Sunday, October 26, 2008

It’s Okay to Hate Sarah Palin Just Because She’s a Woman

Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. The media says it’s okay to hate Governor Sarah Palin just because she’s a woman. Prior to the 1960s misogyny was not the only perfectly acceptable prejudice. When the Oppressor Clubs held their weekly meetings, there was a veritable potpourri, a melting pot, if you will, of different ethnic, racial, and religious groups, let alone women and gays, to hate based solely on their membership in a particular group. Then the 60s came along and more and more people began talking about equality. The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke about judging people by their character, not their skin color. The National Organization of Women spoke about judging people not by their gender, but by their abilities. Finally, it was no longer “politically correct” to hate people based solely on the group to which they belong (except for fat people [http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/03/080327172129.htm] and Catholics [http://catholicexchange.com/2003/08/18/95673/]). Thus, the weekly meetings of the Oppressors Club are really boring if you are, like me, a fat Catholic.

Then came Monica Lewinsky. Now, ordinarily, a young woman who had sex with her boss at her place of business and then complained about it, would be the champion cause of NOW. But, not this time. Rather, Lewinsky was perceived to be not the proper type of NOW woman. A NOW woman would know to keep her mouth shut (so to speak) instead of endangering NOW’s faithful ally in the White House. Lewinsky was a stain (so to speak) on the good name of her male employer. For a while, the media allowed us to hate, mock, and make sophomoric jokes (see above) of Ms Lewinsky simply because she was a woman. Then, we had to lay off women and go back to the good prejudices against fat people and Catholics.

Then, Senator Hillary Clinton decided to run for president. We had some slight leeway to ridicule or denigrate her simply because she was a woman (http://www.journalism.org/node/6755). We didn’t have carte blanche like we did with Lewinsky, but it was close. And significant elements within the media encouraged our boorish behavior.

But Gov. Palin may be the holy grail of female bashing. We haven’t had such fantastic leeway to ridicule, denigrate, and hate somebody simply because of what group they fall into since the ‘50s – the 1850s. Palin is an idiot because she said you can see Russia from Alaska. You can (http://nationalatlas.gov/printable/images/pdf/reference/pagegen_ak.pdf), but the media lets us bash her because she’s a dizzy broad. Just look at the caricature of her on SNL. Sen. Clinton is portrayed as a bitter bitch and Gov. Palin is a dizzy broad (http://www.hulu.com/watch/34465/saturday-night-live-palin--hillary-open#s-p2-st-i1). A few days ago, Joy Behar on The View called Gov. Palin a pig with lipstick (apparently a take-off on Sen. Barack Obama’s far less offensive use of the phrase “lipstick on a pig”). Thank you, Ms Behar, now we can all hate Palin for being a woman who, apparently, wears lipstick.

We can ridicule Palin for having hunted moose http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rQukFbfdLM, which contains the wonderful line “if we let this woman loose, the depth of her experience, is like lipstick on a moose”) Admittedly, this isn’t nearly as funny as Sen. Joe Biden suggesting he would shoot Obama if he tried to take Biden’s guns (saw this on The Daily Show, but can’t find it on the internet), but Biden is a guy and Palin is a dizzy broad.

Likewise, we can mock Palin’s religious views (http://www.clipser.com/watch_video/822103). Her views aren’t nearly as hilarious as Obama’s God who hates America (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hPR5jnjtLo). But, once again, Obama is a dude and Palin is, to quote Bill Maher, “a bimbo.”

Let us not forget all the wonderful humor on the various late night shows and on Comedy Central mocking Palin for being a woman. Thanks for all the great material. Even Jamie Dukes on the NFL Network got in on the hating after he was asked as what he was dressing up for Halloween. Dukes put on a pair of glasses and said in a falsetto voice, “I can see Russia from my house.” Great stuff. Even though you can see Russia from Alaska, she’s an idiot, and we can make fun of her because only a woman would say something that stupid.
On behalf of the misogynists at my local Oppressors Club, I would like to thank, among others, CNN, CBS, ABC, NBC, The New York Times, The NFL Network, The View, The Daily Show, and The David Letterman Show, for the freedom to disparage and, to a certain extent, hate Sarah Palin simply because she’s a woman. What a great country.

