"I am the proud daughter of Indian immigrants who reminded my brothers, my sister and me every day how blessed we were to live in this country ... My story is really not much different from millions of other Americans. Immigrants have been coming to our shores for generations to live the dream that is America ... Today, we live in a time of threats like few others in recent memory. During anxious times, it can be tempting to follow the siren call of the angriest voices. We must resist that temptation. No one who is willing to work hard, abide by our laws, and love our traditions should ever feel unwelcome in this country."Really? Donald Trump and Ted Cruz have 50 to 60 percent of your party's presidential primary vote, and you're going to say this?
Two theories:
* She and the party are still in denial about the fact that the GOP has gone overwhelmingly nativist.
* She thinks (and possibly the party thinks) that Trump or Cruz will crash and burn this year, and Haley -- soon to be a term-limited ex-governor -- will have nothing but time to plan a 2020 run against President Hillary Clinton, by which time all this neo-fascist silliness will be a thing of the past.
I don't know about the latter, but I do know she's not going to be anyone's running mate this year. Anyone who tells you next summer that that's a possibility is an idiot.
Tell this fwit (hmm.. the f was a typo - but looking at it, maybe I can coin that word to mean "female twit!" ), that my not-so "recent memory" goes all the way back to my parents and close relatives living nearby, acting like a family of long-tale cats in a room in a senior's facility chock full of cat-hating old-timers in rocking-chairs, during the Cuban Missile Crisis!
ReplyDeleteAnd then, more recently, the assassinations of JFK, Malcolm X, MLK Jr, and RFK - all at the height of the Cold War, while the USSR and China had thousands of nuclear missiles pointed at us, and the Vietnam War, which killed almost 20 times the number of people as those who died in the horrible attacks of 9/11! And that's just the Americans!
I could list my more recent memories of anxious times and times of threats - REAL threats, and not the ones woven by conservative spin-meister's whose job it is to keep Americans divided through hate, fear, and bigotry - but it'd be kinda long, because I'm kinda old, and I have a memory which goes back further than pissing my fucking pants on 9/11!
I'd take the time to tell you stories about "duck-and-cover" drills in the schools of my youth, Nikki, but you'd probably think that meant not crossing your legs when you're wearing a short skirt in front of one of the "Duck Dynasty" freakazoids!
JAYZOOS!
What a party full of amoral cowards, the GOP is!
And as for Gov. NIKKI, what a fucking FWIT!!!
(I like it even more, now!) ;-)
"Fwit"? Love it -- since the first thing I thought upon seeing it was "fuckwit."
ReplyDeleteI'm also old enough to remember trading black-humor nervous jokes in my junior high cafeteria as we waited in barely subdued terror for the Cuban Missile Crisis to blow up into the end of the world. Bunch of whiny ass titty babies out there who have no idea just how good they've got it -- especially dusky-hued daughters of East Asian immigrants who wouldn't have been let into a state capitol other than as a maid or cook, back in the (not so long ago) day. And it wasn't the Republicans who made that change.
Well done Ben, well done.
ReplyDeleteWith all the talk, and now TV series' and special movie "events" about Daesh sleeper cells or Soviet plots to destroy the nation coming to fruition, I wonder if perhaps we should revisit the offspring of immigrants qualification.
India Indian. Not "American".
"No one who is willing to work hard, abide by our laws, and love our traditions should ever feel unwelcome in this country."
ReplyDeleteDoes "abide by our laws" include the immigration laws?
Heh, heh... I had the same initial thought about "fwit" as NBB.
ReplyDeleteI really don't understand the Conservative fear of everything. Daesh is not a credible threat to this country. Hell, I don't even think China or Russia are serious threats to do us harm, and they actually HAVE long-range nuclear weapons. If we could get through the tension of the mid-20th century Cold War without annihilating ourselves, I'm pretty sure we can weather whatever a penny-ante regional religious sect can cook up.
If you're going to traffic in anxiety, at least make it about something that is real. This Tome Engelhardt piece does a nice job of putting things in perspective:
http://www.tomdispatch.com/blog/176086/tomgram%3A_engelhardt%2C_the_fate_of_our_earth
Whops!
ReplyDeleteThat previous comment was really meant for the next post about the SOTU, but I commented on Victor's neologism and just pasted what I was composing for that other comment thread in here.