Palin Goes Too Far

Gov. Sarah Palin. I've tried to stay away from that topic because I've doubted, and seen my own continuous failure, to (as Greg Boyd would say) ascribe unsurpassable worth to her even as I am critical of the things she says. So I've tried to just shut up.

But tonight I read an article about how she is now going after Obama's ties to an 'ex-PLO spokesman'. For a moment I was startled. But I almost fell off my chair when I saw who, in fact, she was referring to. Professor Rashid Khalidi is the Chair of Middle Eastern Studies at Columbia University (undoubtedly known to Gov. Palin as that wacky liberal Ivy league that has no ROTC program and allowed Ahmadinejad on campus for a forum). Whatever one might think of Columbia's political leanings, it is an Ivy league school with a stellar reputation, not least through their School of International and Political Affairs. But fine. Whatever. He could still be a radical. So why am I up in arms about this?

Whatever his political leanings have been, and I truly don't know what they have been or are, Prof. Khalidi (whose book Resurrecting Empire I mentioned some time back) is one of the most informed, succinct and impassioned historians I have ever read. Read his book, Resurrecting Empire. Take yourself out of a purely American mindset and allow his book to show you what our actions abroad have looked like to millions of others. What our complicity has allowed to blossom in the form of poverty and oppression, death and dismay. Allow thousands of years of rich Middle Eastern history to enter into your mind and spirit...that land of Mesopotamia and Babylon...the very lands that Sarah Palin, and others of us, read about in the Old Testament of the Bible. And then allow him to at least make the point of how our country's actions, with a fairly myopic historical perspective, have been viewed. It's hard not to be struck by how naive, at best, some of our policies have been and how arrogantly belligerent at worst. And this is not just from Khalidi's viewpoint, but countless others who share a keen interest in both the wellbeing of the United States, and the human rights of all individuals throughout the world.

I'm not saying that reading Khalidi will cause you to give up your views, for or against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as they may be, but just listen to the informed viewpoint of someone who has brought a great deal of thought, caring and expertise to this discussion.

And then ask yourself if you think Sarah Palin should even go near him in her squawking about Obama's ties to alleged radicals. It seems to me that to critique the thoughts and actions of another, one ought to have at least a modicum of understanding about the issue involved. She has shown, repeatedly, that she has none. (She might have actually done better on her foreign policy interviews if someone had allowed her to read Khalidi's book. At the very least she would have understood what the Bush doctrine was!) It breaks my heart that she is even allowed to drag his name through the mud in such a shallow, superficial, righteous way. Perhaps it's not a kind or charitable thing to say, but I think she shouldn't be allowed to speak to this issue at all without being fully exposed to the horrors of which she knows nothing. The issue she is stepping on is highly complex and has caused untold suffering for thousands--Jews and Palestinians both. And she knows, and seems to care, nothing about it. Nothing other than a last ditch attempt to take Obama (and now Khalidi) down into the mud with her. The McCain camp must be getting very, very desperate.