Friday, October 24, 2008

The Idiocy of University Administrator Welfare

By the start of 2008, universities in the US were employing more administrators than full-time faculty (http://www.splicetoday.com/on-campus/faculty-fallout; http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2008/03/12/jobs). Typically, this is justified by administrators because they have so much more to do running the university. However, when I first started teaching, I incorrectly assumed that the purpose of a university was to teach students how to think. Then, I discovered it was to support a winning football team (http://aspatula.blogspot.com/2008/05/idiocy-of-funding-college-football.html). Now, I realize the entire purpose of a university is to provide welfare benefits for administrators who couldn’t get a job in the real world. I know of a university where the provost (essentially, the vice-president of a university) gets paid at the national average while the full-time faculty are paid below the state average. Parents who are spending increasingly large sums of money to educate their kids in universities should ask why more and more of their tuition money is going to pay more and more administrators higher and higher salaries. Maybe they would get a warm and fuzzy feeling knowing they are enriching administrators who have nothing to do with their kids’ education.

Saturday, October 18, 2008

Barrack Obama Is Jesus Christ

Senator Obama is perfect. Think about it. Apart from FOX News (with its obvious biases), have you read anything negative about Obama or heard anything critical of him on the national news? Since you have to be some kind of apocalyptic idiot to believe that the media is biased (just ask the media), then the only other logical explanation for Obama's perfection is that he is the second coming of the Savior. I'm a little disappointed because I thought there was supposed to be trumpets and cymbals announcing His return. I think there is also some mention of the dead rising from their rest. I guess Obama is waiting until his inauguration to raise the dead. To paraphrase one of my favorite groups, Emerson, Lake, & Palmer: Hallelujah, Noel. Be it heaven or hell, the political savior we get we deserve.

Thanks to ACORN, We Need UN Election Monitors

The voting fraud now going on this country is truly stultifying. The most obvious example of this is the fraud committed by ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now). According to “Voter Fraud Watch: Could ACORN Scandal in Washington Have Been Avoided With Photo ID?” by Eric Shawn and Becky Diamond on FOXNews.com, ACORN fraudulently registered about 1800 voters in Washington in 2006. As Washington Secretary of State, Sam Reed stated, “`There is nothing more fundamental to a democratic republic and to a citizen of the United States than participating in selecting your public officials. For people to undermine that and try to perpetuate fraud on the system is an outrage.’" According to the article, John Jones, head of ACORN in Washington, stated that this isolated incident outraged ACORN. ( http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/05/02/voter-fraud-watch-could-acorn-scandal-in-washington-have-been-avoided-with-photo-id/ ) However, in September 2008, at a joint House Administration and House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing on "Federal, State and Local Efforts to Prepare for the General 2008 Election,” James Terry, Chief Public Advocate, Consumers Rights League stated: "`ACORN routinely says it will clean up its act. Yet, given its decade-long history of voter fraud, embezzlement, and misuses of taxpayer funds, ACORN's pattern of fraud can no longer be dismissed as a series of “unfortunate events.”” His testimony is a scathing attack on a pattern of fraudulent behavior at every level of ACORN (http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/crl-testimony-acorns-voter-fraud/story.aspx?guid=%7B573B31D0-6AB7-4353-B8E7-91300F4DFF81%7D&dist=hppr).

One of the most obvious ways to prevent voter fraud is through a system of voter ID. Routinely, the requirement for voters to present a photo ID to vote is portrayed simply as a means to prevent African Americans from voting (http://truthaboutfraud.org/ ) However, there is never an explanation, short of some conspiracy theory, to prove this allegation. Further, according to a Rasmussen Report, 76% of those polled favored voter ID – including 66% of registered Democrats (http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/76_support_showing_photo_id_before_voting)

John Fund in “Democracy Imperiled,” in 2004 noted the widespread voter fraud in a number of cities including Baltimore, Milwaukee, New Orleans, and Philadelphia (where the number of registered voters exceeded the number of adults eligible to vote). Without requiring an ID to vote, “the illegal alien who assassinated the Mexican presidential candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio was registered to vote in San Pedro, California — twice.” (http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/fund200409130633.asp) Sometimes the solution to a problem is so obvious it’s blinding.

