Palin, Voldemort 2012

Joy almost unconfined when I read then news this morning. Hope at last! Big rally in Washington held by Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert – the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear. For once a halt to all those endless reports about mad hatters at tea parties, with Sarah Palin as a malevolent Alice, and Fox TV talking up the ‘patriots’, giving their events and issues attention they’d never normally have achieved. Maybe it’s not accidental that it’s been hard to pick up on sane America in the UK because we have to put up with the Murdoch Times, Murdoch Sunday Times, Murdoch Sun…with other natural tea party supporters in the Mail and Telegraph.

This suddenly is the America we remember from the Obama campaign and inauguration, that doesn’t get reported – and been there all the time. They’re disappointed, yes , that more hasn’t happened, critical of banks, health reforms (too much or too little), Afghan policy and much more, but aware that the American way shouldn’t involve all that confrontation and nastiness, opposition to any compromise or middle ground, the hatred of opponents… The Tea Party is a legit movement, but it’s got out of control.

‘Palin, Voldemort 2012’ was the slogan of the rally. A few more (courtesy of the BBC):

I’m a little annoyed but I’ll get over it

Somewhat irritated about extreme outrage

I’m pretty content actually

We have nothing to fear but fear itself and spiders

A few more:

Hyperbole is the antichrist

Obama – re-open NY subway toilets now

One nation under Aqua Buddha

Fox keeps fear alive. (Shades of Roald Dahl’s Fantastic Mr Fox and all those chickens.)

Aqua Buddha…. being interested in Buddhism I thought I’d check this out. Tea Party senate candidate Rand Paul, son of Ron, apparently ‘kidnapped’ a girl back in his college days and took her off to be inducted into the Aqua Buddha sect…all very unChristian, and Paul has had a lot of flak for it. Now we all want to know more about Aqua Buddha.

Stewart at the end of the rally:

We live in hard times not end times….. If we amplify everything, we hear nothing…. We hear every damned day about how fragile our community is – on the brink of catastrophe. We work together to get things done every damn day.

The last comment prompted the loudest cheer of the day, reports the Beeb.  And it is the best. The simplest of messages but with all the screaming going on around you the easiest to forget. They scream, you scream, we all scream. Ted Kennedy and John Macain had a better way when in the Senate of not long ago they worked together if the occasion demanded.