Joe Klein: 'Obama is the precise opposite of Mountain Man Todd Palin'

NewsBusters ^ | September 11, 2008 | P.J. Gladnick

[PJ-Comix]

Remember all those months of the MSM building up the myth of Barack Obama, the Lightworker of unique spiritual powers whose image was frequently photoshopped to present his blessed head surrounded by a halo? Well, now Time magazine columnist, Joe Klein, is upset that Americans are supporting Sarah Palin because of another "myth" of a small town frontier America. Those who create the myths really shouldn't be complaining about what they perceive as myths but that is exactly what Klein does in his column (emphasis mine):

Sarah Palin has arrived in our midst with the force of a rocket-propelled grenade. She has boosted John McCain's candidacy and overwhelmed the presidential process in a way that no vice-presidential pick has since Thomas Eagleton did the precise opposite — sinking his sponsor, George McGovern, in 1972. Obviously, something beyond politics is happening here. We don't really know Palin as a politician yet, whether she is wise or foolhardy, substantive or empty. Our fascination with her — and it is a nonpartisan phenomenon — is driven by something more primal. The Palin surge illuminates the mythic power of the Republican Party's message since the advent of Ronald Reagan.

[Let's Roll]

Related to ‘per the rules’. Did any of you see Greta’s interview with Todd’s racing partner, Scott Davis, last night?

yes-s-s-s-! indeed.

[mancini]

So now Obama is running against Todd Palin, Joe? What a bunch of idiots.

[Jemian]

Oh, I missed that. Hubby was watching “Midway.”

[xsmommy]

no, i didn’t, but sounds like i need to be sad i missed it~!! LOL!

[RandallFlagg]

I work with a guy here who looks exactly like Mr Palin.

(sorry, ladies. He’s married, too.)

[o2bfree]

Joe Klein is a wasted carbon footprint. What a dope!

[AnnaZ]

Arugula McTeleprompter (D-Rezko) is a new-age castrated drone, speaking in theoreticals and PC buzz words to avoid offending anyone (or taking a stand on anything). He’s never worked an honest day in his life, considers signing people up for every new handout he can get funded by those who get up before noon an accomplishment, and has devoted his life to making people as dependent on omnipotent government as possible.

*applauds*

[Wonder Warthog]

Right on all counts. I'd rather live on the outskirts of a small town than anywhere else. I'm a country boy originally, but I've spent most of my career in a medium-sized city (300K),lived for a while in a megacity (Houston), and have been in most of the other megacities at various times, including several in Europe. Thanks, but NO THANKS! Now I'm back in the country and have no plans to leave it.

Obama is the quintessential city-boy prig.

[drbuzzard]

From the Klein piece:
“He lives within the hilarious conundrum of being both too “cosmopolitan” and intellectual for Republican tastes — at least as Rudy Giuliani described it — while also being the sort of fellow suspected of getting ahead by affirmative action.”

This is so typical of leftists. They immediately assume that being an intellectual implies intelligence. Sorry, I’ve worked in academia long enough to be sure that this isn’t even vaguely true.

Intellectual merely describes an area of focus. I know some brilliant people who don’t do intellectual pursuits. They don’t read a whole lot of books, nor do they banter about on philosophy or history. However they are some of the smartest people I’ve known. Just because they focus on being experts in, say, sports doesn’t have any bearing on their brain power.

Obama is a great example of this. He’s an intellectual. He bandies about his Ivy league credentials, and says the right references from the literature, but he doesn’t understand jack didly squat. His grasp of economics, history, or even the constitution are all laughable. This is from an alleged constitutional lawyer. He understands far less, even, of everyday life.

It’s pretty apparent to me he got by on Affirmative Action because his ability to comprehend complicated issues is next to nil.

[Zionist Conspirator]

Once again I am reminded of a very unpleasant thing--that the two parties seem to have switched worldviews from their origins (Klein's sneering reference to "Jefferson's yeoman farmer," the Original Democrat, really drives this home). And as I always remark, as a pure Republican (with roots in the Whig and Federalist parties, Hamiltonianism, and ultimately Puritanism) I am quite embarrassed by the implications.

The Democrat party began as a coalition of anti-federalists who had been opposed to the new Constitution because it gave the federal government too much power, and therefore they favored the next best thing: a strict construction of its text. Its original exemplar was, as noted, the Jeffersonian "yeoman farmer," who was succeeded in turn by the Jacksonian backwoodsman. These were the original Democrats, and they lived in, and sired the people who still live in, "fly-over country."

By contrast Alexander Hamilton, the great-grandfather of the Republican party, was an urban cosmopolitan. A rootless bastard born in the West Indies, his home was the big city which to him was not a symbol of decadence but of vitality. With accountant's ink for blood, he created Pat Buchanan's ultimate nightmare--the National Bank!!! (Ironic when one considers how Hamiltonian Buchanan is in his other views.)

Hamilton, and the Federalists, Whigs, and Original Republicans who succeeded him, believed in federal supremacy and loose construction of the Constitution (contrary to contemporary mythology, laissez faire was never the doctrine of American business, which has always been interventionist, but of Jeffersonian agrarianism). The "heartland" of Republicanism and its antecedents was the coasts--New England, California, and the Pacific Northwest. In the Election of 1896 it was the Coasts that voted for the conservative McKinley while the Bible-Belt Heartland was frothing at the mouth for the radical William Jennings Bryan.

The closest I can come to pinpointing the point at which all this changed was the New Deal, when Jefferson's Democrat party adopted Hamilton's interpretation of the Constitution (though one could say that the Bryanites had already done this) and Ivy League grads, formerly staunch Hamiltonians and McKinleyites, began to spy for the Soviet Union. And even here, the New Deal was king in the traditional Jacksonian areas. In fact, in the FDR landslide of 1936 the only states to go Republican were Maine and Vermont!

Nevertheless, the New Deal seems to have been the beginning of the reversal of ideologies and attitudes among the two parties. And as an unabashed and unashamed Hamiltonian, this fact gives me no joy whatsoever.

[Ole Okie]

Of course, it also works to have Sarah Palin decking Barack Obama herself!

If I were Braaaaack (ptui) I'd be careful around Sarah.

She's mighty pretty even with her jaw set, and I'd bet she has a mighty roundhouse right!

[Let's Roll]

Video at link, scroll down and on the left there are photo/buttons - the one that starts out First Dude ... should be the Scott Davis interview.

http://www.foxnews.com/ontherecord/index.html

[Kevmo]

This guy pretty much calls Obama a pussy. And this is what zerObama’s SUPPORTERs are saying?

[Kevmo]

I should use better language:

This guy pretty much calls Obama a wuss. And this is what zerObama’s SUPPORTERs are saying?

[RandallFlagg]

I was finally able to sneak a pic of him here at work. Apparently, he's being told this quite a lot. Here's a side-by-side:

Even by his Wife.

[7thson]

What you wrote is pretty good but I disagree with a couple points. I don't think you count on how much Progressive Idealogy contributed to the two parties.
I first came across this when I read FDR's Folly several years ago. Reading about the Dems and the Repubs - there did not seem to be any real difference between the two parties. Hoover - a Republican - created more problems by using Progressive policies.

The book Blacklisted By History also spells this out. However, the book I am reading now - Liberal Facism - really lays it out. Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson were both Progressives.

I am coming to the conclusion where I think that today's modern Republican Party - the policies and beliefs - actually originated in the 50's with William Buckley and his gang. It took a step forward with Barry Goldwater and then the next step was Ronald Reagan.

I think the next step may be Sarah Palin.