All too often, government prosecutors are loathe to investigate charges of election fraud because, according to John Fund, “… they fear charges of racism or of a return to Jim Crow voter suppression tactics if they pursue touchy fraud cases” This is the problem in Alabama. According to an AP article in the Tuscaloosa News (18 October 2008) entitled, “6 counties have more voters than possible,” “The Birmingham News compared the state’s voter registration numbers with the Census Bureau’s population estimates and found more registered voters than voting-age adults in Conecuh, Greene, Lowndes, Perry, Washington and Wilcox counties.” (http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/article/20081018/NEWS/810170236/1007?Title=6_counties_have_more_voters_than_possible) The following chart shows that four of the six counties are predominantly African American, all are impoverished, and all are undereducated – a mixture ripe for abuse by those who will manipulate the system for their own aggrandizement.

A=County; B=%African American; C=Median Household Income (2004); D=%Below Poverty; E=Percent High School Graduates
A......................B.........C...............D........E
Conecuh .........44..... $24,334 ...23.1...67.7
Greene ...........79..... $22,439 ...26.5...64.8
Lowndes .........71 ....$24,967 ...25.5 ...64.3
Perry ..............69 ....$21,640 ...30.4...62.4
Washington ...26 .....$32,147 ...18.1... 72.3
Wilcox ............72 .....$19,682 ...30.4 ...59.5
Alabama .......26.3 ...$37,062 ...16.1 ...75.3
US .................12.8 ...$44,334 ....12.7...80.4
(From: http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/01000.html)

An article similar to the one in the Tuscaloosa News appeared in the New York Times, “Officials Investigate 3 Alabama Counties in Voter Fraud Accusations” by Adam Nossiter (10 July 2008) detailing the charges of voter fraud using multiple suspicious absentee ballots (a long tradition in Alabama) where six times more absentee ballots were cast in Perry County (where the Black Panthers were founded) than the state average. One of Perry County’s commissioners, Albert Turner, Jr., charged that this was a racist plot. However, Michael W. Jackson, Perry County district attorney, an African-American and a Democrat, doesn’t hold Turner’s opinion of a conspiracy to disfranchise the blacks of Perry County. “`For there to be that many, it’s suspicious. When you get the absentee ballots, it’s a lot easier to pull that off, forge their names, vote for them.’ He added, “`It certainly needs to be looked at, because given the historic significance of Perry County, we want to make sure candidates and the public have a fair process.’” (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/10/us/10fraud.html?_r=7&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=login&oref=login&oref=login) A number of affidavits in Perry County demonstrate that some candidates, including Albert Turner, Jr. routinely buy votes. One of those who was paid by an associate of Turner stated, “`The last time I voted, I was paid $30,’ Mr. Collins said in a telephone interview this week, adding: `It’s pretty common. It ain’t nothing new.’” (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/10/us/10fraud.html?_r=7&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=login&oref=login&oref=login)

The real tragedy of unchecked voter fraud is that as more and more people see politics as a game without rules, voter turnout will continue to decline. John Fund notes, “This growing cynicism diminishes respect for the nation's institutions and lowers voter participation. Only 11 percent of the 18- to 19-year-olds eligible to vote for the first time now bother to go to the polls. The United States ranks139th out of 163 democracies in the rate of voter participation. The more that voting is left to the zealous or self-interested few, the more we see harshly personal campaigns that dispense with any positive vision of our national future.” In short, ignoring voter fraud undermines our democracy and elections degrade from a debate over philosophy and ideology into a vituperative combat of personalities.

Will state and federal investigators have the courage to pursue the loss of civil rights (whether it’s by ACORN or the Perry County commissioners) resulting from such flagrant voter fraud in the face of charges of racism, or will they, as has happened several times in the past decade in Alabama, simply abandon the people (of whatever race) to a political cabal that manipulates both race and political parties for their own aggrandizement?