I Can see Sarah Palin From My Front Porch

Sarah Palin came and spoke at a rally here in Colorado Springs yesterday morning. There was a smaller than expected crowd, and that may be because it was held in the morning. If it was held in the afternoon, I would have attended and brought along my sister's grand-daughter. She's 11 years old, but I've gotten her to sit and watch some of the debates, and she will even ask pointed questions when watching the news.

It seems that the McCain campaign is conceding Colorado, which is sad as I would like to see a good fight to the bitter end. So, they are positioning Sarah for a brighter future. A few more years getting used to being in the national spotlight and they might let her do a news interview on her own. Plus, she will get to have people make up catchy phrases of her own. But right now she is the darling of the right-wing fringe of the Republican Party, and that is the bankrupt part who's ideas have been proven not to work in real time. If she was smarter, she would show a more moderate and balanced view, so she can have a central role when the Party begins to rebuild itself after the election.

She also was interviewed by our local James Dobson over the phone for his radio program. Tom Minnery, the reactionary senior vice president of government and public policy for Focus on the Family, was quoted in the Gazette  " She is smart, articulate, and has a Christian testimony, so we can see why the national media is out to get her."

Why does every Christian fringe group feel paranoid, that the rest of the nation is out to get them? Perhaps its from the romantic notion of wanting to be a martyr. Or it could be anger and frustration because their beliefs haven't become more mainstream. Anyway, it has become part of the institutionalized rant along with the unenlightened and unforgiving nature of the mainstream media, or MSM, in fringe jargon.

Being a socially repressed conservative seems to be part of human nature. We have them in every society, and the super conservative evangelical Christians have more in common with the super conservative Islamic folk than anyone else. Their approach to their religion, their application of mores to society are the same. This religious, right-wing approach is responsible for the mess of the Bush administration, the Iranian government, and the rise of the Taliban. If we can promote a moderate, more balance approach to policies and politics, what wonderful changes we could create in the world...