Posted on 04/28/2014 1:20:49 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
It’s been no secret for a while that Sarah Palin, erstwhile vice-president candidate, is no longer a serious political contender — for evidence of that transition, note that even among her faithful, at CPAC this year, she got just 2 percent of the vote in the straw poll, tied with Condoleezza Rice. But as her crowd-pleasing performance in the very final speech of that event — and her lucrative contract with Fox News and huge social-media following — indicate, she’s gone from being a potential political leader to something of a cultural totem.
That means her speeches have gone from being standard political pablum to something even more substanceless — more or less a long string of hokey but often amusing jokes. But for all the lightheartedness, her appeal is to a set of people who take seriously their commitment to faith and freedom, right? Well, should this line garner laughs from such a crowd?
Oh, but you can’t offend [Islamic terrorists], can’t make them feel uncomfortable, not even a smidgen. Well, if I were in charge, they would know that waterboarding is how we baptize terrorists.
(VIDEO-AT-LINK)
As Rod Dreher explains, this is pretty perverse:
"Not only is this woman, putatively a Christian, praising torture, but she is comparing it to a holy sacrament of the Christian faith. It’s disgusting — but even more disgusting, those NRA members, many of whom are no doubt Christians, cheered wildly for her. . . . Palin and all those who cheered her sacrilegious jibe ought to be ashamed of themselves. For us Christians, baptism is the entry into new life. Palin invoked it to celebrate torture. Even if you don’t believe that waterboarding is torture, surely you agree that it should not be compared to baptism, and that such a comparison should be laughed at. What does it say about the character of a person that they could make that joking comparison, and that so many people would cheer for it. Nothing good — and nothing that does honor to the cause of Jesus Christ."
Torture — waterboarding being something reasonable people may consider to constitute it — is and should be a question of grave moral consequence for Christians, and is for any Catholic familiar with the Catechism. Palin wasn’t even just jokingly comparing a serious violation of human dignity into one of the most important transcendental recognitions of it – she was mounting an expansive defense of something near torture, on the grounds that our prisoners ”would obviously have information on plots,” and therefore ought to, apparently, be subjected to a horrible practice not as a morally necessary last resort but a habit of quotidian intimidation. There’s a word for that kind of practice: barbaric. The Greeks used to use it to describe the other guys.
Would a same person get so worked up about defending the honor of a politician?
Skepticism of politicians and loyalty to ideas is a differentiator from the left.
Except for the Palin groupies, who have their own Cult of Personality.
It'll be fun watching you guys get strung along again.
Looks like the boss warned you to duck the obvious setup and bull ahead with the standard talking points. Kinda sad you had to go ask and could’t come back based on your own grey matter but no biggie. SOP for the left.
Watching a lib come on a conservative site to trash conservatives and be oblivious to the people laughing at him haZ it’s own rewards.
Please, continue
Do Sarah proud, and give us something really creative and off the wall; climb that ladder.
Sigh...You missed the obvious. I handed it to you giftwrapped and you missed it...I knew you had the attention span of a flea.
Dude. You walked right into the exact comeback I OPENLY warned you about the mental health thing.
THEN I further set you up saying you missed it when the first line of your post included that very thing.
THEN you didn’t even catch it! you bulled ahead with the standard talking points after being handed the gift on a platter. You know the only people that would do that when supposedly trying to bash someone in an arguement?
Someone reading from a prepped script of talking points. Because after over 15 years of flamewars, N O B O D Y paying attention to the argument at hand lets that easy a kill slide. ESPECIALLY after being TOLD it was coming.
My fellow Freepers, lurkers and the Acadamy, the defense rests.
It would be barbaric if she meant it literally. I say this as somebody who just got baptized, confirmed and took First Communion in the Catholic Church Easter weekend and took those steps very seriously: No. I wouldn’t have said it. I wouldn’t have advised her to say it. But no. Ronald Reagan didn’t really outlaw the Soviet Union and start bombing it, and a Palin administration wouldn’t really waterboard terrorists in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Ron the Great was trolling the Reds, and Sarah, I think, was speaking out of deep frustration, as a human being, as a citizen, and as the mother of a soldier, at the current administration’s lack of seriousness about defending against the jihad. You know what? I’m frustrated, too. Because on that larger point, she’s right. You think she could have expressed that without going there? I agree. You want to get her to start expressing it without going there? Start having the discussion with her as one mature human being to another for a change.
Just listened.
Mark was ticked. He also says she’s not running.
Hand-wringing hysteria...
Keep in mind this whole time that I never said anything overly critical of Sarah Palin, only her idiotic lackeys like you who insist on obsessively insulting anyone who doesn't believe she is the next Reagan.
Luckily, you're as predictable as the Obama media.
It would have saved a lot more lives to have surrendered on Dec 8, 1941. /s
Norm, I’ve been following your debate here on the thread. Sad to say, the opponent has sent in the “C” team. I think they’re recruiting acne-challenged High School freshmen these days. No cogent points, no expectations of having a reasoned debate from them; just childish schoolyard taunts. I feel like I’m watching a “Pee Wee Herman” movie.
Nah he meant it...
Please....don’t delude yourself. Even Satan would shy away from your hypocrisy...!
You’re on the wrong website pal. This is Palin Country.
Ever notice the level of PDS rises dramatically every fundraiser? Not that there ‘t a year round clusterfreak of PDSers doing their best to keep conservatives fighting them instead of getting our act on one page. But they sure do like to make noise and drive people away during the fundraising season.
I will never understand why they are allowed to run free but it is what it is.
For our buddy above, all anyone has to do is look at the drool cup tied firmly under his chin to see what he’s really about. And after several years now, you think they would be recruiting a better quality of troll. god knows we have gotten pretty good at mocking them. but you are on the money. The C team seems par for the course lately.
Either they can’t find q Pissant quality of troll anymore or they have President Camacho leading them. I mean my God. When some one tells you you are being set up, then sets you up and hand holds you through your own mockery...and you are actually stupid enough to do it?
And THEN follows another meme. the one about playing chess with a pigeon. the pigeon kicks the pieces over, craps on the board and struts around like they won.
What ever happened to a sense of self worth? They are walking talking parodies. And proud of it.
But Brawndo really doesn’t help plants grow.
...and continuing my thought...
Although Sarah was baptized in the Church as an infant, for all practical purposes, she’s been a Pentecostal and then non-denominational evangelical Protestant (with her family) for most of the time since then. So it’s probably absurd to expect her to accept the Church’s doctrine (on baptism, on torture, on, frankly, a lot of things) as binding on her. Sure, one could use this as a teachable moment about why she should. But again, that would mean trying to treat her as an adult human being instead of a punching bag.
The discussion thread about Mark Levin’s blow torching was just posted:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3149843/posts
So pat yourself on the back for wasting a bunch of time trying to explain your phantom Rube Goldberg "set up" that only exists in your mind.
None of it makes sense to the outside world. You can keep runnin for Captain of her fan club while the adults have a substantive conversation about 2016.
Someone pondered on another thread if irony ever killed anybody. I dunno. Your tolerance/obliviousness to it seems superhuman.
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