In her appearance at Ralph Reed’s version of a Taliban revival meeting (aka the Faith and Freedom conference), Sarah Palin gave us a glimpse of American foreign policy if it were developed by a lobotomized ferret.
Most of her address sounded like a loser on Last Comic Standing. She made jokes about protesters driving Chevy Volts, Obama voters being “knuckleheads,” and “pot-smoking deadbeat Bostonian” terrorists,” She even attempted an impression of Amy Poehler’s SNL Weekend Update anchor. Her punch lines included hilarious references to victims of terror in Boston and Ft. Hood. What could be funnier? Plus, she reprised her classic material about health care death panels and thousands of armed IRS agents (both of those issues have been definitively debunked and relegated to the fringiest conspiracy kooks).
Eventually she reached the portion of her address that dealt with foreign policy, and she did not disappoint – so long as you expected cartoonish, bumper sticker analysis that insults leaders and offends allies. Here is Palin’s approach to the crisis in Syria:
“I say, until we know what we’re doing, until we have a commander and chief who knows what he’s doing, well, in these radical Islamic countries, who aren’t even respecting basic human rights, where both sides are slaughtering each other as they scream over an arbitrary red line, ‘Allah Akbar,’ I say until we have someone who knows what they’re doing, I say let Allah sort it out.”
The tragic events in Syria are not material for a comedy routine. More than 90,000 people have been killed, and a million more are refugees who have been driven from their homes and country. To cavalierly suggest that the killing should continue and that the U.S. should be content to sit on the sidelines and ignore our national interests in peace and democracy for the region, is irresponsible in the extreme. Neither the brutal dictatorship of Assad, nor the ascension of radical Islamists, would advance the interests of the U.S. But that is what Palin is advocating. Contrary to her idiotic and dangerous indifference, America needs to be engaged with allies who share our objectives. Syria is a critical player in the region and is presently aligned with provocateurs like Iran and Hezbollah. To miss this opportunity to forge a new alignment that inures to our benefit would be foolish. Yet that is Palin’s approach – an approach that sometimes doesn’t sound all that different the one proffered by Al Qaeda’s fundamentalists:
“We’d do well to re-dedicate ourselves to our one true heavenly father. Because we’re not gonna come up in our own simple minds with the solutions. The challenges are too big.”
That’s the prefect summation for the Palin Doctrine. She admits that she has a simple mind that is incapable of solving complex problems. And she defers any action to a supreme being who, if you believe people like Palin, has already demonstrated that he isn’t averse to snuffing out the lives of the innocent in Syria, Iraq, or the World Trade Center.
If you think you can stand twenty-four minutes of Palin’s ear-piercing, high-pitched squeal, here is the whole video. I assume no responsibility for your aural health, broken vases, or the holes you may punch in the wall.
Ralph Reed and Sarah Palin, what disgraceful human beings! This is just what we would expect to find at a religious nuts’ convention. Don’t forget Palin is absolutely sure of her belief in Armageddon and all that other biblical nonsense. The arrogance of these brain dead know-nothings is mind boggling.
“Commander AND Chief”? And to think all these years I thought it was “IN chief.” Thanks for the correction Sarah.
You give her too much credit (if you can believe that) – she is ACTING the part she thinks people want – I don’t think she has a set of beliefs that guide her, just some kind of weird desire to be popular and influential with some group of conservatives. That behavior never gets you anywhere as is clear with her. There is no substance there, just an act – and she doesn’t do it very well. Not sure who is actually listening to her – you are, but only to ridicule.
I hate to say this here, but she had a point. *flinch, duck* I’m tired of the US trying to make everybody play nice.
You nailed it Paula.
I’m not, I take a lotta shit from people for this but I do think that we should act as the world police. We fucked it up with Iraq and debatably Afghanistan, but I think that it’s a good thing. We’re the good guys, we aren’t infallible, and some of our politicians are dumbasses that lie to the whole fukn world just to start a nonsensical war that had nothing to do with fucking anything, but before that I like to think that we had a good reputation for fighting for the oppressed. I also take a lot of shit for being in favor of denied ops, the shif that we never hear about but we know happens. There are massive fuck ups like Iran contra, the war on drugs, Iraq. But we still get a lot of shit right, I can’t even fuking imagine a world where we were isolationists. I also favor a huge fucking military, what do we think the latter half of this century is gonna look like? I’m not optimistic, what with a rising china and dwindling oil supply that is heavily controlled by the Middle east and what will be south America. I mean, Syria has chemical weapons, is in a region that, thanks to Israel, is already in a nuclear arms race and is dominated by theocracies. Theocracies/religiously charged states + nukes=end of the fucking world. Becoming a witness to the world’s ills is just a bad fucking idea, I mean, do you think the UN is gonna amount to anything anytime soon?? Non-action is myopic and ultimately dangerous, and not just for us. You wanna see us as a bully, and recently that isn’t so far from reality thanks to w, but I like to see us as a savior of nations. Besides, if the president wanted to sit it out madam batshit Palin would be bitching at him to go in with everything we have. Steve up there is right on the money with her…
So now it is time to point out the nonsencial “analysis” that Mark just burped onto his page. Sarah Palin is correct to point out that having the US government try to pick sides in this conflict is foolish to the nth degree. The main players in this civil war – the Assad regime and the Al-Qaeda-backed rebels – are, sad to say, not worth backing. This is Libya all over again. I wish this weren’t the case, but there isn’t anybody worth supporting at this time. And this current administration is too incompetent to mold anything positive out of this (although I tend to doubt that any administration could do much better in this case).
Yea! Al Qaeda’s involved so we should just sit and watch!! Great idea!! I mean, why should we get involved where we know al Qaeda to be active and gaining support in a war in which we know chemical weapons are being deployed? That doesn’t have the potential to turn into a gargantuan international clusterfuck and/or new terrorist dominated advanced weapons cache or anything!! A humanitarian crisis being fueled by Russian arms with the potential to spill over into an already unstable region, being made ever more unstable by a nuclear arms race? NAH! Pop some popcorn and grab a good seat! Maybe we can see more stories about weapons being supplied to Hezbollah, or more dead children!
And I end by pointing out your epicly dumbass self contradictory Obama bash. You truly never have anything worthy to say about anything. Next time, you should think about the talking points you so blindly invest emotion into and adopt as realistic policy before you shit all over yourself…again.
RANT COMPLETE
What I pointed out is fully accurate. Unless a rebel group that actually believes in human rights emerges and has a decent chance of winning, The Obama admnistration needs to stay out.
REASONABLE RESPONSE TO RANT COMPLETE
I couldn’t agree MORE with Palin on “let Allah sort it out”—–
A culture of violence that has been going on for centuries—–no prospects of changing—-stay away.