The 9-11 of it all

Never fails.

This morning it occurred to me that Sarah Palin was really just a shiny bow and wrappings on the same old package. I really like her, although I couldn't agree with her less about a lot of issues. I could see getting along with her anyway. But people, imagine John McCain's health fails him in October. Do you really believe the Republicans would run her as their presidential nominee for the rest of the month? I can't imagine it.

It was pretty easy for her to take shots at Obama and the Dems in general. After all, she's in the duck blind here. They're the ones out in the open. We know all about the two of them, and we know almost nothing about her. In fact, every time the media, or anyone tries to dig into her life story or deviate from the Republican version, they cry sexism. They make up stories about "Obama-Biden Democrats" making slurs, yet whose names they can't seem to come up with when pressed. Yeah, she's a good hunter. A sniper. For now. As Obama pointed out on 60 Minutes last week, she's complaining about the snooping and nastiness she's getting now about her personal life, and it's only been a week or so. Look what he's been getting for the last year and a half.

Her speech really didn't reveal as much about her as it could have. I didn't hear her speak about a couple of her supposedly strongest beliefs last night, the pro life issue, her belief that the Iraq war is a mission from God, that Bush's foes are going to hell; that creationism should be taught in the schools; but she ws pretty clear that she wasn't going to stand up to international oil conglomerates who want to drill up every inch of our country and sell our oil resources to China or the highest bidder on the open market. I heard her talk about McCain's suffering at the hands of his torturers, but I didn't hear her speak out against torture. Or for the Constitution. Or for checks and balances in government. Or against the imperial presidency.

I heard her belittle Barack Obama's, and by extension, every grassroots organizer's work and yes, responsibilities to the people they serve in poor communities-- and these are Christian organizations he, and others like him, worked and work in. She sold them down the river for the sake of a political point.These are the thousand points of light, the faith based initiatives that the Republicans say are better than governments at serving the needy. Yet she thinks she's superior to those folks who give of themselves for the poorest of us?

I didn't hear her admit that she was all for the bridge to nowhere until it became unfavorable in Congress, then, when it became clear it wouldn't pass, and Stevens was in trouble, she was all against it. But that is in fact the chronology. I didn't hear her admit that she went to Washington herself, lobbying for her own earmarks for Alaska. But she did, and got them by the tens of millions.

On the other hand,I didn't hear her claim 9-11 for the Republican party, and try to make it a political trophy. She alluded to the war, and McCain's experience (although frankly, a fighter pilot is not a general). But I respected that she didn't try to shove the images of our burning cities in our faces, and threaten us with more of the same if we didn't vote for her man.

Oh no. She didn't have to. The RNC did it for her just a little while ago. And the voice-over, smarmily saying, "we all remember where we were on that day."

Fuck you, whoever you are. I was there, on Fifth Avenue, right after dropping my kids off at school, watching helplessly with thousands of my fellow New Yorkers. I was there, frantically trying to find my children in the ensuing chaos. I didn't see Jesse till the next day because they cut off the bridges and public transportation, so he was stuck in the Bronx overnight. My friends were in DC, evacuating federal buildings where they had served America most of their adult lives because no one knew what would be hit next.

And we New Yorkers were there for months afterwards as the photos went up and the body count mounted and the burning and the digging and the praying and the mourning continued. And you don't get to call dibs on what happened to us.