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Sarah Palin compared America’s hockey-moms to pit bull terriers. I wonder how many found it complimentary?

Apparently, it’s fine for her to make cheap, jokey, gender-laden remarks designed to raise the crowd to hysterical frenzy at St Paul’s Republican convention, but everyone else must remain silent for fear of the dreaded ‘sexism’ accusation. Well, why not? After all, the Jews adopted a similar tactic, hollering ‘antisemitism’ for sixty years, with admirable results.

Ms Palin considers herself, and the other ‘hockey-moms’ of America, as “pit bulls with lipstick”. Has she really considered the implications of that comparison? The pit bull terrier is not an attractive animal. Bred for the sole purpose of satiating man’s lowest passions, it will instinctively attack others of its species without warning, inflicting grievous and often fatal injuries. Compared to other breeds it lacks intelligence in favor of pugnacity and commonly attacks small children, no doubt falsely assuming them to be canine adversaries.

{Google – ‘pit bull kills child’ for an abundance of evidence}

So dangerous are these animals, the UK and other European nations have banned the keeping of them unless stringent conditions are met. Britain’s Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 prohibits the keeping of pit bulls, Japanese Tosas, and certain other breeds considered dangerous. Exemption certificates may only be authorized if the animal is neutered, insured, muzzled and on a lead at all times out-of-doors.

America is not yet so civilized, though dog-fighting, at least, is illegal in 49 states. As late as January 2008, it was still only a misdemeanor in Wyoming. In the American state of Illinois pit bull terriers are the most common of canine pets, and many are used for dog-fighting. This disgusting and debasing activity is still widely practiced in the state, despite its illegality. Much of it provides funding for gangs.^[1]

I doubt that many American ‘hockey-moms’, when they stop to consider the implications, will relish the comparison put forth by Sarah Palin. America’s mom’s are not pit bull terriers. Neither are they, in any way, similar to Sarah Palin.

If Ms Palin is on her way to becoming a ‘pit bull with lipstick’, she still has much to learn. She’s only a puppy. To understand the true depth one has to sink in order to qualify as the human equivalent of the American pit bull terrier she has to study this man – the embodiment of everything ‘pit bull’ in a human being……

Sarah Palin may eventually achieve Cheney’s status as the most despised human on the planet, if she truly perseveres. From her demeanor at the recent Republican Convention it appears likely she will try.

Unfortunately, pit bull terriers of any species can never be trusted. The question for America is whether it wants another pit bull vice president for the next four, or eight, years – or is it time for the breed, en masse, to be banned?

^{[1] “Illinois man faces dog fighting….charges” Pantagraph.com, August 21st 2008}

Filed under: Dangerous dogs

Over the course of the next few days Sparrow Chat will be changing. The old pad has been redesigned and its new look will, hopefully, last well into the future. It is expected to complete the changeover within a very short timescale – half an hour, if all goes well. If it doesn’t, any glitches should be ironed out fairly rapidly.

So if you do have problems raising the page, be patient and try back after an hour or so. Once the new look is up and running, please email if you encounter any problems.

Thanks

RJ.

The BBC World News broadcast its 5.00 am summary to the world this morning, and the news anchor described her as, “…. a gun-toting, church-going, mother-of-five…”. Many Americans will not view the portrayal as particularly grotesque, but the antithesis it conjures will be obvious outside of the US.

The very next news segment concerned a shooting in Washington yesterday, in which a number of people died. It served to emphasize the contradiction arising from professed Christianity coupled with a desire for lethal weaponry. The nomination of Republican vice presidential candidate, Sarah Palin, has caused raised eyebrows and muted ‘tut-tuts’ across most of Europe.

The concept of a crucified Christ viewed through the crosshairs of an AK47 does not sit well outside the United States. Despite serious attempts by the religious marketing moguls, always eager to purloin another buck or two from any available source, few Europeans are sufficiently simplistic as to entertain the idea politics and religion make loving bed-fellows, even when the weaponry is left outside the boudoir door. Sarah Palin may consider her religion not at odds with a willingness to kill things, but as a Republican she’s likely one of the first to condemn Islamic extremists motivated by a similar philosophy.

There are still huge numbers of US citizens who take an egotistical delight in poo-pooing what the rest of the world thinks of them. After all, for decades their nation has marched, jack-booted, around the planet wreaking havoc on any country daring to resist US doctrine.

Those times are long overdue for change.

Just as the Middle East has to drag itself from agrarianism to modernity before the fundamentalists eventually bow to the inevitable and leave the stage, so too has America to relieve itself of doctrines designed solely to inflate the US ego. Religious self-righteousness; the self-delusion of superiority over the rest of the planet; a notion that weapons are more important than words, all need to be released if America is ever to become both ‘in’ and ‘of’ the world, assuming a supportive role rather than taking what it needs and leaving others to pay the price.

Sarah Palin and her “soulmate” John McCain, are devoted to preserving the present US model, just as were their predecessors, Cheney and Bush. They are prepared to sacrifice the American people on their altars of Christian fundamentalism and gun violence, as Cheney and Bush slaughtered four thousand US soldiers and uncounted Iraqi innocents in the cause of their twenty-first century, God-inspired, Crusade into the Middle East.

The choice of the ultra-right-wing conservative, Sarah Palin, as a potential US vice president, with all its implications, was brilliant Republican strategy by those determined to preserve the status quo in this country. At a stroke it has re-opened an issue that dogged the Democrats for the last twelve months, though they hoped it had died at their Convention: the vexed question of race versus gender. Even if Clinton’s supporters were won over by their heroine’s speech’s in praise of Barack Obama, this new star in the ascendant, this Boadicea or Tomyris, may well be viewed as a substitute to lead them to the glory that will be theirs when a woman finally becomes the most powerful person on earth.

After five years of a bloody Iraq war, are Americans finally ready to relinquish their egotism and join the rest of the human race?

In his book, “The Limits of Power”, Andrew Bacevich, a professor of history and international relations at Boston University, and former US army colonel, writes in its introduction:

“History will not judge kindly a people who find nothing amiss in the prospect of armed conflict so long as they themselves are spared the effects. Nor will it view with favor an electorate that delivers political power into the hands of leaders unable to envision any alternative to perpetual war.

Rather than insisting that the world accomodate the United States, Americans need to assert control over their own destiny……..the onus of responsibility falls squarely on citizens.^[1]

Bacevich rightly believes it is the politicians’ promises to maintain the status quo, reinforce America’s egotistical beliefs, and glorify its self-obsession, that wins them the votes into power. The electorate needs reassurance that nothing in America will ever alter; that all is permanence.

The decision to choose Sarah Palin may appear to be a willingness to change – a ‘first’ in gender equality at the top – but the opposite is true, because Palin represents everything about America that resists change: its multiple obsessions with God, guns, abortion, a superpower mentality, and imperialism heavily disguised as benevolent foreign policy.

Is the US finally prepared to evolve into the humane, caring, nation it has pretended to be for years while it was waging wars across much of the globe? Or, is a ‘gun-toting, church-going, mother-of-five’ too much for the addicted American psyche to resist?

The answer will come on November 4th.

^{[1] “Bill Moyer’s Journal, PBS, August 15th 2008}

Filed under: Metaphorical oppositions