From time to time Maureen Dowd says something that I couldn’t have said better. In her Op-Ed column for The New York Times, she raises the question, “When [did] elite became a bad thing in America?” From my viewpoint, I’d prefer to have the leaders of my country to be a bit smarter than me. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want the guy down the street to be president of this country. He might be a nice guy and all and can be president of the block association, but he’s not getting my vote for President of the United States of America. And forget about “Joe six pack.” We all know that “six pack” does not refer to his abs. And since when did we begin rewarding “C” students, and ridiculing the student that worked hard and finished at the top of his/her class? What is it about Republicans—some of which are smart people (I hope)—running toward and praising such incompetence in their candidates? Do they just want to win at any cost? Sarah Palin is sadly just another George Bush in a skirt (and lipstick). McCain’s campaign have nothing to be proud of in selecting her. In an excerpt from her Op-Ed column, Dowd offers her insight:

Being mush-mouthed helped give the patrician Bushes the common touch. As Alistair Cooke observed, “Americans seem to be more comfortable with Republican presidents because they share the common frailty of muddled syntax and because, when they attempt eloquence, they do tend to spout a kind of Frontier Baroque.”

Darn right. And that, doggone it, brings us to a shout-out for the latest virtuoso of Frontier Baroque, bless her heart, the governor of the Last Frontier. Her reward’s in heaven.

At Sarah Palin’s old church in Wasilla, they spoke in tongues. Maybe that’s where she picked it up…

…At another point, she channeled Alicia Silverstone debating in “Clueless,” asserting, “Nuclear weaponry, of course, would be the be-all, end-all of just too many people in too many parts of our planet.” (Mostly the end-all.)

A political jukebox, she drowned out Biden’s specifics, offering lifestyle as substance. “In the middle class of America, which is where Todd and I have been, you know, all our lives,” she said, making the middle class sound like it has its own ZIP code, superior to 90210 because “real” rules.

Sometimes, her sentences have a Yoda-like — “When 900 years old you reach, look as good you will not” — splendor. When she was asked by Couric if she’d ever negotiated with the Russians, the governor replied that when Putin “rears his head” he is headed for Alaska. Then she uttered yet another sentence that defies diagramming: “It is from Alaska that we send those out to make sure that an eye is being kept on this very powerful nation, Russia, because they are right there.”

Source: NYTimes.com

The thought did occur to me last week that George Dubya has a lot of nerve trying to reprimand Russian for doing the same thing that he did. But I think Maureen Dowd expressed it a whole lot better than I could in her op-ed, Russia is Not Jamaica…

America’s back in the cold war and W.’s back on vacation.

Talk about your fearful symmetry.

After eight years, the president’s gut remains gullible. He’ll go out as he came in — ignoring reality; failing to foresee, prevent or even prepare for disasters; misinterpreting intelligence reports; misreading people; and handling crises in ways that makes them exponentially worse.

He has spent 469 days of his presidency kicking back at his ranch, and 450 days cavorting at Camp David. And there’s still time to mountain-bike through another historic disaster.

As Russian troops continued to manhandle parts of Georgia on Friday, President Bush chastised Russian leaders that “bullying and intimidation are not acceptable ways to conduct foreign policy in the 21st century” — and then flew off to Crawford.

Read the rest…

For the past few weeks now the Republican party has been doing what it does best. When all else fails, they simply play the sleaze card.

I came across a very “in your face” op-ed from NYTimes.com entitled Running While Black.

According to an ABC News poll, Michelle Obama has a more favorable rating than Cindy McCain. I find that to be very interesting since there is so much negative spin out there about her or things that she is accused of saying.

It seems the Obama camp is on a mission to give Michelle a new image. I was reading an article at NYTimes.com today where they talked about the new image she will be taking on. It was also a very informative article that speaks about she personality and this image change. Now a days, no one on the campaign trail is off limits, so there will be a lot of eyes on Michelle Obama. According to a brief excerpt:

Rather than pulling Mrs. Obama behind a curtain, her husband’s campaign is pushing her farther out on stage. She remains a charismatic presence, and when she gives her husband a fist dap or talks of him as a father, she is telling voters, this is a regular guy. This South Side woman anchors him in her reality.

In coming weeks, Mrs. Obama will visit the spouses of military personnel and talk of the patriotic duty to provide these families with care and services. And the campaign has hired Stephanie Cutter, a veteran strategist, as her chief of staff, who will seek to deflect attacks.

Senator Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri, a close ally of the Obama campaign, says Mrs. Obama must stop sounding like a lawyer trying to win an argument. The trick, she said, is “not pushing so hard to persuade people that Barack is the right one.”

“All she has to do is be likable,” Mrs. McCaskill said.

Mrs. Obama has already had to check her brutally honest approach to talking about race. Now she co-stars in a campaign that would as soon mute most discussion of race.”

Source: abcnews.com, nytimes.com