palin snl, etc

actually sort of funny

I wasn't all that surprised this happened. And it was, in the typical SNL fashion, almost (but not really) funny. (Alec also needs to learn to memorize lines).
I also wasn't surprised to hear that Palin endorsed the anti-gay marriage amendment. The basic problems of the GOP seems to be an attempt to hijack the party by the redneck wing of America. Obama's contextual argument that many Americans are clinging to their guns, bible, etc isn't all that far off the mark in these cases. That doesn't mean it wasn't inappropriate, because it's possible that religion is of some value to some of these people, but I've yet to see a substantive example of a person who opposes Obama from this population of people who could actually cite any issue and deconstruct it. That's vaguely frightening. Adlai Stevenson when running for President in '52 was informed "You will have the vote of every thinking person in America" To which he replied, "That's fine, but I need a majority." If that was true in the 1950s, it isn't any less true now.

Palin's appeal is precisely to this 'real America'. But I'm rather tired of two Americas. There once was, and of course, the 'other America' lost that war. (I still am confused as to the whole display of a Confederate flag as some issue of pride in heritage, don't you people know you lost?). There is not and never has been two Americas since that time. We create these distinctions of rich versus poor, religious vs secular, liberal vs conservative, black vs white, but the realities are that we have no (well, few) easy categories and instead a continuum of reality across that spectrum. Most Americans are generally in the middle of these 'battles' between two Americas. And there are few enough who would claim that their little part of America is somehow 'a fake America'.

Jon Stewart pointed this out with deliberation by creating a simple quiz with such illustrative points as: favourite amendment is a) the 1st or b) the 2nd (the use of the British sp is intentional on my part). And of course, concluded with, if you answered any of these questions, you are watching the Daily Show, and are a fake American. The implications of this new version of 'religious townie vs college educated city folk' are not difficult to track in an electoral college way, but they in no way demonstrate a division between Americans. There are plenty of church going people who hold liberal social policies, such as anti-poverty measures or tolerance on issues like abortion or homosexuality, just as there are plenty of ultra-conservatives living in our largest urban centers who despise taxes and somehow applaud conservative judges overturning public freedoms. The quaint manner of publicly dividing these sectors is annoying and should be regarded as an insult to any intelligent person.

If there is a 'real America' peopled with people whose intellect is insufficient to understand that their way of life is in no way superior to that of others and is marred with just as much hypocrisy or delusion as any other American's, then I am not at all sorry to be not counted among them.