{"id":63,"date":"2009-09-25T04:27:00","date_gmt":"2009-09-25T12:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=63"},"modified":"2009-09-25T04:27:00","modified_gmt":"2009-09-25T12:27:00","slug":"editorial-should-palin-be-dixiechicked","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2009\/09\/25\/editorial-should-palin-be-dixiechicked\/","title":{"rendered":"Editorial: Should Palin Be Dixiechicked?"},"content":{"rendered":"

I trust you all remember the Dixie Chicks.  In 2003, while performing in London, according to Common Dreams<\/a>, lead singer Natalie Maines sais that the group was \u201cashamed that the President of the United States was from Texas\u201d.  The reaction from the rabid right was extreme, as described in the same article:<\/p>\n

\n

\"dixie-chicks\"<\/a> That comment ripped through the country music world, prompting outraged fans to hold CD burnings, some even taking their kids out to the parking lot to publicly stomp on the group’s product and likeness — creating eerie images of exuberant violence-as-family-outing, that should be a shameful reminiscence for the South. Led by right wing press and political figures, otherwise peaceable Americans heaped scorn, verbal abuse and, ultimately, vandalism and even death threats on the three young women, who have topped the charts as the top selling girl group in music history. Country radio stations and even whole networks — including, not surprisingly, the rabidly right wing Clear Channel conglomerate — yanked the group’s songs from playlists. Backlash songs promoting the war in the most muscular terms hit the airwaves, and the man who originally recorded the group’s hit "traveling soldier" re-released the song to capitalize on the Dixie Chicks ban-wagon. <\/font><\/p>\n

And if the images of people burning and breaking perfectly good CDs that they already paid for (thus — and work with me here, country fans — the Chicks already profited from,) wasn’t bizarre enough, the world was treated to a bile-spitting display of American intolerance unlike anything those of us who didn’t live through the McCarthy era have ever seen. The Chicks joined Hollywood celebrities like Sean Penn and Susan Sarandon as objects of hatred and ridicule by Americans who accused them of selling out the troops — willfully ignoring the ad nauseum statements of support for the fighting men and women of the U.S. armed forces that were issued by the antiwar celebrities. But the snide ridicule directed at the Hollywood set (who had the odd event canceled or who became the butt of endless late-night TV jokes,) was nothing compared to bitter, violent reaction to the Chicks. <\/font><\/p>\n

And then there was the hour-long, televised rebuke of the women Thursday night, in which ABC News correspondent Diane Sawyer repeatedly pressed, in tisking, school-marm fashion, for just one more apology to Bush. Maines heroically resisted the attempts to reduce her to a wicked child, who surely must realize that it isn’t nice to criticize her betters, but the interview ought to go down in history with the House Committee on Un-American Affairs hearings for its daring presumption of guilt. What many of the rest of us still don’t get, is just what Maines is guilty of: Feeling ashamed? Being from Texas? Or speaking her mind?…<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Do you remember those days?  The Dixie Chicks had criticized the President abroad, during a time of war, an act tantamount to treason, said the right.<\/p>\n

Glen Beck was busy organizing grass roots<\/em><\/strong> pro-war rallies that included vilification of the Dixie Chicks<\/a>.  The more things change, the more they stay the same.  Even three years later, Bill O\u2019Lielly of Faux Noise<\/em> said that the Chicks have not recovered to this day<\/a>.  The Chick did have a few supporters.   Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) likened Dixie Chick boycotters to Nazi book burners and "communist dictators" who "strip out all the works of art that they don’t agree with."<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I wish I could have found more direct quotes from that period, but I remember that all the GOP talking heads were putting down the Dixie Chicks and calling them traitors.  It was so extreme that, to this day, the vilification of a public figure is called being Dixie Chicked.<\/p>\n

Shifting to the present, a group of Hong Kong businessmen exercised poor financial judgment in hiring Snake Oil Sarah Palin to speak to them.  Guess what?<\/p>\n

\n

\"Palin<\/a> Sarah Palin took her closely watched political act overseas for the first time since resigning as governor of Alaska, telling a Hong Kong audience that President Barack Obama had weakened American influence in Asia<\/strong>.<\/font><\/p>\n

With speculation raging over whether the former Republican vice presidential candidate is planning to challenge Mr. Obama in the 2012 presidential race or simply trying to convert her fame and popularity into income, Ms. Palin gave a 90-minute speech Wednesday that touched in part on foreign-policy issues, which were seen as her weak spot in the 2008 campaign.<\/font><\/p>\n

Ms. Palin’s address at a conference sponsored by investment firm CLSA Asia Pacific Markets was officially closed to the media. The Wall Street Journal reviewed an audio recording of the speech. CLSA officials declined to say how much Ms. Palin was paid for the appearance.<\/font><\/p>\n

Speaking on China policy, the former governor criticized the Obama administration for cutting back on some defense spending<\/strong>, suggesting that it sends a worrisome signal to allies depending on U.S. strength to counterbalance China’s growing influence\u2026 [emphasis added<\/em>]<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Inserted from <WSJ<\/a>><\/p>\n

How about that!  Sarah Palin criticized the President abroad, during a time of war, just like the Dixie Chicks.  And this charge comes not from some leftist blog.  It\u2019s from Rupert Murdoch\u2019s own Wall Street Journal, a most conservative source.  Where is the Republican outrage?  Where are the accusations of treason?  Where are te screaming crowds publically burning moose heads in protest?  Why has Alaska not disowned her?  Why isn\u2019t Glen Beck rabidly organizing protests against her?<\/p>\n

I guess that from the GOP perspective, it\u2019s only treason when someone criticizes one of their own, not when someone criticizes a Democrat.  What hypocrites they are!<\/p>\n

So, I ask you, how should we on the left respond to this?  Should we Dixie Chick Sarah Palin and accuse her of treason?  I say we should not.  To criticize the President abroad is not treason.  Every American has the right to speak his or her mind, including Sarah Palin.  What the right did to the Dixie Chicks was evil, and the most evil thing we on the left can do about this is to copy their foul tactics.  But I will take this opportunity to post a small tribute to the Dixie Chicks for their courage in speaking out when most Americans were cowering in fear.<\/p>\n

 <\/param><\/param><\/param><\/embed><\/object><\/p>\n

I\u2019m not ready to make nice either.  I\u2019m mad as hell too.  But as much as  I abhor the GOP tactics of hate, fear and intolerance, I refuse to take part in them.  How about you?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I trust you all remember the Dixie Chicks.  In 2003, while performing in London, according to Common Dreams, lead singer Natalie Maines sais that the group was \u201cashamed that the President of the United States was from Texas\u201d.  The reaction from the rabid right was extreme, as described in the same article: That comment ripped […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-63","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-editorial","category-politics","category-19-id","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}