Friday, April 18, 2008

Oh, Well, That's OK, then! Wait, What?

So yesterday, I was listening to Daniel Shore's commentary (I think) on NPR on the way home from work. He was very disappointed in the Democratic debate in Pennsylvania, but not for the reasons you and I might be disappointed. He didn't even mention the part I thought was the weirdest--who thought it would be a good idea if the top guy in the Clinton White House got to moderate the debate between Hillary Clinton and any other candidate? When the general election gets started, I hope McCain gets to send his flunkies in to moderate his debates with Obama, too, but I won't get my hopes up.

But that's not what made me shout at my car radio. Mr. Shore was really upset at some of the questions asked of Obama, and the one that drove him the craziest was the question about Obama's friendship with an unrepentant terrorist named Ayers, a member of The Weathermen underground who admits he planted bombs in the Pentagon and police stations and said in an interview published on September 11, 2001 that he's not sorry . . . he only regrets that he didn't set more bombs.

Mr. Shore was exasperated because the moderators didn't mention the very important fact that although Ayers' interview was published on September 11, he'd actually made the statement a few days before. You see, they'd characterized his comments as "insensitive."

Oh, well, OK then. On September 11 it would have been outrageous, but on September 8, 2001, how could have had known that it would someday be considered insensitive to declare that he was glad he'd tried to murder Americans with bombs?
I guess 9/11 really did change everything, huh, Daniel?

If Barack asks you for advice on how not to sound like an arrogant elitist prick, refer him to somebody who gets it.