I cannot for the life of me understand why so many Americans are infatuated with the hairbrain solutions that Sarah Palin offers them. I know she looks and sounds like your average mom dishing out cookies and desserts to adoring kids. But most of what she says publicly has not much intellectual stimulus in it at all. Using metaphors about guns she tells supporters to "target" Democrats. She exhorts them "Don't retreat - instead, RELOAD!" I bet she thought that immensely funny at the time. Perhaps her porcelain smile has been wiped from her face now?We can only hope that Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords makes as full a recovery as possible. She was doing a very brave thing. Meeting her constituents in public. That surely is the stuff of democratic politics. The local sheriff, Clarence Dupnik, speaks volumes when he says, "When you look at unbalanced people, how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths about tearing down the government, the anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous. And, unfortunately, Arizona I think has become sort of the capital. We have become the Mecca for prejudice and bigotry. That may be free speech. But it's not without consequence." It's not free speech with any meaning, just prejudice and bigotry.
The consequence outside this Safeway store (some irony there!) is a grave tragedy for American democracy. The likes of Sarah Palin need to think before they speak. If not all she will be is a common rabblerouser.
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