NewPhin
11-05-2008, 08:37 AM
http://open.salon.com/content.php?cid=38890
Hey Peggy Noonan: Savor
Rate: 17 Flag
On November 4, 2004, Republican speechwriter Peggy Noonan wrote a column for the Wall Street Journal that was a picture of graceless victory:
Hello, friends. Let us savor.
Let us get our heads around the size and scope of what happened Tuesday. George W. Bush, 43rd president of the United States, became the first incumbent president to increase his majority in both the Senate and the House and to increase his own vote (by over 3.5 million) since Franklin D. Roosevelt, political genius of the 20th century, in 1936. This is huge.
It will be hard for the mainstream media to continue, in the face of these facts, the mantra that we are a deeply and completely divided country. But they'll try!
The Democrats have lost their leader in the Senate, Tom Daschle. I do not know what the Democratic Party spent, in toto, on the 2004 election, but what they seem to have gotten for it is Barack Obama. Let us savor.
Hey. Peggy.
Let us get our heads around the size and scope of what happened Tuesday. Barack Obama, soon to be the 44th president of the United States, the first president born outside the continental United States, has won a landslide victory. He has done so with a message of hope and aspiration. Resoundingly he has done so.
The Democrats have defeated not only John McCain, but Elizabeth Dole in North Carolina, as well as Republican Senators in (as of this writing) New Mexico, Virginia, and New Hampshire. There is not a single Republican left in all of New England. This is huge.
Savor.
The elites of the far right are depressed. Savor. Tom Delay appears on television, red-faced and puffy and irrelevant. Savor.
The Supreme Court will see probably two, perhaps more nominees and will firmly root the Court for generations to come-- with Justices who protect liberties like habeas corpus and freedom from illegal search.
Oh, yes. Let's savor that too.
Republicans cannot frighten people into voting against their own interests. Savor. Race-baiting has been defeated, probably forever, because it turns out the American people are smarter than that now, and know they can see past their own differences-- even their own discomfort with difference-- and choose the more noble path. Savor.
Karl Rove's tactics are dead, and even Rove predicted it. Savor.
It will be hard for the right media to continue, in the face of these facts, the mantra that we are a deeply conservative country. But they'll try!
They'll forget that our better angels never called us to hatred, never beckoned us to warrantless wiretapping, never sought the blithe destruction of rights settled as long ago as the magna carta. They'll forget that pride in country need not mean hatred and smallness, but rather the embrace of liberties that are as fragile as they are precious. Our love of liberty has given us strength to defeat your fears. The country has agreed. We want to listen to our better angels after eight years turning away. Savor.
Welcome to the wilderness, Republicans. Savor.
Hey Peggy Noonan: Savor
Rate: 17 Flag
On November 4, 2004, Republican speechwriter Peggy Noonan wrote a column for the Wall Street Journal that was a picture of graceless victory:
Hello, friends. Let us savor.
Let us get our heads around the size and scope of what happened Tuesday. George W. Bush, 43rd president of the United States, became the first incumbent president to increase his majority in both the Senate and the House and to increase his own vote (by over 3.5 million) since Franklin D. Roosevelt, political genius of the 20th century, in 1936. This is huge.
It will be hard for the mainstream media to continue, in the face of these facts, the mantra that we are a deeply and completely divided country. But they'll try!
The Democrats have lost their leader in the Senate, Tom Daschle. I do not know what the Democratic Party spent, in toto, on the 2004 election, but what they seem to have gotten for it is Barack Obama. Let us savor.
Hey. Peggy.
Let us get our heads around the size and scope of what happened Tuesday. Barack Obama, soon to be the 44th president of the United States, the first president born outside the continental United States, has won a landslide victory. He has done so with a message of hope and aspiration. Resoundingly he has done so.
The Democrats have defeated not only John McCain, but Elizabeth Dole in North Carolina, as well as Republican Senators in (as of this writing) New Mexico, Virginia, and New Hampshire. There is not a single Republican left in all of New England. This is huge.
Savor.
The elites of the far right are depressed. Savor. Tom Delay appears on television, red-faced and puffy and irrelevant. Savor.
The Supreme Court will see probably two, perhaps more nominees and will firmly root the Court for generations to come-- with Justices who protect liberties like habeas corpus and freedom from illegal search.
Oh, yes. Let's savor that too.
Republicans cannot frighten people into voting against their own interests. Savor. Race-baiting has been defeated, probably forever, because it turns out the American people are smarter than that now, and know they can see past their own differences-- even their own discomfort with difference-- and choose the more noble path. Savor.
Karl Rove's tactics are dead, and even Rove predicted it. Savor.
It will be hard for the right media to continue, in the face of these facts, the mantra that we are a deeply conservative country. But they'll try!
They'll forget that our better angels never called us to hatred, never beckoned us to warrantless wiretapping, never sought the blithe destruction of rights settled as long ago as the magna carta. They'll forget that pride in country need not mean hatred and smallness, but rather the embrace of liberties that are as fragile as they are precious. Our love of liberty has given us strength to defeat your fears. The country has agreed. We want to listen to our better angels after eight years turning away. Savor.
Welcome to the wilderness, Republicans. Savor.