For many reasons, few of which I’ve explained here, I once thought that Hillary Clinton was the best person to carry the Democratic flag in 2008. But as much as I was comfortable in that decision, I maintained doubts about her candidacy. And more than a few of those doubts were related to the company she kept:
The Penn memo suggesting that the campaign target Obama’s “lack of American roots†said in part: “All of these articles about his boyhood in Indonesia and his life in Hawaii are geared towards showing his background is diverse, multicultural and putting that in a new light.
“Save it for 2050. … Every speech should contain the line you were born in the middle of America American to the middle class in the middle of the last century. And talk about the basic bargain as about the deeply American values you grew up with, learned as a child and that drive you today. Values of fairness, compassion, responsibility, giving back
“Let’s explicitly own ‘American’ in our programs, the speeches and the values. He doesn’t. Make this a new American Century, the American Strategic Energy Fund. Let’s use our logo to make some flags we can give out. Let’s add flag symbols to the backgrounds.â€
Fuck you, Mark Penn. Fuck you from me and every other American that isn’t interested in your hateful and narrow little heartland view of a county that doesn’t look like you. Fuck you and your willingness to attack the very things (say, “fairness, compassion, responsibility, giving back”) that makes this country great in service of a petty political victory.
Carla
He’s a toad, and I find his chauvinism distinctly un-American.
sasha
I think I’d tend more to immoral than amoral. But check on the asshole part.