On the subject of Benghazi, Jennifer Rubin has really gone a bit manic:
This is a full-blown scandal.... The scandal has now enveloped the Oval Office and will define his second term, if not resolved satisfactorily.She really believes that. Budget battles, the full implementation of Obamacare, other ongoing and unfolding conflicts in the Middle East, the avoidance of a second recession, the struggles of Europe, the rise of China -- none of that is going to define Obama's second term. Rubin actually believes that a couple of weeks' worth of less-than-accurate messaging, in response to four U.S. deaths -- after thousands of Americans have died overseas for the lies of the Bush administration -- is going to define this Obama term. She's nuts.
And here's the irony: she and her ideological soul mates are trying (vainly) to turn this into a scandal by doing the exact opposite of what their side did throughout the Bush years.
Do you remember? Back then, American targets were attacked by Al Qaeda -- and the Bush administration responded, with the unwavering support of wingers like Rubin, by going after Saddam Hussein, who had nothing to do with 9/11 and wasn't working with Al Qaeda.
At that time, right-wing propagandists struggled to make sure that Americans didn't distinguish between one set of Muslim enemies and another. Saddam? Osama? What's the difference? Throughout his presidency, George W. Bush gave one speech after another in which all the Muslims who'd ever looked at America crosswise were described with one singular noun: "the enemy."
As a result, Americans who weren't well versed in the group distinctions in the Muslim world were kept ignorant. They were all alike! They all hate us!
And now we've had an attack in Benghazi that was first characterized as the work of religious zealots angry at a video they thought was blasphemous, but that was actually the work of Al Qaeda-sympathizing terrorists -- and the right wants the American public to be upset at the notion that the administration initially advanced the former story when the latter was true. Righties, you helped make the American people incapable of distinguishing between one group of Muslim opponents and another. Now you want outrage based on the kinds of categorical distinctions you didn't want Americans to be able to make a decade ago?
Well, that's too bad. You relied on ignorance, and you can't expect to reverse it when it suits you.
It was the right wingers who were screaming the loudest initially about crazy Muslims whipped into violence over a video...and denouncing Obama for not standing four square with the video maker. That's because they were happy for any excuse to portray Muslims as prone to violence.
ReplyDeleteThey're the ones who took the longest route around to finally identifying the attackers as extremist militias. Along the way, they stopped off at every conceivable position from which Obama could be attacked. They only arrived at that old GOP fallback position ("he refuses to use the word 'terror'") after they'd tried and failed every other trick to politicize the events.
"turn this into a scandal by doing the exact opposite of what their side did throughout the Bush years"
That would also include demanding accountability and starting an investigation of what happened. Republicans never did anything of the sort when Bush was president...not after 9/11/01, not after Bin Laden got away, not after the invasion of Iraq, not ever.
You can fix "ignorant."
ReplyDeleteYou can't fix "stupid."
And Jennifer Rubin is stupid. The people who read her, are stupid. Why else would anyone read her, if they weren't stupid? Ok - maybe for shits and giggles.
And the people who let her keep writing her stupid screeds, are stupid.
Either that, or she has some KILLER photo's of Fred Hiatt enjoying carnal pleasure with barnyard animals.
Or worse - feckin', and being fecked by, Charles Krauthammer (I bet that image won't leave your minds for quite a while :-)
Someone needs to take her for a drug test. She's on something. Trying to huff a tragedy into a conspiracy, should be reason enough to have her checked out - mentally, as well as physically.
Jen, dear stupid soul, get help. Do we need to do an intervention?
This is a well-earned encomium.
ReplyDeleteIf you don’t know Jennifer Rubin, she’s the source of the heavy breathing you hear behind Mitt Romney at every event. She is the small trickle of sweat that runs down your back every time you think about criticizing outsourcing. She is fear and hatred and the realization that you left your phone in a public bathroom.
Great point. And well-made. The tiger has run away with its would-be riders.
ReplyDeleteThey never remember the scariest* line from Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein," in which the monster tells Victor:
ReplyDelete"You are my creator, but I am your master. Obey!"
*Although many authoritative sources consider "I will be with you on your wedding night" a strong contender.