TAM,The Annoyed Man wrote:http://www.salon.com/2012/10/10/camille ... ng_images/
WEDNESDAY, OCT 10, 2012 06:45 AM CDT
In “Glittering” return, Paglia lets loose
The provocative Salon vet talks about her dazzling new book, "Real Housewives," and who's getting her vote
BY KERRY LAUERMANPaglia goes on to offer the following reasons why she cannot support Obama:Next: I know you’ve got thoughts on the election.
You’re getting an exclusive, because I haven’t said a word about this publicly. Journalists have tried to get me to comment, and I’ve refused, because I’ve been saving it for Salon!
OK: Who are you going to vote for?
I am voting for the Green Party.
Oh, you are? I don’t even know who the Green candidate is. Who is it?
Jill Stein — a doctor from Massachusetts. Now, I wouldn’t be voting Green if Roseanne Barr had won the nomination, but Stein is a solid and sensible candidate. I don’t agree with everything the Green Party says, but I’m in tune with many of its basic positions. I’m remaining a registered Democrat because I still hope for the reform of my party. If the Republican candidate were Rick Santorum or Newt Gingrich, I would certainly not be voting Green; I would be voting for and contributing to Obama again, as I did in 2008. There are three people on the political landscape whom I absolutely loathe — Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum and Dick Cheney — that delusional and mendacious war-monger. But I think that Mitt Romney is a moderate — like Nelson Rockefeller, who as governor of New York poured money into the state university system that educated me. Romney is an affable, successful businessman whose skills seem well-suited to this particular moment of economic crisis. Hence I want to use my vote to make a statement about my unhappiness with the Democratic Party and the direction it has taken.
Camille Paglia is an enormously influential thinker/writer on the far left. I don't agree with her politics or a lot of other things about the way she lives her life, but I do credit her with being very bright, and rigorously honest and consistent about her outlook on things. When someone like her calls Mitt Romney an "affable moderate," it may be painting him in a bad light for some conservatives, but for a person like me, it means that she doesn't worry about the future of the nation in his hands, while she thinks of her own party's candidate as essentially an incompetent fascist. A lot of very liberal democrats with either vote Green party at her suggestion, and a lot of more centrist democrats are going to vote for the "affably moderate" Romney.
- "[T]he state of endless war," which is now Obama's responsibility
- "[T]he appalling rise in the military and domestic use of drones."
- "...third reason for going Green is the creeping totalitarianism of Obamacare...."
Obama's goose may well be truly cooked, but lot can happen in the next 4 weeks—particularly if Paglia is right about Obama's fascist tendencies, so we can't really take all of this for granted—even so this is encouraging news.
I normally agree with your statements but am a little confused as to where Paglia made any statements indicating that she thought Obama had Fascist tendencies.