Wednesday, January 12, 2011

Sarah Palin and the rhetoric of Evil

"a single evil man"

This follows a key statement: she agreed with the "sentiment" expressed at the "beautiful Catholic Mass".  Her evangelical followers hear the message about the "innocent" just as they hear "sentiment" and "beautiful" in relation to a Catholic mass.

It is not that she contrives to speak in code: she has spoken to the public in these terms for so long that it is likely now her natural bent.

But take a moment to remember that other shattered life: a young man in the grip of delusions, having fallen prey to a mental illness.  He was not yet a man in any of the fullest sense of that term, as his family well knew.

Let me give you evil men: those who conspire with others to commit murder for private gain and to maintain personal power.  Step-fathers who rape and then murder their step-daughters yet show no sign of psychosis themselves.  Ex-husbands who plot the kidnapping and murder of their former wives.

The assassin was not a single evil man: he was a member of a community with inadequate mental health services and extremely lax gun laws.

America is not exceptional in its political life: it stands with England, Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Switzerland, Iceland ...

Some truly evil demagogues have also had speech writers who knew how to turn a phrase.

If you are not acquainted with the doctrine of evil of her chosen evangelical church with its brand of biblical literalism, now would not be a bad time to learn who this particular demagogue is.  Become acquainted with their views on Catholics, Jews and mental illness.  Then listen to a great Polish-American Rabbi from Milwaukee who is also a renowned psychiatrist.  It is a way to gauge the distance between a leader and a demagogue, an imperfect mind and a defective mind.

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