Biden has had decades of experience in being both consistently wrong and consistently a source of asinine statements.

Governor Palin's candidacy for the vice presidency was what galvanized grass roots Republicans in a way that John McCain never did. But there was something about her that turned even some conservative intellectuals against her and provoked visceral anger and hatred from liberal intellectuals.

Perhaps the best way to try to understand these reactions is to recall what Eleanor Roosevelt said when she first saw Whittaker Chambers, who had accused Alger Hiss of being a spy for the Soviet Union. Upon seeing the slouching, overweight and disheveled Chambers, she said, "He's not one of us."

The trim, erect and impeccably dressed Alger Hiss, with his Ivy League and New Deal pedigree, clearly was "one of us." As it turned out, he was also a liar and a spy for the Soviet Union. Not only did a jury decide that at the time, the opening of the secret files of the Soviet Union in its last days added more evidence of his guilt.

The Hiss-Chambers confrontation of more than half a century ago produced the same kind of visceral polarization that Governor Sarah Palin provokes today.

Before the first trial of Alger Hiss began, reporters who gathered at the courthouse informally sounded each other out as to which of them they believed, before any evidence had been presented. Most believed that Hiss was telling the truth and that it was Chambers who was lying.

More important, those reporters who believed that Chambers was telling the truth were immediately ostracized. None of this could have been based on the evidence for either side, for that evidence had not yet been presented in court.

For decades after Hiss was convicted and sent to federal prison, much of the media and the intelligentsia defended him. To this day, there is an Alger Hiss chair at Bard College.

Why did it matter so much to so many people which of two previously little-known men was telling the truth? Because what was on trial was not one man but a whole vision of the world and a way of life.

Governor Sarah Palin is both a challenge and an affront to that vision and that way of life-- an overdue challenge, much as Chambers' challenge was overdue.

Whether Governor Palin runs for national office again is something that only time will tell. But the Republicans need some candidate who is neither one of the country club Republicans nor-- worse yet-- the sort of person who appeals to the intelligentsia.


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Government; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: abortion; deathpanels; obama; obamacare; obamalies; palin; partisanmediashill; partisanmediashills; presslovesaliar; reagan; thomassowell; zerocare
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1 posted on 11/07/2013 12:57:17 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

V.I. Lenin-”Just tell them what they want to hear!”


2 posted on 11/07/2013 12:58:16 PM PST by tcrlaf (Well, it is what the Sheeple voted for....)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Because the liar has a ‘D’ after his name, silly.


3 posted on 11/07/2013 1:00:20 PM PST by Hoodat (Democrats - Opposing Equal Protection since 1828)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

A 3-letter word....

BIAS

h/T Joe Biden


4 posted on 11/07/2013 1:00:53 PM PST by newfreep (Breitbart sent me...)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Because they’re libtards. They love anti-American, tyrannical communist dictator wannabes... alsway have. In fact, they are so stupid, that they don’t even know that they would be the first ones lined up and shot, since they have proven how easily duped and gullible they actually are.


5 posted on 11/07/2013 1:03:31 PM PST by Common Sense 101 (Hey libs... If your theories fly in the face of reality, it's not reality that's wrong.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet



6 posted on 11/07/2013 1:03:45 PM PST by Diogenesis
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To: Common Sense 101

Leftism requires lies to move ahead.


7 posted on 11/07/2013 1:04:47 PM PST by GeronL
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

“For decades after Hiss was convicted and sent to federal prison, much of the media and the intelligentsia defended him. “

Who was the Obama nominee that defending Hiss during his congressional hearings?


8 posted on 11/07/2013 1:04:48 PM PST by TexasGator
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Every complaint they made about Sarah Palin could be applied to a much higher degree to Barack Obama.


9 posted on 11/07/2013 1:05:17 PM PST by GeorgeTex (Obama-The Ultimate Terrorist Weapon.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Party uber alles


10 posted on 11/07/2013 1:05:22 PM PST by brownsfan (Behold, the power of government cheese.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Most of these “Journalists” went to a liberal college and studied under Socialist and communist professors.

The people in charge of the news stations are Communists.

Is it any wonder they pick Socialists to accept and Patriots to harass?


11 posted on 11/07/2013 1:07:49 PM PST by Venturer (Keep Obama and you aint seen nothing yet.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Simple the elite media are owned by the same people who control our political establishment, courts, financial industry. These are the same people that are pushing global governance and will eventually succeed is enslaving the entire worlds population if we allow them to do so. Anyone who stands in the way of their goal has to be destroyed or silenced. At this point I can’t see how anyone could be so blind not to see this.


12 posted on 11/07/2013 1:09:00 PM PST by 30 Govt.
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
‘For decades after Hiss was convicted and sent to federal prison, much of the media and the intelligentsia defended him. To this day, there is an Alger Hiss chair at Bard College.’

In spite of pretty conclusive evidence in the Venona intercepts that Hiss was the agent code names ‘Ales’.

13 posted on 11/07/2013 1:10:40 PM PST by robowombat
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

The simple answer is because the elite media serve Satan, the father of lies.


14 posted on 11/07/2013 1:10:55 PM PST by Vigilanteman (Obama: Fake black man. Fake Messiah. Fake American. How many fakes can you fit in one Zer0?)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Upon seeing the slouching, overweight and disheveled Chambers, she said, "He's not one of us." The trim, erect and impeccably dressed Alger Hiss, with his Ivy League and New Deal pedigree, clearly was "one of us."

I've thought all along that the pundit reaction to Palin was in essence one of class.

America doesn't have a class system in the British sense. Nobody cares who your father or grandfather was.

But we're increasingly developing a class system of a type based on diction and education. I thought a lot of the antagonism to Sarah was based on her not having attended an Ivy League college, but instead having the nerve to think she could run for VP when she went to a cow college in ID.

In essence, she was "getting above herself," and those so proud of their own credentials as members of the ruling class felt threatened by her. So she was duly destroyed.

15 posted on 11/07/2013 1:11:35 PM PST by Sherman Logan
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To: FReepers

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16 posted on 11/07/2013 1:14:55 PM PST by DJ MacWoW (The Fed Gov is not one ring to rule them all)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Bids of a feather flock and lie together.


17 posted on 11/07/2013 1:18:39 PM PST by mulligan
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

There is no elite media.

There is the propaganda bureau of the criminal enterprise that is the Democrat Party

Using the term Elite Media means the author knows not of what he writes


18 posted on 11/07/2013 1:24:42 PM PST by bert ((K.E. N.P. N.C. +12 ..... Travon... Felony assault and battery hate crime)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Because they created him.


19 posted on 11/07/2013 1:31:20 PM PST by boomop1 (term limits will only save this country.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Because they follow Satan, the Father of Lies. They loved Clinton because he lied so shamelessly.


20 posted on 11/07/2013 1:33:03 PM PST by txrefugee
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